Hi everyone! So good to see you again! Look at you, my little pumpkins, plumping up and melting into golds already. Going strong, baby melon. And I see there are still bumblebees getting their big fuzzy butts up in those squash blossoms and spreading pollen everywhere, a sight to warm the heart.
Back /
After a week away, I’m headed back! I’m comin’ for ya, guys.
Damage /
Hmm... here’s what all that heavy hail wrought in the dark of night. Poor broken stalks and battered leaves. The corn, squash, and melon plants look hardy enough, but the bean bush may be a goner before it even began producing. And now that their mother plants are shredded and beat down into the wet dirt, I’m worried that these first two pumpkin half-siblings may be the only ones we get this season.
Hail /
Albuquerque received a brief but thunderous outpouring of hail tonight! I wasn’t there to witness it myself, so these flash photos in the dark are courtesy of my partner back home. The plants look pretty beaten down, but we have faith they’ll bounce back.
Relax /
Vacation: vacating a place, vacating your mind. Just for a brief moment in time, like taking a deep breath and letting it all out. To wash away your worries, reset, and refresh. To relax.
Trust /
...serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
Courage to change the things I can,
And wisdom to know the difference.
I’ll be away for a few more days still. Better to let go of the worry and trust that the weather does what it does, and the plants do what they do, whether or not I’m there to see and touch them.
Worry /
It’s funny being halfway across the country and thus unable to walk among the plants each morning and evening, pulling the occasional weed and checking the undersides of leaves. I know they’re being watered regularly while I’m away, but beyond that how do I know they’re healthy and well?
I communicate my concern for their well-being in the form of texted questions that are too vague to be meaningful. How’s the garden doing? Fine! How do all the plants look? The usual, same as yesterday. Are they growing? I think, slow and steady like always, maybe faster with all the rain. Great! ...Is this a taste of how parents feel when they leave their young kids with relatives for a long weekend? That is, entirely trusting of those in charge, but possessive of their right to worry anyway.
Away /
Another July week, another out-of-town trip to visit loved ones! Fingers crossed the weather stays mild and damp here for the garden and its babysitter while I’m away.
Sunshowers /
One of my favorites this evening: sunshowers, in which rain falls even as the sun is shining through. The air glows amber, shot through with threads of falling pewter.
Surprising /
Just when I thought high heat would be dogging us all week, it broke again last night. For the night. Scattered thunderstorms swept through after dark, lighting the clouds with bursts of electricity, soaking the neighborhood, and sending loose squash vines thrashing in gusts of wind like the tentacles of a frantic octopus. By morning most of the sun-wilted plants looked like they were sufficiently reinvigorated to face another hot day. I think this is a pattern we can live with.