I guess, like many people, we had thoughts of homesteading.
Like many dreams, lack of money and time always seemed to rob of us of those hopes and aspirations.
We had enough time and money, however to put a few raised plots in our postage stamp-sized yard, and we reaped the reward of our efforts with a bounty of fruits and vegetables.
Eventually we found, and moved to, a bigger piece of land, which enabled us to triple the size of our modest garden.
The abundant supply of wildlife forced us to erect barriers in the form of chicken wire and hardware cloth when we tired of feeding the squirrels. We even had to put a chicken wire roof on our enclosure.
My wife and I were both now in our early sixties, but we both enjoyed starting seeds, planting, growing, harvesting and yes, even weeding. I find it a very peaceful and meditative to sit and pull unwelcome plants.
One day we were out working in the garden- she was tying up tomato plants and I was pulling weeds.
I looked up at the road to see a pickup truck slowing to a crawl, and I could see the driver looking in our direction.
I wondered what he was doing. You never can tell these days, but I always keep a gun handy just in case.
The driver drove on, and I went back to the task at hand.
About forty-five minutes later, I heard the truck coming back down the road, apparently finished visiting someone.
This time he came to a complete stop, and I could see him checking his watch, looking down the road, then looking up the hill where we were, then repeated that process a couple times. Apparently at some point he decided he had enough time, and I heard the truck shifting gears as he put it in "park".
He was about 75 yards away so I couldn't make out what he looked like just yet, but from a distance he looked like a farmer.
He was wearing a wide-brimmed straw hat, long-sleeve button-up shirt, blue jeans and the typical light-colored leather work boots.
"Hey, there!" he called out. "Mind if I come up?" he asked from the bottom of our hill. "I'd like to see your garden", he added.
I looked to my wife, Mary.
"I don't want any visitors, I'm a mess..."
"I'm not going to be rude, and besides, he looks like he's been working himself." I replied to her, and then turning to face our visitor, "Come on up!" I called down to him. Mary let out an exasperated sigh.
"Thanks", he answered. "Do you know Jim down the road? I was just helping him with some landscaping."
"Yeah, we know Jim. What's he got going on there?"
"Just helping him with a small raised flower bed."
He was now a few feet from me. I saw he was mostly an outdoor type that looked like he spent most of his time working with his hands. He was shorter than me- I am six foot two, and my wife is five foot two; I would place him halfway in the middle. He was ruggedly handsome with a fuller-than-mine beard and moustache, blue-green eyes, a perfect smile, and I could see through his unbuttoned shirt that he was pleasantly hairy. I was a little jealous of that because I am mostly not hairy.
Reaching the top of the steps, he stuck out his hand, "Hi, I'm Jake!"
We shook hands; he had a pleasantly good grip-not trying to crush my hand, but not wimpy either.
"I'm John, this is my wife, Mary."
"Nice to meet you John, hello Mary!"
"Hello," Mary said.
"So I saw your garden set-up here, and I was hoping to get a tour."
Mary laughed.
So did I.
We both looked at him like he just turned purple in front of us, like Violet in Willie Wonka.
"No, I'm serious," he said. "I am always fascinated by how different people come up with different solutions to different problems, and your garden enclosure interests me. May I have a look?"
"Of course," I said. "Right this way..."
I led him to the entrance, which was a screen door- the kind that goes "slap, slap" when you let it go.
"I like your door," he said. I especially like the sticks and jute and bangles artwork on it..."
"It's nothing special, just something I whipped up," Mary said.
"Well I like it."
So we led him on a tour of our enclosed garden.
Mary would point out the things she had planted, he would nod and inspect, give a mm-hmm, nod and inspect some more.
When Mary had shown him all there was to see, she said, "Well, that's pretty much it, not much but we get enough to do some canning."
"No, no- don't apologize," he said. "I like what you've done here. In every garden there's room for improvement."
With one arm folded across his chest, and the other hand stroking his beard, he appeared to be thinking about something.
"I want to help." he said.
"What?!" Mary and I incredulously exclaimed at the same time, causing him to laugh.
"No, I'm serious. Normally I charge to help people improve their gardens."
Oh boy, here comes the sales pitch. Should have known.
"But what I would like to do is help you become more successful, and in return you allow me to photograph our progress. I have several different blogs and other online presences and I think, with your unique enclosure, I could get a lot of material for those. You have a cost-effective solution to a specific problem, and I earn money through my online activities."
Mary asked, "So, you help us with this, and in turn you take pictures of our progress for you websites?"
"Yes. You have to be ok with being in the pictures and videos, too. People are more engaged when they see 'average' people accomplishing something.
"I don't know if I'm comfortable with being so...public," Mary said.
