October returns

Fall has been flirting with Virginia for a while but it finally seems like it might be setting in. Just in time, too. I was beginning to strangle in the weather, and my yard has become overgrown and weedy and half dead with unseasonable heat.

It seems this happens every year now. Perhaps it is so pronounced this year because I did so little in the garden this spring to prep for the long summer months. In February I usually mulch beds and add compost and all the other things you have to do to keep your flowers growing but I made no real attempt at that this year. I have two years of neglect to work off of the yard and I can’t say it’s not daunting.

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, as they say. And that’s as true in gardening as anything else.

Fall isn’t all weeding and fading blooms. There are things you can and should plant in the fall. Trees and bushes, bulbs, and certain cold-hearty annuals – kale, spinach, beets. I am always uniquely bad at the last because I am a neglectful gardener, generally. My best crops are garlic and hot peppers, two crops which are pretty set it and forget it since not many pests care for them and they don’t require much watering. I grow more flowers than edibles and mostly the kind that take care of themselves.

This year my pattern of neglect has included a fig tree which I’ve plopped in the yard just in time for some semi-regular showers. I may regret putting it where it is, but also maybe not! (I am also a haphazard gardener.) I figure it has to survive for me to regret it so there’s a better than even chance of no risk at all.

I’m pondering what other seeds I want to plant in life, too, and what I want to lay to rest. Winter is coming, and the time to be strategic is here. Perhaps it’s past that time, even. After all, the time to plan for winter is in the spring. But we all do what we can. None of us can see the future. Our foresight is limited. We can only guess at what winter will bring.

May it be soft. And if it cannot be soft, may we be soft enough to one another to bear it.