Help is on the way! Gardening is an activity that is so good for all of us that gardening as we age should be part of every lifestyle. The easy answer is to hire a Bothy Boy - this is an old English term for a youngster between the age of 13 to 16 that for just one or two visits a year at a low price can do the important job of weeding beds and then spreading a mulch to keep the weeds out. You don't need skilled labor - a young teen with you in attendance can learn a lot. The tip is to only have the teen for a few hours at a time. Other weed blocking tips are to use a sharp hoe like a \"Winged Weeder\" to slice the top off of weeds without bending over, to add a weed blocking groundcover such as Sedum Angelina, and to use a layer of newspaper under a mulch of wood chips or bark dust to keep weeds from coming back so quickly. If your wife has some garden wisdom, passing this on to a teen that can offer a few hours of physical help each month is perhaps the best solution. Encouraging young people to discover the joy of working in the garden is a gift that can only make the world a better place. Keep growing, Marianne Binetti