Saturday

Somehow I have managed to catch a summer cold. A shame? Well yes, but summer colds are easier to handle in that you are never cold, just sniffly. I blame El Niño! Why not, right? That and the heat wave, which continues into the weekend.

It's early. Ed is awake, I'm awake and so he asks -- want to head out to the farmers market now?

Hold on there! Rushing is not in my calendar for this day! Still, he is correct that going early has us escape both the heat and the crowds. And it's not every week that he wants to tag along. And so I agree. We go as soon as I take care of the animals.

(morning walk)

Okay, done.

As always, I first want to pick up breakfast treats from Madison Sourdough before hitting the market. Yes, there are the croissants, breads and cinnamon rolls. Today I'm also tempted by a blueberry cornmeal cake. I add a slice to the box of treats, just to try it.

(in my opinion, the breads are always the most photogenic!)

And now we're ready for the market.

For me, walking from one stall to the next is a tiny bit social, in that I like to check in with farmers I have known for a very long time. Most importantly though, the market is my chance to shop super seasonally and locally and I always bring back a load of produce. And flowers.

Ed has no expectations, but he's been a resident of the greater Madison area since 1969 and he has done business here for many years and so he has a lot of connections, many of therefrom the days when he designed and manufactured tools for BMW motorcycles. And so inevitably, in big crowds, he will run into people he knows. As he did today.

The problem with this is that Ed has a reputation -- of a good guy, a smart guy, a his-own-person guy. A character. So that, for example, today, when I tell him that he cannot wear these farmette shorts out in public (me: they are over the top wrong! Ed: they're super fashionable; besides, you know I do not care what people think), he shrugs and wears them anyway (so predictable!). And then his guy friends at the market laugh and say things like "I wish I had the courage to do that!" He throws me a "what did I tell ya" look. 

Our walk around the market takes 45 minutes and it is wonderful.  In addition to the flowers, the mushrooms, the asparagus, the carrots (oh, the Snug Haven new carrots!), I find buckwheat honey at the Bee Charmer (it's such an acquired taste!) and I pause to chat with Dave from the Flower Factory. He no longer sells perennials from his greenhouses, but he does come to the market each week for the fun of it, always bringing a nice selection of flowers with him for anyone (like me!) who wants to continue the tradition of stocking her garden with his wonderful plants. I pick up a Salvia.

And we are done by 9:45, just as the heat and crowds begin to intensify, forming a soupy mixture that I am happy to avoid.

Breakfast, on the porch, with the fan blowing air straight at us. The blueberry cornmeal cake is great, though Id probably use less icing were I baking it.

And then we nap!

By noon the force of the flower fields is upon me: I need to give at least some of the plants extra water (yep, it is truly a terrible time to give thought to watering anything). And so I rouse myself and tiptoe out and uncoiled the very very long hose and get to work.

Go ahead, ask me if I had meditative fun, standing there in 94F (34C) degree weather, for four hours, watering imperfectly, while deer flies buzzed around my sniffling head and in swatting at them, I kept hitting my phone and mistakenly bothering my daughter with butt calls! You have to love working with plants to devote this much time and effort to them. For no one really, except maybe Ed, me, my grandkids, and you!

On the upside, while not giving all plants a good soak, I do attend to the desperation out there. Those that really needed it, got it. With moderating temps next week, they all should stay safe until that blasted rain finally reaches us after mid-June.

And, as always, there are the special moments. Some of my flowers can't be seen in the course of my daily walks to the barn and to the car. A whole blooming period may go by and I will have totally missed their beauty. But when, like today, I so minutely attend to the fields, I find them and it is in fact a moment of ecstasy to come across, for instance, these:

Evening supper? Cheeper eggs, market mushrooms, market asparagus, market carrots in a salad. It's a beautiful time to be fixing easy meals here in south-central Wisconsin!