STRESSED IS JUST ‘DESSERTS’ SPELLED BACKWARDS

It’s like the Universe is trying to tell me something ... like “go make a rhubarb crisp” or “this is a cinnamon bun baking kind of day”.  Heck even a puffed wheat cake would be a good use of my energy.

My jittery, hyped up, nervous energy.

I’ve got some things on the go.  Nothing Earth shattering, really: just Life.  Projects I’ve started, stuff I’m involved in, committees I belong to.  Individually they are all just small things - just a meeting here and there and a little volunteering from time to time.  I actually like this role of giving back to my community.  It’s just that back in February when plans were first forming for our summer season it all seemed so far off and laid back.  As of yesterday we are officially past the first day of summer and February’s far off big picture has made its usual progression into multiple lists and details and duties that seem to get more numerous each day.  July 1^st is only nine days away.  The crunch is on.

We’ve literally done everything there is to be done at nine days out.  There have been blips along the way, for sure, but at this point in time we are on top of it.  I think. 

I’ve double and triple checked the lists from other years and nothing seems to be missing.

We’ve made up the worker’s list and even have a few new names to work with.

The posters and ads have been proof read several times – let’s hope we caught all the important stuff.

And there’s absolutely nothing I can do about the weather.

I try (in vain) to recall how it feels to have the whole day behind me:  that happy kind of tired we get because it’s all done for another year, the writing down of ‘lessons learned’ so we have them for next time, and the occasional pat on the back for the work we’ve done.  I know the antidote for all this pre-event stress is a successful ending, and I just can’t wait to get there.

I also have come to understand that it always is a success – even if it rains, or the band cancels, or we run out of hotdogs.  It is what it is.  People will eat cake in damp clothing, sing Oh Canada with a lump in their throat and stay for the fireworks because it’s our country’s birthday and we are all there to celebrate.

And yet I still can’t shake the anxiousness I feel.  I wish it was July 2^nd already!

Whenever an award like Citizen of the Year or Woman of Distinction comes up on the news I always listen in awe to the years of service these people have devoted to earn such a reward.  I add up their years of service and multiply that by the meetings they’ve attended, the ideas they’ve tried out, the cold calls they’ve made, and the donations they’ve asked for, and I think to myself that the recognition they are being given is like the light of a single candle when the mega watts of a search light is what should be called for. 

And as I watch the winner of the award accept her pretty plaque and graciously acknowledge all the people who deserve this prize with her I think to myself ... did she spend the time between the planning stage and the actual event baking desserts because she was stressed too?

PURVIS STEW

Given the kind of day it is today – cool and rainy (finally, thank goodness!) it seemed like a great day to make a pot of stew.  Comfort food, and since I like to cook it in the oven, the added warmth of having the oven on all afternoon is an extra plus.  Yes, it was a good day to make stew.

As I thawed out the meat there was a decision to be made:  would it be Hainsworth stew?  Or Purvis stew?  The regular, safe, ordinary gravy-based stew, or the weird concoction written in my mother’s handwriting that includes tomato soup and chopped cabbage along with all the regular meat and veggies normally found in stew? 

It had been quite a while, I decided ... out came the tomato soup.

Since tomorrow is Father’s Day I had been thinking about the man whose surname this recipe has taken on.  I smiled as I peeled the potatoes; he didn’t even know that he had a stew named after him.  Eons ago, in my growing up years, it was just ‘stew’.  It was only after joining this Hainsworth clan that I had to differentiate between two kinds of stew – after I learned how to make the meeker, plain, gravy version.

And, personally, I’ve often wondered how much dad liked mom’s version of stew.  I remember the food that his mother served – it was good, and wholesome, and plain.  I cannot imagine Grandma Purvis being so adventurous as to experiment with tomatoes and cabbage in a stew, let alone cooking the meat with some brown sugar and vinegar first to give it a bit of a sweet and sour flavour.  I think that would have been way outside the box for her.  Dad probably didn’t have ‘Purvis’ stew for the first thirty years of his life.

Which means, of course that it is not named correctly.  In the interests of not putting my mother’s maiden name out there on the Internet, though, we’ll just leave that one be.

