I recently recalled a series of photographs of my garden next to the Fort Totten Metro Station in Washington DC taken in early July. Looking at these pictures I was struck by the dramatic "then" and "now" sort of contrast they evoked. At this point in July, everything was lush and green and wet from the relatively frequent afternoon rain showers that visited the city then. 
It was a period when the garden was healthy and alive, but still on the verge of yielding its ultimate harvest. Everything was well weeded and trimmed. All the plants were making ready for the real depths of the summer time while their energies could be spent on the color of leaves and the thickness of foliage, and the purely aesthetic aspects of their existence in those few moments before the ripening of maturity and old age set in.
It was a period when the garden was healthy and alive, but still on the verge of yielding its ultimate harvest. Everything was well weeded and trimmed. All the plants were making ready for the real depths of the summer time while their energies could be spent on the color of leaves and the thickness of foliage, and the purely aesthetic aspects of their existence in those few moments before the ripening of maturity and old age set in. Now, I can't keep up with the harvest that it is yielding. There is a bag full of tomatoes or green bush beans every other day. In accordance with some grandmotherly advice I received this weekend, I just blanched and froze a second bagful of bush beans so that they can be preserved for some desperate and unimaginable time when the beans have stopped growing. I've also recently discovered the joys of making tomato sauce. And oh, the squash!!! While I'm struggling to keep up with the vegetables ripening all around me, sometimes I am baffled to think that this is the result of the work I have put into the land. 
This harvest comes at a price though. July has past, and the rainless heat of August has set in. The vegetables have stopped growing per se, and instead channel all their efforts into their fruits. The leaves suffer somewhat from the lack of water and these reappropriated energies. Things are less lush and green, and generally more brown and crunchy. The weeds take advantage of this, not that I can really blame them. And now there are bugs, lots of little yellow ones who have a particular fondness for collard greens and all the brussels sprouts, or others who like to excavate their way through the base of my squash plants. It is when these plants are at their height, at least in terms of their producing, that they seem most vulnerable. Thankfully, they are also quite generous.
This harvest comes at a price though. July has past, and the rainless heat of August has set in. The vegetables have stopped growing per se, and instead channel all their efforts into their fruits. The leaves suffer somewhat from the lack of water and these reappropriated energies. Things are less lush and green, and generally more brown and crunchy. The weeds take advantage of this, not that I can really blame them. And now there are bugs, lots of little yellow ones who have a particular fondness for collard greens and all the brussels sprouts, or others who like to excavate their way through the base of my squash plants. It is when these plants are at their height, at least in terms of their producing, that they seem most vulnerable. Thankfully, they are also quite generous. 
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