Late Summer

Morning Glories, bee balm, and daisy-like flowers; Deb Marshall photo

The garden, this time of year, is a magical place. The Chinese have five seasons to our four: the fifth is called Late Summer, and when it starts can vary from year to year, and how long it lasts can also change. It sets between Summer and Fall, and it’s here when every growing thing is at its richest, and ripest, and fullest; when the fruits are sweetest, the pumpkins big and glowing, the beans bursting their shells, the sunflowers at their tallest and turning their heads down, away from the sun, in the heaviness of their ripening  seeds. It’s the moment in the year when the seasons hesitate and, if we’re very lucky, doze along for days, or weeks, or maybe even a month or two. In Late Summer we can taste the richness of the work the earth has been doing since Spring. In the heat of the sun, we can still taste Summer; in the tang of coolness in the breeze, we can feel the bite that will come with Fall.

In Summer our hearts are aflame with warmth and growth and joy; in Fall we taste minerals in the foods that are swinging past their prime, and our hearts feel the bittersweet pang of sadness. The world will slow even further, and give us, who live in the northern circles, a violent blaze of joy and pain to fill our eyes and noses with the glory that can occur with the world’s ultimate descent into death, and cold, and quiet.

Three weeks ago I saw the first red leaf; since last week, one maple on the edge of the front 40 has sported a blazing branch of autumn glory. The peaches grew heavy and began to fall from the tree; we’ve had a basket of them on the dining table, perfuming the air and making breakfast a special treat. We’re down to the last few, now; many have been frozen, two peach and basil galettes made and consumed, and the Husband and I keep moving the last remaining peaches about in the kitchen, hiding them from each other as they reach perfection, hoping to be the one who gets the last, perfect bite. Truth is that guilt will set in and whoever cuts the last peach will reluctantly share it with the one we love most – and I’m not talking about the Barkie Boys.

Scarlet Runner beans; Deb Marshall photo

 My garden, because of the way it’s situated, becomes a secret fairyland when late August arrives. The peach tree stretches out luxuriously over two pathways so one has to duck below it to pass from one area to the next. The oatgrass that took over one brick path has finally released its grip so I can clear that path, but the sage – which is more a bush than a plant, now – brushes legs on that path, and covers part of the path on its other side. The sunflowers are tall and thick, and their heart-shaped leaves are huge, something else to duck under or push open to travel from one part of the garden to another. Scarlet runner beans cover nets and form not only a screen on one side, but an arch, and the pathway under the arch has been taken over by an invading butternut plant, rogue marjoram with its purple flowers, and a daisy-like plant that I didn’t plant but which has spread itself from the back fence row. On that back fencerow, beebalm, marjoram, and the unknown daisy are all nearly 4 feet tall and the Jerusalem artichokes, which have yet to bloom, are over my head.

Catman’s main catnip patch is busily sending out new babies, and I’m having a hard time keeping up, weeding them out. The main patch is also 4 feet tall, in spite of his twice-daily ministrations. The far end of the garden is partly bordered with raspberry canes which have become a jungle this summer, and the fall berries are beginning to ripen. Blueberry bushes, finally all finished ripening, are beginning to turn a vibrant scarlet. Some weeds I allow to sprout yearly are tall and in bloom – yellow and pink and purple – and orange calendula and California poppies wave in the breeze, knee-high, and multicolored nasturtiums climb and crawl and stretch everywhere. Pink and purple morning glories have covered the back fence and climb the bee balm, Jerusalem artichokes, marjoram, and some sunflowers. Love Lies Bleeding drips its elegant long red tresses down to the ground, countered by its cool green cousin across the way. Carrots, and parsnips, and parsley root, and beets wave their tall tops in amongst the other plants.

In the center of the garden; Deb Marshall photo

In the very center of the garden – if you can figure out how to get there – is an open space, with extra compost bins, bird bath, and the solar-powered ball-that-changes-colors in the night. From that spot – oh, that spot! – you can see all the colors, hear Buzzy Boy the hummingbird singing his war song at all invaders, hear the drone of bees on all sides. The bees, and the butterflies, fill the garden, and follow the long-reaching limbs of the buttercup squash plant up and over the resting compost bin and into the yard. The resting compost bin is not really resting this summer – it’s filled to overflowing with volunteer tomato plants and a long tendril of the buttercup.

