you’re not very good at this

I stoop over trays of purple kisses, Dianthus, Aster. I dig the tulip bulbs out from the garden bed, excavating them from perlite and caked peat. The bulbs are deeper than I expected, clustered and slimy. I toss them in the wheelbarrow and weed as I go. The mugwort roots are like hydra.

Moving the bulbs seems onerous. I build a rough bed where the peony plants have been marooned and neglected, using old greenhouse baseboards with the carriage bolts still in them, screwed together at the ends, hope for the best.

Oliver and I walk the farm in search of a pickaxe. Who lawned this? he asks about the strip I'd cut the day before. We look in the old tin tool shed. We look in the rotten wooden shed next to the bulk body and wash tubs. We search the workshop, then the potato barn. He tags along behind me with his litany of questions about each space we enter and I push to move on because I am trying to get something done.

Oliver wonders about the birds swooping and chirping above him in the rafters. We pause to watch the barn swallows carve the air into smooth parabolas, fiercely fluttering between us and their mud nests. Impossible to track at such speeds, they blur.

His eyes are green and wide and in love with the world speaking riddles.

This is Jaja's forklift. This is Jaja's busted forklift. Jaja has a lot of machines, dada.

Indeed.

I press on to the wood shop and land on using the power auger to bore holes for three peonies to be transplanted and a bed for the tulip bulbs we're moving.

What's that for?

For making holes.

I pump the ball, choke on, pull pull, sputter, pull pull, ignition. Oliver talks to me the whole time as though I can magically hear through two-stroke noise. The silver chip bag he's munching from catches the sun every now and again and flashes me so bright I'm sure it's visible from aircraft.

The auger bounces and shakes, binds and wracks my wrists. A hunk of asphalt holds me up for several minutes. I have a photo of my grandfather standing here in a greenhouse frame. I like to imagine him proud, photographed in the middle of something being built. He sure as hell never said no to free. When a road was being repaved: I'll take it, asphalt, concrete, road sweepings.

I cut the motor. Yes, love, what is it you want to say?

Um um um um. You're not very good at this.

So matter of fact, so unburdened by the knowledge of all I am up against. Is sarcasm genetic? It stings.

I hold the auger at an angle to bust up several yards of compacted soil. We wheel over the bulbs — shiny white with brown husks, some small as wild onions. Three bags of decent soil from the Agway, thirty dollars. We spread it in the trench, throw the bulbs in by the handful, press them in. Cover with the third bag and water them in.

Oliver waters the bed on Jet, cutting the soil and scattering bulbs. We set them back in place and click over to shower.

My father rolls up in his pickup and shells me with woes: the company deteriorating faster than he has ever seen, a doctor's appointment tomorrow he calls the death diagnosis, the fuel truck declining to come out for such a small amount after all these years. Where did it all go wrong? My great grandma rolls up and cruises shakily from the car to the fence wearing canvas Keds and complaining of sore toes. She gives Oliver a bag of mini Oreos. I want him to remember me, she says several times. I answer her questions. I’m doing well. Me? I'm doing ok. Yes, I am well. No, thank you, but I do not want any ham and deli meat.

Some days there's a knot between getting something done and being present for the people you love. Today it tied me tight.

You're not very good at this, dada.

I know. Would you let me try again tomorrow?