Tuesday, July 17, 2012
The Backyard Bounty
After a stretch of sunshine, the gardens are stabilizing. The Farmers' Market is filling out: gooseberries, raspberries, fresh garlic, broccoli, zucchinis as well as the usual suspects. Wednesdays in the Creek are becoming a tradition; Sebi and I bring a basket and some cash and stock up as much as we can. The only reason is we go to the store anymore is for nuts, the odd watermelon (we can't help ourselves), milk and cheese. Otherwise, we've stocked up at the food co-op and are trying to eat way more brown rice and beans to match our veggies. This is kind of diet used to be so unappealing to me, but I've come around. There's nothing some spices, chipoltle mayo, soya sauce or an avocado can't spruce up. It's also an exercise of strategy and creative cooking. And of course, sacrifice.
Even with the garden underway, we still can't rely on it. We baby the plants. At dusk we drown slugs, we water squash so carefully to avoid powdery mildew, and we built contraptions for the tomatoes, tobacco and cucumbers to trap heat. We see entire rows of kale and beets devoured overnight by a handful of wood bugs or one tiny slug. We can't rely on our garden yet. It will get better and better with the years, as we build the soil up, save seeds, hone our knowledge. We had a late start with moving mid-April and a wet spring, but there will always be wet springs. Or dry springs and wet summers. Or wet both, or dry both. Right now we're lucky if the garden supplements the farmers' bounty. We get a handful of raspberries from the path, or a few sweet peas or some stalks of kale. Later we will get more, onions, potatoes, squash and tomatoes, but not now. Right now, we're turning to the native plants that thrive in wet springs, or mild summers, no matter what the West Coast throws at them, they can adapt. We have a huge salal bush in the yard (you know, the dark glossy leaves often found in bouquets) and as the berries ripen you realize you're crazy to spend the day hunched over the raspberry spindles, watering, mulching, slug-picking when you have an abundance of berries right there, thriving. They taste like grapes and wild blueberries, a tad chewy and a bit fuzzy, but you adapt. We find native blackberries buried under morning glory on the edge of the yard, and find they are so good, lemony somehow. So we pick them, freeze them, store them for a big berry mix in the freezer. We go out to the shady forests and pick huckle berries for hours. We spend the afternoon in the cherry tree and eat well for days. Next will be blackberries, that rampant, aggressive, thorny weed that blesses the West Coast all over. Is it perfect? No. We have to leave a lot for the birds, bears and the plants themselves. We get caught road-side without water and have to eat half our bowl. We sit with children on our laps and try to ignore their little hands shovelling berries into their mouths as we pick. But man, it's satisfying, and on the best of days, even bountiful.
Sebastian's imagination is roaming these days. He talks about impossibles that quickly become truths around the house. For example, Sebastian and Poppy go to work together in their "car-car" and we have to bid them farewell. This usually happens on Sunday, the one day of solid family time for us. I say, "Hey Sebi, neither Mama or Papa have to go to work today!" and he replies, with a serious look, that he in fact is heading off with Poppy. Fair enough. He also works with Shed staff in various awesome places, such as "sky!" or "in a boat!" At first some Mom-guilt set in about his boundless imagination settling on the mundane, work of all things, but I quickly realized it's a form of mimicking and relating, and it's fine.
Work is a big topic around here, though, especially this summer. When I'm not down at the taco stand on the weekend, Sebastian often has to endure my long phone conversations about Shed logistics, stock orders, or run out with me mid-day when I'm not supposed to be working. There are other sorts of work, too, of course. Laundry, cooking, gardening, cleaning and so on. And emails to UBC, bouts of editing and reading for my freelance stuff. Alex is working four days a week on Keats as well, and throughout the day Sebi often checks in with me to makes sure that Papa is in fact at work.
He doesn't ever seem frustrated about all this work, although the transition back into the summer schedule made him clingy for a couple of weeks. We make sure to lay as low as possible whenever we can. Most days we play in the garden or go for walks. I like to think it keeps us sane.
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