rabbit, rabbit, rabbit

The first day of July.

I started the day by saying out-loud: "Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit."

It's good luck you see. The kids at the farm taught me to start each new month by saying these words. The key is to have no other words leave your mouth before you utter the magical "rabbit, rabbit, rabbit." Doing so will guarantee good things happen throughout said new month.

Though I can't say definitively how my months that started with "rabbit, rabbit, rabbit" compare to months that started with other words, I can say that the months I have remembered to say these words I feel a certain, simple joy. Saying these words connects me to the farm, the kids, and my time there. I always chuckle that 7 years later (and not so far off from my 30th birthday) I still find it perfectly acceptable to honor this juvenile tradition.

Today, however, uttering these words connected me to the literal friend waiting for me outside my back door.

The rabbit, rabbit, rabbit that eats my garden, garden, garden.

I hope this month's chant isn't some sort of prophesy.

great things are happening

Fall Nostalgia

Fall.

Or as I like to think of it: the sentimental season.

Wow, it sure has been an interesting few days around these parts. It doesn't take much to put my brain into complete nostalgic over-drive during autumn. This time of year I find myself thinking about a handful of topics in constant rotation: past relationships, growing older, and farming. 

Many of my relationships have started in the fall, so I tend to feel this strange mixture of hope - maybe I'll find someone great (and lasting) this fall - and utter, ultimate, jaded despair. Ha! How's that for honest? There are definitely relationship memories that are specific to this season - first kisses on hay bales, walks under a harvest moon with thermos' of steaming hot cider, the boy who introduced me to Neil Young, whiskey-inspired confessions in the pantry (yes pantry), and a million other mundane but important snapshots of past autumn loves.

I also think about the big life questions: who do I want to be? What do I mean when I say I want to be "useful" and "good" in the world? What is enough for me? What is success? Failure? How much is ego driving my desires? How much is fear holding me back? I spend a lot of time in the autumn sitting and thinking about how little I know. 

Farming is the strongest memory that visits me during the fall. Six years ago when I was farming, this was the point in time when I actually, finally felt like a farmer. I remember waking up while it was still pitch black outside and working up until the point it was dark again. I can almost feel the soreness of my muscles and the fatigue that you couldn't give in to because it was so close to being over - you were this close to the season's end. When I close my eyes, I see myself harvesting broccoli in an early season snow, wearing thick, leather gloves to protect my hands from the chill. I vividly recall pushing a cart full of carrots up a hill and marveling at how my arms were - for the first and only time in my life - stronger than my legs. I remember enjoying the harvest so much more during the fall than at any other point in the season- seeing the bounty as I visited the root cellar and thinking to myself "we created this." The crispness, vitality, and peace of that time is something that brings me great joy, but also haunts me a bit. The memories come flooding back to me and I'm not sure if I feel closer to it or further away. 

So, today, after discussing much of this with a dear, dear friend, I went out to my backyard and gathered the last bits of the season in the closest thing I've got to 'the farm.' I wanted to remember how I am trying - in my urban life after the farm - to not lose this part of myself:

It was a little pathetic, especially compared to the 20 pumpkins from last year and the hundreds on the farm, but I loved going around the yard and finding small treasures here and there. There are enough green tomatoes for a green tomato pie (don't knock it till ya try it), a handful of rainbow carrots, a few delicata squash, some last eggplant, a few onions, a couple of beets, and some awesome decorative gourds. Yes, I promptly arranged the gourds in a bowl in my house.

Then, I took the leaves from throughout my garden and stuffed them into one of the many house-warming gifts my Mom gave me when I bought old blue three years ago:

This reminds me so much of my childhood home, it tugs at my heart a little.

It's the sentimental season though, so it's only fitting.

why, hello there

Morning glories are wonderful, aren't they? Their discovery to me is always, always like reuniting with a good friend after a long hiatus and when you are in each others beloved presence again all you can think to say is "Why, hello there."

Why, hello there, good friend.

August Garden Tour

August is the best time for gardening. Or rather, August is the best time for enjoying the fruits of your labor! Now is the time of year when you can't go out into the garden without returning with an arm-full of produce. Before I break this down, here's a big picture view of my August garden:

Now, get ready to be hit with a crazy amount of photos. I'm about to break this down. This year my garden - with almost no TLC from me, mind you, except for a lot of mulching and very strategic watering - really is happier than it's ever been. There is probably some lesson in there.

Garden Tour: August 2012

1) Beans

My beans were destroyed by the bunnies, but I love that one plant survived and climbed up my improvised string trellis. Even if I only get 10 beans this year, at least they will be ten purple beans.

2) Squash/Squash-like Things

The photo on the left is delicata squash with a buckwheat flower poking through. I had planted a cover crop of buckwheat that the bunnies found too tasty to resist. This is the only buckwheat that survived. As you can see from the pumpkins and butternut squash on the right, these plants take up a lot of space. Lots of pumpkin and butternut squash blossoms, but none have started to turn into squash yet...hopeful...waiting...we've got till Halloween...

3) Cabbage

I'm known amongst friends as having a over-the-top love of slaw, but I'm afraid even I don't have the capacity for slaw that this year's garden promises. Check out that huge cabbage! Need to harvest it.

4) Greens

Kale and chard, with marigolds and cosmos throughout. Having lots of fresh greens is one of my favorite parts of having a backyard garden.

