How to Know When It's Time

An online Colorado Facebook gardening page has received the same question for weeks now. When can I put my plants outside? Or variations on the theme of when to plant a garden. Some go by dates (Mother’s Day, last week of May). Others by watching extended weather forecasts.

My recent answer to “when is it safe” was NEVER. The weather in Colorado Springs is fickle. Summer one day, freezing the next. It has snowed in July. Devastating hailstorms can destroy a garden in minutes Any Time During the Growing Season.

If you’re not interested in gardening, and wonder what this has to do with writing fiction, skip to the end. But for me, gardening and writing are intimately connected in my head.

Does the photo of my deck garden look ridiculous? This is the result of bitter experience. Allow me to explain each element.

Grow boxes and other containers: in this region, you get a choice of delightful soil options. Sand, clay, or decomposing granite. I attempted for years amending my existing in-ground beds. I have concluded that container gardening – and buying soil – provides the swiftest, most satisfying results. (I use Growbox from www.aGardenPatch.com topside, and www.cedarcraft.com below deck.) An added benefit is climate control -the smaller space is easier to protect. See the next two points.

Hail cloth: too many times, I have had a lovely garden going, only to lose everything during a hailstorm. With our short growing season, you can’t recover from the loss. The mesh-looking white material covering the frames and cages on the grow boxes deflects or breaks up all but Armageddon-level hail.

Row cover: has three purposes. Keeping tender plants like tomatoes warm on the nights that refuse to remain above 40 degrees F until July. Preventing the blasted white moths from ruining greens like spinach and chard. Shade from our intense high-altitude sun. Obviously flowering vegetables have to be liberated, to allow for pollination, but that’s still a month or more and lots of bad weather away.

Greenhouse hoops: protect plants from wind, cold temperatures, intense sun, and insects.
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This might all sound like the end result will be a $100 tomato. After the initial purchase, the grow boxes and flower pots endure for many years. Even the hail cloth can be reused for several seasons. The greenhouse material was leftover from a project my husband created in the distant past – so it was free to me. The row cover and hail cloth can be purchased inexpensively by the foot at my local garden center (Phelan Gardens www.phelangardens.com ).

What does all this have to do with writing?

Putting your work out in the cold harsh world too early can be a killer. But how do you know when it’s ready to send to agents, publishers, or to release yourself via self-publishing?

Your greenhouse hoop is your own caution, keeping your work private until you’re absolutely certain it can withstand the blustering winds and freezing conditions of reader criticism. Hail cloth can be provided by critique partners who will deflect the harshness of anonymous rejection with their gentler suggestions, preserving your work to continue to grow. The row cover is editorial assistance, either by a paid professional or competent beta reader, to help you work the bugs out of your manuscript.

The thing you have most control over is soil condition. Are you nurturing your writing? Fertilizing it by reading good literature, joining a local writing group like Pikes Peak Writers or a national genre group, learning more about the art and craft of writing using the many resources available online?  

In the past, I have exposed my fiction to the elements before it was at its best and strongest. I’m going to take more care going forward. Protecting, not coddling (see last week’s post), until my work is ready to face whatever the world may throw at it.
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Best wishes for your gardening season, or writing life. Remember, there is no failure, only learning. Even if you lose an entire growing season, or have to abandon a writing project, you can start over. Never stop growing and learning! 

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