Current Inventory of Growing Things

8 pickle cucumbers, with 3 gigantic pickles holding on for more companions.
3 pumpkin vines
1 bronze fennel plant
37 watermelon radish seedlings
7 cantaloup plants
28 banana pepper plants
6 eggplant
2 grapes, one black, one red
9 blackberry/raspberry stalks, I can't remember which is which
7 potato plants
25 corn stalks
27 climber beans
33 tomatillo plants - salsa verde ole!
32 strawberry plants
20 pattypan squash plants
5 bell peppers
29 tomato plants, 3 warding off blight
2 cabbages, loaded with aphids (should be getting rid of those!)
2 blueberries
1 passionfruit vine
11 swiss chard
2 collards, which I grow for the chickens
2 cucumbers
12 onions
1 lemon tree
1 orange tree
uncountable carrots, probably need thinning
mint
sage

At this time, I am watering all by hand, which takes me about one hour daily.  I keep my water bill down by using grey water from the washing machine and bio-eco-friendly laundry soap, but I need to reroute my soaker hoses so I can put them on a timer before the summer heat hits.
Other news is that my hollyhocks finally bloomed in their 2nd year and as soon as my camera battery recharges I will post pictures of their delicate loveliness.  In the meantime, enjoy my favorite rose (the only one that has survived my pitiable rose cultivation skills).  I can smell the fragrance of it just looking at the photo.

I am looking forward to sweating in the kitchen over the canner this summer!

Garden as Church

Everything is growing.  I find this to be a magical thing, although it happens all the time. 

My mother asked me why I don’t go to church and after telling her that it gave me the heebie jeebies, she asked for clarification.  What is it about church that creeps me out?  It’s not the scripture.  I have no problem with the Bible, old, new, Jewish, Christian, Gnostic.  Even the Qu’ran fascinates me.  But I don’t like the sound of someone else’s voice reading it.  Very self-centered, I realize, but I don’t like hearing a voice of God.  If I read it to myself, I can pretend that voice has no sound, which makes sense to me.  Similarly, I don’t like other people in church with me.  Yes, I want to have the whole place to myself, and that just doesn’t happen on Sunday morning.  So I have found a chapel of my own, close by, and full of wonder.

My garden is a humble place, but there are growing things and dying things, and to me that is the clearest evidence of a great design.  The fact that bright flowers emerge from nubs, or that fruits and vegetables peek out, plump up, and, if left to go full cycle, deposit the seeds for the next generation, these are miracles that prove the existence of purpose.   And it is so peaceful.  There are no sounds of someone else’s interpretations.  There is only life, as natural and pure as it gets.  The birds are calling to each other, the chickens are muttering, the branches in the jacaranda are creaking in the wind, and the cars on the road below drive by.  This is real to me.  This place gives me the regeneration and perspective I need to carry on.