"Well, I do want to be able to share your likenesses, but we can change your names to protect the innocent! How about Fred and Esmeralda?"
We all laughed at the silly names.
I looked over at Mary with a 'whadaya think' look, she gave a' yeah, I guess so look'.
"So, how would this work?" I asked.
"I would bring a release for you to sign, allowing me to use your likenesses for my online activities, and then I'd work with you all to find a time that works best for me to come by. So, what are your work schedules like?"
"I work seven days a week. she's home seven days a week." I said.
"Well, I'd like to come by, like, three times a week, depending on weather, my schedule, your plans, etcetera. If I can come by after you get home from work, John, we can take some initial shots after you guys sign the release."
So we made plans to meet again on Sunday after I got off from my weekend job, and then he left.
"Well," Mary said, "It'll be nice to have a professional get us going in the right direction!"
"Yeah, but..."
"But what?"
"Well, we don't really know him, and he's going to be coming here when I'm not here. Aren't you even a little worried?"
"No, not really. I mean, he seems nice enough. And he isn't going to make any money of us if he causes problems...and Im too old for him to be making moves on me!"
Sunday came and Jake came back with the release forms.
We signed the forms, exchanged phone numbers, and went outside to take pictures and videos of us, and the 'before' pictures of the garden.
He left not too long after that, saying he would text us regarding the first actual working day.
Tuesday he sent a group text asking if he could get started that day.
Mary replied with yes, they set a ten o'clock start time in the morning. I replied with a thumbs up.
When I got home from work, Mary was working on dinner.
I said hello, gave her a kiss, then went to look at the garden.
It was nice to see progress.
Over the next few weeks, the garden started to take shape, the improvements were noticeable.
And that wasn't the only improvement - Mary seemed happier with progress actually taking place. She was bubbly and talkative, always sharing what was happening, and talking about how her and Jake had plans for this or that.
In fact, I started to notice that she talked about Jake a lot, and I was getting a little concerned that she was getting a little infatuated with him.
I had decided to talk to her about it one day when I got home from work.
I walked in the door, and I went to give her a kiss. She started breathing heavy and well, before you know it, we were on the bed having passionate sex.
We kissed, our tongues entertwining as I undressed her, then myself.
I kissed down her neck, then worked my way down to first one nipple, then the other, taking them into my mouth as I squeezed her 44D breasts into tall mounds.
Meanwhile my hand was between her legs, rubbing her sensitive clit. I then switched, bringing my hands to her tits, and my mouth to her moistened slit.
It didn't take long before she was moaning through an orgasm. Ever since she went through menopause, she has become multi-orgasmic, so I continued licking, and we were both rewarded with two more orgasms before she said, "No more!"
That was my cue to move into place. Thirty seconds later I was cumming inside her.
We lay there catching our breath for several minutes before I said, "Does this mean dinner's gonna be late?"
We both laughed before getting cleaned up.
Now, we haven't been having sex very often lately. Once every couple of months is the new normal. But when we do it sometimes is spontaneous like this, so I didn't think anything of it.
The thing I found curious is she started being spontaneous a lot more than before.
If I didn't know better, I think that Jake got her motor running, and I was the beneficiary of the attraction.
I wasn't complaining!
Heck, we were having sex twice a week! Sometimes three times.
I have a feeling that she became aware, as I was, that our suddenly frequent sex timed perfectly with the days Jake came by, and I think it made her self-conscious.
Because as quick as it started, it stopped.
Her exuberance and excitedness every day that Jake came by turned to quietness.
That was almost as equally disturbing as was the excitedness.
What had happened?
I already missed the sex!
Friday came, as did Jake.
That night we settled in to watch Titanic.
I've never been a fan, and as the show progressed, I began to draw parallels between the characters on the screen and our lives.
Yes, Mary was Rose.
But I wasn't Jack. Jake was Jack (if you haven't seen the movie, Rose was engaged to marry some rich guy, but fell for the scoundrel Jack).
I nursed my drink as the movie continued, but Mary was getting drunk.
As a rule, the drunker she got, the hornier she got, and tonight was no exception.
She moved closer to me and I could tell by her breathing that she was heating up.
I started caressing her neck, then pulled her in for a kiss, our tongues dancing to the music in the movie.
I had her shirt off in no time and, pulling her bra straps down, began caressing her milky-white breasts.
I decided to continue this where we were, on the couch.
I lowered the lights and paused the movie.
I got undressed in front of her, then removed the rest of her clothes.
She was sitting up with her butt at the edge of the couch, her eyes closed.
I pushed her legs apart and moved inside as she finished her glass of wine and set it on the side table.
Each hand held a tit, and I pushed them together, licking and sucking her nipples as I teased her by pressing my groin against hers.
