Garden Inventory, July 13

Asparagus – 2 beds, gone to seed
Basil – Teeny and yellowish. They didn’t get off to a healthy start.
Beets – Ready to pick. Will anyone eat the greens?
Black flies – Gone. Phew!
Broccoli – Wants to produce. Need to review harvesting tips.
Brussel sprouts – If we keep bringing them water, we will have sprouts through Thanksgiving.
Cantaloupe – It doesn’t look like this will be the year.
Corn – 4 feet tall, robust
Cucumbers – 4 fruits on 3 plants, all stunted. Will they grow bigger if we bring them more water?
Delicata Squash – small plants, blossoms beginning
Fennel – One delicious bulb eaten in stir fry. Three more waiting to be picked.
Flowers – Zinnias, calendula, cornflower, and strawflower scattered throughout. Currently blue, orange, pink, yellow and purple beauty! A mystery plant almost ready to bloom.
Horseflies – Aggressive!!
Kale – Abundant – keep picking!
Lettuce – 4 more heads ready to harvest. Salad anyone?
Snap peas – Juicy, swollen, sweet. I wish we had planted more.
Mosquitos – Nowhere in sight.
Potatoes – Past flowering. Robust plants. No potato bugs!
Tomatoes – bushy plants, green fruit, over-crowded bed again
Water – Two wheelbarrows full of buckets and watering cans will keep the plants alive. Is it enough to  keep them healthy?
Watermelon – It doesn’t look like this will be the year for watermelon either.
Zucchini – None planted this year. None will be wasted.

Of all the miracles happening in the garden, I want to spotlight three of them here: the milkweed, the horsefly, and the asparagus.

The horsefly wants something from me. It has attempted to bite the front and back of my right knee, left thigh, left ankle. Each time he lands, I swat him away. I try an experiment. Let him land and have a solid bite. Perhaps it will satiate him long enough that I can linger a little longer. I am seeking a common ground for the horsefly’s need for the physical sustenance of my body and my need for the spiritual sustenance of the garden.

The asparagus had arrived in May to announce to me that gardening season had begun. Before I had added compost or turned any of the other beds, the first spears had poked through the soil. As usual, I had been watching and waiting for several weeks, but that anticipation does not dull the surprise and joy that I felt when we spotted that first spear. The asparagus beds fed us (and neighbors and friends) for over a month and now we have left them to rest. We stopped cutting while the spears were still coming up strong. The tall fronds that bloom now are feeding the root systems below and, next May, those roots will again feed us.

The “Tea Bed” has a bumper crop but, this year, it won’t become tea. The bed holds perennial chamomile, mint, and lavender and, as an experiment, I left a few stalks of milkweed when I was weeding early in the season. The milkweed is now taking up more than half of the bed. It just bloomed and it smells heavenly, warm and sweet. Among the dozens of flying beings on the blossoms, I count 1 hummingbird, 3 different butterflies, 4 different bees, and more than a handful of insects I don’t know how to classify. As I gaze into the cacophony of life in the milkweed today, I celebrate the interrelationship of many beings.

I am grateful to be both a witness and a full participant in Creation’s co-mingling. With renewed attention, I step anew into the opportunity and the responsibility of the dance.

May I show up to each new day like the pollinators, ready to feed life as well as be fed by it.