Hanging out at the Olive Bar

Pasta salad is one of the delights of warm weather.  Here are my vegetables ready to mix in: snow peas, red onions, broccoli. For added deliciousness, I cannot resist the olive bar. This mixture is pitted Kalamata, Manzanilla and all sorts of brine and oil-cured savory bits. It also has Feta cheese chunks and button mushrooms all marinated in oil, vinegar and herbs. I like banana pepper rings, too.

As soon as the peas start coming, we have crunchy pods at every supper and are glad to have them!

In Honor of National Poetry Month

In my teenage years, writing poetry kept me moderately sane. Building strings of beautiful words was how I understood my world. Now, I am mother to a poet. A poem, to anyone in love with words; is a robin's egg blue box tied in a satin ribbon. There is something wonderful inside! As you push aside the tissue layers and go deeper, more is revealed. Lift the lid and begin.

This is a poem I wrote for my beloved Grandpa Zehner's 80th birthday.

 Grandpa in Harrisburg
I
Dear well-loved man of hats and lessons,
wheat-smelling Renaissance man of turkeys and potatoes
and school lunches.
In time's wild flight you are with me
the privileged listener-nodding my head,
anxious to run off and play.
Shifting feet,
nodding.
Lessons and little stories and questions,
Admonitions that grated small ears
school-deary ears    innocent ears.
Wonder of wonders: my principal knew my Grandpa far far away
in Harrisburg
that was importance.
HE OWNED A LAKE!
that was importance.
We baiting hooks with twisting worms
leaving no loops for clever fish to nip off.
These worms were 'not in pain'
nor the fish who lay gill gasping in puddles at our sneakered feet.
He held my hand and explained the order of things
and the promise of my life to be
the goodness of Work
the lore of the precious Land.
Digging in the moist pine earth
treasures of worms and sleepy toads
The rituals of banana apples and cupping spring water.
He plowed the brown dominion with empathic flow,
knowing the earth: loving the earth.
In Harrisburg
he made piles of paper behave
he fed legions of shrieking school children
by signing his name.

He watched me nod my head,
a nestling so smug.
What miracle neurons would blaze from his words?
These were lessons for Other Children--
my life held no ditches, no puddles.
Time keeps all things for new discovery,
and patiently waits.
Dear Historian
you planted wise seeds in me.

II
A girl and a boy
well-loved    well-tended,
shiver and laugh at the absurdity of wearing
sneakers in the creek.
We slip over slimed stones,
trickles of disturbed water blowing behind.
(every year we went a little further up creek).
Magic, powerful water; flecked by sunlight and fallen leaves
Musical water,
changing   unchanging.
This expansive world was ours!
Our fish, our crayfish, our muddy shore
presented by Grandpa.
By love
on our empty slates:
the delicate charms of Nature.
At dark, the night wind
parted by owls and secret running things
tamed with Grandpa's metered breathing.
The path of his life without us was unthinkable--
he is our Grandpa!
We apprentices to Time and Understanding
Oh learning, learning to be more than children.
We thought our days were endless sun-bathed rhythms.
Erosion, the enemy never showed its blank face to us--
We were the raspberry-eaters, the fisher-children
dipping our hands to the silver creatures in the water.
Time waited for us.

Time furrowed our lives.
Puddles and ditches came in locust waves,
poor irrigation left us gasping at the bottom of the boat
We could not see the falconer.
History mowed our adult lawns of ground ivy--
so tangled, persistent and pungent
and the promise of our future
made by a now slight man with paint-freckled glasses,
This dear children,
this is what the Love is for.

Scented Spring Beauties

This is my Native Plum tree in blossom. It's a weedy little shrubb-ish tree that spreads underground like sumac. I ordered it on a whim from Kelly's garden catalog.You know: the catalog for gardeners with more patience than money. The postman delivers slender, bare rooted sticks that will eventually catch and start to produce in a few years time.
The plums from the tree are tiny and sweet-one bite and they are gone. Its hard to imagine making quantities of jam. In trying to encourage a larger fruit, I pruned (AKA hacked) severely but the plums seem to be genetically small.The white flowers in Spring are really what keeps me from giving up on Native and planting a more voluptuous tree.The blossoms are fragrant, penetrating and yes, intoxicating. The sunshine and breezes bring wafts of concord grapes, cotton candy and a floral note I can't quite name. It is one of my spring treats and the bees and I love it.

Here is another gorgeous spring beauty. This is Koreanspice Viburnum. This smells like gardenia and myrrh and it will stop you in your tracks. I also purchased this from Kellys catalog. It is now about ten feet and this week it is full of blooms.

What would Bertha Do?

This is one of my treasures. Painted in 1965, the artist called it "The Yellow Breeches." I was overjoyed to purchase this as part of a scholarship fund drive. I bid on two watercolors from this amazing woman but was so very happy to have the honor of buying this one.
The artist is Bertha Reppert, founder of the Rosemary House in Mechanicsburg, PA. I first met Bertha in the pages of her book- Growing Your Herb Business. I bought it from Amazon, it may be for sale at the Rosemary House, too. Written in 1994, the style of her writing is so exuberant, so charming-- full of love, generosity and wisdom. I savored every word. Did you ever read a book and feel close to its author as if she shared her secrets, hopes and fun adventures with you?And you could tap into her cool, fresh spring of confidence and success. This prolific, creative writer of all things herbal inspired me with her ideas and knowledge.
When Sugarloaf Herb Farm first began to sprout, as it were, I did not imagine the amount of time, money and work I would be devoting to this enterprise. I had a cute image in my mind- kind of like a movie prop with nothing behind it. It seemed for every dollar I made, it took twenty dollars of effort. I almost quit so many times. Bertha's book was a lighthouse in my business fog. Scattered as I was, I sharpened my focus and made long range goals that were achieveable. Bertha advocated fiscal responsibility- something I still struggle with. She is with me at every milestone, however, wishing me well. When I'm tempted to add just one more scent or buy the $700 soil sterilizer I'm drooling over, I think "What Would Bertha Do?" If I can't justify it in those terms, it gets tabled.
After I closed the book for the first time of many readings, I determined to meet Bertha, thank her and maybe give her a hug! Sadly, I learned Bertha passed in 1999. Her beautiful and talented daughters Susanna and Nancy now supply the world with herbal goodness from the Rosemary House and next door to it Sweet Remembrances Tea Room. The Rosemary House and Sugarloaf Herb Farm both belong to the Herb World Marketing Group--a very diverse group whose common love of the useful plants brings us together.