Isn’t it funny how time slips away? And isn’t it funny how memories can bring tears to your eyes? So not to let memories fill me with sadness and tears, I’ve made another run at my day. I don’t want my precious time to just slip away. What better way to bring myself back to the here and now than to step out of the house. I’m greeted with morning sunshine and blue skies. Hello Saturday! It’s nice to see you.
Then it is into the greenhouse. It is still green and lush with growth. I can’t complain of it being barren and empty. I might even get a bitter melon or two afterall. Aphids destroyed most of my plants early in the season. So I’m crossing all my fingers and toes.
Another hot 30℃ August day, the kind of heat we wanted in July but never got. Makes me wonder what kind of winter we will have. So many unusual and unpredictable weather patterns. How will we navigate the future? Will our planet survive what we have been doing to it? And can/will we change our ways? We seem to be hell bent on going down the same path – fast everything, more money and more stuff.
I am not hopeful but at the same time, I am not hopeless either. I am still interested and engaged in this little life of mine. I am doing my best in not adding to the stress of the planet. Perhaps it means little to the grand scheme of things to say I recycle. But I do. I recycle and compost. I save rain water. I even save water I wash my vegetables with. Perhaps I do go a little overboard sometimes and exhaust myself. But I’m happy to have that extra water to throw on the strawberry plants. They pay back with beautiful delicious red fruits.
I feel very fortunate that I am able to do the work of growing my own food and to share some with family and friends. I am grateful that I find joy and fulfillment in working the soil. It keeps me sane and grounded when life is hard. And it is always hard.
Saturday reminds me of childhood days when we watch the Bugs Bunny Show. It’s theme song On with the show, this is itgot me on my way this morning. It’s a lively and very catchy tune. It put a bounce into my step as I bounce my way out the door. It’s another beautiful sunny day. Time is marching along. No time to be maudlin. There’s work to be done – gardens to be weeded, books to be read, tea to be sipped, art to be painted and blog post to be written. I wonder if I could get it all in.
The first stop was at the community garden. Being community, I took time to chat and visit with a few other gardeners there. Sometimes the opportunity isn’t there. When there is, I try to make the best of it. I spent a little more time than I intended but it was worth it. I still got home in good time. So many tasks was calling out. I quieted their voices. I need to take time to sit, rest and enjoy the beautiful morning before me. I got out a lawn chair, made myself a cup of tea and sat behind the herb spiral. Everything was at their best. The grass swaying gently in the morning breeze. The bees flying to and fro between the clover and borage. It was a peaceful and magical moment.
The moment passed, the tea sipped and the magic went. It was time to work again. I got the water hose, hooked it to the rain catchment behind the garage and started filling the pails for the greenhouse. It was not all work. I had a bit of entertainment. The guy had painted the story of Puff, the magic dragon on 2 board panels to camouflage the rain catchment. It had a practical use and it also provided magic and a show for the kids at the daycare nearby.
Now it is getting quite late for this 26 day of the Ultimate Blog Challenge. I must close shop and say good enough.
I feel so bland these days. I don’t think I could get excited even if you lit a fire in my pants. I wonder where it all went. I didn’t really try too hard to figure it out. I had no energy to spare. Instead, intellectually I know the best thing to do is move as if I am interested and engaged. In other words, just pretend. It works for Nat King Cole. It might work for me, too. If it doesn’t, at least I know I have tried.
Pretending I’m full of vim and vigor, I hustled out to the front yard early this morning with my pitch fork, garden gloves and a pail. I was going to tackle those darn creeping bellflowers while it was still cool and shady. The soil is still moist from the previous days of rain. It should be easy digging. It was. I didn’t get all the bellflowers but I did get a bunch. I transplanted a few amaranth into the bare spots. I hope they will take, flourish, flower and scatter their seeds in the fall for next spring. Right now they’re looking drooping
I didn’t stop there. I knew if I stop, I would not move again. I gave the shaggy grass a clip and swept up the clippings. Next, I put away my tools. If I didn’t, they would be hanging out for awhile. It’s best to pick up after myself as I go along. Surprisingly, I find the process soothing.
Being an early bee, I can get a few things done in the morning. Next on the list was blanching and freezing the shelled peas. It is not a hard job but the clean up is because by then I am tired. I pushed through that, cleaned up and put away. A job well done if I have to say it myself. Now it is the end of day 25 of the Ultimate Blog Challenge.
