Faded garden memories

Most of the kids I grew up with preferred playgrounds as their main place of fun, but I and a few of my friends spent most of our summer evenings with my mother and their moms in garden, which was just near to the river. It wasn't just our garden; the entire area was for the gardening of every household in the village, so everyone had their own plot right next to one other. Every evening, we rode our bikes there, carrying only the most necessary tools, as turning right after crossing the bridge meant the end of the scorching air that raised from the hot asphalt. As soon as possible, I would take off my shoes and keep walking the path barefoot.

My favorite toy was the water pump, which was placed at the front of the garden; I would hang all of my weight on the handle while it slowly slid down and pumped out water. And in the moments when mom was busy watering the plants, I made sure to give myself one fair splash of water all over my feet and thirsty warm sand. That part was otherwise forbidden due to the cold water and my mother's fear that I would catch a cold, but there was nothing that would stop me. Then, at some point, every kid "from the garden" would meet and get down to the river, some with pockets full of stones and others with twig as fishing rods. I'm not sure how I managed to avoid mosquito bites back then, when there were swarms of them, wouldn't dare nowadays.
When we were hungry, everyone would go back to their garden and pick ripe fruits, usually tomatoes and cucumbers, which we would wash briefly in water and eat like apples.
I would crawl between the rows of potatoes, semi-muddy and pleased, watching how the sand sticks to my feet, covering them as if I were wearing shoes; my mother's constant warnings to "put on some shoes" did not yield; I just refused to put on any shoes. Until the very last moment of leaving, which means only one more splash of water from the pump. Collecting adult potato beetles was given to me as a chore; at the time, we were not using pesticides on the fields, and I still felt horrible about killing a "beautiful" bug, so I buried some live ones on a couple of times - not sure how that helped.

The fireflies would come out from their hiding places before sunset, turning the gardens into a magical world, flying over the plants and us, inviting us to chase them, which we did! The air would smell deafeningly of the dust of freshly harvested wheat fields. The first black layer of the night meant packing up and leaving home, which was also the saddest part, since as we rode away from the garden on our bikes, firebugs alternately glowed in the fields behind us. The worst thing is that when we moved the garden to the house thanks to increased thievery, it was still pleasant to wander around barefoot in the moist dirt and puddles, pick and eat veggies, but the river was no longer there, the firebugs were no longer present, and the roar of playful children no longer filled the silence of the village.

The pump was the thing I missed the most, honestly. Yes, I've got other toys like watering hose, but that wasn't fun at all.

Collecting potato bugs stayed my responsibility, regardless of where the garden was located; their yellow marks on the skin were still obvious every early summer; I just didn't bury them alive any more. There are still plots along the river, although only few people still grow gardens there...

Huh, who knew that this part of my childhood gardening memories would ever find it's place to tell about it?
This was a nice throwback to my very first garden ever, in case you wanna share some, check out @gardenhive and find out new monthly not so ordinary and creative gardening challenge!