Greenhouse 3.0

On the Neurodivergent Impulse to Build, Tear Down, and Build Again

I have a friend who is best described as a weird dude. He has a blacker than coal sense of humor and an ADHD brain spinning in fury. He is a mechanical genius, one of those types who can build just about anything or instruct others on how to do it.

He’s led an interesting life, beginning in his family saw mill, where he crafted expensive wood flooring salvaged from old Kentucky tobacco barns (some of which ended up on Oprah’s personal jet), got a degree, and then life got in his way.

Wife, kids, and a slowdown in lumber led him to make a practical life choice. He entered nursing to pay his bills. So did I. We worked together and recognized each other’s weirdness (I write 500-page neurodivergent Westerns, and he built a casket for his front porch).

Anyway, a handful of years ago, he and his sons made a bet: whoever could gain the most TikTok followers in one month would win twenty dollars. His teenage sons played with filters and made dance videos, while my friend created instructional woodworking videos.

At the end of the month, he had thousands of followers. A few years later, he boasts close to a hundred million views, creating a cool “maker” empire that empowers viewers to build and sell practical products.

I like to build. But I don’t like following directions. Call it some nod to artistic integrity or the childhood residue of holding a flashlight while my Dad (a skilled builder in his own right) cursed his every mistake (something I inherited).

Or, as my friend reminds me of my freelance style and general obstinance: “You’re kind of an asshole.”

The results are what you would imagine.

I’ve built some cool stuff including a master bed with underneath storage that I mostly screwed up, and a garage man-cave my daughter calls “the movie lounge”, which is no doubt my crowning achievement. It’s a cool space that reflects my weird interests. It also hasn’t collapsed yet.

Of course, along the way, I texted my genius uber-builder friend about a hundred times, asking a litany of questions that usually begin with “You think this will work?”

His responses are thorough and hilarious. I always picture him taking a deep sigh to steady his brain for the coming lecture. Quite a few of his texts begin with “You are a dumbass”, a sentiment I can’t always dispute.

I’m always surprised he still answers me. Besides his crazy YouTuber schedule (think like 16-hour work days), I often respond to his super-detailed advice with: “Okay. But what if I do this instead?” You know, like I actually know what the fuck I’m doing.

His advice has saved me a bunch of times, but never enough to avoid what I view as my cavalier, “let’s just try this and see what happens” failures.

My wife and I moved to the country four years ago, which has been easily the best decision we've made. Two (now three) neurodivergents living in the calm of the country is our little slice of heaven on earth.

Our place came with a worked-in garden (and ample compost, a vastly underrated homesteading resource) comparable in size to half a football field and the stuff of my gardening dreams.

So, I tilled it up and planted a massive garden. The next year, I made it bigger, but I got busy and lazy, and by mid-June, it had become a thick nightmare of gnarly weeds.

So, in a preview of things to come, I then made the neurodivergent decision to get rid of the garden and build a stupid amount of raised beds.

GREENHOUSE 1.0

That first year was a whirlwind of re-learning (I leaned heavily on my avid gardener parents), but I also wanted to take full advantage of our new blessed land. So, I started some seeds and ordered a “greenhouse” from Amazon.

The results again are predictable.

It took a significant part of two different days to assemble this idiotic structure. Think Mandarin instructions and tiny sticks of bent, pseudo-aluminum. The cover was likely the best part of the jumbled orange mess of hoops.

When I finished, I admired my hard work and immediately thought of the wind that sweeps across our wide-open place. The included yarn and bottle opener tie downs weren’t going to cut it.

So I found some real ground anchors (the kind that root in mud and are designed for skinny fruit trees) and good, thick rope. I made six loops and tied the hoop down, admiring my inventive effort.

It worked. Until it didn’t.

The morning after a big storm, I noticed something missing. I could see an orange speck some five hundred yards away, rolling into my neighbor’s woods.

The greenhouse was gone, but in a cruel, taunting twist, my tie downs and ropes survived.

So, of course, I had to take a picture. I sent it to my builder friend who years later told me: “You know, whenever I’m in a bad mood, I just think about that picture and laugh my ass off.”

As I’ve grown, I tend to look for the silver lining in unfortunate events. Every challenging moment presents an opportunity for personal growth and improvement. The greenhouse was no different.

That fall, I was determined to avenge my defeat.

GREENHOUSE 2.0

I texted with my maker buddy, and he kindly sent me some highly detailed building plans that I stared at for a few minutes before deciding, “But what if I tried this?” (“This” was another in a long lineage of dumb ideas).

So, I did “this” and spent a solid month crafting a 12x14 building that resembled a greenhouse in a way.

It worked. Until it didn’t.

This time, another force of nature, excessive rain, was the culprit. Because I typically gloss over things like measurements, angles, or load-bearing specifics, the peak of the “roof” began to sag under the weight of pooled rain sitting on the plastic-covered wood.

