Chapter 20

We were all having breakfast the next morning at 9:30 in Pat's kitchen when our Sisters showed up to talk to our girlfriends about their gardens. We had gotten to sleep very late last night after a lot of loving and sex. Our Sisters noticed the rings on our girlfriends' fingers, as soon as they were close enough.

"You have engagement rings!!" they said excitedly. Our women held up their hands for them to examine the rings. They quickly lost their excitement.

"You couldn't get rings with larger diamonds?" my Sister, Laura, demanded with a frown.

"Those are... !" I started, but Shannon quickly interrupted me.

"It's not the size of the stone that's important to us," she told Laura and the others. "It's the width and thickness of the band and how it's decorated that are important."

"But here it's the size of the diamond that's important," Pat's Sister, Gail, insisted.

"We are not worried about that. We are not showoffs. It is as Shannon has stated. These are the rings that WE picked out," Cathleen told her.

"I guess you' all look at things differently than we do," Pat's Sister, Margie, said after hearing that.

"We do have our own values," Sheena acknowledged. "Where we grew up there were no diamonds and few other stones like those we saw at that store. We had never seen so many rings and other types of jewelry, but we are not interested in those things," Sheena told them, as she leaned against Pat.

"We didn't come here to talk about that anyway," my Sister, Katie, told them, dismissing the subject entirely. "We want to see what size garden you want, and what you want to plant in it."

"We can have a garden of our own here!?" Clare asked excitedly.

"Yes, we all have gardens. One of the first things that our Mothers taught us as children was how to garden," Laura told her.

"Let's go outside, and see how big a garden we can put in," Shannon suggested. Our women all quickly rose and headed out the backdoor of Pat's house followed by our Sisters.

"I guess that means that we get to do the dishes," I said to Pat, as the backdoor slammed shut.

"Yes," was all that he said as he began collecting the dishes.

We were busy with our school work later when our girlfriends and Sisters returned. Our girlfriends were all excited especially Clare and Cathleen. Our Sisters looked stunned.

"Have they talked to you about the size of garden that they want?" Pat's Sister, Margie, asked us.

"No. Why?" Pat asked.

"Because it stretches all the way across the back of both houses and runs most of the way to the back of the empty houses behind you, that's why!" she told him.

"Okay," Pat said. "And?"

"We were going to send Brian and Conner over to loosen up the ground with the tiller, but they would be forever with that size garden," my Sister, Katie, told us.

"Don't worry. We'll borrow the small tractor and plow it for them. Then we'll use the rototiller on it," Pat told her, unconcerned.

"We will need seeds and fertilizer plus shovels and rakes," Sheena told us.

"We can give you some seeds for flowers and herbs from our supply," Laura told them. "But you are going to need to get more seeds and plants from town if you are going to fill up the space that you have marked out."

"When can we go to town to look for them?" Cathleen asked, still excited.

"How about tomorrow? Pat and I will work on plowing the area this afternoon. You can decide what you want to plant and where to plant it while we plow," I told them.

"We can do that," Laura agreed, and all eight girls left to see what seeds there were an excess of in our families' supplies. Pat and I finished out lessons for the day and then went to check on the small tractor to see what maintenance it needed and to check on the attachments. It appeared to be in fine shape, but we changed the oil, and checked everything before driving it over to our house. Our women were back when we arrived, but the noise of the small tractor startled them, and they came out to see what it was.

"What is that?" Shannon asked when I had turned off the motor.

"It's a tractor. A small one that we use for the smaller fields and the larger gardens. We use much bigger ones in the regular fields," I told her.

"What does it do?" Clare asked looking closely at the machine. "Besides make noise and smell bad, that is?"

"It's for plowing up the ground for planting," I told them.

"Plow... !!?" all four girls asked, startled.

"Yes. Show me where you want to start the garden, and I'll demonstrate it for you," I told them.

"We marked the area with sticks," Shannon told me. "We left enough room for clothes lines and an area for washing clothes at each house, but want the rest of the area for our garden."

"Clothes lines? Washing area?" Pat asked in shock.

"Yes, our clothes will get dirty and need washing, often," Sheena told him testily.

"Wait!" I said holding up my hands. All four women turned to look at me.

"Come inside with us!" Pat requested, and turned toward the house. He led the women through the house to the area where the washer / dryer was located.

"This machine washes and then dries the clothes," he told them pointing at the washer / dryer.

"A ... a machine that washes and dries clothes??" Shannon and Sheena asked in shock.

"Really?" Clare and Cathleen added.

"Yes. We'll show you how to use it later. Let's eat lunch now, and then we'll start plowing," Pat told them.

