July challenges

Here's a fun fact: yesterday, England celebrated National Meadow Day. It always falls on the first Saturday of July. Meadows are important (they attract pollinators, they improve the soil), though we don't talk about them much here, in the Midwest. You'll see a lot of reference, instead, to prairie restoration. Meadows thus fall by the wayside. What's the difference between the two? Well, technically prairies have more warm weather grasses and meadows have more spring cool season grasses, but that is really a very artificial distinction because many grasslands have a little of each. 

I've worked on building up meadows in two spots at the farmette, but as usual, each year I run out of steam -- or, truthfully, out of waking hours to do the job right. Still, it's been rewarding to see flowers come up in both!

(peach tree meadow)

(new orchard meadow)

Which brings me to the subject of farmette flowers. People often ask me - why grow day lilies? They're so fleeting! A day for each bloom and then it's gone. And I always say -- yes, but what a day it is! 

Of course, that's not the full answer. One plant, if healthy, will produce multiple blooms. One, maybe even two week's worth. And if you fill the beds with day lily plants, the effect can be grand. Though I have to admit, I'm not 100% behind lilies. They're important, but I actually like them much better if they're mixed with other perennials. The question is -- which other perennials? This is a challenge, because not many plants look good next to day lilies. Their leaves take up so much space that you cant easily create a dense bed full of blooms if you're going to put in day lilies. This is why I rarely see them in herbaceous perennial borders in, say, England or Scotland. The flower per soil space ratio is on the low side. And once done with a blooming period, they just take up space.

On the subject of short blooming period -- well, most perennials have a pretty short blooming period. That's your challenge: fill your border with flowers that will ensure a continuous bloom. 

Yet, there is always a "best period" for most borders and though I haven't asked, I'm sure most serious perennial growers will whisper to you what that period is. For me, it's mid July.

Oh, you mean now??

Here's the rub: it is so buggy this year, that as I keep repeating to Ed, the joy is there, but it's being pummeled from all sides by the pernicious mosquitoes. In the early morning, as I plunge into a field to snip spent lilies, swarms of these guys rise in the air, ready to attack, to annoy, to disturb the peace. (We of course had even more rain this morning, and there's no wind to speak of so they are at their worst!)

And so this year I'm being challenged from two fronts: the bugs and of course Covid. Yesterday (Day 3) was indeed the worst. This morning, the fever's gone and only the cold remains. (But what a cold!) Energy levels aren't soaring yet but they're a hell of a lot better than yesterday's lows. So, I'm gettin' there. But, of course, I'm sure I'm still contagious (I'll start retesting tomorrow, though I'm less eager to do this frequently because these days you have to pay out of pocket for tests, which, perhaps, explains why most don't bother). But the point here is that even the few people that usually pass this way and who can appreciate the flowers have to be cancelled out because Nina's contagious. The young family is back from their road-trip vacation. Can they come for dinner today? No, Nina's contagious. Friends we invited for lunch this week -- will they be here? Not if Nina's contagious.

So, a fleeting garden, horrible bugs, and Covid. I said to Ed this morning at breakfast -- I'm ready to give up.

I didn't mean it, of course, but still, this year's July has presented interesting challenges.

Let's get back to the start of the day though, because this really is the start of the best week out there in the flower fields.

(opening the farmhouse door these days is such a pleasure!)

(blooms, on all sides...)

Again, a challenge to photograph, what with all the bugs, the sneezing, the wetness out there, but I persevere!

So much strong color, so much delicious density!

The Big Bed is finally coming into its best days...

It's so wide, that you have to look at it separately, from both sides...

Okay, let's walk back to the farmhouse.

It's a while before I'm finally all bugged out and ready for breakfast. Ed joins me again and it is wonderful to have him here.

I tell him about Meadow Day and he proposes we take a walk to examine my two meadows, because he, too, finds them delightful! And while we are by the Peach Orchard meadow, we may as well walk over to the veggie patch. I pull some radishes and pick some lettuce leaves, we admire his tomatoes, and the lavender, always the lavender!

Next meadow, in the New Orchard -- also looking good! While there, we check on the new blueberry bushes. Also good!

As are the pear trees. Looks like this year will be the year of the pears!

