Sometimes it is good to work not where you feel the most comfortable or the most ready.
Jerome Robbins

Luckily no one was there to issue commentary on the day three years ago when I planted purple asparagus in my back yard. I had no idea what I was doing. The event was a long time coming, first inspired by a gift from family friend Rufus Ross to my startled mother. Wide-eyed she later said, “He has his own asparagus bed.”

I was nonplussed - nothing had ever sounded so divine. In these parts during the sixties, at first bite, fresh asparagus could claim divinity. We all were unnaturally convinced that asparagus from a can had to suffice as the impostor that it was. Such a travesty.

Seeking more information, I utilized my untested driver's license for a jaunt to view the asparagus bed. As Mr. Ross showcased the plants; he delivered a caveat - “Three years from planting until harvest.”

I perked up. I knew better than to doubt his authority having once, in his presence, made a flirtatious dash away from his son Bob while shouting - “Get your son in control, Mr. Ross.” He shot back - “It looks as if you are doing that.”

I felt the silly girl inside me...simmer down.

Asparagus beds were not a dime a dozen. I surmised that getting one would require some feistiness and at the least, a background in delayed gratification. As a beginner in both categories, I chose to indulge my love of asparagus each spring by selecting an occasional bundle in the grocery, though I winced at its origin.

And so passed my twenties, thirties, forties until my fifties, at which time I received a second fresh asparagus prompt. It issued from my car radio in the voice of an elder master gardener. Before her soliloquy faded to music, she paid tribute to the fact that she had finally planted a crop of asparagus crowns.

“Don't put off planting as I have - I'm 76 and by now, I could have been eating from my own asparagus bed for many years but...better late than never,” she said.

That did it. I made a purchase of purple passion crowns on March 27, 2010. I know this by virtue of a garden journal that I started that same day which states that I also picked up a few rhubarb plants. All to say that though rhubarb is now a sad and distant memory, the purple passion rules. And just as Mr. Ross forecasted, three years later, the tiny edible spears are beginning to break soil.

Never think for a moment that my project was the low maintenance sort. I had to select a pleasing site and use a shovel. Then too, there was those one way morning coffee chats where I provided encouragement to each crown, investigating their latest incarnation from flowering ferns in late summer to straw colored bushes in the winter.

The commitment was hefty - but the reward, mighty.

Some say I'll be eating fresh asparagus every April and May for the next 20 years and during that time, I plan on startling some mothers with deliveries from my very own asparagus bed. I was taught that's the way to get the party started.