And So It Goes....

It is strange, this little Life of mine.

As with all things, lately, this Pennsylvania Year is already a run away train. One hardly can breath within this tangle of excitement, trepidation, and wonderment.

My mornings are spent working in a professional setting with plants. This is not as easy as it might sound. There is driving to and fro on an unfamiliar leviathan of highways, running up and down ladders, heavy lifting, and moving amongst large professional buildings, a world of foreign cubicles and workers that I always shake my head at. I have never understood that life, boxing oneself in such a fashion, spending years--decades even--of one's life caged like this.  But there are those who thrive in it and  I suppose it’s just as easy to look at me and consider me a foolish person for choosing  a non-corporate job, a "secure" one. I suppose it's a matter of what tribe one's values come from--and it's all risk at the end...all we have is time, and what we do with it.  For now, mine is an amalgam of rushing and watering and worrying over foliage and fauna. 

There are parts of me that wonder if I’ve gotten myself overwhelmed in this job, that I won’t have time to create the fun mayhem I’ve conspired in my head. Other parts of myself shut out these fears--as first time job jitters. It will smooth itself out in the end…..

From there, it is glorious Summer afternoons spent knee down in the soil of a small garden. We are now in apricots, with the ritual shaking of trees and running willy-nilly to grab fallen fruit. The taste of Strawberry Summer is a distant memory, it's funeral only a short week ago. Nature is like that--briefly beautiful and bountiful, but fickle and fast passing, too.

I am watching my little garden, an index of recipes mentally swirling in my head based on the ingredients that are popping up right before my eyes. I am especially eager to eat the heirloom tomatoes that are growing fat before my eyes. I’ve grown them before, in a city landscape, but I wonder how they will do here. Will they be bigger, better? Will they taste different?

I will not know this yet, however, as they stay obnoxiously green. Instead, it looks like my black satin eggplants have made the most of the sun and might beat all in the harvesting department. Right now, two of those fellas are looking good, and somewhere in the old noggin, I am thinking eggplant parmesan might be happening in a week or two.

There is other exciting news: I am headed back to the city for a visit this weekend. It will mark a month since I have been to Pennsylvania.  I am missing my friends and realize that in my brief foray into PA so far, I’ve been far too busy with my job to actually cultivate a social life. I am also missing those New York City folk, the ones who know me, have shared tales to tell amongst us, and who love me for my good and flawed characteristics, anyway. I am also hoping to wrap arms around a certain Sweetheart. There is much sacrifice between us during  this Pennsylvania year and I am hoping the road flows well and forward for us.

I am also, oddly, still mired in the world of bees. There is a rooftop in the midst of the Big Apple, full of bees I have been missing, their buzzing haunting my dreams. I will be harvesting their honey this weekend,  and there already seems to be a loyal band of takers to this particular liquid gold. It’s humbling, knowing people are actually interested in those things you are producing and selling, and so many people are now interested in raw, local honey.

It’s been quite a trip so far….so tell me, what is your Summer like so far? How Goes it for you?