Playing Squash (I)

Squash is a complicated game rich folks play. It is played in a bare room with one glass wall where players knock a rubber ball off the walls scoring points in ways I don’t understand. Clearly, squash was invented by someone doing time for insider trading, and the criminal mind is a dark and mysterious thing. I’ll stick to badminton, which is far simpler and less stressful. It was invented by a British Lord and follows the fine English tradition of sports which do not involve exercise.

However, there is a much more challenging game with much higher stakes that I want to talk about, and it is truly a game of squash. Squash is a vegetable of the cucumber family used exclusively by parents to torment their children. People have been known to starve to death on a desert island in the middle of a squash field, and this is understandable. Squash grows in large quantities in any kind of soil including granite, but its edibility has been compared to old lithium batteries. Unfavorably.

But everyone who has a garden in the back yard grows squash, particularly zucchini. They do so because the whole point of having a garden is that there should be green things growing in it, but most plants require good soil to grow in. The average Maine garden spot is suitable for growing rocks and withered tomatoes, presenting a discouraging faded-brown appearance. Unless you plant zucchini in it, in which case your garden becomes a lush green jungle with tentacle-like vines creeping out into the yard as the zucchini attempts to expand beyond the borders of the garden.