Spent the day in the Roofscape's garden in the Fenway getting ready for - although I'm in denial about this - the fall. Fall! Where did the summer go? Well it was here today, the temperature grazing 90° in the heat of the day.
Cloudless with just some high thin overcast, haze hovering over the river, fitful westerly breezes. Crickets in a high, fast chorus with ranks of lower, slower singers; cicadas rising, swelling and fading away against this steady soundscape. A horn heard in the distance across the water practicing in Mother's Rest. A tune I couldn't place, but for once it wasn't Ride of the Valkyries. Bees and wasps buzzing in the flowering mint. Dragonflies the size of your hand beating their impossibly gossamer wings. Birds calling as they glean the grapes newly ripened, many gone straight to raisins, on the vines. Reeds bowing and raising back up in waves. A slight sound of surf. The city far away.
Grooming the garden. Pulling out the summer stuff as it fades and planting the cool weather crops. Often these are the same, but after a summer of production the collards, for example, need renewal. And there's always new lettuce to plant. Most of these will go until they disappear under the snow. The frost brings out their sweetness. Spinach, collards and kale kissed by the frost are utterly different animals, well plants; sweet, round and rich. Something no supermarket will ever supply. You have to grow your own to taste something that good.
The fern brake is weary too, looking sunburned and droopy. I cut them back to the ground and they soon return looking fresh and rested, a bright vernal green that lasts through the more moderate late summer weather. The other reason this year is to finally dig out the rampant multiflora rose which has ressurected in their midst. Maybe. I could feel the shovel about to snap going up against those though roots. The canes bit and lashed against me in protest. We left it at a draw, both wounded, but I was the one retired from the field of battle.
Indeed many weeds. Everywhere but thin air. The three composters are piled high, bulging and groaning. With more to come. I'll shovel out the finished compost from the bottom, then jump on their tops and water them down. Some people don't compost weeds - but if they don't, what then do they compost? A weed being just another word for a very successful plant. Off with their heads and onto the pile.
A quiet day - Peter and Charles the only neighbors, late in the afternoon. Charles said that there were over 40 recent break-ins. A squad car was parked in the middle of the field behind the reeds along the river - all day (unprecedented), relieved later by an unmarked Crown Vic. He thinks that this is retaliation. The reeds were cut down right to the water (apparently by mistake), almost eliminating the open air sex and drug rooms that they harbored. And their denizens are not happy campers.
My wonderful day ended on that note. Had a pad thai and pedaled back home as the shadows fell.
Image ... Geese flying over the Fens.
