Life in the garden (and other places)

The garden is alive and it is created to endure just the way a human being comes into the world and lives, suffers, enjoys, and is mortal....Is the cycle any easier to accept in the garden, than in a human life? Both of them are hard to take! In both cases, there is a sense not only of obligation, but of devotion. (Stanley Kunitz, The Wild Braid).

And so, no matter how preoccupied with self this human life, the garden carries on, volunteering big orange pumpkins,

and one perfect carnival squash.

And continuing with its own cycle of life...

(That's a monarch butterfly on the zinnia and a bee coming in for a landing on the morning glory.)

Meanwhile, I finished my paper and promptly got swamped with work, taking DS to college, and preparing and delivering a speaking engagement in the Midwest on a whirlwind one-day trip. By the way, here's the view from DS' (temporary, tripled, intended to be a lounge) room. Not bad...

I have managed some more finished objects, all food-related, as I work to put up as much food as possible before the garden rests. I picked some Saturn peaches and some MORE blueberries at Hurd Orchards a couple of weeks ago, and made peach/blueberry preserves from Gourmet Preserves.

Then, last weekend, T. and I spent some time in Buffalo for her birthday. I can hear you...you're saying, "Why Buffalo?" First, Delaware Park is an amazing place to have a picnic of homemade scones with blueberry jam, pasta salad with fresh tomatoes and home grown tomatillos and herbs, and melon/cherry tomatillo honey fruit salad.

Second, the Albright-Knox Art Museum is a premier contemporary art museum.

Third, the Niagara Riverway bike trail. We biked from Riverside Park in Buffalo, up through Tonawanda to where the Niagara River meets the Erie Canal. Some industrial sections, but mostly very charming.

And fourth...it's rose hip season!

We picked rose hips along the trail, and since I've never used them before, I'm trying out different recipes. A jam with honey recipe from a very old used book...a little too sweet. Then Euell Gibbons' (raise your hand if you're old enough to remember his Grape Nuts commercials) barely cooked recipe, which will be good for getting our Vitamin C in the winter, and definitely tastes like it's good for you, if you know what I mean.

Finally, one from The Neighborhood Forager, still in progress, which looks promising. The rest will be dried for tea. I hope to pick more throughout the fall.

So those are some of the obligations and devotions in my life at the moment...Next time, a knitting-related post...

Growing up in rural America

This isn't directly related to my 45th year challenge, but I recently learned that a woman I graduated high school with has written a memoir. So, of course, I read it as soon as I could get my hands on it!

Publisher's Weekly describes Driving with Dead People, by Monica Holloway, as follows, "Her memoir sings with the power of a disenfranchised woman finally finding her own voice, and her brutal memoir is hard to forget."

I have to say that her ability at capturing our hometown's sense of place and culture is uncanny. Although Monica and I didn't socialize outside of high school, we were in many classes together. And, of course, I would never have guessed what she was dealing with outside of school. Nor, I'm sure, would she have guessed anything about my personal life.

The book reminded me of how overwhelming being a teenager can feel, and also of how we all find ways to deal. Monica and I were similar in that we both coped by achieving. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but as I've lived my 44 years, I have realized that tying one's identity to achievement is a tenuous proposition.

The spiritual teachers to whom I relate, such as Pema Chodron and Toni Packer, would remind me that tying one's identity to ANYTHING is problematic!

So, perhaps this is about my 45th year challenge...working with feelings of image and identity are a big part of meditative work, and as I've begun to think about my solo retreat, I've realized that it may be a tiny bit harder than I've imagined. Nearly 2 whole days with no externally-imposed schedule, no one to be responsible for or to, no one to ground me in some sense of role or identity? Yes, it might be a little more challenging than I initially thought.

Oh, by the way, if you read the book, no, I'm not in it, but my best friend is mentioned. Ask me and I'll tell you who.