Fresh From the Farm This Week: Early July Edition

This last week, I've been on break and had a little more time than usual to go spend on my knees in the dirt.  Mostly it was weeding and then more weeding and then after that, a little more weeding, but yesterday, I finally decided to make harvesting a priority.

First up were the blueberries.  I had to shoo the crows away, but in about twenty minutes, I was able to fill my two little buckets.  There weren't too many Rainiers this year although the birds were still making a go of it higher up in the branches.  I didn't do more than pick some of the low-hanging fruit, but I felt very grateful that every year, despite almost total neglect, these blueberry bushes and cherry trees produce again and again.  Miracles all around us, and grace upon grace.  

This year's garlic has been proceeding quite nicely despite a super late harvest last year that produced garlic bulbs that had already split and were therefore not storable for long.  The hardnecks kept a little better, so that's what got planted, with the lucky by-product being garlic scapes in the early summer before harvest.  I got a huge basket of them, and then proceeded to shear the mesclun that's grown back again from their first cut a few weeks ago.  Finally, I picked the last of my English peas, which I need to remember to plant more of next year since the fresh peas are a hundred times better tasting fresh than the ones that come frozen.

The cilantro has also bolted into a lovely field of white flowers that will keep reseeding itself.  I always find myself needing just a little bit of it to make salsa or whatnot, but inevitably, it's bolted or in the seed stage when I get around to wanting to make it.  

I haven't been too inspired to document what's been growing in these last few seasons, maybe because most of what I'm growing is nothing new.  Also,  the amount of weeds and the time and effort needed to dig out the beds this year was especially laborious, so snapping photos took a backseat to getting more urgent things done.  But this year, it seemed we've had an especially cold year and everything seemed to be two to four weeks later in showing up than usual and I found myself scrolling through some of the posts from years back to check whether it was just a feeling or were things indeed later than usual? (They were.  By about 2 weeks it seems.)  It was also a good reminder that despite the effort, remembering is important and especially for a memory like mine, documenting is crucial.

I've been thinking about just how hard it is these days for me to get something written or read or done with the seemingly infinite ways that I can be distracted.  It's now been months since I first wrote this post, but something, often mindless Internet browsing, takes precedence.  This passive decompression is necessary at times, but because it's so easy, I find myself absent-mindedly losing big chunks of time to it and really needing an act of will to stop.  I used to think that being a writer or an artist or some kind of a maker of things was a matter of talent, but even more so, one has to just write or draw or make or do whatever it is that you say you want to do.  Period.  Just do it, as the slogan goes.  So, here we go again.  You have to start somewhere, right? 

Remember by Joy Harjo

Remember the sky that you were born under,
know each of the star’s stories.
Remember the moon, know who she is.
Remember the sun’s birth at dawn, that is the
strongest point of time. Remember sundown
and the giving away to night.
Remember your birth, how your mother struggled
to give you form and breath. You are evidence of
her life, and her mother’s, and hers.
Remember your father. He is your life, also.
Remember the earth whose skin you are:
red earth, black earth, yellow earth, white earth
brown earth, we are earth.
Remember the plants, trees, animal life who all have their
tribes, their families, their histories, too. Talk to them,
listen to them. They are alive poems.
Remember the wind. Remember her voice. She knows the
origin of this universe.
Remember you are all people and all people
are you.
Remember you are this universe and this
universe is you.
Remember all is in motion, is growing, is you.
Remember language comes from this.
Remember the dance language is, that life is.
Remember.