It’s times like today when I’m thinking about such questions, and there is no one left who can answer them, that I enter into the world of regrets that all grown children visit from time to time.  Why do I only have my vague, one-sided memories to go on?  Surely there were times when we could have had conversations that covered silly, every day things like this!  Why don’t kids pay attention to these details that will matter to them some day?

The memories I do have of meal times are sweet though; our places at the table were him at the head of the table and me to his left, just around the corner.  I always had to watch him if green beans were on the menu.  He didn’t like them and if I wasn’t paying attention the serving on my plate mysteriously got bigger; it was a game we played.  As far as I can remember I never had to make him take back a scoop of stew, but I know mom only made that new-fangled dish, chilli con carne, on nights he wasn’t going to be home for supper because he said it was too spicy.  Something just tells me that dad would have preferred Hainsworth stew over his namesake.

And, for some reason, my sisters insist that I have the recipe wrong – that’s not how mom made it.  I had to show them the page in the wedding shower recipe book that mom gave me that proves it was her recipe.  Again, it would be nice to ask mom if her recipes evolved over time and I just got the 1973 version?  Something else I’ll never know.  All I know is that I’m the only one who makes it this way.

Which, ironically, means that it is only made by me – now a Hainsworth – so technically it should be the one called ‘Hainsworth’ stew. 

How’s that for a weird twist of Fate?  Something for my kids to try to figure out someday after I’m gone.

HIDING OUT

The dog and I are hiding out today.  We’ve been at it a lot this past week or so.  It’s just plain too hot to go outside.  When I say this aloud poor Turbo just rolls his eyes at me.  Apparently he feels that I don’t know the half of it – I’m not wearing a permanent, fluffy fur coat designed to withstand an Arctic climate.  He needs to understand that my genetics have evolved to keep me from dying of starvation and/or hyperthermia in the Scottish highlands.  We are both out of our element.  The 2019 version of June on the Canadian prairies is going to be the undoing of both of us.

The house maintains its cool, thank goodness.  We open the windows at night and close them when we get up.  Years ago we installed a very large area of ceramic tile flooring.  At the time everyone kept saying “Oh, I’ve heard they are so cold to walk on.  You’re going to be sorry with your choice.”  I can’t claim that I knew what I was doing, I just liked the tile and wanted something that could stand up to the wear and tear a family of six can dish out, but I have since learned that the miracle of heat conductivity in ceramics is my friend, not my enemy.

Those tiles take on whatever temperature they are surrounded with.  In the winter when the furnace is running they stay at a pretty constant and acceptable temperature.  If you’re cold and want some extra warmth you go over to where the furnace venting runs under the floor and stand there for a while.  Much more beneficial though, is how in the summer it takes on the night cool and keeps the house an oasis of cool the whole next day.  We don’t have an air conditioner but people don’t believe me when I tell them that.  It’s 28 degrees outside today, and only 22 inside without so much as a nickel being spent to keep it that way.

It’s not like I haven’t been outside.  Every day I go out and survey what this nasty heat and lack of rain is doing to all my plants.  Some are just withering in the sun.  Some are cooking against the black soil.  The poor things that survived 4 degrees of frost a couple weeks ago are now sun scorched and giving up in the intense heat.  I water them and apologise profusely every day that I can’t make it rain. 

I’ve tried ... washing my car, hanging clothes on the line ... nothing seems to work.

So, me and the dog are just hanging out in the house.  He is laid out flat on the cool floor, only to open an eye when I enter the kitchen – he wouldn’t want to miss out on a treat if there is one to be had.  Other than that his only movement is to get up and find a new cool spot when his body heat has cancelled out the cool where he was at.

As for myself, I tend to wander from window to window, looking out at the jobs that need doing.  Jobs that I would even enjoy doing – if only the sun wouldn’t melt my brain while I was doing it.  There are dandelions to cut, and weeds to pull, and trees to water, not to mention dead trees to clear out of the shelterbelt and branches to put through the wood chipper.  I could be busy for days.  But also I might die.

