It's the heart of summer right now - days that stretch on forever. If the sun is out, you feel like perhaps you could move mountains in a day. If it's cloudy, everyone tends to curl up, exhausted, and recharge. Manic Alaska summers. This year feels exceptionally manic. The long list of things that needed to happen to get the high tunnel up and running was so daunting, but today, as I wait for my sleeping children to rise, I feel like perhaps I am close to being caught up. It's been months.
Pretty much since the beginning of May, when the soil in the high tunnel got to be soft enough to work, my children and I and the Wwoofers who have come to stay with us have been sprinting. Setting up a 2,100-square-foot garden for the first time is no small feat. Add to that putting in an outdoor garden for potatoes and planting the old hoop house beds with cabbage, cauliflower and broccoli and you have quite a project.
And then there's the random factor. Like when the tractor came to till the soil in the outside garden and the well-meaning fellow who did the tilling tilled over the top of my septic tank, breaking it and causing a complete collapse that took a week and a half of very distasteful work to fix. I am grateful every time I flush the toilet, and have an indepth and hard-earned appreciation for all the inner workings of a septic system now.
The greatest surprise to me so far is the entire success of pretty much everything I've planted to date. Even the basil, which originally looked sad and unlikely to produce into anything of merit, has since taken off with ghusto after a generous application of lime. The tomatoes are crazy. Late-planted crops like squash and beets are up. The first generation of salad and bok choi are almost going beyond their prime.
This week, I put out an email to a few friends who live in the area saying that if they need salad greens, please come visit. I had my first visitor yesterday. What a joy to see her leaving with bags of greens and a smile on her face. I can see that this is just the tip of the iceberg. My zucchini plants are just starting to put out - tiny zucchini that will surely explode soon enough. Mysterious squash and pumpkin plants that I've never grown before are creating little yellow balls. The first tomato is turning golden in the tomato forest. We must learn how to prune. The peas are flowering. It's all happening at warp speed. Cucumbers. herbs. Carrots in beautifully-spaced rows.
Liam and Théa are having a different kind of summer, too. Matt is gone on a fire, and more often than not, they seem to be staying home with me, friends coming in, and trips to the beach and adventures with Wwoofers dotting the days. And the wonderful Wwoofers! This year started with Joe, who was as wonderfully tolerant and often amused by the antics of my smaller people and did countless loads of dishes and runs up and down the hill collecting people and dropping people off. Then came the dream team trio - Sue first, with her worried parents in tow, and a strong spirit and dedication to knocking back the weeds that were overtaking the tunnel. Then, the day the toilet died, Jeff and Peter arrived simultaneously, and together, the three of them took on huge projects, like planting a huge potato patch and digging all the fence post holes for the new outside garden and weeding and weeding and weeding.
More often than not, I give out a stream of confusing and vague directions on my way out the door, and somehow they figure it out. And then there are the times that I come back and see amazing things happening like Peter and Sue galloping through the yard, donning dress up clothes and a tutu for a wig, and strumming a guitar with children in tow. It brings me great joy to see these vibrant young people enjoying my world and my children getting to see an example of young adulthood that is creative and lovely.
Théa's imagination and intellect is exploding, Liam's creativity and loving nature are wonderfully rich, both are growing like weeds, and desirous of snuggles and love and endless stories. And they are up. And there are many more stories to tell. Of full tables, and a community that I love, and of course, Craig, who enriches our lives on so many levels, mine especially with an influence that is both calming and inspiring. But for now, it will have to wait, because this day is launching and there's no stopping it! Onward.
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