In the spring a young man’s thoughts turn toward love, they say. Thinking about spring my old man thoughts turn to seed catalogs. I enjoy paging through and looking for exotic variations on familiar veggies and flowers. In my mind I can lay out a complete back yard homestead. I speculate about where I would place the fruit trees, what crops I would raise, and where I would put the duck pond. My reality is actually very different. In our condo situation I will be limited to container gardening and a few foundation plantings. We do have ducks and Canadian geese that visit our mini lake, but all they do is foul the sidewalks. If we could cook them for supper, they would be useful! So almost all my garden planning is fantasy. In my grandiose vision it is easy to forget just how much work farming is. Still it is fun to imagine. In the garden of my dreams I can walk with peace and tranquility, and leave behind the stresses of everyday life. Sometimes I wonder if that is a sort of longing for the Garden of Eden, or the abundant messianic abundance. Better yet it may be the pleasure of well- tended fields, open meadows and unspoiled wilderness. All this pleasure and pondering from a free seed catalog, who would have thought?