He helps me stake the hollyhocks and we plan to do some serious mowing later in the day (when things dry off a bit) and it's at moments like this that I remember why I do it. Why I plant and grow things. Why, despite the challenges, it's all worth it. It's for him, for me, for those who pass this way, if and when they do, for everything that's good about planting and watching things grow, by your hand, with your effort. 

The rest of the afternoon belongs to... couch time.

 

 

with love...

a pause

That's the best way to describe being sick with Covid right now: everything is on pause. Oh sure, the wheels of daily life grind on, but very slowly, tentatively and more out of necessity than because hey, it's July and the weather is (for once) splendid and shouldn't we seize the day? 

I do not want to seize the day. I'm on the couch, hoodie on (despite the warmth outside), tissue box right next to me. If the second and third day of Covid are said to be the pits -- well, I'd agree with that. Feverish and tired, sniffly and croaky. I'm looking forward to the fourth day. No one said anything horrible about the fourth day.

I did get up with the usual determination to snip off spent lilies. 350 today. It was so buggy outside that I grabbed a netting jacket and sprayed it with Deet. Unfortunately it was Ed's netting jacket so now I have to decontaminate it and, too, it was very frustrating to work in the garden because the sleeves were too long and they'd fall all over the plant I was snipping. A messy messy way to proceed. Too, I could not see past my nose (all that netting!) and so delightful photo opportunities did not present themselves to me. I had to finish the work outside, then take off the jacket and go back out again, to see what's actually beautiful out there. 

I kept thinking that threatening to quit gardening might be a persuasive way to convince Ed that we really need to spray for the bugs. So I tried it.

Ed! -- a shout from me. I'm quitting gardening!

Oh, okay. Too much work, eh?

Well that didn't work.

No, not too much work -- too many bugs. The hollyhock have been slumping for days and I haven't the will to get in there and figure out how to build a support system for them. It's like that: I do the basics, but I don't finesse anything, I don't improve, I don't even weed anymore. Weeds? Who cares. Let them flourish.

Still...

When I finally do look up, it is very beautiful indeed (Ed's garlic plantings in front of the lily bed notwithstanding).

I cant quite get a good photo shoot going because I'm just too tired and impatient to be done with it all, but trust me: it's all lovely.

And as if that wasn't "normal" enough for a July Saturday morning, I then get in the car and drive to the farmers market downtown. This would have been the perfect day for walking the market, but of course, I am with Covid, so I can't join the crowds (others may not care if they're sneezing out Covid germs, but I do!). I drive over to the flower vendor I like so much, get out of the car and shout to her -- here's some money! I'm sick, but I want you to pick a bouquet for me and put it on the street. Anyone will do!

And she does. 

So much for market shopping. I dont even know what they're selling right now -- it's been such a long time since I've actually walked the stalls.

I then drive over to Madison Sourdough where I preordered a box of croissants and such. Same thing. I call them on the phone: I'm outside, I have Covid, I don't want to come in. Can you bring my order to the driveway and just place it there for me? They oblige, holding their breath as they approach me (I'm still several dozen feet away!). 

 

 

 

I am a known pariah. So many people walk with their Covid -- after all, that's how we all get infected, right? From those who walk with their Covid, knowingly or unknowingly -- and in our innocence we pass them, talk to them, buy from them, sit next to them. But once you know someone's tainted, you know to stay away.

And that's my exertion for the day.

Best part of this July beauty? Breakfast! On the porch. At first with cats...

... but then with Ed. 

 

 

 

We sit far apart and he doesn't stay long, but it is indeed glorious to have him there for a few minutes so that my life wouldn't be a complete pause -- it continues, rolling forward with these diversions but forward nonetheless.

Having time but being without energy means that I read a lot of news stories which of course is up there with mosquitoes in terms of how pleasurable it is. I know all about stubborn denial and paranoia in the very old. Trust me, I know. Where reason ceases to be a guiding principle and you witness something akin to a cemented positioning of belief systems. Nothing, nothing you can say will change a mind. The self-preserving convictions are that strong. 

So here I am, or, here we all are with this pause in our regular summer progression. Everything seems to be standing still. Waiting. For what? Well, in my corner, for the fever to go away and for Covid to recede. Elsewhere? For sanity to prevail.

With love, always with love...

an interesting July, continued

 I   Flowers and bees, not the buzzing kind!

It was to be my day of social delight. A tale of two Bee's -- a breakfast with my New Mexico friend Barbara, then a Zoom call with my Polish friend, Bee. In between? Fun in the yard!

