Summer Gardening 6 (Last Installment in This Series)

The monsoon came. By “monsoon,” I mean only a week of showers. The hot, muggy weather, punctuated by frequent spells of rain, grew a carpet of tiny weeds over the bare soil of my garden. I pulled the tall weeds that had a head start and waited for a day dry enough to push my one-wheeled cultivator through the open ground.

For several weeks, the weeds and I did battle. Eventually, I surrendered, and a lush growth of crabgrass soon carpeted the ground. 

My Garden on September 27th with Crabgrass

And Brown Stalks of Sunflowers

Here is what I had thought I would write in my blog: Meanwhile, my snow peas enjoyed the wet earth. They curled their tendrils upward, flowered, and began to form the edible pods for which they are revered. I was amazed that peas, which I have always considered a cool-weather crop, could be harvested in August! Pods with their fresh snap adorned my salads! Unfortunately, I could not compose such sentences. My snow peas were a total flop. They remained stunted plants that set on nary a pea, as my grandmother might have said.

Was I disappointed? Why, yes! But I looked back on a summer of fun and contentment amounting to bliss: not a loss, no matter what!

My garden was essentially finished. It amazes me how quickly a garden adopts a bedraggled appearance after the plants have ceased to be productive. The shabby stalks of broken-down sunflowers and the browned leaves of what had been vibrantly green beans not a month ago were symbolic of the change of seasons and of all things that begin, only to end. Of course, nature also represents things that end, only to begin! Five months had elapsed since I had planted the first seed. I had worked happily during three seasons. Chuang Tsu quoted Confucius as saying, “Live so that you are at ease, in harmony with the world, and full of joy. Day and night, share the springtime with all things, thus creating the seasons in your own heart.”*

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*Chuang Tsu Inner Chapters: A New Translation by Gia-Fu Feng and Jane English (New York: Vintage, 1974).

Why I Plant Raspberries

One of my favorite memories of growing up was when my mother went berrying in the summer. My brother and I piled into the car, and our mother drove to a deserted farm that had become overgrown with blackberry vines. Except for being startled by an occasional snake, we spent a dreamy morning peacefully filling our buckets with plump berries—and eating more than we dropped in our buckets! I say “dreamy” because there is no way to race through a patch of berries. Thorns cover the canes, and the picker of berries must be as graceful as the canes themselves and proceed with slow, thoughtful movements, if scratches are to be avoided.

Now I grow red raspberries, and they are among the easiest plants to establish. My raspberries have been taking over large sections of my yard for several years now, and I don’t mind a bit! They supply me with seemingly endless streams of berries in those wonderful hot months that bring out the fullest flavor of raspberries. I am reminded of Walt Whitman, the great American poet whose work was the focus of my dissertation, and whose life and poetry were the subject of one of my courses that I taught for many exuberant years; In Specimen Days for June 21 in 1882, Whitman wrote about his “favorite dish, currants and raspberries, mixed, sugar’d, fresh and ripe from the bushes—I pick ‘em myself.” The canes form artistic arches. Where they touch the soil, they form roots. The part with the roots can be cut from the rest of the cane and given a shallow planting, thereby expanding the berry patch with minimal effort.

A Few Jars of My Raspberry Jam

 

Berries form on two-year-old canes. After harvesting the berries, I cut away the canes that held them. I am careful to leave the springy, new canes that have not yet borne fruit; those canes will give me the next year’s crop. Hsün Tzu (whose name is often given as Xunzi) was born around 313 or 310 BC and died between 238 and 220 BC; philosophers often include his work with that of Confucius and Mencius in the development of Confucian thought. Hsün Tzu wrote about a raspberry vine standing upright without needing to be staked; his metaphor represented Confucius who, at age 70, had perfectly blended his inborn nature and his philosophical training. I hope, when I am that age, my thinking and my nature will likewise be indistinguishable from one another; for the time being, I can opine that the selection of a raspberry vine to represent a well-respected philosopher is most fortunate! The supple cane—grounded yet free, arching delicately, and bringing health and happiness—is joyously symbolic of wisdom.  

Dried red raspberry leaves can be steeped in boiling water for fifteen minutes to form a “tea” that can be effective as an eye wash. I am told that such use of an infusion of dried raspberry leaves was practiced among some groups of Native Americans. The astringent quality of the tannin in the leaves helps to heal styes. Many websites describe the benefits of raspberry leaves for pregnant women.

Morning is the best time to harvest raspberries, provided that they are not wet. In the hours before the sun beats down on them, they offer their richest taste.