I let it grow!

  "What do you do with it?"  Son queried.  "What do I do with it????  Why!  Why...I let it grow!" was the only logical answer that I could render.  We were in the garden earlier when he posed the question about the purple basil.  The stuff is taking over the place but I refuse to pull the plants and toss them in the compost.  Hmmmph...what do I do with it indeed!   I let it grow and fill in the planter boxes when all the other plants are withering.   This end of the summer garden is nothing more than a few volunteer zinnias, tons of chives and an overgrowth of purple basil but it looks pretty good, if you ask me.

  Purple basil is one those plants that reseeds itself, which is pretty good in my book!  I am all about that easy gardening stuff and if a plant wishes to do its own thing, then I let it.  Years and years ago, Mark's sister gave me a handful of seeds and things just burgeoned from there.  Each spring, the plants come up in thick wads wherever the seeds have dropped the winter before.  As I am preparing the garden for the first planting of the season, thousands of tiny seedlings are turned under the soil but thousands more grow to healthy plants.  I give purple basil to anyone who will take it, the compost receives its share of plants that have any green tinge from cross pollinating with the sweet basil or Thai basil but I still wind up with boxes full of the stuff.  It grows between the tomato plants, mixed in with the marigolds and nearly shuts out the peppers.  It dwarfs the squash, hides the beans and is a prop for the cucumbers.  I let it grow.

  Occasionally, but not often, I will grab a handful to toss in with some dish.  I have a tendency to use the sweet basil far more readily than the purple.  This non-trimming leads to huge plants that are nigh as tall as I am!  The garden has never looked so full as when the purple basil is at its prime!  So, what do I do with it? I let it grow!