The kale, spinach, and snow peas are spent. Totally spent. Burned, bloated, skeletized, and gone to seed. And it all happened right around the Summer Solstice, which pleases me to my bones. It’s fitting that springtime vegetables should bow out just as the hottest season takes center stage.

So yesterday I ripped them out of the soft, silky earth and heaped all the faded green, leafy remains into a large hay bucket (also green). One raised bed plus half of another are now ready to be re-imagined. Redesigned. Repurposed. This kind of opportunity is always equals parts thrilling and intimidating to me.

Mostly, it makes me sad, this passage of time and loss of gorgeous food. Time slips away too easily these days. And so many resources are wasted.

What do we have to show for most of our days? For what lasting treasure do we redeem these hours, days, weeks? Months and years?

I want it to count. Really count.

At least with these spent vegetables, I have the sweet consolation that our chickens will eat it all greedily. And they certainly did, yesterday evening at sunset. They dove into the heaps of wilted greens and tore it all apart, clucking and dancing and zeroing in on stowaway bugs I hadn’t even noticed.

It’s Monday morning now, and once again Oklahoma has opened her eyes to a soaking rainstorm. Every lawn is emerald green and every lake is rising steadily. We all get a fresh new week with a clean slate! It’s like a tiny little New Year’s Day, opening to us all the possibilities of accomplishment, relief, satisfaction, and dreams come true. Plus, thanks to the rain, we don’t have to water anything.

Whatever your goals, I wish you abundant energy and meaningful inspiration to work toward them. Whatever your heart’s desire, I wish you unexpected miracles and little, encouraging doses of the bigger things yet to come. Live in the light of possibility this week. Stay vigilant so that your hours and days are traded for good things. Amazing things. Your life is so valuable, and it passes by so quickly.

“The flower that you hold in your hands was born today and already it is as old as you are.”
~Antonio Porchia, Voces, 1943
XOXOXOXO

On May 23, 1980, my great-grandfather “Papa Joe” Neiberding wrote this in his apiary journal:

As usual, much has happened in the last twenty days and I have failed to write about it.

I know that feeling, Papa Joe. So much has been happening here at the Lazy W, in our family, in my mind and heart… I could sit at this keyboard for the next two  weeks solid without distraction and still not tell it all. And actually? That sounds like a dream. Keep the dark coffee flowing and the glass bowls full of watermelon and almonds, and dismiss me to run once in a while, and I would be one happy camper. Err, writer.

How about some life snippets?

The gardens are ridonkulous right now! Once neatly spaced veggies are now growing together in deep, fluffy masses of green. I love every messy detail.

The baby chicks have all been graduated to the coop full time, except for Ethel. She is a permanent companion for Pacino, and they are very happy neighbors. She might soon gain Lucy as a roommate, too. You are going to love Lucy! If Ethel is a Las Vegas show girl, then Lucy is a punk rocker chick. So cute.

Handsome and  I keep crazy evening rituals of gathering stray chickens and geese. They apparently love to be chased and herded. Sometimes it’s funny and we laugh and laugh and think we lead the most pastoral, romantic life ever. Sometimes it is less funny and we say swear words and get our tangly ponytails caught in chicken wire and almost slip in mud which is NOT actually mud. Oh, and Duck-Duck (the Canadian gosling? I told you about him, right?) is growing like a weed. And he loves to eat weeds! The Oklahoma kind of weeds, that are green and have itchy yellow flowers. Not the Colorado kind that make you wear patchouli and crave junk food.

Reading and running are high on my list of personal time passers this week. Here is my current reading stack:

Reading Stack:

• I’m thoroughly enjoying a thick chunk of fiction by Stephen King, 11/22/63. It’s a great lawn chair read: Part science fiction, part modern American history, all King. It has wonderful characters and thought provoking ideas about time travel, motivation, etc, etc.
• I’m browsing poetry to soften my mind a little.
• And re-reading The Rodale Herb Book as the mood strikes (this year’s Lazy W herb garden is epic so far and I don’t want to miss a thing).
• I’m also constantly reading page after page of Papa Joe’s apiary journal, trying to soak up as much of his wisdom as I can.
• Last but certainly not least, I’m reading Seven Days in May. It’s piece of historical fiction by Jen Luitweiler, the same author who visited the farm to answer Dinner Club’s questions on her book Run With Me. Remember? Super smart, loving, wonderful lady. Her newest book is set in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and it tells the stories of the 1921 race riots there. Important material, folks, so check it out! Dinner Club With a Reading Problem meets in early July to discuss it, and Jen is joining us once again! We are so lucky and excited. I’ll post a review here for sure, as well as notes from the discussion dinner.

Handsome and I have enjoyed lots of one-on-one time lately, recharging our batteries and filling those deep wells of love and friendship. Our thirteenth anniversary is fast approaching, and I am feeling all of those yin-and-yang things like, “Has it already been 13 years? But wait, is that all? Feels like we’ve built a lifetime together already.” Stuff like that. I love watching him with the animals, and I love watching him work on his own cars. It’s one of the sexiest things in the world.

Have I even taken the time to tell you all about little Meh? Meh is the name we have given to the newest baby, our little llama son.

Meh runs and I means RUNS to us when we call, that adorable sideways kicking style of running llamas do, then he cuddles our faces like there’s no tomorrow. He is a kisser, a nibbler, a neck-twisting sponge for affection. And we both are madly in love with him. By the way, Meh is his name because that is the sound he makes. Meh! But he says it cheerfully, not like a hipster.

So much more, you guys. Really. Just like your life. The days fly past. They are full to bursting with goodness and work and beauty and pain. Then they are yesterday and tomorrow is today and is almost over again.

Thanks for checking in with me. Thank you so much for stopping your busy life to read the silly happenings at the Lazy W. We feel very blessed and very excited for the future. I hope you do too.

And thank you, Papa Joe, for helping me feel less alone in the too-busy-living-life-to-write-about-it category.

Brave flowers, that I could gallant it like you
And be as little vain;
You come abroad, and make a harmless show,
And to your beds of earth again;
You are not proud, you know your birth
For your embroidered garments are from earth.
~Henry King 1592-1669
XOXOXOXO