Well, I got one out of three (of those delightful options), so there's that!

My day began in the night. Ed called from the sheep shed. A runny nose, a sore throat. I could hear him croaking. Damn. I left him a Covid test kit and went back to bed and waited. We discussed how quickly he should take Paxlovid. I waited some more. He calls back with the surprising news: I'm negative!  -- he tells me. 

Sure, you can have a false negative, but he woke up with an all clear on his cold symptoms too. Either he had some passing other irritant or he had an extremely light case of Covid. (An afternoon second test confirmed the negative result.)

Me, I'm still sniffling away, but not too bad. Yet. I was up cleaning the garden at the usual time, fighting not so much my cold symptoms, but the mosquitoes. After yet another heavy rainfall overnight, they're just having a field day out there! Fun in the yard? Not so much.

The garden looks okay, but in my opinion, it's modest in its display. What a surprise -- places that are increasingly shaded are not producing a heavy flower display. That and the constant rain... Still, it's deeply satisfying to be immersed in a lily field. July is truly their month. 

Back at the farmhouse, I have breakfast. Alone. Well, with Dance, but that hardly counts. She doesn't talk.

(Ed and I communicate by phone or this way: )

Bee bails me out with a nice, extended Zoom session. And my friend Barbara? She texts -- guess what, we could have had breakfast after all! Turns out I tested positive for Covid this morning as well!

Travel these days comes with hazards. 

 II   A tale of another B, the British kind

Having just spent a week in Scotland where I kept myself happy by listening to the radio while driving down roads that don't deserve that label, I got a lot of pre-election British chatter and opinion hurtling. I have to say, I like the way Britain (and France and a bunch of other countries) run their elections: campaign periods are limited! Five weeks in Britain and two weeks in France! Can you imagine?? None of this prolonged agony we experience here in the US. [Take note, you skeptics who say that four months is not enough time to present an alternative to Mr. Biden before the public. What are we, dunces, worse at processing info than the Brits or French voters? Personally, four months is a bit too long for me. Let's go for two. Hey, yesterday I cast an absentee vote in my state primaries for state representative and I knew NOTHING about any of the names of the ticket. What is Google for? I got informed in less than ten minutes.]

A Labour win was predicted in Britain. Many people were saying that they would be voting strategically at the local level, so that Labor would have a strong support in pushing through reform. Now that's what I call community minded! Farmers, who in Britain are pretty split between the conservatives and Labour were wanting change so badly that most gave their vote to the one party who could accomplish something.

[Here's another "this could never happen in America" moment: the British victorious PM, Stamer, is a professed atheist.]

This morning I listening to this piece  by Jonathan Pie (from the NYTimes). It's both factually strong and very funny! (You know how the French take pride n their cuisine and their cheeses? Well, the British take pride in being funny! It's their thing! You can find more of Pie's take on British politics on YouTube: it helps to laugh when you've just been, as they have been, through a fourteen year period of calamitous   political ruin and an economic slide to hell.) Whether you follow British politics at all or don't know a Tory from a potato (listen to the video link and you'll get the reference to a potato!) -- this piece will make you laugh.

 

III   And then there is F for Fatigue

The one thing you can count on with Covid is a high level of fatigue. The conventional wisdom is that the second and third days will be your worst Covid days (unless you are at high risk for some extraordinary health failure) and I am hitting this period right now. Welcome to the coughing sniffling tired wonderland of Covid. Just like the last time, except this time I passed (for now) on Paxlovid, which does offer quicker relief. I'll let you know tomorrow if that was the right call!

Well, I'm glad I have a pot of chili in the fridge. The lesson here is, if you get Covid, do a lot to prepare for being sick the first day, because the second one will be worse. The storm will come, before things improve.

F is for Friday, too, and this one has been a weird one -- snuck in between a major holiday and the weekend. I did go out (I know you're not supposed to but I avoided all people types) to pick up (curbside!) more Covid tests (we have finally run out!) and to put something in the mail (drive up!). It's like back in the days of the pandemic when isolation was your go-to state of affairs and when getting close to humans was off the charts scary.  

 

 

I expect to zonk out early, so in anticipation of the inevitable, I'll post this now. And turn on the TV and drift off to some irrelevant movie, easily forgettable, easily dismissed.

Tomorrow will be day three of this. Let's see how that goes!

with love... 

 

have a happy Fourth!

