9:12 am. Watered the 2 gardens early, walked the dog, early, but there is no early any more.
At 10:30 last night the heat index still registered 110 degrees. I always hope when I burst out the door at 6:30am, I will enter the summer temperatures of my childhood. I grew up in a little town on the St. Clair River in Michigan. The river is part of the International Great Lakes Waterways. There was boating and fishing for pickerel and perch . Our garden grew peacefully, no brown twisted leaves on the tomato plants, there was a pear tree in the back yard and honey bees were always buzzing around the overripe fruit on the ground. We could pick cherries and grapes from the neighbors yards.
My only beef was I was an only child and was expected to help my mother with her projects. My mother was Martha Stewart before there was a Martha. We went out in the country and picked bunches of wild berries and grapes then made jar after jar of jams and jellies. We pickled cukes, chopped vegetables for relishes, and made tons of fruit pies ready to pop in the freezer and be baked in the winter months. We had a compost pile before there was compost. I never tasted a store bought English muffin until I went to boarding school. Isn't it odd I can't make pie crust?
In the summer I would sleep on the big screened in porch listening to the mournful sound of the freighters foghorns. And I would dream of the day I would move away from the little town and make an exciting life for myself elsewhere.
How ironic I've recreated that so much of that childhood right here in my little house with the garden and the fruit trees and the compost and the reading and the cooking.
It's probably hotter then hell there now too, but in my memory I'm riding my bike to go swimming. And it's a beautiful summer day.
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