Finally the few tomatoes that set this year are beginning to color; and the beans, except for the runners, have been picked and pulled. There’s great satisfaction in harvesting the last of some vegetable: To the compost! Become food of the earth! I say cheerily to the plants as I pull them up and admire the nitrogen balls on the bean plant roots, and tuck them lovingly into the working compost bins. The green, yellow and purple beans are mostly done, as are the purple-speckled shell beans;the potatoes are dug, and most of the onions have toppled over and been pulled, braided together to hang from a peg in the kitchen to dry and be used through the fall. My freezer slowly fills: lots of zucchini and summer squash and beans, a few tomatoes and bags of corn, all destined to be turned into breakfast soups every week through the winter.

Pink runner beans, the daisy-like flower, and marjoram; Deb Marshall photo

In the very center of the garden – if you can figure out how to get there – in its open space, the sun is warm and the breezes usually don’t reach it. The ground is covered with a deep layer of straw mulch on deep layers of newspaper and cardboard to battle the grass that still finds a way to poke through here and there. In the very center of the garden, if you sit in the mulch near the birdbath, you can see that the critter hole that opened under the French peas earlier in the summer has been filled in, and a new hole opened amongst the fava beans. You can lie back and see the faces of the tall sunflowers. You will notice that you’re surrounded by the hum hum hum of bees: in the catnip, scarlet runners, beebalm, sunflowers, poppies, calendula, squashes, sage flowers…

Sage flowers; Deb Marshall photo

In the very center of the garden – if you can figure out how to get there – in its open space, Buzzy Boy will come to see what your’e doing. Catman will sashay through, eyes blinking in the sunlight, tail waving. The Barkie Boys will circle the garden, not sure how to reach the center. Biscuit will stare at you from under the raspberry canes, bright eyes all that can be seen in the shade all around her. You will hear the breeze ruffle the peach tree leaves. The sun will sink into your limbs. You will sink into the earth. You will become part of Late Summer, and when you doze, the dreams you dream will be magical.

In the very center of the garden – if you can figure out how to get there – all will be well; all will be well; all manner of thing will be well.

For the blog, August 31, 2017

Morning glories, catnip, sunflower leaves; Deb Marshall photo

From the Edge of Darkness: 8

Ardor

Trashcan; Charley Freiberg photo

Ardor.

Fervor, zeal, passion, vehemence, devotion, intensity, fire, eagerness, enthusiasm, emotion, intensity. 

Comes a time in most lives – about the time we hit 16 years old, sometimes a little later, or, sometimes all over again at a later age – when we seek an object or mission on which to focus our ardor. We’re brim-full of it at that age, and desperate to make use of it. Life -  normal, day-to-day, mundane, boring life – just isn’t enough.

Our ardor is like an animal inside us, surging, seeking, lighting upon and muckling onto something, or someone, that we deem – surprisingly often very wrongly – to be worthy of our passion, our conviction, our intensity, our strongest beliefs. We might discover an art form that speaks to us, somehow completes us; we might be swept away by love for a god or spiritual leader, and join a religious sect or monastery, become a preacher, become a contemplative, proselytize to everyone we encounter; we might devote our lives to healing others; we might become a fiery social worker, or lawyer, or peace worker, determined to save and change lives. We might decide we can effect social reform better as a policeman, a soldier, a politician, a farmer, or a saint. 

Sometimes our ardor latches onto less world-shattering things – we become enamored of style, or  gardening, or food, or wines, or horses, or martial arts, or sports. Sometimes our ardor launches us down roads that can ultimately be very wrong for us, or dangerous, or that sweep over others in evil ways: we fall passionately in love with exactly the wrong person, we acquire addictions that will suck us dry, we join a gang, we acquire weapons, we become hard-line religious fanatics, join a cult, become a soldier-for-hire or fight for a questionable cause. We pursue money at all costs; we pursue power no matter what it takes. We join hate groups, become neo-Nazis, or white supremacists, white nationalists.

Ardor burns hot: it has one thought, one goal in mind; it justifies all means to achieve its end. It can create an inspired leader, or a murdering dictator; it can drive its container to invent something amazing, find a cure for horrible disease, improve the lives of millions of people through social reform; or murder a doctor who performs abortions, or blow up a temple, or perpetrate other diverse acts of terrorism, or kill a young woman who is marching in protest of hate groups. The thing about ardor is that it doesn’t hear reason; it doesn’t acknowledge the possibility that it might be wrong-headed; it doesn’t seek or accept compromise.