"Yes! We want to see how this machine plows. We used a donkey or a horse with a small plow in Ireland," Sheena told us, obviously doubting that a machine could do the work as well.

After a quick lunch, Pat and I went out and readied the tractor while the women watched. They were very interested in how it worked. I drove it down to where their first marker was, got lined up, dropped the plow attachment into the ground, and gave the tractor the gas to start forward.

I drove a good three hundred feet before reaching the other marker. I raised the plow, turned the tractor around, lined up with the marker to plow the second set of rows, and dropped the plow again. I returned to the first marker before stopping. All four women were inspecting the rows that I had plowed.

"So even!" Shannon said as they walked toward me.

"So quick!" Sheena said in surprise.

"So noisy!" Clare said.

"And smelly!" Cathleen added.

"Why don't you ladies finish planning what you are going to plant, and we'll finish plowing," Pat told them, as I turned the tractor again. The women went to do their planning, and Pat and I took turns plowing, and then went to get the disk harrow to finish up. The soil in the O'Connell Realm is a very rich loam and doesn't have a lot of clay in it.

That evening, we helped the women gather all of the dirty clothes. We then returned to the washer / dryer in Pat's house where we explained about the differences in washing colors and whites, plus about detergent, bleach, and fabric softener before we showed them how the washer worked and allowed them to actually do any laundry.

They sat and watched the washer operate the whole time like it was a television. We hadn't had an opportunity to watch TV yet and were sure that it would also surprise the women. After the wash cycle was finished the dryer completely amazed them.

Friday, we took the women to town to buy seeds, plants and fertilizer, and the other items that they would need for their garden. Since it was such a large garden, we went first to a store that sold large quantities of seeds and fertilizer to farmers. You could buy seed by the pound or by the sack there. Our women were amazed at all of the choices, and amended their list of what to buy.

From there we took them to one of the big box hardware stores for smaller quantities of seeds, live plants and garden tools. Again they were amazed by the huge selection of things there, and had to tour the entire store before making any purchases. It was late afternoon before we returned home with a load of supplies.

Saturday morning, our women were up early and after a quick breakfast started on their garden. We had gotten wooden stakes and tape for them, and they quickly divided the area into plots for the various items they would be planting. Next they put in the various young plants that they had gotten. Clare and Cathleen had passed on the health of each plant or group of plants they had gotten.

Later that afternoon, Clare and Cathleen began inspecting the different types of seeds that they now had. To Pat's and my surprise, they could identify individual nonproductive or bad seeds using their Magic. Some they discarded, but others they put aside to be worked on later.

"How can you do that?" Pat asked incredulously after watching them for a while.

"Our Magic allows us to feel those that are viable. If there is no feeling we know that they are bad. Some just feel weak and need a little help to grow. We put them aside to be worked on later," Cathleen told him with a smile. Shannon and Sheena had already started planting the good seeds. The women worked on the garden for the next week, while Pat and I worked on the fields with the other men in our family.

After their garden was planted, Clare and Cathleen joined us in the fields. Not only could they rid the fields of weeds, as the rest of our family could, they would use their Magic to encourage plants that weren't doing well, and that we would have just pulled out of the ground, to grow better. They could also identify the parts of fields that required more fertilizer or other nutrients. They were the original Green Gardeners.

April brought different things. Shannon and Sheena received their power rings, and we took them to the quarry in the mountains to practice with them. Clare and Cathleen, due to their different Magic, couldn't use the power rings, and stayed behind to happily work on the gardens and fields. This turned out to be a mistake on our part, but we didn't realize it until later.

May and June brought our women's birthdays. In May, Shannon and Sheena celebrated their sixteenth birthday. We had a small party, just the six of us. Shannon and Sheena had been very passionate in our beds that night.

In June the berries were ripe, and it was time for making jelly and preserves. For several weeks Clare and Cathleen had been spending time in the berry patches using their Magic to gently encourage the plants toward better production. They had also spent time in the gardens of our relatives, and those who worked for our businesses to encourage their plants to better growth. They were very popular with everyone by now.

As a result of their care, berry production was exceptionally good this year. In kitchens all over our Realm, men and women sweated over hot stoves making a surprisingly large number of different jellies and preserves. There would be more than enough to last until this time next year.

Later in June, it was Clare and Cathleen who celebrated their fifteenth birthday. All of this time our girlfriends had been very chummy with our Grandmothers. Clare and Cathleen had been drawn to Mother Margie, while Shannon and Sheena had spent their time with Mother Katie. Besides their interest in gardening and cooking, our Grandmothers had helped them with their singing, and had instructed them on the Irish Harp.