The Truck Goes Bap Bop Bap Bop

An entry from General Manager Billy Polansky

This Friday morning started like most “install” mornings with the Opportunity Gardens program. Loading the truck. When I arrived, Trish Woolbright our OG Coordinator already had the truck parked in the driveway of the Urban Farm with dozens of tools leaning against the side. “Sorry I’m late,” I said. “Oh no, you’re good,” Trish tells me, “I always make sure I’m early: tools could be missing and the truck could be out of gas, you’ve gotta be ready.” I ad-lib a country song in my head My truck’s all outta gas and the tool sheds all a maass. Boy we’re runnin late and them JobPoint kids won’t wait. Another humid day, we’ll make it through, Lord I pray… Bad, I know. I should probably just stick to gardening. So I help Trish load: walk the tiller up the ramp, add tools, seeds, broccoli starts and we’re off!

Riding down Wilkes Boulevard, the truck goes bap bop bap bop bap bop as it hits the joints between the concrete slabs. We’re running a little early so Trish decides we should get a bag of ice for the water cooler. “It’s amazing how many more people will drink water when its ice cold.” Coincidentally, at the same time the song Hey Ya by Outkast was on the radio. “What’s cooler than bein cool? Ice cold!”

We stop by the BreakTime at Ash and Providence, an excellent people-watching spot. This gas station is arguably one of the busiest in town. While Trish is inside paying for the ice, the guy parked next to us walks out of the store with a relish-covered hot dog and bottled water in his hands, he juggles his keys and gets inside of his brand new BMW. A hot dog and relish at 8:45 in the morning? To each their own. After the guy with the neck tattoo walks by me for the third time a hurried guy on a bicycle rolls up. “Hey, uh, are you gonna be here for a minute, there’s nowhere to lock this up and I just need to run in and get a Five Hour Energy,” he continues to fumble over his words, unsure if this is a good idea. “You’re good, go ahead, I’ll look out for it,” I tell him as he hustles inside the store. Meanwhile, Trish comes back out and we fill the water cooler with ice. When the bike guy comes back out he says, “I don’t know if there is any way I can thank you!” I replied, “Just do it for someone else.” During my response I noticed his eyes catch the logo on the door of the truck, “Ooooh,” he said, “You’re those guys, very cool. Yea, I live in the cthulhu house over on 8th street, we’re doing a little homestead thing there.” Trish replied, “Awesome, you should come check out our farm sometime.” As he hopped on his bike he ended the conversation with an “I will.” It’s always rewarding to meet new people who support the work that CCUA does.

So we hopped on Providence Road, northbound. That half-mile stretch of Providence Road between Ash and Wilkes has changed quite a bit in the last few years. If you tune your eyes, you can see the new life that CCUA has brought to this part of town. The first two things you see are at NW corner of Park and Providence at the Blind Boone Center. Up close to the building are two raised beds we installed in 2011 for the Moving Ahead afterschool program. Closer to the street is a rain garden that catches runoff from the building. Last fall the Columbia Housing Authority hired CCUA to plant this former mud pit with native plants. These plants attract pollinators and other wildlife, they make way for rainwater to penetrate deep into the soil, and frankly they just look good. A little further up the road, before you get to Rogers/Worley Street you can see three more things. There are a few Opportunity Gardens visible in front of some public housing units, pretty bushes we planted in front of the CHA homes that face Providence Rd, and in the new crosswalk (the one replacing the pedestrian bridge) there are four planters that comprise the jointly-sponsored CCUA/CHA Adopt-A-Spot. Different varieties of native plants were carefully selected to withstand the brutal conditions of the island. A little further up the road is Kilgore’s Medical Pharmacy and the Kilgore’s Community Garden. CCUA has worked with Kilgore’s since 2011 to make this once-empty lot a source of nutritious veggies for the kids at Nora Stewart Early Learning Center. Finally, we turn onto Wilkes again bap bop bap bop, we have arrived to our destination, the offices of Job Point. 

Job Point’s mission is to Promote the abilities of individuals seeking employment and greater participation in community life. Today we are working with the Columbia Builds Youth (CBY) program who primarily builds and renovates homes in Columbia’s First Ward. On the west side of the brick building are two patches of dirt totaling over 800 square feet. This new garden space is tucked in between the building and sidewalk and was most likely originally intended for something exciting and flashy like a boxwood or yew bush. Half of the space had already been planted with bush beans, sweet corn and squash. Today, our goal is to tackle the northern half: till, make beds, seed/plant, and water.

