a man and his hoe

every day is a good day

Author: theMan

Worth Waking Up

Any day that starts like this is a day worth waking up for. It’s late October and there are almost no clouds in the sky. A cool mist blankets the neighbor’s horse pasture, and as soon as the sun rises, it will float away (the mist not the pasture). Now you see it, now you don’t.

You often read about tourists flocking to see the fall colors in New England. Hordes of tourists from all over Asia sojourn to Japan to see the maples turn red and yellow. So how come there aren’t crowds thronging the vineyards in late fall to see the grape leaves turn? Grape leaves know how to party at the end of fall. They put on brilliant colors before they fall. Picnicking among the turning grape vines, bottles of wine in tow, that would be a lot of fun. Can’t you see vintners recommending certain wines over others when viewing red versus yellow grape vines?

Or should you drink the wine from that particular grape to truly appreciate the fall colors of that vine? Smell the wine, smell the leaves, can you detect the flavors of the wine in the leaf? You can’t? You need to drink more wine until you can.

Or you could have a taste test where you try and match the wine to the colorful leaves. Take a sip and guess which dried leaf made that wine.

It was a perfect day for splitting more wood. Most likely, this will end up in next year’s wood stack. There’s enough stacked for this winter. It’s time to start working on next winter’s stacks.

And what is this that is trying to bloom? A stewartia pseudocamellia. Nearly all the leaves are off the tree. Just a few dry, red leaves are left, and yet it’s trying to bloom? Maybe it’s roots have tapped into the grape vine’s roots and it is feeling tipsy. Oh please, oh please, just one more bloom. Plants can be like children. I don’t want to go to sleep yet. I don’t want to wait until spring.

October 27, 2015
What’s For Dinner?

What’s for dinner? It’s a timeless question. The answer is out in the garden until a killing frost lays waste to the greens still flourishing into mid autumn. Some of the white flower beans are blissfully unaware of frost’s impending doom. They continue blooming even though there is no hope of them becoming beans. Originating from the mountains of Central America, they are used to eternal spring. In milder climates, they are perennials. Perhaps if I mulch their roots enough, they will sprout next spring.

Soon to be on the dinner table, is this stunning rooster. Sadly for him, his coat of many colors can’t save him, not even his blue feather. He is too aggressive like his brother, who is currently in the freezer. He chases the hens too much. He fights the other roosters too much. “No” means nothing to a rooster.

October 26, 2015
Maybe, Maybe Not

There’s one last artemis melon left in the hoop house. Will it ripen? Maybe, maybe not, but I’ll let it stay on the vine as long as it wants. I found a berry flower in bloom today. It’s too late to be pollinated and turn into a sweet berry, but it’s as beautiful as berry flowers in spring.

October 25, 2015
Trees on Fire

The trees are on fire. When the sun is out, where is the heat coming from? The sun? Or the trees and their burning leaves?

Every day there are more white flower beans to pick. I never tire of popping open the bean pods and seeing the large white beans.

The horse chestnut leaves are yellowing. They look like dancers in the gentle breeze.

It’s a morning for olive-green-pink eggs and ham. Why settle for white eggs when eggs come in so many colors?

October 24, 2015
Is It Fall? Is It Spring?

The budding artichokes and morning sun make it look like spring. Artichokes are monumental plants. If you want your garden to make a bold statement, plant artichokes. How does something so magnificent sprout from such tiny seeds?

The wheelbarrows of leaves I’m gathering say it is fall. Tangerine and her chicks come out to investigate what I’m doing. We weren’t so sure she was going to make it as a mother. She was not one to stay home and bake cookies for her babies. If something caught her eye, she’d go after it, and not worry if her baby chicks could follow her or not. It was up to the chicks to find her if they wanted a mother. There were numerous times when we helped the peeping chicks find their mother. A peeping chick in search of it’s mother can peep so loud, its cry pops your eardrums. In the end, the chicks learned to cope with their eccentric mother. She shows them off with pride now. “See, tough love works,” she seems to crow. When the chicks are older and sharing their life stories with Hazel’s chicks, I can hear Hazel’s aghast chicks say, “Your mother did what!”

October 21, 2015