true dirt

I’m sore. Physically.
The winter garden is hard work. This week-end I planted two new roses: Charlotte, a David Austen yellow to complement an over-abundant Graham Thomas, and a Buff Beauty to grow over a low wall.
All the books tell me to dig a BIG HOLE for my new rose. In the past I’ve always dug the BIG HOLE and my roses have done pretty well. So I set out to dig two BIG HOLES.
Picture of gardening: Dig two big holes. Jam several massive heavy bags of manure and mulch in the wheel-barrow, and haul them around from the back of the garage (up a hill, I live in San Francisco) to the BIG HOLES. Repeat.
Fill the BIG HOLES part way up with the old sad dirt and the new happy dirt. Plant the roses and fill some more. Yes, I’m, leaving out all the details of the natural fertilizers and other horticultural amendments. They went in the BIG HOLE too.
Part way through the planting of the second rose, it started to rain (San Francisco in winter, yep). So there I am kneeling over this BIG HOLE full of muddy gooey dirt and manure, trying to make a cone for the rose to be planted onto, but the pouring rain keeps collapsing the cone into a pile of muck.
I persisted, and eventually the rose got planted. But — did I mention kneeling over a BIG HOLE of chicken manure in the rain?
Gardening: a gentle breeze, the sweet smell of roses, a vase of cheerful bright dahlias. But all that’s months off.
And in the meantime, my back, legs, arms, even my feet, hurt. How old was Gertrude Jekyll when she hired a staff to do the hard labor while she stood on and directed?