I was renting an apartment that had a backdoor leading to a walkway, chain-link fence and a narrow strip of hardpan between. One day, I decided that it would be fun to plant morning glories there. I planted seeds and tended them, and they started to grow up the fence. I went out just about every day to see how they were doing. I had no idea that the area was full of fleas, which of course I brought back into the apartment. The entire building had to be fumigated!

I finally moved in to my own home. The house was a tiny 1940s box on a fairly large lot. Suddenly I had a huge garden to take care of. I giddily planted trees and bushes; about fifty percent of them survived. I learned the hard way to read up on a plant before buying after I planted four blue eucalyptus, which can grow up to 180 feet high. I was lucky that three died. The trunk of the fourth grew so large that it pushed a fence over!

I had the lawn mowed and trees trimmed, but did everything else. After a while, I was only growing plants that didn't mind waiting a week to be watered. Even so, it took whole weekends of gardening to keep up. After a few years it was gorgeous.