Second Chances

Okay so remember how I accidentally drowned my rosemary? Well apparently, even the most inept agronomists deserve a second chance.

“I gotcha’ some more rosemary,” hubby announced, yesterday.

“You’re kidding.” I couldn’t imagine that my husband was that supportive. True—he had shown a bit of interest in “Project Kitchen Garden” (mostly in the form of amused sarcasm.) But would he have actually picked up more rosemary seeds at the store? Doubtful.

“Look,” he said, proudly drawing me over to the kitchen counter where some tiny sprouts floated in a bottlecap, filled with water.

“How do you know they’re rosemary?”

Cue heavy eye-rolling here on the part of dear spouse. “There’s a ton of it out in the cactus bed.”

“Show me.”

I followed him out to the cactus bed—you know—the one he’d insisted on planting after he pulled out the unruly rosemary shrubs. Amid the river stones, newborn sprigs poked their baby leaves.

“How do you know it’s rosemary?”Heavy eye-rolling accompanied by deep sighs here. “Smell it!” he ordered.

Yep, Sure enough, my nose detected that sweet floral fragrance. Remember my theory that by pulling out the old rosemary bushes we had created bad herb karma? (See my previous entry on The Reluctant Rosemary.) The joke was on me. I had been trying to sprout rosemary from seed packets, with no success. Mother Nature germinated these wayward seeds without so much as a starter pellet or a terrarium cover. Our record rains of recent days worked their magic and the tiny rosemary sprouts were thriving in the sand.

Consider the lilies of the field…

“How much of it do you want?” asked hubby. “You’d better pull it now—as soon as it get’s a little warmer, it’s gonna die.”

So I gathered enough rosemary sprouts to fill three egg carton starter pots. The Universe has sent me a second chance—now let’s just hope I don’t screw it up.