Sleeping with Lumbago

Grandpa got to work in short order. He strapped on an old-fashioned plow (obtained from where, I’ll never know), donned a straw hat and neck bandana against the summer sun, and plowed the furrows. My father enlisted me to go across the street to the chicken ranch and haul wheelbarrows full of chicken poop for fertilizer. When the garden was ready, Grandpa planted and grew onions, eggplant, fava beans, escarole, and other traditional vegetables. Thanks to his green thumb and my loads of chicken poop, everything grew beautifully in the well-prepared soil. But Grandpa had another crop growing back there. Ever a resourceful man, he soon figured out he could grow garlic bulbs in a small patch of dirt behind an abandoned incinerator in his garden area. Growing it was the easy part; eating it without drawing attention to himself was another matter. The poor old guy didn’t stand a chance. My mother had the nose of a blood hound. She could pick up the scent of soiled clothes, unwashed bodies, and unkempt households from the driveway of a home we were visiting. She could not only tell if you had been smoking or drinking, she could also tell you what brand of cigarette or alcohol was involved. So when she opened my grandfather’s drawer to put away his clothes, she immediately detected the dry cloves hidden beneath his underwear. Never one to let things like this slide, she confronted him with the evidence, and he coughed up the info about his little patch of illicit bulbs behind the incinerator. Grandpa was busted, and there was no use appealing to his son. His son hated the stuff as well and knew better anyway than to take on his wife in a matter like this; he was clever enough to pick his battles carefully. And for as long as my grandfather lived with us, there were plenty to choose from.