Weeds to greens
The once immaculate infield of the Trotwood baseball diamond has been growing only weeds the past few years.
Granted they were waist-high weeds.
Waist-high now are tomato plants. Cucumbers crawl where base-runners once slid. Corn in proper ranks cover the area where outfielders once roamed.
The old ball yard no longer produces hits or runs, rather produce.
Transformed into a community garden, it is continuing the sense of community, a gathering place just like the old ball yard.
On a recent morning, the plot-holders chatted in soft voices as they weeded, watered and admired each others’ plants.
Squash and peppers vie with tomatoes and corn for attention. Flowers draw the eye, while greens and cabbage flourish under the radar.
Mr. Groundhog, whose burrow on the banks of Wolf Creek adjoins the gardens, has seen the most benefit from the new lushness of the old ball yard. Evidence of his snacking abounds. Most gardeners, however, seem willing to share their bounty — at least for now.
The gardens work at so many levels.
Getting your hands dirty is one of the basic joys of childhood. In adulthood — in moderation — why should it be different?
Taste a grocery store tomato. Now pick one off the vine and eat it. Need I say more?
The eyesore that was once the old ball yard is now a profusion of greens. There is every shade from lime to forest green. The chaos of abandonment is tamed into ordered rows.
It looks as if someone again cares.
Those many someones form their own community. It’s a community that grows and chats and laughs and takes care of things.
Just as the community of spectators of old hollered and cheered and applauded and cared for the youngsters that called the ball yard their summer home.
Olde Town Trotwood has a new heart. The old one never truly broke; it was just forgotten for a space.
Now it is renewed.
It will never have the economic impact of a new Salem Mall. It will not add to the tax base in the same manner as a subdivision of $300,000 homes.
It doesn’t create jobs in the manner of soon-to-open parts warehouse for General Motors.
But each 25-foot by 25-foot garden plot is a strand of life woven together into a neighborhood, a community.
I’m one of those people who believes a house without a front porch and a front sidewalk can never be a home.
Now I’m thinking a neighborhood without a garden is one in name only.
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