A Late Freeze, An Intuition and a Garden Saved

This year I was partially feeling guilty about waiting so long to start my planting.  Am I lazy?  Why couldn't I bring myself to dig and hoe and plant?  Then, we had freezes well past the date I would have planted.  Thankfully, the vines are undeterred.  Both are sprouting new leaves.  The beets loved the cold.  The chives haven't stopped spreading.  The weeds are just as thick as ever.

The tiny seeds?  This year they needed more time.  Much like my children.  They need more time for their physical development.  They aren't on a typical child's gross motor development.  I've trusted my instinct on what do about their education.  This week I found out what the public school system would have expected of my kindergartner in the name of "safety," and it would be detrimental to their long term progress.  They would have stuck us in an unpleasant situation due to expectations on his bowel disability.  We've done what's right for him at the right time, but their timetable wouldn't have done that.  My gardens needed more time this year: both my green one and my kinder one.

Wondering When I Can Plant

It's right before the last frost of the season, and I have no idea when I can get planting.  I should have the next few weekends for hours of gardening.  However, I have some things to do for the car and errands and without help on the weekends with the boys.  In the last two years, we had help with one boy because he was tube fed during the day.  The Vintner was agreeable to keep an eye on the other boys.  Now, the boys are orally fed during the day and tube fed during the evening.  The Vintner does not help with this, except occasionally turning the pump off after I got to bed, and flushing the line with water.  I have all of two or three hours between the feedings, and during that time I have to prepare the boys meals.  One of the boys is on a special diet.  We cannot afford to purchase his foods as convenience foods, and must make them from scratch.  I don't mind in the least, and enjoy this, as evidenced by the Cottage Vineyard Kitchen.  However, it takes even more time from other tasks, like work in the vineyard - not that either vine needs much these days, or in the garden.  Really, I have only an hour at a time.  Cleanup and meal preparation and feeding on the hospital regimen can take over four hours of the day.  Then there is my other child, who also needs care. Somewhere during this time, I have homeschooling and housework and driving back and forth to therapy and writing.  What is missing? Care for myself.  Gardening used to be part of my psychological care.

I enjoyed taking a break to watch the blossoms on the neighbors' trees.  I don't know when I can get enough time to myself any time soon, although I know I need it.  No one can continue at a busy pace like this for long.  I do feel frustration at asking for help and only getting excuses: from my mother, my friends, the agency for the employees and the Vintner.  I will appreciate the break all the more when it comes.

On Eating Mashed Potatoes

My eldest son has decided that he does eat mashed potatoes, after all.  I'm so relieved, because I was prepared for it to take four weeks, not two.  At last I can settle into our new pattern at home.  The intense feeding regimen that we began at the feeding therapy program prevents me from attending to other things here at the cottage.  I spend about half of my day preparing and feeding them.  Then, we have homeschooling and other child care.  One day, it won't be quite so all consuming, but that assumes we won't see a progression of the boys medical conditions.  If we do, it may be even busier.  I am prepared to have even less time to attend the vines.  Fortunately we chose a vineyard over a dairy farm.

A Spring Rain on Pear Blossoms

As I sit near the window here at the cottage, I can look across the street and see rain gently falling on our neighbors' blossoming pear trees.  It's beautiful.  We don't have the brutal weather of other places in early March.  I can see a few green leaves budding out, but mostly the trees are covered with delicate white flowers.  Every day they change a bit more.  I wonder how many people don't even notice a bit.  I am certain many people do appreciate them.  We live in that kind of place.  Unlike other neighborhoods I know,  we are surrounded by walkers, cyclists, skateboarders and the like.  So many people are always around us. How much better to have trees and gardens and neighbors than to have landscaping and associates - wouldn't you agree?

A few weeks from now, all the trees will be filled with green leaves.  The blossoms will be gone. The grasses will be lush and needing weekly management.  I'll have weeds to pull out by their roots.  The garden will take up so much of my Saturday mornings.  The grape vines will bud again.  For now, we can enjoy the rain before the rain of work begins.

Thriving Spinach and Beets

Here at the vineyard, spring is just around the corner.  I could, and should, plant cold weather seeds this weekend.  I won't.  I'm too busy with the children and errands.  I'll have another window the following weekend.  Fortunately, I don't have to worry too much about that.  My spinach and my beets survived the winter and look gorgeous.  I even have garlic chives hanging onto their space in the garden.

Fortunately, I have a toddler playing in the garden, digging to his heart's content.  It saves me work for him to  "play" and accomplish the hardest work.  I love having little ones who are happy to work as play.  Not that he doesn't have more than enough toys.  He's a delightful boy who loves to help.  He watches whatever we are doing and dives right in alongside us, especially me.

Both my beets and my spinach are heirloom varieties.  I discovered early in the winter a new garden supply business that features organic and heirloom items.  I have amazing support for my way of looking at the world, and it's all around me.  I appreciate so much how much I have - physical, emotional, geographical, social and spiritual.  Few people get to live in a magical space like I do.  Someone else my not be so fond of my little lot.  They would be missing all the beauty that I'm experienced enough in the ways of the world to treasure.

My Musings On John 6:60-7:13

John 6:60-7:13

In our own time, we can see people who are initially attracted to Jesus become disenchanted and fall away.  Jesus knew more than Judas Iscariot's betrayal.  He was abandoned by many disciples, Jewish leaders and even his own brothers who wanted to distance themselves from him. He knew that there would be those who came to him for his miracles, but couldn't accept all his teachings.  We like to believe that the way we see the world is the way it really is.  We like to believe that our understanding of what is true and good is the whole story.  Jesus was able to see so much more than we ever can.  He sees our struggle with the truth.  He knows how much we want clear rules to follow and simple explanations of things for which there are no simple explanations.

In my own life, I've struggled for many years to be good enough.  If I can just be the best I can be, then that will in turn mean I'll get my needs fulfilled.  Recently, I've discovered that it just doesn't matter.  I can't be good enough.  It's not a matter of being good enough.  I was afraid that if my flawed self were discovered, then I'd be cast out of the life I've spend years building.  Instead, I've found acceptance.  Being the best rule follower and trying to meet assumed expectations only made me unhappy.  While my life was filled with meaning, being a "Good Christian" was creating an impediment to closeness with the very people I needed - especially Jesus. 

Jesus knew, and knows, all of his betrayals.  He still loved the Jewish leaders and Judas, even as they plotted to kill him.  He still loves me, even though I was trying to hide my flawed self.  Being a Christian doesn't mean following another set of rules on top of all the rules in the Old Testament.  It's a new covenant that has nothing to do with earning.  It involves hard teachings that we may not even want to accept.

A Standoff

My elder son is pushing back, as they called it in feeding therapy.  He's not having any of the mashed potatoes.  Nope, nada - not one bite.  Otherwise, he's doing well with adjusting to the feeding at home.  He's had a rough day with behavioral problems.  He's testing my limits.  I won't allow for him to succumb to the behavioral adaptations that he previously had.  We've committed to a new protocol for feeding, and we're going to see this through.  I know that we've made the right decision to help both boys reduce their dependence on tube feedings.

Emotionally, I've looked to the vines here at the Vineyard for solace.  They are dormant.  Not one bud of a leaf on either of them.  I can wait.  They will bud.  Then, following the leaves comes the grapes.  The children will grow just as the vines will grow.  My vineyard may not look like another woman's.  However, it's mine.  I don't have to have a thousand hectares of merlot vines.  They wouldn't suit me anyway.  I'm better suited to my two scraggly mystery vines.