Trish and I walk in the office and ask to see “Ms. Gee”; the man at the desk tells us, “she has been waiting for us.” An awkward four seconds pass, “We’re not late are we?” Trish says. The man replies, “No, she’s just excited.” A middle-aged white woman with a ponytail comes out from behind the locked glass door, “OK, the CBY group is ready, we’re on our way out.” Trish and I make our way over to the truck and ten young adults, in their late teens to early twenties, meet us over there. The group was mostly African-American men, with two women all dressed in their JobPoint shirts, camo pants and boots. We all worked to the hand tools out of the truck so that we could walk the tiller down the ramps and onto the sidewalk. “Do we get to use the blue thing?” one of the guys asked of the tiller. My standard response is, “Weeelllll, the thing is that this tiller is known to take toes off, so you’d better leave it to me.” The half joke/half warning wasn’t received with disbelief or laughter…so I pulled the ripcord and took to tilling while Trish briefed the crew. Mostly the ground was like butter, obviously there was lots of organic material previously added. Every once in awhile though I would hit a rock or some hard clay and that big blue piece of Italian machinery would run and buck. I maintained composure and control though, after all this was my first impression with this group - I didn’t want to embarrass myself.

After this quick, buttery till it was time to dig out the walkways and mound up the garden beds. While I was tearing up the ground, Trish marked out where the walkways and beds would go. Shovels-in-hand the CBY’ers started digging. “Uhhhhh, what’s that?” one of them called out. ::Sigh:: The joys of urban gardening…. Among the things we dug up that day were: chunks of concrete, a clothes hanger, gloves, and some carpet. “Y’all remember that movie Space Jam?!” someone yells out. “Yea, and them little alien-things who were actually big monsters. And the big fat guy who was always smoking a cigar….yea...that was a good movie.” Everyone from the group is looking his way, but no one is saying anything…”Well, I didn’t really know where I was going with that.” You can’t blame the guy for trying, I think we all find ourselves at a dead end sometimes. The six 4’x11’ beds got mounded up fast and we were quickly ready for planting.

Trish brought out the packets of seed and started with the group “OK, each of these vegetables has a different planting depth and spacing in between plants.” Reading the pack of seeds in his hand someone looks up and asks “Don’t we just follow the instructions?” Taken aback a little, Trish responds, “Yes...yes you should just follow the instructions on the seed pack.” We split up into groups of two and tackled the fluffy rows we had just mounded. I worked with two guys to plant carrots. We started by scratching a ¼” deep row for the seeds to go into. Then we determined that the 3” spacing for the plants was best measured by the size of our thumbs. I kept scratching in the shallow seed trenches while the guys sprinkled seeds in between thumb-sized gaps. After the entire bed was seeded with Red Core Chantenay carrots, we covered the seeds, gave them all a nice pat and started looking for the hose.  “Lettuce live in peace!!” the Space Jam enthusiast called out. That time he got some feedback, most were laughing, Trish yelled out, “Lettuce live in PEAS!” Gotta love garden puns. Ms. Gee has something in her hand and says, “Look everyone a grub! These can eat plant roots and they feed moles; if there’s too many of them it can be a problem. We don’t know if that’s the case though, for now we’ll wait and see.”

Towards the end of the planting you could tell the crew was getting restless, talking how the Chinese restaurant downtown, next to Carhart is the best one in town (I tend to agree) and THAT is where they were going for lunch. Then like frogs calling out to a mate across the pond, you started hearing, “Brreeaaaaaakk… Breeak… break… BREAK… buuuuhhhh- rraaaaaaaaayyyy- kkkkkuuuhh”. I had no idea what was going on, but clearly this was not a new joke, everyone loved it. Then, over the loudspeaker, was a long belltone, “Break!!!!!” Since we were mostly done, and the group was due for their 10-minute break, everyone went inside. Phew! Trish and I looked at each other, “That was easy,” I said. Lettuce, spinach, carrots, beets, peas, cilantro and broccoli all found their way into the garden with relative ease that morning.

After break, plants got watered, the tiller and tools made their way into the back of the truck and we were off. “Make sure you water it real good every day and we’ll see you in two weeks,” Trish said as we drove off. After we unloaded the truck at the farm, the clock in the truck told us it was 10:30! How did that happen? Garden installations NEVER happen that quickly. There wasn’t a single hiccup. Of course, this is just the beginning...if you think about it, planting a garden is the easiest part. The key to a successful garden is having the patience and frame of mind to follow through with regular watering, thinning, weeding, trellising, pest control, harvesting and the rest.

If these men and women in the CBY program can learn to build houses AND build gardens think of the possibilities! Will they include garden space in future houses they work on? Will they build gardens at their homes? This garden project fits right into Job Points mission. Gardens get people outside, talking to their neighbors (participation in community life) and the patience and forethought necessary to grow food for an entire season makes for a good employee (job skills). When they complete the program, these CBY’ers will have construction and gardening skills. Those skills contribute to the three essentials of life: shelter, food and clean water.  Well, for now, two outta three ain’t bad.

**Postscript**

Like CCUA, Job Point is a Funded Agency with the Heart of Missouri United Way. I firmly believe that Community Impact can only be achieved when ideas and resources are shared between agencies. It tickles me pink to know that we can work with other social service agencies and use gardening as a tool where peas and carrots are produced, but aren’t the end product. I didn’t use names of the CBY’s participants out of respect for their privacy. If you’d like to learn more about Job Point and the programs they offer, you can visit their website: http://www.jobpointmo.com/

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