A Moveable Garden

Weekly recap of my ritual of existence in this liminal space called life. (See here for more info.)

• Weather

Hot. Hot hot hot. And dry. Essentially no rain here since 6 July and that was very little. We’ve had about a half-inch of rain since 24 June, while other parts of this rather small state had flooding this week.

The highest high temperature was 89.1°F but the range was small, between that and 85.3°F, for an average of 87.2°F. The lows ranged from 62.2°F to 68.4°F, averaging 64.°F. We ran the bedroom A/C all week so we could sleep at night and to give us a respite space during the day.

• Beginnings/Firsts

Bought my first Christmas items this week, though not through my own initiative; I renewed a couple of memberships/magazines when I got the notices. Xmas shopping will resume in Nov/Dec.

First monarch butterfly photographed in the yard! Mostly on comfrey and common milkweed.

• Wild Flora, Fauna, Fungi

Wild things in garden this week – there were many!

• Wandering 

Just walks in town this week, about an hour for me most days/evenings.

Seen on walks

On Sunday I went with a friend to another friend’s permaculture garden tour in Concord, NH; she drove and I saw parts of the city I’ve never seen before, which was a fun unexpected additional perk.

Garden Tour

• Curiosity & Discoveries

So many to choose from this week.

#1 – A primrose moth! In evening primrose.

From the Vermont Center for EcoStudies July field guide, lots of info about this interaction:

“The Primrose Moth (Schinia florida) is clad in cute pastel colors that may remind Vermonters and moth lovers alike of the Rosy Maple Moth (Dryocampa rubicunda). Except, rather than a maple tree, this yellow and pink moth uses the Common Evening Primrose flower as a host for its lifecycle. … [An adult moth lays its eggs in the primrose flower. Then, instead of helping the host plant out by pollinating the flower, the larvae munch on the flower buds, damaging the plant’s reproductive organs. However, it’s only when larval populations are especially high that any serious damage is done via herbivory.

“After an unfortunate loss for the plant and a nutritious meal for the moth, the former caterpillars emerge from their cocoons as winged adults. At this stage, the moths spend their time hiding in partially closed flower buds during the day, camouflaging into the plant so an onlooker would only see the creamy yellow tips of their wings popping out from the petals. When the sun sets, the flower buds open and the moths come out, ready for a sugary drink. The Primrose Moth has a notably long proboscis (about half of its entire body length!) that they use to drink nectar from the flowers.”

#2 – This is a bristle/tachnid fly, Gymnoclytia occidua, on New Jersey tea (Ceanothus americanus). I love it.

#3 – Mating Japanese beetles on filipendula buds, but see the white dot on the front individual? It’s a death sentence, the egg of a winsome fly (Istocheta aldrichi) whose larva will emerge and devour the Japanese beetle when it does. The winsome flies were introduced to the U.S. to reduce the population of Japanese beetles, also an introduced species.

• Creating

I worked on my sister’s cat’s photobook for about 7.5 hours this week, editing the photos and starting to create the photo book with photos, backgrounds, text, embellishments, etc.; I might be 1/3 of the way finished.

• Repairing and Maintaining (everything but the house & yard) 

Body/Mind: I walked more than 10,000 steps on five days this week, with two days of about 14,000 steps. I worked out 4 times (4 hours) this week.

Finance: I finally deposited a small check from my second jury duty day in May on Monday, and on Tuesday I called the Boston Globe to cancel a recurring monthly subscription being charged to our credit card.

• Gardening/Yard 

I spent a lot of time in the garden, about 10 hours, mostly watering due to the droughty conditions. I cleaned out the birdbath thoroughly, a dirty slimy job.

Also harvested arugula, parsley, sungold tomatoes and one ‘Bloody Butcher’ tomato, kale, and about 50 peapods. Cucumbers are almost ready. Did a little weeding. And I spent more time just wandering around the yard taking photos. My husband mowed the lawn, removed brush piles, and weed-whacked on Friday, and he fixed a leaky outside spigot on Thursday. He also harvested some raspberries and bramble berries.

Garden this week

• Nesting 

Cleaning/Maintenance: I did clothes laundry on Monday and also vacuumed the kitchen that day. My husband fixed the patio umbrella shaft Monday and he cleaned some mildew out of the dishwasher on Tuesday. He went to the dump on Thurs. and dropped off some of my clothes at the consignment store.

Food: I made a cacio e pepe with Old Bay, garlic, peas, and shrimp on Tuesday, which we also had Wed. Thursday was veggie burgers on arugula or kale from the garden, with corn on the cob from the farmstand, and yellow squash from the farmstand sautéed with onions. I made crabcakes on Friday and we had those through Sunday dinner, on arugula, with homemade tartar sauce, and farmstand corn on the cob. My husband made homemade yogurt.

Supplies: Another week of not ordering much (anything?) or stocking up.

• Sleeping & Dreaming

I slept an average of 7 hours 23 mins per night this week, with an average sleep score of 82.6 and a range from 90 to 74. I got 12 hours 19 mins of REM sleep and 8 hours 52 mins of deep. Had especially vivid dreams on Tuesday night.

• Reading / Words & Ideas / Listening / Watching  

BOOK: I finished reading The Years (2008) by Annie Ernaux, which as I mentioned last week is a ‘hybrid’ memoir described by her publisher as an autobiography that’s “at once subjective and impersonal, private and collective.” Really enjoyed it and my reacquaintance or introduction through reading it of a lot of history, especially in Europe, from the 1940s-2000. Another excerpt:

This made me laugh, from an essay by Olga Khazan on The Atlantic in Feb. 2022, titled “I Gave Myself Three Months to Change My Personality: The results were mixed”:

“Around this time, a psychologist named George Kelly began prescribing specific ‘roles’ for his patients to play. Awkward wallflowers might go socialize in nightclubs, for example. Kelly’s was a rhapsodic view of change; at one point he wrote that ‘all of us would be better off if we set out to be something other than what we are.”’ Judging by the reams of self-help literature published each year, this is one of the few philosophies all Americans can get behind.”

Like it:

• Connections &  Community 

Local Support: Ate outside at local café/bakery on Wednesday and also picked up a Too Good To Go bag from them on Thursday. Bought veggies from local farmstand on Thurs. and Saturday. Had breakfast at a different local market/café on Saturday morning.

Eating outside

Relationships: Poetry Posse met on Tuesday afternoon in a shady spot on the village green, with five of us reading poems and chatting for 1.5 hours. I hosted the permaculture group Zoom on Thursday morning, with 8 of us attending for an hour (2 of whom had just picked up day-old chicks!), and I attended Salon in a friend’s (R’s) gazebo on Friday afternoon with four other locals and one joining us from Colorado on Zoom. As mentioned above, I also went to the meetup garden tour with a friend (E) on Sunday for a few hours, where I chatted with a few other friends. Quite a lot of texting and emailing this week. Husband went to a cars & coffee event on Saturday and chatted with friends. Worked on photobook for my sister for about 8 hours this week.

• Endings/Harvest

Harvested veggies from the garden on Wed. and Friday.

• All This Useless Beauty

Cherries and pomegranate-gingerale water, with The Years, yum.

I picked peas while sometimes stepping on the edge of thyme, whose scent enveloped me and made it all the more pleasurable.

I spent quite a while on a couple of days watching this snowberry clearwing moth flitting around the bee balm. Enchanting.