There are no easy days even when good things happen. We had what seemed like a huge deluge of rain last evening. You could not see out of the windows from the onslaught. While the moisture is still much appreciated, we are left with a mess of mud, dead leaves and other debris. The rains are also promoting the growth of those creeping creepy bellflowers that has taken over our front yard. I had spent last summer trying to dig them out of one flower bed. Now they’re all back. They’re impossible to rid. It’s no exaggeration that what I feel is despair when I look at them. But I will not go the chemical route.
So I found myself digging again this morning, the soil being very wet and soft. I could only do so much before tiring. I planted 2 clumps of false sunflowers in their place. My plan is to crowd them out with perennials. That and sporadic digging, weeding and mulching. I’ve had some success with these methods in other parts of the yard. Realizing that, I’m not feeling quite as hopeless. There’s still hope.
Talking about hope, I am sad to learn that Johanna Macy, author of Active Hope has died. I have the book for many years and have yet to finish reading it. That has been me, collecting and not finishing reading. I will have to find it and read it. Maybe I will learn to be more active and not give in to these moments of despair. Sometimes it is hard, especially when there is smoke in the air again. But I will try.
A cool grey misty Sunday morning in July. We had rain in the night. It’s not a morning that would have me singing Hallelujah! But I am relaxed and comfortable in my skin. I made a tour of the garden and the greenhouse before our breakfast of bacon and sourdough pancakes.
I have the making of chicken soup in the Instant Pot. I am at the keyboard early for a change. 11 days left in the Ultimate Blog Challenge. I can make it. I can finish my Daisy Yellow Index Card a Day Challenge, too. I am a few days behind. I can catch up. I have 14 cards to go. It’s not a matter of do or die. It’s about doing doing my best, persevering and finish what I have started. I hate feeling lackadasical and sagging, sighing and giving up. I’m testing my mettle. Here are my 2 index cards from yesterday’s effort.
gratitudepivot
Sometimes scrolling is not always a waste of time. I found someone interesting and inspiring on Facebook yesterday. His name is Paul Alexander. He had polio when he was six and was unable to breathe on his own. He was paralyzed for life. He lived most of his life in and out of an iron lung. Yet he was educated and became a lawyer. He wrote and self published his memoir Three Minutes for a Dog: My Life in an Iron Lung, in April 2020. It took him 8 years to write it. He passed away at age 78 in March 2024. What a remarkable man! A story like his makes me keep trying to put my best foot forward.
It’s difficult to come to the keyboard in the morning. I have to make the best of it and settled for afternoons and evenings. There’s much garden work and the best time is mornings when it is still cool and I’m fresh. I’m into the rhythm of it now. I’m sufficiently recovered from losing my mother and my hearing almost at the same time. I do not like to talk much about either experience. I’m superstitious. I don’t want to jinx myself. I’ve recovered a good part of my hearing. I am highly functioning again. I’ve regained most of my self confidence though feeling life is very vulnerable.
I would say that this past year is a most pivotal year. I am woke, seeing and hearing the world and life through a different lens and ear. It might be paradoxical, but I have been both traumatized and gratified by my experiences. I am reconciled to my new realities. The fog has lifted. I am strong again. I am at peace and moving on with living. I find myself enjoying again working in the garden and greenhouse. The empty spaces meant for bitter melons are not seen as failures but spaces for new possibilities of parsley, more cucumbers and lettuce. Yes, maybe, just maybe it is still possible for bitter melons. I stuck in 3 bitter melon seeds. If I don’t, there definitely will not be any.
There was no smoke for this 17th day of the Ultimate Blog Challenge. We had sunshine. I was off early in the morning to the community garden to harvest and water. Now in late afternoon, we are having rain. It’s good for the garden. It is good for me. I don’t have to water the home garden. Yay!
It is amazing how time slips away when I am not paying attention. I had intentions of writing this post this morning but look. It is afternoon. I also had intentions of attacking the weeds in the yard this morning, too. I don’t know what happened. Grocery shopping took longer than I anticipated. I hadn’t done it for a long time. I gave that up to the guy after he complained I took too long and bought too much. He’s away sailing. It is our grocery day and it is Seniors Day. I had to take on the shopping challenge.
