Pollinate Like a Doula

Last year was my very first attempt at planting a small herb garden — plus a couple of tomatoes and peppers (bell peppers and jalapeños) because apparently, I thought I was suddenly capable of running a miniature farm. I bought this four‑foot‑long, two‑foot‑wide wooden raised garden bed for the herbs and peppers, feeling very “look at me, I’m a gardener now.” The tomatoes got their own pots because I bought them already established and about a foot tall, and I didn’t want to be responsible for killing something that had clearly worked so hard to get that far without me.

Naturally, I placed the garden bed and pots inside my screened‑in porch on the back deck — because in my mind, the outside world was full of bugs, birds, squirrels, raccoons, and possibly tomato‑loving woodland creatures waiting to snatch my produce like it was a Black Friday sale. The herbs were thriving, and a few weeks later, little flowers started popping up on the tomatoes and peppers. I sat out there kvelling over them, sipping a glass of wine like I was admiring my firstborn children.

As I sat there, basking in my newfound plant‑mom glory, it hit me. OH NO. I put these tomatoes and peppers in the screened‑in porch… and now bees can’t pollinate them. I panicked. I thought, “Great. Now I have to move them outside and risk them being eaten alive by the entire cast of Bambi.”

But then — as I sipped my wine — I got a brainstorm. I ran inside, grabbed a tiny little paintbrush (the kind you’d find in a paint‑by‑numbers kit), and I lightly touched the inside of each flower. I went from one to the next like a busy little bee (pun absolutely intended), pollinating them myself. And honestly? I was proud. I got a lot of cherry tomatoes that year, one regular tomato, one small bell pepper, and one small jalapeño (but I planted those too late). Still, I was thrilled because clearly my idea worked.

Last year was my test garden, because I do not exactly have the greenest thumb. Every time I saw more flowers, I repeated the paintbrush routine. And I was happy to do it — I had results!

While I was talking on the phone to Coco — my book collaborator and blog partner — I mentioned that when I get back from vacation on June 18th, I’ll plant everything the same way and do the paintbrush trick again. Coco paused and said, “Paintbrush trick?”

So I told her the entire story. She laughed so hard I thought she was going to pass out. When she finally calmed down, she said:

“Michele… tomatoes and peppers are self‑pollinating.”

As in… they do it themselves. As in… they don’t need bees. They don’t need butterflies. They don’t need my tiny paintbrush. They don’t even really need me. Except water. They do need water. So there’s that.

I went silent. Who knew? I didn’t. I was so quiet she had to ask if I was still there. I finally said:

“Yeah, I’m here. It’s just that this conversation suddenly turned into one of those moments where you realize you’ve been doing WAY too much for something that apparently never needed my help in the first place, ya know?!”

I mean, there I was all summer, meticulously pollinating my own tomatoes and peppers like a dedicated plant midwife. Gently touching each little flower like I was performing IVF and praying for results.

When I tell you, my dear readers, that I was seriously committed to this paintbrush thing every morning…

With a tiny paintbrush. Carefully. Proudly.

Then Coco says, “Oh stop, you’re not an idiot — it’s not like you grew up in the country farming! You lived in Brooklyn, New York.”

All they needed was a little vibration…

A breeze. A bump. A squirrel with an attitude problem.

But they certainly didn’t need me acting like a porch‑side fertility specialist, swirling my brush around like Bob Ross painting happy little trees. There I was, silently questioning every gardening decision I’ve ever made… which clearly wasn’t many.

So if you need me, I’ll be over here letting my plants handle their own business while I retire from my short‑lived career as a tomato and pepper doula.

 

Planter Rick

I know someone who, whenever they got drunk, did something so absurdly weird yet so unintentionally hilarious that you couldn’t even be mad. I won’t say who, so let’s call this person Rick.

Back when I lived in Brooklyn, a group of us would go out to the bars every weekend. And Rick? Rick was that friend. The one who laughed so hard he folded in half like a busted beach chair. The one who did random nonsense out of nowhere, like his brain had a “Surprise Me” button.

Living in Brooklyn, we walked everywhere unless it was more than half a mile away. So one night, after the bars closed at 4 AM (yes, FOUR — Brooklyn nightlife is built different), Rick decided to do something none of us saw coming.

Picture Bay Ridge: rows of private homes, each with a few steps leading up to a cement porch, and on top of those steps? Cement flowerpots. Heavy. Filled with dirt. Filled with plants. Filled with responsibility.

Rick took one.

Not like “picked it up to admire it.” No.

He stole the entire planter like he was auditioning for Ocean’s Eleven: The Gardening Edition.

The next morning, he woke up to find it sitting on the rug in front of his TV like a decorative hostage. He scratched his head, confused, because he didn’t remember taking it.

We told him:

“Rick… you took it home with you. Laughing the entire way. You were giggling like a cartoon villain.” He didn’t believe us, but he shrugged and said he was keeping it.

And then… It became a hobby.

Over the next few weeks, Rick collected planters like Pokémon. He had at least five. Five cement porch planters sitting in his living room like a botanical crime museum.

He watered them (sometimes), but they weren’t getting enough light on the floor of his apartment, so the plants slowly died like they were in witness protection. 

Then one day, Rick woke up and decided he was going to return them.

At 2 AM. Because of course.

He loaded them into his car like he was transporting illegal produce and drove back to the block he always walked down. One by one, he placed planters on porches that didn’t have any. He didn’t know if they were the right houses. He didn’t know if the planters matched. He didn’t know if he was restoring order or creating horticultural chaos.

He was basically the Reverse Porch Bandit.

When he finished, he started laughing hysterically — the silent, doubled‑over, no‑air-coming-out kind of laugh that makes you think someone needs medical attention.

We asked what was so funny, and he (through his laughter) said:

“Can you imagine waking up every day and your planters keep disappearing… and then one day you walk outside and they’re BACK? Like the universe said; my bad?”

We all lost it. Rick’s laughter was contagious - the kind that made you laugh even if you didn’t know what the joke was. And that was the saga of Planter Rick, the only man I’ve ever known who accidentally ran a one‑man planter redistribution program across Bay Ridge.