Monday, March 24, 2008

Swiss Chard

I just had to take a picture of this beautiful vegetable. The striking red stems burst with so much color that they simply can’t contain themselves, spilling their joy and lifeblood into the leaves, as well. Color is playing a more important role in my enjoyment of vegetables and these days, it seems the brighter, the better. The Halloween orange of the sweet potato…ahh! The verdure of spring asparagus…heaven! And my new favorite vegetable, one that I couldn’t stand to have pass before my nose as a child, the blood red/purple beet…simply looking at its beating center makes me happy, truly!

I long for the days when these vegetables are a part of my own landscape--for the summers when the sunburned red of tomatoes will fill my window sills or when the lovely mix of inky black compost and summer squash coat my kitchen sink.

These images, both of my present and future dinner plate, fill my heart with a contentment that is new to me. When I muse about what life could be like for John, Aidan, August and myself—simple country living, growing our own food, living and learning together—I feel so grounded. As if I am being pulled closer to the dust from which I came while simultaneously being nudged from above into a life groove most befitting my true self.

May I only be worthy of such a calling.


“There are two spiritual dangers in not owning a farm.

One is the danger of supposing that breakfast comes from the grocery,

and the other that heat comes from the furnace.”

Aldo Leopold

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