5) Eggplant

 

I tried a few new things with eggplant this year per some reading I did. First, I got a different variety, the long, slender Chinese eggplant. Next, I attached them to trellis' at a very early age so they would have support and possibly be able to hold more eggplant. Not sure if it's the variety or the support system, but this year is a bumper crop of eggplant. I make eggplant "chips" a few times a week (cut into rounds, sprinkle with olive oil and salt, and bake - turning over once - until crispy).

6) Herbs

Nasturtium is not an herb exactly, but I put it here because not only do the flowers taste great on salads, but the plant itself is a nice compliment to squash and many other garden plants. My little herb garden, surrounded by petunias, is really happy. That's new this year with bricks I found throughout my yard. Sage, rosemary, oregano, and parsley.

7) Raised bed: onions, beets, carrots. 

My onions are really happy (and ready to be harvested and cured for later use), but for some reason my beets did not do well this year. You can see a few of them going to flower, which I don't understand at all. I will try to harvest a few soon and see what's up under the ground. The carrots are a rainbow variety - orange, yellow, purple - and I cannot wait until they are ready!

8) Peppers

This is my first year of success with bell peppers! These are actually an orange variety, so you can see this guy has a few more weeks until ready.

9) Flowers

I love the way this sunflower is growing: a lot of small flowers off one big, main stalk. That's not typical for the variety I have sprouting up throughout my yard. The zinnias were new this year: I normally don't bother with annuals, but this is one of my favorites and they are so cheery. I decided to put them in rather unsightly areas throughout my yard and, as I hoped, they've really brightened those areas up. I also watched the world's most boring youtube video about zinnias and learned that if I keep breaking off the dead flowers they will keep blooming. I have three clusters throughout the yard and they have been blooming wildly for over a month!

10) Melon

I have two varieties of watermelon this year (although only one is pictured here). One is the classic variety, with the deep red center, and the other is a dwarf-yellow. I harvested one of the classic variety a few weeks ago and as I was cutting it open and saying to my roommate "Moment of truth" I was presented with a totally under-ripe, white interior. Very sad moment of truth. It's also made me unsure of when to harvest them. I picked one of the small yellow ones this week, cut it open and it was a beautiful sight! It was perfectly ripe, juicy, flavorful. That's more the type of moment of truth I like.

11) Tomatoes

I planted three heirloom varieties this year, and two are pictured here. I am not sure what accounted for my success with tomatoes this year, but this has been my best year ever. The last few years have been perhaps too wet, thus producing the dreaded "blossom end rot." This year it was very dry, with a few well placed rain storms, and just a few waterings from me. (Again, I didn't water much, I tend to expect a lot of my plants - they'll survive if they want to sort of thinking.) I think the dry heat made them very happy because I have more tomatoes than I know what to do with. I'm looking out my window now and see about a dozen big ones I could pick, not to mention the dozens of tiny, yellow cherry tomatoes. One thing I'm sold on: heirloom all the way. These are some of the most flavorful tomatoes I've ever eaten.

Okay, so now that I've rattled on and on about my garden, I better get out there and enjoy the day. I leave you with two "from a distance" views of the garden.

August Garden: Preview

What I like best about this little bouquet is the pile of pollen gathering beneath the sunflower.  The sunflower already looks like it's peering out at the great, big, beautiful world, and the little pollen pile is almost like its exuberant gift that declares "I was here. I exist."  Or it's flower drool. One of the two.

garden discoveries

Moments after taking this picture of some sunflowers blooming outside my house, I discovered a decapitated baby bunny in my backyard. One of the strangest parts was how untouched and clean the body was. Truly it was just a little, perfectly clean, headless creature - the gore restricted to the ripped off head region.

That discovery pretty much screeched to a halt my mid-summer-garden-photo-essay. Who can take a leisurely stroll through the garden when they are busy cursing out and screaming at a tiny, decapitated bunny?

I know what you are thinking, and yes, perhaps I wished too hard for the bunnies to DIE.

On the positive side, my housemate was impressed with my efficient removal of the dead bunny. Of course I've had loads of practice with squirrels and mice. What's next universe?!

My only lingering question is when and where will I find the head?

the little things

My roommate gave me a great gift: 

Bits and pieces of my garden, artfully, thoughtfully arranged, and left for me to discover.

june blooms

gardengardengarden

My garden is on my brain lately.

That I have been finding traces of last year's garden in books throughout my house, is only half of the "problem."

I spend pretty much all waking hours thinking about my garden in some form.

I think about the new buds appearing everywhere.

I think about the tender young vegetables I am putting in the ground.

 

And how I can get rid of the critters that threaten to destroy them.

I think about sections of the yard that have annoyed me forever. And then I take my shovel and attack them.

I think about the ways I can make it better. And so, for instance, I add an herb garden.

 

I think about irises passed down to me by my mother, which were passed down to her by my father's mother.

I think about the little places of beauty I am creating.

 

I hope it brings as much joy to those passing by as it does to me. I was digging quietly in the yard the other day, when I saw a young man kneel down outside my fence and spend about five minutes crouching there strangely. When I realized he was photographing my columbine, my heart swelled with pride. I garden primarily for myself, and the peace it brings me, but I would be lying if I didn't admit it makes me happy to know others are noticing as well.

I garden for the connection with something bigger than myself. 

Sure, it probably appeals to me on some very basic level because of the great many number of cheesy metaphors that can be made out of the activity. I garden to plant the seed of the future...I garden to grow closer to myself and others....I garden to nourish something bigger...I garden...yada yada yada...