The End of Summer

It’s also Fair Week, which is the biggest event of the calendar year here. Thanks to my clients, I learned a lot about what it takes to enter and maintain cattle through 4-H, and Little Miss also entered some zinnias, taking home Fifth Place. She was delighted. We’ve survived the fair visit with games and goodies–Ride a Rama will be coming up later in the week, and perhaps we will survive that too. IF we’re properly fortified with elderberry pie from the Methodist Women’s booth. But the week after that is back to school. We have supplies, new bookbags, new shoes, and a few new clothes, though we’re waiting till a little later in the season before stocking up on clothes, hoping for economic downturn sales. The garden is chunking out zucchini almost faster than we can give them away. All in all, our community garden experiment has turned out well. We have sent at least one bag of fresh produce a week with my father to distribute to the older folk who have bravely come out (some with canes and walkers, even!) to weed and maintain the garden while we’re working. The green beans are wonderful, and we have a dozen butternut squash coming along. The only garden disappointment this year has been the tomato blight, and since it’s widespread, there won’t be many tomatoes to even buy and can from other growers. We’ve completed the summer reading programs through the library, watched a few more hours of television than I would have liked, and traveled the country to see both far-flung relatives and friends and landmarks of all sorts. Everyone’s grown up a bit and they’re looking forward to another school year. I hope all of you hold on for those last few days and enjoy the sunshine, the fresh flavors, green leaves, and the opportunities to do things with the children before the days of fall set in.