Suspended between lush summer and retiring autumn, mid-August is a quiet crescendo. Seasonality’s song swells with the chorus of cicadas and tree frogs, the searing solos of Perseid meteors arcing across the dark dome, and Rosslyn’s gardens and orchard burdened to breaking with blooms and food. The dramatic juxtaposition of abundance and scarcity invites a moment of reflection and wonder.
Mid-August Meditation
Seasonality, with its quirks and ticklish surprises, is sewn into the fabric of this rural North Country life that Susan and I stepped into when Rosslyn became home in 2006. For us seasonality isn’t a figure on a chart, but a language spoken in an afternoon heat shimmer, exuberant vegetable beds, a crimson maple leaf, and the occasional honk of Canada Geese. It’s brush hogging the backland, sunset boat rides on Lake Champlain, and Library Brook so dry not even a trickle wets the shaded stones. Seasonality is a sun-soaked poem wading into the cool lake while chewing a homegrown carrot, the subtle but seductive rhythm of falling asleep in a hammock while reading a book.
Senses of Seasonality
Mid-August abundance is foremost evident in Rosslyn’s garden where tomatoes burst with acidic-sweetness, zucchini thickens in the blink of an eye, eggplants swelling into white or purple crescents beside shiny green peppers, and sweet-tart ground cherries hang like husked secrets near green beans snd carrots.
Tree frogs and cicadas sing-song seasonality’s chorus beneath skies streaked with Perseid showers, sparks vying with fireflies for brightest light in the dark. Dry days and reluctant rain crack the earth and brown the grass. Lake Champlain’s water level drops, and our beach broadens. My bike rides take place early in the morning to outpace the heat, and day’s end is often marked with watersports, the pleasant presence of houseguests, laughter and shared meals with friends. But beneath the bliss the threat of drought looms. A moratorium on watering lawns. Restrictions to night watering gardens. And there’s another unspoken shift. Autumn is no longer a distant promise, but an advancing almost. Returning. Soon.
What do you think?