I have also gone back to my weather app habit that got me through the winter.  What is Environment Canada predicting for my future?  Is it ever going to rain again?  How long are the brain-melting temperatures going to last?  Can I go outside tomorrow? 

You do all realize that summer isn’t even here yet, don’t you? 

If you happen to drop by and find me laid out on my ceramic floor next to the dog, don’t worry.  It’s no accident – just us coping with eons of evolution in an era we weren’t designed for.

MAYBE THIS TIME

I’m so excited.  Well, I’m also a little wary, but still pretty excited.  Holding my breath.  Fingers crossed.  On the edge of my seat.

One of the primary benefits of living out in the country is the wildlife feature.  Oh sure, it would be nice to have pavement right to the yard, a store just a few blocks away, and if sewer and water problems develop they are someone else’s problem, but these are more than balanced out with the tranquillity of being miles from your closest neighbor, the endless green space we are surrounded by, and sharing the whole setup with wildlife.

There have been beaver and moose wandering right through the front yard, fox and coyote that keep our evenings alive with their wild music, and in the next month the yard will be twinkling with fireflies at dusk.  There are also white tailed deer that hang around but I’m not too happy about that right now.  They like my apple trees more than I like them at the moment.

At this time of the year though, it’s the birds that are the most fun.  Throughout April and May, as each warmer day follows another, birds of all shapes, colors, and sizes arrive back to declare spring is here.  The crows squawk it first, then great flying wedges of geese honk their greetings, followed closely by the robins.  Each of these harbingers of spring making us happier than the last.

Then the wait begins for the rest ... the morning doves, the meadow larks, the wood peckers, the little junkos and wrens, the noisy reunion of redheaded blackbirds on the slough north of the house.  I’m also always glad to see our blue heron back, and hear the strange sound of the slough pump (egret); it means that we have all made another trip safely around the sun.

I don’t know if they are the last to arrive – maybe I quit paying attention once I spot hummingbirds at the feeders – but their arrival gives me the biggest sigh of relief.  So good to see them “home” again!  In the thirty plus years that they’ve been summering here we’ve had as many as four nesting pairs at a time.  It makes for some crazy bird watching (and ducking) by mid August when the juveniles come to feed too.  They are like tiny Samurai warriors defending their territory; dipping, weaving, diving and chattering threats at each other.  It’s quite the show.

Almost at the same time as they arrive, the orioles do too.  I don’t know if they are travel buddies or that that they just know to follow the hummingbirds to where the sugar water feeders are, but sure enough they are a package deal.  Almost.  The hummingbirds stay, the orioles fuel up and move on. 

I want them to stay so badly, but they don’t.  I know they like oranges so I slice the fruit and set it out; they dine and leave.  I’ve tried grape jelly too; no dice.  It makes me so sad.

But this year (and I hope I’m not jinxing this by talking about it) it’s beginning to look like we have a couple of keepers.  We’ve been through seven oranges and they are still coming back for more.  It’s been more than a week – that’s never happened before.  The part that makes me the most hopeful is that the last two days it’s only been the male eating the oranges.  If my guess is right, the little lady is sitting on some eggs.  I am so excited!

AS PERENNIAL AS THE GRASS

Nothing makes me happier than the time I spend cutting grass.

I know that may sound weird to those who consider it a chore, but that’s not how I feel about it at all.  To me it’s a time of meditation and fresh air accompanied by one of my favourite scents – fresh cut grass.  What’s not to love?

I know what you’re thinking.  You are thinking that I must have a big, beautiful zero turn mower, and you are right about that, but I also have a push mower and I don’t mind doing the job that way either.  Although, with the size of our yard I would never get done if I had to do it all by hand, still the smell is the same, and the finished look it gives makes my heart happy.

The year’s mowing season has started off a little rocky.  There hasn’t been a really good rain to wash off the accumulated dust and mould, or to spur on lush green growth.  It left the yard looking shaggy and unkempt.  You know, that awkward stage when the quack grass hasn’t quite got the jump on the dandelions yet?  Only about 47% of the lawn needed to be cut but what did need it needed it badly. 

