Yep. You nailed it. That's actually the secret to vegetable gardening that for whatever reason, people don't want to admit. It isn't about the vegetables. It's the process.
I just totally kicked ass today. I bought this garden cart, so I got up today with my tool set. Assembled it in about an hour. Then I dug a bed. The ground was as perfect as I have ever dug, and I have dug a lot. We had a nice, on and off light rain for two days. So my edging shovel was just slicing through the grass like a knife through better. It was coming up in these beautiful crumbly chunks. You could just grab a big chunk without it falling apart, but slam it in the ground, and the soil was just crumble away. Toss the grass and roots left in your hand.
The one thing I am really good at is digging beds. I was in the zone, instantly seeing exactly how much ground I could take up in the next shovel. I dug out about a 6x10 area in maybe an hour or so. Then got the turning fork, turned it over. Got the hie, smoothed it out.
Then I went to the hardware store and in two trips bought like 20 bags of mulch, 10 bags of leaf gro, and a bunch of lumber and stuff.
Came back, threw down the leaf gro, turned it over and smoothed it out again. Then I laid down the mulch, and I got to wheel the garden cart back and forth doing all this.
Then I broke out the saw, cut up the lumber, got the tools out and built a 4x6 bed. Went back to the hardware store, loaded up on vermiculite, peat moss and compost. Threw that in, raked it out. Perfect.
I wanted to dig another bed, but I knew my back would hurt if I pushed it. So I stopped, but it was still not bad because I know I have another three beds at least look forward to.
But here's the thing with perennials. Once I plant those beds, it's over. I will never use the garden cart or the edging shovel or fork, etc again. In fact that fork was brand new and had been sitting in the basement if my last house for like ten years.
I will still have to mulch, but I won't ever get to just lay down big heaping mounds and rake it all smooth and fluffy. I'll just do little handfuls at a time. In 2-3 years maybe the plants can be divided, but that is not fun. It actually makes your garden look worse for a bit. And you don't get to eat the plants, you just throw them away.
So yeah, if you vegetable garden, you get to start new and plant all the time. You are always growing, instead of just tending to what has grown.