Most of us outgrow those first flushes of adolescent ardor. Life intervenes. Our brains and thought processes develop and we begin to be able to think clearly and not only feel intensely. Experience teaches us to curb our ardor, to rethink where we have directed it. We get tired of the constant struggle with the unsuitable mate; we need to direct our money and intention towards baby clothes or an ill or aging relative; we break the addiction because we’re weary and afraid to die; we get away from the gang because we acquire a family; sometimes, if our ardor remains unabated, we get killed. Sometimes we continue to pursue the objects of our ardor, because they’re basically harmless – we follow a sports team enthusiastically  and name our children after our favorite players; we drink expensive wines and bore our friends with tales about it and fill our cellars full of it; we join a group of people as enthusiastic and obsessed with model train sets as we are and turn our cellars and back yards into complex trainways.  And yet, we manage to live our lives, be productive members of society, raise children, enjoy friends who have other interests. Or we become artists or doctors or social workers or politicians or cops or inventors, and improve the world as much as we can, feeding the flames of our ardor all our lives, loving what we accomplish through the ardor that enables us to live fully and do something amazing and important.

But in some of us, it goes all wrong. We waste our lives shouting vile things at people we don’t know; we join with others like us to terrorize people who we think aren’t like us; we kill; we maim; we try to destroy and tear down. We are hell-bent on destruction.

There are theories – theories that have some psychic basis in real people – that we’re born inclined to an archetype we’re driven to embody if we want to experience fulfillment in our lives: Scholar, Warrior, Healer, Priest, Mage, Artist and others. The folks who most often become problematic to the rest of us, when how they fulfill the drive of their ardor goes awry, are Warriors. You can see it in their faces; you can hear it in their voices; you can observe it in the way they dress themselves, arm themselves, present themselves – they love military regalia, guns and knives and other weapons, they love banding together to shock with a show of force, and putting themselves in dangerous situations, alone or in groups. They found a cause, and they’re willing to die for it; they’re itching for a fight. Whether they have the actual stamina and fortitude to hold up under actual combat or returned resistance is anyone’s guess. But when it’s all dress-up and marching and spouting off and threats and carrying weapons and torches and causing terror or horror in on-lookers and their perceived enemies, then high-fiving each other about their warrior virility and impact – it’s warrior heaven. 

They’re in their glory. They mean something to themselves, and also, sadly, to the rest of us, and it’s not the same meaning. But they believe themselves to be a righteous force to be reckoned with. They feel more real, more fulfilled, than when doing anything else. And they believe they’re fighting a good fight – even when the rest of the world disagrees - so they aren’t going to curb their ardor. 

And this is the problem – we can’t reason or compromise with them, we can’t thwart them in a way that will make them stop. Oppose them we must, with vigor and with clarity, continually  and in multitudes; but if we want them to stop and not become more destructive, we need to correct and redirect their Warrior nature. Dad used to say, “The only person who can train a grown man away from his chosen inclinations is a tough drill sergeant.” The first thing the drill sergeant must do is shut the noisy ones up, teach them what being a Warrior is really all about, and not allow them to play with weapons until they’re calm and reliable, and trained into a new way of thinking.

So let’s start by shutting them up, and not feeding their warped Warrior ardor.  We were in error letting them simmer underground, watching them poke their heads up from time to time, bubbling away in the dank places on the Internet, in molding hidey holes, in the rotten offspring they begat that we allowed to have too much attention in the name of free speech.  Let’s name them for what they are: terrorists; and make it hard for them to band together and find each other. Let’s take away their weapons – which should not be allowed in the possession of warped psyches, and certainly not in public. 

When they arrive in our cities and towns to spew their venom and march in their costume parades, let’s restrict them to carefully defined areas, and let them march in empty streets lined with  shuttered doors and windows; give them only silent squares and lonely alleys. Let us turn our faces away from them, leave them to sputter only to each other. Let their only audience be someone’s granny, who cries on them “Shame, shame, shame!” Take their photos for future reference, but don’t remark on their audienceless  gatherings. Attention, and news stories, and their words repeated in media feed their ardor. Even whacking them with mace becomes a history of glory in their twisted minds. Instead, let them slither in the shadowland of our refusal to look or listen to their vile spewings.

While they’re throwing their lonely demonstrations that no one else comes to, let us meet on the other side of town, in the sunny streets, and celebrate each other. We are all Witnesses; and we don’t have to play by their rules.

Special note to northern states fellas who fly the Confederate flag but aren’t actually racists or anti-Semites: We get it – you’re Johnny Rebs, all anti-establishment, fast-driving, law-bending, free-spirited bad boys. Woo-hoo. But that flag means some seriously bad shit to most of the country, so it’s time to find another flag to fly. The people who are serious about that flag aren’t your brothers or your soul-mates – exactly the opposite, in fact. So liberate yourselves from that misrepresentation so we know whose side you’re really on. 

