Every year, about this time, articles appear explaining how easy it is to grow fresh vegetables all winter long on your windowsill. Every year thousands of gardeners try it. Every year thousands of gardeners fail abysmally.

I’ll tell you up front how to avoid these failures: Don’t try. If you must try, don’t expect much. In gardening, as in politics, this is called lowering expectations. But just because something won’t work doesn’t mean a gardener won’t try it. So let’s try to grow some vegetables.