When I’m working in the garden I use the same equipment over and over again.

Some things I inherited, like my spade and my rakes (garden and leaf) and a menacing-looking yet elegantly effective pitchfork–the way it pierces a pile of composting leaves is poetic.

Other items are new friends, things I don’t know what I did without them.

Yes, actually, I do know what I did.  I didn’t enjoy gardening as much. And, sometimes, I thought unkind thoughts.

In particular, I love my nice garden hose.  Its predecessor was the most regular target of my ire.  The kinking.  Aaargh, the kinking.

I would suddenly lose water pressure.  I’d slap it against the ground.  Twist it and pull it.  Slap some more, grimace and gripe.

I hope the neighbors weren’t looking, with me like some demented lion tamer whipping that flaccid thing around.

It was so weak-walled it had multiple mends which would periodically blow, sending it hissing and skittering through the garden and me running for the faucet to turn it off, wet and bothered.

Finally, standing there in the garden center looking at the good, better, and best grades of hose, a light bulb went on.

I could buy my eighteenth cheepo hose and continue this self-abusive dance.  Or, I could cough up a little more money and put an end to the torture.

I got the best hose and I could just kiss it.

My second best friend also has to do with watering.  After all, watering is one of the most important aspects of successful gardening.  I used to dread it but now I love it, thanks to my lovely new hose and the eighth wonder of the world: The Watering Wand.

If it sounds like magic, it is.

My old upgrade from The Thumb was a nozzle, like you use to wash your car.  It had a “gentle” setting, but compared to the watering wand, well, ptooey!

The beauty of the wand is not only in the soft, “rain” setting, but in the wand part.  It puts the water right where you need it, right at ground level, without bending.  No splashing, no carving ruts around your tender seedlings.

It makes watering fun again.  Luckily for the entertainment of my neighbors, robbed of my performance with the old hose, they now can watch me wrestling my kids for the use of the watering wand.

“Let me water!”

“No! I’m watering!”

“Give me that!”

“Let me do it for a while!”

“Mama!”

image finegardening.com