Color Story: yellow, grey & black

Prima Verde

Just weeks ago, the above little babies were all I had to show for all my prophesying of the return to the Victory Garden (more on that later). The peet pots for herbs were cute and uniform and rustic-looking, but also seeped moisture out on every side. So I returned from out of town for a few days to find that while the other party’s tomato seedlings were doing just dandy, my herbs looked pretty sad.

This formerly teeny arugula and mesclun mix, however, had blossomed. Yesterday I finally dared to pick, along with the abundant and flowering chives and even a couple varieties of mint.


First Spring Garden Salad

1 Bulging Handful Arugula, Mesclun, Chives, Mint and Chocolate Mint from garden

1/2 Red Bartlett Pear, sliced

1 tbsp. Creamy Goat Cheese

1 Smattering Pumpkin Seeds

3 Squares Green & Blacks Mayan Gold Dark Chocolate, coarsely chopped

Simple Balsamic vinaigrette

Looks like I’m not the only one making these funny combinations.

P.S. I have since applied the same plant-straight-in-the-pot-outside technique that worked for the greens to my other little herbies. It is now warm enough, and a certain tough-plant-love advocate I know thinks maybe this treatment will engender stronger, braver, and more resiliently delicious herbs & veg. Or perhaps he is just invoking a Darwinian approach to cover for not watering my herbs while I was gone for the weekend. We’ll see how this goes.

One thing I know: we’re gonna need lots more pots for lettuce.

plus ça change

This is, perhaps, supposed to be a blog about finding order, beauty and purpose in the quotidian. It may, therefore, seem strange to begin with a trip that took me away from my everyday state. However, I gratified to find as I look back on my images of this trip that I have made some happy sense of a loaded visit.

This was the first time visiting my family in Maine when I have split my time between two houses. I worried I would find that the physical world of my childhood had begun to unravel. As it turns out, the shifting around of familiar objects did not reveal as illusory the comfort I took in them.

Things change. This fact is disturbing. But more and more (and more disturbing), they keep staying the same.