What’s this?

Easter is very late this year, which has the gardeners down south all bollixed up. Every southerner knows Good Friday is the vegetable gardeners’ Opening Day, and Good Friday is almost three weeks away. (Today, April 4, was Easter last year.) In their logical mind, people know perfectly well it isn’t too early to plant in the sunny south, but everyone also is haunted by the ghost of their old granny, rustling seed packets and moaning, “Don’t ever plant before Good Friday whatever you do.” It goes beyond science into the realm of the spritural, the barely subliminal message being God himself might reach down and smite the squash that was planted too early. It’s serious business. Some people have decided not to plant a garden at all this year.