I might have wanted to infringe on the OBUGS garden space in West Oakland, but no matter, I still think they’re awesome. And therefore I must encourage those of you who are local to, through November 22, take your reusable shopping bags to Whole Payc…I mean, Foods, do a little shopping, put some things in a reusable bag, and donate the bag discount to OBUGS. ‘Cause they’re doing great work and deserve everything we can kick their way.

None Found

So far, I’ve heard nothing.

It’s only been about three weeks, of course, since I sent the email, and things move slowly in Oakland government, but it’s now going on six months since I put myself in line for a community garden plot and, well, it’s tomato season, so it’s on my mind often.

But I’m about to get all manner of ridiculous about this. I’m heading out to Burning Man later this week, but when I get back? I’m going to start putting that office windowsill to work.

• A tomato invasion, in song
• The nerd approach to garden location
• A little fear of change
• The investigation has opened
• They call me number 19

The garden is the sole territory of Oakland Based Urban Gardens, a stellar program that gets kids excited about gardening, no matter how citified their environment.

Instead, the coordinator offered me a spot on the list at another garden, one up toward Temescal, that doesn’t appear on Oakland’s website, nor, therefore, on my map of the city’s community gardens.

And yet? Even though this garden is, apparently, so secret as to not officially rate publicity, I am number 19 on the waiting list.

The coordinator assured me this is not an accurate representation of the real situation, and, well, I couldn’t help but think, Really? ‘Cause your website, also, seems not to be an accurate representation of the real situation. But I bit my tongue, and am just grateful to be nominated.

Or whatever.

Anyway, apparently when the coordinator calls people on the list, often they don’t want a plot anymore. Possibly because they have had to wait so long for said plot that their children have just gone ahead and put them in a nursing home.

(He didn’t say that last part.)

The good news in all this (besides the false 19) is that apparently they will fill plots on a rolling basis. So, even though March is the deadline for re-upping one’s annual commitment, if someone kicks the gardening habit in, say, June, I could slide right in and get going during the prime growing season.

That’s, of course, assuming Waiting List Members one through 18 turn down their chance at a piece of Oakland dirt.

• The waiting & hoping game
• The nerd approach to garden location
• Where things (don’t) stand with the community garden
• The investigation has opened
• The discovery of Oakland Roots

But an email came across my transom that indicated that might not be true. A group called Oakland Roots has apparently taken over a plot of land between 9th and 10th Streets on Martin Luther King Boulevard, which is even closer to where I live than the other plot I identified. They describe themselves as a “school of urban sustainability,” which sounds grand and impressive and official.

Their website is, indeed, mysterious and fairly underpopulated. There’s a small map, an aerial photo of volunteers prepping the dirt for the garden, and information about a mushroom cultivation workshop—the reason behind the email that went out to an Old Oakland listserv—that will be happening this weekend. I’m not going to be around, but otherwise, would definitely go check it out, if only to do some recon.

After all, what is gardening without a good spy storyline?

I’ve joined their mailing list, and I’m curious to see what comes of it. Regardless, this could turn into another outlet for my sheer lack of gardening skills.

• They call me number 19
• The nerd approach to garden location
• The waiting & hoping game
• Where things (don’t) stand with the community garden
• Volunteers…or scavengers

Regardless, all existing gardeners have until early March to get their money in for the next year, so I won’t hear anything until after that. They won’t know how many spots are open until they know who’s returning and who’s abandoned their plot.

What I don’t know for sure is whether I’ll be offered a plot at an alternate garden if there isn’t space at the one I chose. There’s no information about that on the community gardening website, and in emails with the coordinator, I haven’t been able to to glean an answer on that particular question.

So it’s a waiting game for now…and a hoping game, too.

• They call me number 19
• Mantis mail, arrived
• Curiosity killed the cactus
• The investigation has opened
• Are we there yet?

“Then you can go out and weed for 10 minutes and come back in and do other stuff,” he said.

“Exactly,” I said. “But with a community garden plot, I’m going to have schlep over and back, and what if I don’t feel like going all the time?”