And then, the day I decided it was time to do something about the shaggy mess out there the battery on the mower was dead.  This kind of set back doesn’t stop me anymore.  I possess competent battery charger skills and I had that baby ready to go for the next day.  The trouble was that Day 1 had been a beautiful, sunny, warm, wind-free day and Day 2 there was a bit of a hurricane blowing (or as we say in Saskatchewan – there was a ‘slight’ breeze).  It’s been a week and I am still cleaning dirt out of my ears and eyes.

Regardless the benefits of being out there on my mower far outweigh the drawbacks.  Like I said earlier, mower time is a time for meditation and contemplation.  The job itself doesn’t require a lot of brain power – it’s pretty much just driving back and forth across the yard avoiding obstacles and trying not to be stabbed by branches when doing the tree line.  On the other hand, it’s important not to get too deep into thought – or I can end up too deep in the literal sense.  Our yard is prone to water hazards.

I also have had to become quite proficient at my self-towing skills.

So, keeping in mind that there are things I have to watch out for, this is when I contemplate Life’s problems – work related, marriage related, kid related.  Even when I worked full time and had very few hours to call my own I would always claim the mowing time – it’s not as if anyone interrupts what you’re doing when you are out in the yard on a noisy machine.  It may have been a loud solitude, but it was still solitude.

The job has developed a new nuance over the past decade or so, though.  There was a time when it was just a case of lawn care, but now there is more to think about than just how pretty your yard looks.  These days we are being asked to think about planet care.  People are experimenting with lawns of clover – low growing, green and lush, no maintenance yards.  We are encouraged to leave the dandelions for the bees and to plant more flowers for the butterflies and hummingbirds.  It is also wise to grow at least some of our own food – not only does it provide fresh, safe vegetables but it gives us all a better understanding of how Mother Nature works: small, grass-roots steps that can only do us all good as a species.

It was these very things I spent my first mowing session in 2019 thinking about.  The yard is unreasonably large to mow, and yet too small to farm.  I already have a huge garden so I won’t be expanding that; it looks like I will continue to mow this much grass.

On the other hand, there are a lot of dandelions out there.  Clover too; the flowering kind – very bee friendly. 

And as I whizz around the yard on my big, fancy zero turn mower this spring nothing makes me happier than seeing the butterflies are smart enough to get out of the way.  I’ve always had the kind of dandelions that are smart enough to duck the mower blades so they’re never going to run out of food

SLOW WALKING SPRING

I don’t know what’s wrong with me this year. 

Normally, by this time of May I am impatiently waiting for my garden to be tilled so that I can get some seeds in the ground.  That is if I haven’t taken it upon myself to get the tractor and tiller out and go do it myself.   While all the patient types talk about letting the soil warm up, or waiting for the last full moon before June or some other such nonsense, I’m always the one out there chomping at the bit, just dying to get dirt under my fingernails.

Oh, I know it’s been a chilly spring, but that’s never held me back before.  I love planting potatoes so much that some years I plant them twice – once to rot in the ground or freeze as soon as they stick their heads out, and another time a few weeks later when they are liable to grow and survive.  It keeps me busy.

By Mother’s Day in a normal year I am usually at a fever pitch to get seeds in the ground.  In my head I’ve come up with at least two dozen seeding plans and know full well that these plans will continue to evolve until I actually drop the seeds into the rows and cover them.  But this year there seems to be no hurry at all.  At the moment the tractor and tiller aren’t even here and I’m okay with that for a bit longer.  I don’t really want to plant seeds until the weatherman says we might get a rain to get them growing.  My weather app says that’s most likely to happen more than a week down the road and for some weird reason in 2019 I’m fine with that.

Maybe I’m just finally getting the hang of this being retired?  For most of my life I had to squeeze all my work into 24 hours per day when what I really needed was 30.  Now that my whole day is my own maybe I have managed to gear down?  Subconsciously I now accept that there will be enough time for everything? I don’t know.  It just seems bizarre that I don’t have a row of lettuce tucked in somewhere by now.

Oh wait.  I do.  I filled a planter with dirt and planted lettuce and radishes just to see how early possessing a greenhouse would provide me with a spring salad. 