With the trauma of the Amazon greenhouse fresh in my mind, I decided to take action and tear down Greenhouse 2.0 before it could naturally fall on its own and crush more of my idealistic folly.

Which it no doubt would have.

Back to the drawing board.

I involved my brilliant daughter with some of the easier tasks (now I know I should have just let her design and build the entire thing). But her greatest contribution came in the form of running commentary every time we passed by the abomination.

“When are you gonna fix the greenhouse?”

I then decided a justification was in order. The next phase of the greenhouse became a lesson in perseverance designed just for her. But of course, I was completely stuck.

Every morning, I passed by the naked shell. Four decently constructed walls stood in a field like some forgotten, ill-conceived ancient ruin.

At this point, I was close to accepting defeat, adopting a zen-like, lazy “it was never meant to be” mentality. Not trusting myself, I knew I didn’t want to build a second wooden roof, so I looked for alternatives when inspiration struck.

GREENHOUSE 2.5

Actually, a guy from down the road stopped while I was at my mailbox. In that overly friendly and helpful, but sometimes subtly pointed, Kentucky manner, he introduced himself, then commented on my disaster, recommending I “throw up cattle panels” to serve as the roof.

For the uninitiated, you don’t “throw up” cattle panels. They are impossibly heavy and inflexible. Easily the most difficult (and dumbest) task I’ve taken on, I somehow managed to slide, bend, and nail the panels to my existing structure.

It was brutal, hot, and stupid work but in the end, I had created not just a greenhouse, but a truly fucking colossal greenhouse that left me feeling more relief than pride. I stapled in 6-mil plastic sheets (another herculean task, given the rampant wind), and it worked.

Until it didn’t.

Much like an overly tall person tends to have more back trouble, building a giant greenhouse creates more things that require constant maintenance. Because I spent so much time fixing my initially sloppy work, I grew to hate this version.

Once cold weather set in, the colossus made a great place to store all my other mistakes and supplies. As for actually creating a warm environment, that’s another story.

It turns out that if you build a greenhouse with high-pitched sixteen-foot-long cattle panels, the warmth tends to stagnate. It was a great place to store tomato cages and other discarded items, but a lackluster choice for growing plants.

A key component of neurodivergence, especially in someone with a slightly autistic brain, is that you tend to fixate on things. So, again, every morning I looked at my giant greenhouse and hated it just a little more than the previous day.

Then one day, some sheeting flew into the neighbor’s woods, and I made another impulsive decision.

I tore the entire thing down.

With only a pile of used boards and busted concrete to look at, I turned my attention to actual greenhouse designs and common sense. Because I don’t like to be on ladders (or roofs), I decided a simple 8x8 greenhouse with a modest, slanted roof could work.

GREENHOUSE 3.0

By this time, my daughter had named each version. Remember, I was still “teaching” her about perseverance. I took her playful jabs as more motivation, then caught a break when I won my essay-writing football gambling league, giving me some “free” (although my wife thinks otherwise) cash to start all over.

Another fortunate occurrence was my Amish friend milling a 30-foot tree that had fallen on our property, providing me with ample wood for the project. On a related note, the Amish are awesome people.

This time, I built a simple structure that I could climb like monkey bars. I used double the amount of concrete (I still have rope and tie-down flashbacks) to ensure that it, too, wouldn’t end up in my neighbor’s woods.

I added higher shelves (I’m old and my back hurts) with storage space underneath, and I redneck-engineered screened-in windows and a sturdy door (Let’s just say I have problems building working doors).

So far, so good. We experience wicked storms in Kentucky that bring ice, hail, massive rain, and furious wind. So I had to emergency weatherproof a section bullied by nature. Other than that, I’ve barely put any additional work into it.

3.0 works great. It’s small, so it heats well. It gets plenty of sunshine, has a cool look (people think it’s an exotic rabbit hutch), and most importantly, it doesn’t offend my neurodivergent sensibilities daily.

Of course, I have my mind set on further improvements. I built Greenhouse 3.0 with the intention of adding polycarbonate panels (the kind used in professional greenhouses). But of course, I’m not going pro anytime soon, and that material is stupid expensive.

In the meantime, I wait for another season of football gambling, as somehow I’ve justified those potential winnings as an exclusive source of greenhouse funds (aka, “free” money).

I also have my mind set on another project, something so hillbilly that it can only work in the country. I bought a used stock tank to make into a wading pool for our 105-degree Summer weather.

So, naturally, the tiny pool has sat barren for three years. My new plan is to construct a little step-up deck around it, creating a little sitting area. Once again, I have zero clue how to build something like this.

However, I do have ideas.

In a fitting tribute to my past failures, I plan to resurface most of the wood from Greenhouses 2.0 and 2.5 and use it on this project. In doing so, I feel I can exorcise some of my building failure demons and create something cool.

Then, next year, I can tear it down.