I realize this is extremely premature whining. I have no idea if I’m going to get a spot in my garden of choice. I have no idea whether I’ll end up just driving for convenience’s sake or if I can figure out a quick-and-easy public transit route there and back.

There will be benefits to the group plot: Meeting some neighbors. Getting ideas about what will and will not grow in this utterly different climate. Learning a different part of Oakland than I usually hang out in.

But it will not provide me some of the gardening benefits that I loved most in Iowa: Walking out before breakfast to cut herbs for an omelette scheduled to be served 10 minutes later. Spending five minutes pulling off tomato plant suckers before running off to work or a social event. Going out in the morning to see how the zucchini is growing, and going back out at night to cut one off because it already grew so much during the day it needs to be eaten.

I’m sure community gardening will provide its own rhythms, and I’m a good scheduler: I’m quite capable of booking in an hour every other day or two to go check on the plants and do all the work at one time. But every now and then, I worry about how much it won’t be the same, and honestly? I wonder if I’ll like it as much.

• Where things (don’t) stand with the community garden
• The investigation has opened
• Situation: untenable
• Where it’s at: June 10
• A different kind of weeding

There are eight community gardens in the Oakland system: three up toward Temescal and Emeryville, three smack dab in the heart of it all (right around downtown), and two down toward San Leandro.

I know I said making a Google map of the garden locations was the most nerdy thing I could possibly do, but I have to say, it clarified some things for me. I probably never would have clicked through to the description of the Marston Campbell garden if I hadn’t seen it is basically the closest to my apartment building. And I certainly wouldn’t, then, have known that this particular garden is also where the Oakland Based Urban Gardens kids do their work.

I’m ready to put my name on the list. Here goes nothin’.

• They call me number 19
• The investigation has opened
• The nerd approach to garden location
• Five local gardens to visit
• Magnolia: Oakland style

As it turns out, I am a misguided human being.

My return email from the coordinator:

I have wait lists for almost all of the gardens. Please let me know which garden you are interested in joining. I will warn you that the Lakeside garden has a list of over 45 people and is by far the longest and slowest list.

Of course it is. That’s the showcase garden, the one where they actually train people up on issues like composting. It’s also the closest to my apartment.

But, like I said, I had little hope I’d get in there, so it is what it is. My next step? I’m going to have to get a little nerdy on this project. While the Oakland City Government page offers good photos and descriptions of each plot, I have yet to really be able to look at a list of Oakland addresses and be able to locate them in my head on a mental map.

It’s time to make the first-ever Inadvertent Gardener Google Map. I mean, what is gardening if not a technological activity? Once I have the lay of the land plotted out, I’ll be able to decide which waiting list I want to join.

• Where things (don’t) stand with the community garden
• The discovery of Oakland Roots
• The investigation has opened
• They call me number 19
• Gardens: mapped

I did a search on community garden plots in the area, and my eyes popped out of my head a bit when I read that San Francisco’s very active community garden program has an up-to-five-year waiting list for plots in the city. And that’s in a city where the fog situation makes tomato-growing a near impossibility in some spots.

But no matter, I thought. I was moving to Oakland. Oakland, where people were more likely to have land, because fewer people want to live there, and where there was no way I’d have any trouble getting a spot in a community garden. Right? (Cut me a break, people of California…while I was thinking all these misguided thoughts, I was still living in Iowa.)

In fact, once I signed the lease on my apartment, I felt certain I could just slide right into an open plot. No problem whatsoever. The good people of Oakland’s community gardens? They’d be thrilled to have me.

Then I discovered…The Rules.

Plants in by a certain date (I’d missed it already). Garden plot cleaned up or replanted with groundcover or winter crops by no later than November 1. Disobey and lose your plot.

Also? Oakland? Reported to have a waiting list in the community plot closest to my apartment.

I stopped investigating the options at that point and gave up the idea of gardening over the summer, figuring that I would just put it aside until the seasons turned. And now they have, and now?

The investigation into Inadvertent Gardening 2009 has officially opened.

• They call me number 19
• The nerd approach to garden location
• Where things (don’t) stand with the community garden
• The waiting & hoping game
• What to grow in shade