Taking leave

I’m leaving my garden tomorrow and will not be here to shepherd it through its first frost. Travel is taking me away until mid-November. It has been a very rich five months, but there is much left undone.

Like the morning glories. For years I have dreamed of a garden gate blooming in morning glories. My gate is right on the verge of being festooned with them (festoon is a word I save for very special descriptions), but I will not get to see it in bloom this year. And there is the one mum I have just on the verge of bloom … not this year.

I gathered all of the tools, watering cans, buckets, thermometers, clay pots, and kneelers and carted them back to the cellar. I drained the hoses and stored them. It is a sad surrender. The first day I am here in the spring I can barely sleep I am so excited about getting started. Out from the cellar and its darkness and into the bright blue of spring I emerge with as many tools as I can carry very early in the morning. Reversing that process is a little like the feeling you get when you take down the Christmas tree and put the ornaments away.

Wouldn’t you know that the spinach has decided to germinate. Perhaps there will be something when I return in November. This is my first season with it and it does seem to work in mysterious ways. There is a second run of tomatoes out there right now that I hope friends will be able to enjoy. I am bringing home many green ones and will fry them up.

There will be more to say in November, but I probably won’t be typing it from my rocking chair perch on the porch. The swallows are swooping against a pure blue sky. The Russian olives are beginning to show their bright red fruit. The recent welcome rain has helped to shift my landscape from brown back to green. When I return it will be time to put the garden to bed.