Mums the word ’til you aster for an apple

A short burst of thunder early on this cloudy, cool, rainy morning prompted me to react that “It’s too early for waterfowl opener.” Can you guess how much I’m anticipating a change of seasons? We return to seasonal temperatures tomorrow for a week or so but today, with the thermometer at 60℉, I’m wearing, for the first time this season, a chamois shirt.

mums lining driveway, 2020

Photo by J. Harrington

The pots of mums and asters for the drive are in place awaiting planting. That may be a tomorrow or Sunday project. In between showers today I managed to scatter more mole repellant on the peony bed to be. We’ll see about getting that bed dug before the temps climb too much next week. It’ll give us a place to use much of the summer’s production of compost.

a bowlful of apples

Photo by J. Harrington

In celebration of the start of apple season, we’re having my famous grilled sourdough apple and cheese sandwiches for tonight’s dinner but this time I’m adding some sliced Virginia ham to the mix. Wish us luck. For a beverage, I’m planning on a glass of apple cider. The Better Half is welcome to share the cider if it appeals to her. It may be too much of a good thing for her taste. It’s the time of year when I get restless and miss New England a whole bunch. I’m working on compensating for my hiraeth.

A Short History of the Apple

Dorianne Laux - 1952-

The crunch is the thing, a certain joy in crashing 
through
living tissue, a memory of Neanderthal days.
   —Edward Bunyard, The Anatomy of Dessert, 1929


Teeth at the skin. Anticipation.
Then flesh. Grain on the tongue.
Eve's knees ground in the dirt
of paradise. Newton watching
gravity happen. The history
of apples in each starry core,
every papery chamber's bright
bitter seed. Woody stem
an infant tree. William Tell
and his lucky arrow. Orchards
of the Fertile Crescent. Bushels.
Fire blight. Scab and powdery mildew.
Cedar apple rust. The apple endures.
Born of the wild rose, of crab ancestors.
The first pip raised in Kazakhstan.
Snow White with poison on her lips.
The buried blades of Halloween.
Budding and grafting. John Chapman
in his tin pot hat. Oh Westward
Expansion. Apple pie. American
as. Hard cider. Winter banana.
Melt-in-the-mouth made sweet
by hives of Britain's honeybees:
white man's flies. O eat. O eat.

********************************************
Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.