Without question, the Fourth of July is many things to many people. History, personal good or bad fortune, played out differently depending on where, when and to whom you were born. So you're bound to feel privileged or disadvantaged, included or pushed aside, depending on any number of things. And yet, all of us feel the significance of the Fourth. Few if any would want to turn our backs on the project of being American, even if some of us aren't so sure if we can celebrate how we got here, and a small fraction of us (not me!) would like to go back to the way things were in the past. 248 years to build this, on a foundation that most of us believe or at least hope is pretty solid. Two years short of a semiquincentennial. My, we are young! Young enough to be foolish I suppose. You know how teenagers are -- always taking that chance at something goofy and self-serving because they think they're invincible and deserving. Let's hope that we get some maturity and wisdom going as we elect our next batch of leaders this coming November.

Happy Fourth to you!

On a slightly lighter note (but be warned -- not in any way good!) -- the Fourth has always been momentous for me because by this date, you know if you're going to have an okay mosquito year or a bad one. And sure enough, this morning dispelled all hopes of a good one. All that rain, all that green jungle growth? Their heaven, and therefore our hell. Those nasty guys are out in armies posed to kill right now!

A few years ago, when things were even more dismal mosquito-wise (hard to imagine, but yes, it's been worse), we did spray. Every two weeks, for a couple of months. We hired someone to pump some frou-frou organic stuff, guaranteed to at least decrease their population significantly. There was all this promise of survivorship among the "good bugs" -- meaning everyone else except for mosquitoes -- but of course, that has to be hogwash because to my knowledge, there's nothing out there that kills off JUST mosquitoes. In any case, the stuff was good for about two or three days and then slowly they would come back. The yard smelled of garlic. I was happy, in the way that you are when your own personal interest has been served and you've managed to block out all the residual consequences your happiness may have had for others who inhabit the planet.

Today I suggested to Ed that we consider spraying this year again. Just to do away with the great bulk of the menace. Because they do multiply and so things tend to get worse, not better, as the season progresses. Sort of like old age.

July 4th, therefore, is a turning point for me. In some years it is the day I start to think  -- you know, winter isn't so bad after all. You may need a warm jacket and mitts and a cap, but at least you're not zapping away at swarms of blood sucking bugs. Yeah, winter's not so bad!

The cruelty of it all is that everything outside is so beautiful right now! The lilies are just now beginning to come into their own...

The air is warm, the fragrance is of the earth, of flowers.

And yet you can't fully revel in it, unless you spray yourself with some poison to ward off the aggressors. (Which is what Ed had to do as he went out to deal with our mounting compost pile.)

Still, I slap and smack and I clean the garden. It takes about 90 minutes to snip and pull some weeds while I'm in there being bitten alive. I'm hauling in about 300 spent lilies a day, which is on the low side, though I haven't bothered with the road-facing bed, so the count is really a bit more than that. Still, it's a sign of either the earliness of the season, or of the fact that we just haven't had that much sunshine. Lilies, like tomatoes, like sunshine.

 

Breakfast, on the porch.

With this guy.

Then we get a little lazy. Ed biked yesterday so he feels like he's paid his movement dues. Me -- no excuse. I got up too early! I deserve some couch time!

After snacking away at what I would affectionately call "lunch," Ed proposes we head out. Where? To a place we like to go to every couple of years -- the Stoughton Fair.

 

 

Stoughton is a small town to the south of us and it holds an annual fair which has the typical rides and stuff that goes from town to town in the summer, and then, more importantly, it has the farm animal show and competition. You will find a lot of beautiful cows, goats, sheep, chickens, pigs, turkeys, rabbits and ducks.  And I mean a lot. You'd never know we have so many young people taking care of farm animals in the vicinity. (It is mostly young people and they are all locals.)

We spend a good two hours walking the fairgrounds (just the animal part). Photos? Of course!

It is just awesome to see kids doing such good work with their animals. I mean, to bring a sheep to such excellence is work. Round the clock hard work. And I cant tell you how many beautiful lambs and sheep alone were paraded before judges. (A lot!)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gorgeous animals, loved and well cared for. Though as Ed noted - probably slated to be eaten at some point. But then, Ed usually can be counted on to bring up the unfortunate side of these things.

I can't say that I moved with any vim and vigor today. And I noticed that although my cough was finally going away, I seem to be back to sneezing. Too many animals? Maybe, but I also traveled. For the first time, without masking. (No one masks in airports anymore. Maybe one traveler in several thousand.)