But, other than that, my spring planting schedule is very relaxed.  At least once a day I wander my garden/orchard space.  My raspberries are coming like crazy, the saskatoons are leafing out, the rhubarb is up, and we’ll be eating asparagus by the end of the week.  Also, out on the big hill to the east there is plenty of room for the giant pumpkins, zucchini, and spaghetti squash, not to mention the cantaloupe and cucumbers – they need to be far apart so they don’t cross pollinate. 

Come to think of it, they need more space already – they are taking over the greenhouse.  I should go move them all outside for the day so they get ‘toughened up’ for their permanent transition to the real world.

This strange lackadaisical no-hurry-here attitude I’ve sprouted in 2019 is not an indication of a waning interest in gardening.  In fact, I have a whole new flowerbed all mapped out.  If I can get the rototiller fired up this afternoon I will ‘break ground’ today.  Heaven knows one whole side of the greenhouse is packed with perennials that will soon call it home.

And the next thing I’ll need to do is fill all my deck planters.  And plant all the gladioli that are soaking in the greenhouse. 

I’ve also decided where the tomatoes are going this year, but they’re not quite big enough for outside yet.

But, like I said, I just don’t feel the usual urgency to get out there and garden this year.  I can just take my time to get started this spring. 

It’s really weird.

GREENHOUSE INTERUPTED

And there I was; enjoying the space and sunshine out in my lovely new greenhouse with all my precious green babies when Mother Nature did a U turn and headed us back into winter.

It’s not like she doesn’t do such things on a semi-regular basis so I’ve been keeping a careful watch on what my weather app on my phone tells me.  Ever since I moved the tiny seedlings out to their own accommodations I’ve been mindful of how cold the nights are.  Their first night out I only had a small heater going – even though the thermometer said it was still a few degrees above zero in the morning I can tell you the watermelons and morning glories were NOT pleased with the situation.  From that point on they were tucked in with a much larger heater and a heat bulb for good measure to get them through the nights.  All was going well.

Until, of course, Mother Nature’s manic episode last weekend.

As I said, I keep an eye on such things so I knew it was coming.  There was lots of time to plan so I think it was Wednesday night’s insomnia stretch (my typical 2:30 to 4:15 stint) that I spent devising how to keep those babies warm.  After all, if you’re not going to sleep anyway, you may as well put the time to good use.  A person can only solve all the world’s problems so many times before the satisfaction gets stale.

I decided that I would move them all to the floor of the greenhouse, drape a plastic curtain over the area and stick the heater in the tent with them.  Same size heater, much smaller space: had to work.  I did the work and the temps dropped to -3 that first night.  Nothing died but they neither did they look happy.  Did you know that pumpkins can pout?  They do when they’re cold.

My weather app told me that things were going to get worse before they got better; obviously this was going to call for a Plan ‘B’.

There were options – like more heaters, which meant more extension cords from other outlets because of the fear of them tripping a breaker.  And even then, at minus 8 or 10, was that going to be enough?  The snow was starting to fall as I made the executive decision to haul everything back inside and wait out the bad weather with my living room looking like a jungle once more.

The plants seem to be doing fine with this turn of events, but whereas a week ago I was all gung-ho on all the gardening things I had to do, this week my momentum is all messed up.  I have transplanting that needs done but I would really like to keep that mess out in the greenhouse so I put it off.  There are some outside jobs to get done but I would really rather work in the greenhouse, out of the wind.  I have this urge to haul all my planters over and fill them with dirt but it’s too early for that.  I’ve wandered my garden umpteen times; Mother Nature froze off my three little asparagus tips that had emerged – she really isn’t in my good books at the moment.

If everything had gone according to plan - My Plan! - I would be happily transplanting nemophilia and lobelia this morning, and maybe starting my gladioli, basking in the warmth that a greenhouse offers.  Instead I’m doing laundry and vacuuming.  Any other month of the year I would consider this productive work.  My weather app tells me to ‘chill out’, Mother Nature is giving us the cold shoulder until the middle of next week.  I might take up pouting with my pumpkins.