What I have learned is everything takes longer than anticipated. Everything is harder/easier than I thought. Sometimes I win. Sometimes I fail. I’m learning to look at all outcomes as learning experiences. Mistakes are great teachers. They teach me to try different things and different ways. Now I look at them as great adventures. Wayne Dyer was right when he wrote Change Your Thoughts – Change Your Life.
I’ve read that book and I know that it is true. But there’s different levels of knowing. Now, in this moment, I really know it. It is that AHA moment. Just Like great ideas, if you don’t write it down, it will disappear again. That’s why I write and participating in these Ultimate Blog Challenges. And I do love words and how they can flow into pictures and stories. It pays to take the time to sit and work at it when I’m blocked. There’s value for my time instead of letting it slip away scrolling through things that don’t matter a damn.
It’s almost the end of the afternoon. It is not all lost. I got a wee bit of weeding done. Being overwhelmed by those creeping bellflowers, I thinned some of the carrots instead. It is very hard work, bending over the raised bed, assessing and pulling. I muttered quite a bit. It’s no wonder some people do not garden. It is much easier to get the vegetables from the store. It’s not just growing and harvesting. There’s storing them, too. We still have carrots harvested last autumn. Though I muttered a lot, I know I will get over the hard stuff and keep doing it till I can’t. I guess that’s passion.
The smoke certainly has thrown a monkey wrench into my plans for this week. I had decided to take this time off from the gym and work out in the yard and the gardens. There’s more than plenty to do. The front yard is a disaster with those creeping bellflowers taking over again. I put in alot of sweat and tears last summer digging and digging – to no avail. They’re still coming and coming. I’m not going to put myself out there, fighting them or anything else, in the smoke.
It is very frustrating to wake up again in this smoky haze. It is the middle of July and it is cool and grey. I am somewhat angry that we’re in all this. There’s still many who are denying and not talking about the climate change even those in power. We need to recognize this and talk about what needs to be done. It is, of course, easier to pretend nothing is wrong even though we are on fire. Grrrrr!
I could not handle being hampered and hemmed in and full of wrath. Not regarding what I said about the smoke, I went to the community garden with my masks. I harvested a bag of snowpeas, weeded a bit and watered our plots. After an early lunch, I drove out to the allotment garden with my masks and gloves. The gloves are for squishing potato beetles. And there were some. The potato leaves were not a pretty sight.
By now the air quality index is better but you can still smell the smoke and the sky is still grey. But the rant is out of me for this 15th day of the Ultimate Blog Challenge. Tomorrow I shall tackle those creeping bellflowers.
When the going gets tough, it’s best to have a plan and get at it early. That’s what I did. Knowing that the day gets away on me if I dawdle, I planned to have my morning cup of tea and head off to the community garden before breakfast. It was 8 o’clock when I left. It was a good thing. I was early enough to have a parking spot. There’s a baseball field across the street. A baseball game was starting up. Cars were lining up.
Our little plot is doing quite well after a poor start. I harvested a good number of snowpeas and can now harvest every 2nd day till they give out. The patching Swedish bean patch is filling out. The carrots are looking good. The 2 bottle gourds and purple beans are doing well, climbing up the towers. Hope they will create a show. That’s my main purpose for them. They are also edible. I weeded our plot and my brother’s before watering. When you have the right tool from Lee Valley, weeding is almost effortless.
I was home in an hour. It was only 9 am. I had a leisurely breakfast. It felt like a treat. I felt good enough to wander out to the garden and water my tomato and squash patch. The cherry tree was close at hand so I picked some sour cherries. They’re washed and in the freezer. There’s a never ending list of things to do. The best thing is to do them if I can and not think about it. After I filled all the greenhouse pails with water from the rain catchment tbehind he garage, the sky clouded over. It was eery. It was dark in the house. I felt my heart catch in my throat. I tell myself I’m ok. There is nothing to be scare of. The world is not ending – yet.
I am happy I had a plan today and made an early start. Tomorrow I shall head out to our city allotment garden early to check on the potato beetles and see if there’s peas to harvest. If I do that, I will really enjoy my tea and breakfast after. The clouds have passed. We had a few drops of rain and the sun came out. This is our new norm now almost every day.
onethousandandtwo 