Could I have Covid? For the second time in my life? Nah... I feel fine. Waste of tests. But then again, there's Ed. There are the kids, soon to return to farmhouse schedules... I'm a compulsive tester. I'll test.

The rain came down hard as I sat there with my test kit and watched the line move right into positive.

Oh damn. Ed!

He moves out of the farmhouse. 

Our Fourth ends this way: I'm alone, he's alone, the mosquitoes are multiplying, it's raining like nuts.

I made a pot of chili so that I wouldn't have to cook for the next several days. Is there such a thing as a too quiet an evening? Ed and I are not fans of fireworks. We're on the side of all the birds and animals that hate all that noise. But this farmhouse emptiness is something else altogether.

Well, so it goes. I do hope you had a cheerful, thoughtful, reflective, beautiful and healthy Fourth!

with love...

this is the life...

In your crazy existence, there are moments when suddenly you get a breather, maybe on vacation, say by a pool or by a lake or ocean, stretched out on a lounger, cool drink in hand, good book on your lap, gentle breeze rustling the pages (well, maybe not on a Kindle page, but you get the idea) and you say -- ah, this is the life! As if this moment of idleness is what you aspire to, eventually, and especially when you retire. 

I get it. Reclining in the middle of the day, coddling yourself with a book that promises a good ending, after the rush of each working day -- I get it. I used to love sunbathing on beaches for this reason. You are lying down and doing nothing! Unimaginable on a regular old day back home.

But the standards (for "this is the life!") change over time.  For me, there is still the exotic allure of being in the Luxembourg Gardens on a sweetly perfect spring day, or sitting at Cafe Varenne and watching the hum of life around me -- that's feels awesome! But the time I say "this is the life!" with the greatest amount of vigor and conviction is on days like this: hot outside, a little too buggy, but still, I weed and snip and fix things in the garden. And then I sit down to breakfast with Ed on the porch and it's a tad too warm for him, but still, we do it, and the skies are dazzling and the lilies are perky again, and I think -- ah, this is the life! And then I work some more -- not too much, because honestly, things are looking okay out there, intervention not needed on a grand scale, just small bursts of weeding in the usual spots that always produce too much of the stuff that doesn't belong, and then I come in to our cool living room -- no AC yet because if you keep the windows closed there is so much shade around the house that it really does keep things cool inside, and I sit down and Ed is there too, and I maybe make myself my second cup of milky coffee, so un-Italian and un-French, so incorrect, but so yummy and I think again -- ah, this is the life!

Because really, it's such a beautiful day that if you can't find pleasure in it now, in your older age, well then what's the point... (Exceptions allowed! Older age can raise tricky health issues and can bring with it a lot of personal loss. All the more reason if you are not suffering either of those, you really ought to take a look around on a day like this and admit this much: to be here, in this world of flowers and trees and foods that nourish you and people you love -- well, now, sit back and let it out -- this is the life!)

As for photos -- well, as I said, the morning, after all that rain was buggy. And I had to get Ed out of bed because when I went to feed the animals, I noticed that once again someone had taken down the cat door to the sheep shed. We think it's a skunk or a racoon who wants to get inside to eat the leftover cat food that we leave out for the three cats that basically live in that shed. In any case, Ed needed to fix it ASAP, because with the downed door, the mosquitoes had been given a clear passageway to the inside and they were making use of it! 

Some early morning garden photos:

Ed absolutely would not pause until that cat door was firmly in place. That means that breakfast would be very very late. Well, here's an idea -- why dont I bike over to Tati's Cafe in the new development and pick up some of the Madison Sourdough treats that they now sell on most mornings?

Yeah!

I also bike over to take a peak at Steffi's House. Did the rains wash it away? They did not. Is the crew doing the landscaping? They are! (Well, one of them is...)

Home again. For breakfast. With Ed.

More work outside.

Some afternoon garden photos:

And now time on the couch, over that second milky coffee... Such a feeling of contentment and well being washes over me... The stress (and excitement) of climbing a mountain, of making a flight connection, of driving a single-track -- all that's behind me. Things are calm right now... How good is that!!

(Dance, on the couch...)

(hens, at rest: one in the barn, two in the shade, three in the sun...)

Finally, an evening garden photo:

 

with love...