Berry picking on a summer day…

  Well, Folks, as you probably know, if you have read any of my blogs or follow me on Facebook at all, weekend relaxing for me comes in the form of backbreaking yard work, construction projects, landscaping and gardening. If I don’t have some project, or at least the lawn to mow, I get all hitchy and anxious. I like to do stuff.

It’s not that I don't enjoy chilling out, sitting by the fire, reading a book or hanging at the beach… I really do. I just need to go away to do them. If I’m around home, there is always something that I have wanted to get done. I have an image in my mind of the little Eden that I am slowly creating on our plot of land, a place to get away from the world. A place without “The News”, without “Politics”, without jobs and clients and planning boards, a place where I grow my own organic foods that are nourishing to the body and bring peace to the spirit.

This little dream has a lot of components, and as of yet, they are not all built or in operation, so that is the source of my incessant business (for lack of a better word) It’s getting there. This weekend, I got a good start on our little fruit orchard… 4 apple trees, 2 pears, 1 plum. I would like 1 more plum, 2 peach trees and two of something else, so far planned only as “the last two spots”

But today… I took a break. After putting up another section of fence near our “orchard”, I took a swim and decided to sit on the patio, drink coffee and read. That lasted 5 minutes. I asked the kids if they would like to take a hike up the road from our house to the top of this bald hill and check for berries. The instant change from bored and bickering to polite, enthusiastic and energized was a miracle to behold.  We got ready in a record 5 minutes and headed up to the hill.

We cal it Allard’s Hill, because about 5 years ago, I was hired by a gentleman, Mr. Allard, to survey and subdivide his 100+/- ace parcel.  He had clear cut the entire top of the hill, which was a little disturbing, but he had a vision of a wildflower and berry meadow. It was hard to picture amidst the mud and exposed ledge at the time. The survey was fun, I learned a lot of history about the people and properties on our road and really, we couldn’t solve the mystery of the property line locations until I came across a will written in the 1840’s that described everything.

Today, the place is beautiful. We go there quite often. Mr. Allard eventually sold the property, without subdividing or building a single house, but his legacy of the beautiful wildflower/berry hilltop meadow has become a reality. The place is teeming with berry bushes and wildflowers of all types and there is tons of wildlife. We saw a huge flock of Turkeys with their babies and found evidence of bears eating blackberries all over the place (evidence of course = poop).

Grace and I wandered all over the hill, picking berries from the countless blackberry patches. It is still a little early, in another week or two, I imagine gallons of berries will be ready for the taking, but we still managed to fill up her berry basket. The new owners have set up a weather station, and a picnic spot at the top, with a log book for visitors. Jeremiah did a great sketch of the view from the table and wrote them a nice note.

 

The four of us, George came too, finally ended up at the picnic table and we just sat, stared at the view and filled our faces with blackberries, and still managed to preserve about 1/2 basket to bring home for ice-cream later and oatmeal for breakfast.

So there it is, folks. Occasionally, I do take a break, and this afternoon’s break was a good one!

2010 Garden Journey ~ Finally…The Garden is in!

Every year I plant a garden. Some years it’s quite prolific, others years it’s attractive, but offers less in the way of comestibles, and a few years here and there, it has been the domain of weeds, spiders and bees or left fallow altogether.

After last year’s success with vegetables and what I felt was a very artistic approach, I decided to step it up a notch. I drew up nice plans, back in January and ordered organic, heirloom seeds. I wanted to start everything myself in March, instead of buying seedlings in May. I also wanted to try a green manure.

As luck would have it, we had a super warm spring, and I tilled and planted my green manure seeds, (buckwheat, field peas, spring oats, vetch and mustard) in the last few days of March. An early start like that is unheard of in these parts.

Well, that turned out very successful! By the weekend before Memorial Day, the garden was completely covered, about knee high, with all these wonderful, beneficial little plants.

I mulch-mowed them and tilled them into the soil, as the method calls for, and let the soil set a week before planting (or so I planned)

But then, two things plotted against me to confound my plans. The first was my complete distraction with building… YES, you got it…the chicken coop! The second was a nasty period of rain, every other day it seemed.

Finally, around the second week of June, I had my coop done and the soil had dried out, so I started putting things in. My time was limited to week-nights and weekends, but now, two weeks later, I have everything in. What is amazing to me, is how fast things are sprouting. The stuff I put in two weeks ago has already sprouted and is off to a great start.

I planted Italian plum tomatoes; Poblano, Serrano, Cayenne, Jalapeño and sweet peppers; pole string beans, Romaine, mixed leaf lettuces, pickling cucumbers, black beans, kidney beans, kale, Swiss chard, beets, rutabagas, carrots, zucchini and summer squash, & cilantro. The corners of the beds are planted with marigolds and Grace interspersed all kinds of flowers throughout the garden. Outside the main garden, in the back, and up on the bank, I planted pie pumpkins, hull-less seed pumpkins and French pumpkins, and three types of winter squashes: acorn, butternut and delicata.

Do I really expect a grand harvest in the Fall or lots of tasty vegetables over the summer? Not really. My friend Michael saw me buying some last minute seeds at Agway last weekend (stuff I had forgotten to order) and commented how late it was to plant a garden. For me… it’s not the harvest… that is just the bonus. It’s all the thought and the care; the work and the sweat; the sore muscles; its watching the plants grow and seeing how the “plan” turned out. The garden is kind of a moving meditation for me, and a method for artistic expression. If I’m feeling stressed or anxious, I can go work in the garden (or really anywhere in the yard) and it all melts away.

 

I guess it’s the New England gene in my blood that wants to make sure my art or meditation has some practical purpose, at least on paper. Hopefully, we will get at least a salad out of the garden.

In other parts of the world, people practice art and meditation for their own sake; here on Poocham Road, we like to make sure that the things we do are of use…