Cycles of impermanence

I uncover the garden plants, and the sheets are warm with the mid-morning sun. I hang them over the garden fence, allowing them to dry before I will fold them and put them in the covered 55-gallon container that lives in the garden. There they will be handy for the next cool night.

I eye the frost-rendered yellow squash plants with an air of regret and notice that at the inner core of the plant a few small fruits still grow. I look over the beans and see a similar scenario. Here and there I spy a flower, and understand that the plants and my attachment to them are not quite finished.

I wonder what it is about being at the end of a relationship that changes the nature of it. A month ago, the green beans loaded with harvest would overload my system and I would ignore them for days. Was it just that there too many that I was willing to forego experiencing them in their absolute prime? Or was it that it was just too hot to consider picking them in the beating sun?

Today, I am aware of the impermanence of the garden, and the opportunities that we sometimes miss.

I weed in between the beets, not so much that it's necessary, but because I want to participate in this end of the garden season.

I, of course, draw all sorts of conclusions to relationships that we have with those around us. And it comes as no surprise, that when our lives are at their fullest, we tend to take them for granted. It is often only when we know that there is a time limit, and an ending, that we develop the ability to appreciate the minute detail.

Something like a garden, or a child going off to school, gives us a painless opportunity to reflect and find the appreciation in the every dayness of our lives.