For the blog, August 22, 2017

Bad-Ass Bee

I hate being chased from my own garden.

Catmandoo, our sometimes benign Lord of the Universe, is quite a gardener. Besides ensuring, from fall to spring - when I block him from the garden beds with a combination of old window screens, pieces of chicken wire, criss-crossed bamboo stakes and other bits of jetsam that will protect the newly planted seeds and seedlings until they get big enough to do battle with him themselves - that the raised beds are well-fertilized and dug over, he has propagated at least a dozen giant catnip patches from one small plant I set for him many years ago. Sometimes new catnip plants appear unexpectedly in the middle of a bed of something else and I have to remove it, other times he roots them at corners of the patchwork of many-sized beds that comprise my garden, or even in a pathway. Those I usually leave alone, except to prop them up as they grow many feet tall, and trim them so His Lordship can lounge under them without having to crush a bed of beets, for example, in the process. 

Bees love the catnip, and eventually all the patches are fully in flower and redolent with bees. Catman takes his gardening seriously and every morning makes the rounds to each patch to trim the edges, but he can’t keep up with their growth, since the consequence of regular trimming is extreme cat lassitude. He generally makes his rounds again in early evening, but mostly to check for mouse invasion and to chase Beastreau out of his domain if she gets too bold. 

Because he has patches located all over the garden, my garden is usually a-hum with bees, even during the gaps in the season when nothing else is in flower. I enjoy listening to the bees, and mostly they ignore me after determining that the colorful elastic band that keeps my long braid contained isn’t a happy new flower needing to be pillaged of its pollen.  But recently one exceptionally loud buzzer was determined to burrow beneath my braid, and freaked me out by getting caught in my hair.

Bad-Ass Bee, Deb Marshall art

The usual flick didn’t release her; and I couldn’t see her because she was up near my neck. I tried ignoring her but the buzzing was entirely too close to my ear, so I did the release-the-braid, shake-the-head like crazy dance – which had no effect at all. Trying to stay calm, I walked away from the area, then, a little faster, away from the garden; then, in a jog, back to the house, where the bee finally let go. 

Okay, that was weird. I tucked the pink-elastic end of my braid deep into my shirt, and went back to work in the other end of the garden, where – within minutes – the neck-loving bee rejoined me and re-engaged in my hair. Now I was seriously freaked, and quickly retreated to the house, wondering if I was going to have to take the darn thing in with me. We had a slightly enhanced discussion just outside the door, and it finally let go. I went in.

Huh. I wasn’t wearing a fragrance; I hadn’t recently washed my hair; the pink elastic was far out of sight. What was it with this bee? Weirdness, but third time’s a charm, right? Back to the garden I went, after taking a few minutes to calm down, to yet a third area in the garden, saying hello politely to the bees working there. And then – and then – there it was again, and it went straight for my neck again. This time I hightailed back to the house, bee in hot pursuit.

Door slammed, I puttered about for a half hour, then put on that net shirt we all have (but never use) that covers the head and face, to keep black flies off during their season. For good measure, I also put on the hat with the anti-blackfly face and neck netting, and pulled the string tight. No way the stupid bee was getting into my hair this time! But just to be sure, I went to yet a fourth part of the garden.

Where I calmly picked beans for about 4 minutes before – yes! – the bee was back! This time it went for my face, so I got a look at it through the double-netting: it was big, fuzzy, and dark, and extremely determined. It climbed down the face net and started burrowing, looking for an opening at the neck.

I know when I’m beat. I deserted my garden basket and beat it back to the house. It was too hot to breathe under the double netting anyway. I shed the nets and went into the screen house on the deck to feel sorry for myself.

When the Husband and the Tall Dude got back from their bike ride, I told them about the bee from hell. And, of course, they laughed at me. So I sent the Husband into the garden to retrieve the basket and pick the rest of the beans. Within minutes, he was hustling back to the house, waving the basket around his head and cussing. The bee was still on patrol.

I’m not going back into the garden unless I’m armed with the garden hose. I may end up soaked, but I’m guessing the bee will like it less than I do.

I did discover something interesting, though, during this battle. The patch of shell beans I’ve been cussing out because they haven’t been blooming, actually have. They’ve climbed into the peach tree to do it, however. Come fall, I’m going to be picking shell beans out of the tree – unless the darned bee gets me first.