Thursday, May 9, 2019

A Better Day


My green beans are blooming and I actually picked a good handful today and I figure that if you add in my labor, each one of them should be worth about twenty dollars.
Let's face it- I do not grow food to save money. I do it because it tastes better, I know what was and wasn't used in the growing of it, and you can't beat it for freshness. But perhaps mostly because no matter how much I bitch and moan about the heat and the ants and being too old now to do it the way I used to, it is something that I apparently need to do for my own soul and wellbeing.

It's been a good day. I have neither cried nor napped. The past few days I have slept at least an hour every afternoon and it's been that kind of sleep which I fall into, deep and dark, to escape thought and feeling, an erasing of consciousness, temporarily at least. But not today. I'm actually tired now (and there is a difference) from my walk, from gardening, from house chores.
I even cleaned out a cabinet and threw things away that I know I will never use. This is not much of an accomplishment and neither is anything else I did but the very fact that I have done something of use, have been even vaguely productive, is good. When the black dog sits on your lap or even on your porch, it is so very hard to gather the energy to do anything.
"What's the point?" is the mantra on those days.
"What is the fucking point?"
And no answer comes to mind which seems adequate.
This is hard to explain to someone who has never wrestled with depression but for those of us who have, it is absolutely as familiar and self-explanatory as, well, breathing.

My hens each laid me an egg today except for Darla who sits so patiently on her nest. My husband brought me home a magnolia blossom and put it in one of my Goodwill silver coffee servers.


I guess it's a coffee server. I really have no idea. The blossom is closed up for the evening but will open in the morning. And it fills my kitchen with its sweet, but not too sweet, lemony scent. 

I picked some arugula for a salad tonight and also, some collards and kale which will go into my chicken dish. 


The bugs are getting to those plants fast and I need to use as many of them as I can before they are nothing but lace on stems. My corn is a few inches tall, my tomatoes are blooming (and Mr. Moon just told me that they are already getting bugs), my squash are blooming, my row of black-eyed peas is looking good and the dollar weed hasn't entirely choked the cucumbers yet. Cucumbers are so funny. Some years I barely get enough for a few salads and some years I get so many that the canning kettle never cools down from the pints of pickles I make in it. 
I wonder what this year will be like? I surely would not mind making a crock of those sweet pickles that almost hurt your teeth with the amount of sugar in them. It's been several years since I had enough cukes to do that. 

Well, I better get to the third shift of the day. The cooking of supper, the packing of my husband's lunch for tomorrow, the filling of the blender jar with what he will whirl into a smoothie tomorrow morning before he goes to the gym. Right now he's raking leaves and dumping them on the garden as mulch. I have told him twice that that's enough. That he needs to come in and rest. 
"Thank you," he replied to me the second time I offered these instructions. And then he hauled the garden cart back to the front yard. 
The man never listens to a word I say. 

Mostly. 

I am grateful for the surcease of darkness today. It's a subtle but very real shift. It would be nice to wake up tomorrow feeling the same. I think that Lily and Jessie and the kids and I may go to the Wacissa and if there is such a thing as soul balm, the river would be it, especially with little children splashing and playing and needing to be wrapped up in towels and hugged in order to warm up. 
We shall see. 

Love...Ms. Moon







8 comments:

  1. Do you ever grow crowder peas? My grandmother did in Alabama. They're really good.

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  2. you have so much in your garden and all I did this year was tomatoes. and peas but the peas are done and I pulled them up last week. and lots of flowers. but I need to do better with food especially with the state this country is in with Trump rescinding all safety regulations, cutting back FDA inspections, and lifting bans of poisons. I wasn't kidding about the micro doses of magic mushrooms for depression, clinical studies even back up their effect and my son is taking them and he says it helps.

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  3. I need to be potting up a tomato plant soon, no matter which back porch it's on.

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  5. I'm glad you had a better day. Your greens definitely look good! I'm glad to hear you have bug trouble in your garden, too. I feel like I'm always the one complaining about pests! (In our case, slugs and squirrels more than insects.)

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  6. I hate depression about as much as I hate cancer. Bah!

    Thank you for your kind words. I'm glad you're feeling better. I ended up being called in to work yesterday on my day off but it was only for five hours so not so bad.

    I am in awe of gardening in Florida. I will be able to plant in a week or two. It finally hit 70F yesterday which was lovely. My perennials are coming up, they're a hardy bunch and the trees are just starting to sprout their leaves, well, almost. It's a short but intense summer here.

    Take care.

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  7. Thank you for your kind words regarding my birthing post. I am always happy to know that you have good days. Your garden sounds fabulous even with the bugs. I hope it is bountiful.

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  8. Just letting you know I'm here, holding your hand. Love.

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Tell me, sweeties. Tell me what you think.