Last February I bought and moved into my very own, very first home. Prior to that I had lived in various apartments, but now I had a home with a yard (a big one at that), and enough room to plant a sprawling vegetable garden in the spring. When I lived in my cramped, tiny apartments, I always dreamed of just going to the garden, instead of the grocery store to make my meals in the summer. On a blazing hot, uncomfortably humid day a fresh, homegrown lettuce salad with tomatoes, cucumbers, cauliflower and broccoli tastes purely divine.

Planting a vegetable garden sounds simple enough, right? Wrong... especially if you don't follow the directions, because you're distracted! By the time spring had finally arrived and it was time for me to plant, I had purchased a variety of seeds, my friend tilled the garden area for me and the sun was shining brightly against the backdrop of a cloudless pale blue sky. At the edge of the garden I pulled on my new floral garden gloves, then knelt down to read the directions on how to plant sunflower seeds. After carefully reading the instructions I made a perfectly straight row with a small hand shovel. I then dropped in the seeds; spaced equal distance apart and gently brushed the displaced soil over the seeds. I followed this same procedure for the cauliflower, broccoli, and lettuce seeds. The garden was going to be wonderful. I could almost taste the sweet, juicy strawberries, the watermelon, the-.

"Aaahhh!" I screamed leaping to my feet and making a mad dash for the nearby picnic table. In the midst of my daydreaming and planting of seedlings a gardener snake had managed to slither its skinny, four-foot long body within inches of my outstretched hand. Just thinking about it gave me the heebie jeebies all over again. A shiver raced down the length of my spine causing me to get goose bumps on a day when the temperature was a sticky 92 degrees.

I rubbed my arms and jumped in place in an attempt to warm myself up. I prayed that none of my new neighbors were watching me. If they were they were probably reaching for their phones to call the nearest psyche ward! I didn't really care. If there is one thing I can't stand more than nosy neighbors, its snakes, and from the few times, I had mowed the yard I was quickly discovering that all of those slithering, nasty creatures seemed to dwell in my backyard. After waiting a good ten minutes I decided to get down from the picnic table. The snake would be long gone by now, right? Just in case he wasn't, or in case he decided to come back, possibly with some friends I quickly made the remaining rows. I hastily tossed in the seeds, covered them with soil, and then ran into the safe confines of the house.

Things began picking up at work, so I had nearly forgotten about the garden until about a month later. I noticed that half of the garden, the half I had taken such care in planting, was thriving. However, the other half looked like a patch work quilt. Tomatoes were intermixed with green peppers. The watermelon vines were creeping over the cabbage and the strawberries hadn't even come up yet. It looked like a tornado had hit that side of the garden, throwing everything together. I didn't think my garden was going to do very well after seeing what I had done, but remarkably it was the best tasting summer I've ever had. All summer I feasted on fresh fajitas and satisfying salads topped with salty sunflower seeds. I had more tomatoes than I knew what to do with, so I ended up giving some to my neighbors, who confessed to being nosy, but we all had a good laugh about what now is referred to as the plant dance incident.

I thought my garden was ruined by the proverbial evil snake, and to some extent it was. It wasn't anything glamorous to look at. It certainly wouldn't have won a garden of the year award in Better Homes and Gardens, but it was "my" garden. And even though it didn't happen like I had thought of in my dreams, it was still wonderful, because not only did I get a summer of delicious dishes, but I also made some new friends, my neighbors, to share them with.