looking back, looking forward

Far too overdue is my deepest thank you for all who followed the wedding here on Ocean and especially those who wrote to encourage me to let go of worry and then sent a thumbs up when it was all behind us. As always, I am humbled by your friendship, cultivated through Ocean. Every kind or funny comment is so deeply appreciated!

Slowly, everything settles to a very regular (ergo: very lackadaisical) pace, starting with a walk to the coop at sunrise...





...with a glance and a nod toward the garden...





and a smile at the flowers that are just now starting to really take summer seriously...










and at the first ripening raspberry -- right in the middle of the clump that was shielded by a tent just a little while ago...


 


and the chickens, parading in spaces that still have a touch of wedding about them.






Our breakfast is especially leisurely as we talk about the bits and pieces of farmette work that will fill the summer days (or only minutes if we're so inclined) for us.





(Oreo wonders why it's suddenly so quiet in the courtyard.)





And so every once in a while, I think back to the weekend -- to those little details that cause me to smile broadly.

Like when the bar station was set up in the courtyard by the garage door: Ed was horrified when the serving team closed that door. (Considering the enormous mess of clutter -- wedding related and otherwise, this was a no brainer: the door had to be closed).
The swallows -- he complains to me -- what about the swallows! They go in and out all the time!
I tell him: they can be inconvenienced for 45 minutes.
No, they'll get confused! It has to go up. He goes to the garage and disregarding the crowd of partying people, pulls up the door.
As he retreats, I give a nod to the bartenders to pull it down again. It stays that way until he notices again.And so on.

I smile too when I remember how the horsefly that buzzed around the groom's brother's face during the ceremony. He'd wave it away, it would come back. I wanted to shout out -- the only way to deal with a horsefly is to swat it! -- but I restrained myself.

I think, too, about how good it was to discover organic cedar oil. The Mosquito Guys here in town are just introducing it experimentally this year for those fussers who do not want more potent stuff in their gardens. That would be us. We had a terrible surge in the mosquito population right before the wedding. We have so much dense foliage that it would have taken a lot of potent stuff to keep them off of a crowd of people. After the (greatly diluted) cedar oil was hosed on portions of the farmette, our mosquito population went down by 95%! Because we were unsure if it would continue to be effective, we had a second guy come in and do just a spot misting of particularly buggy corners with the "real" stuff.  And here's a funny thing: if you went further afield, beyond the cedar oil, the mosquitoes would be there to make your life miserable. But within our wedding space, we were wonderfully mosquito-free. And much to Ed's delight, the bees are still with us, having a grand old time in all the flowers that are emerging. The bug worry, the weather worry, the willow worry -- none of these in the end posed problems.

I definitely grin broadly when I think of Ed's incredible work as he helped me pull the farmette into shape, toiling with me during all good weather days of this past year. I happened to overhear his conversation with his aunt just a while ago. So how was the wedding? -- she asks. Lots of fun, he responds.

I smile, too, when I think of all the young people here that evening. To my knowledge, with the exception of one Madison friend of my daughter, all of them are city people. Chicago, Minneapolis, New York, D.C., New Orleans. Is it not fitting that their weekend away should include a fish fry on a farmette in the country?

And a huge smile -- I save that for my girls. My older one, who so deeply wants her sister to be happy...



(June 21)


...and for my younger one, who so deeply wants her sister to be happy.



(June 21)



Okay: I face this day's tasks and events.
I have lunch with one last out-of-towner and my older girl and her husband...





...and I walk through the garden preparing it for a three week period of neglect (deadheading spent flowers, weeding, staking) and I take out my little suitcase for the trip before me. But that's tomorrow's story.