Fruitfulness

Zinnias (and beans, tomatoes, squash, eggplant, even if they aren't obvious)

"The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, kindness, gentleness, and self-control"

I've been thinking about this verse as I watch beautiful and delicious things grow in my garden. It's always been one of my favorites, but my understanding of it has changed over the years. I used to think of it as a checklist of qualities I was supposed to have, and berate myself when I felt depressed, anxious, or otherwise lacking in any of them.

But as I've watched my garden grow, and as I've grown older, I've come to the realization that I can no more will myself to bear spiritual fruit than the flowers, fruits, and vegetables in my garden can will themselves into being. A tomato plant creates tomatoes because it is a tomato plant, not because it decides to do so. Given the right amount of sunlight, warmth, water, and nutrients from the soil, it has no choice but to produce tomatoes. It is true that I planted some of the things growing in our backyard, but others have come up entirely on their own, from seeds scattered by the wind or birds, or from vegetable scraps I threw out for compost.

I think "the fruit of the Spirit" manifests itself in us like the fruits in a garden. It's not something we strive to achieve, but something that grows out of our relationship with God. As we nurture that relationship in whatever ways we've found work best, the "fruits of the Spirit" can't help but grow in our lives.

Tomatoes

Artichoke

Fig

Green beans

Strawberrie

Yellow squast

Peaches

Red potatoes

A time for every thing

Now that the photographer has come and gone, we're enjoying this (probably the last for a while) cool spell by working on some garden projects that we've been putting off. I also find my garden time more relaxing since I don't feel the need to keep it "company ready" at all times. Here are a few overview photos taken from different angles.

We've wondered if the photographer came out at exactly the optimum time. The roses were past their peak and fading fast, and the hollyhocks and coreopsis weren't blooming yet, although I think he got some nice pictures of larkpur, nasturtiums, and Mexican petunias in bloom. The vegetables have grown quite a bit, and I picked the first squash and green beans yesterday, along with the last of the broccoli and asparagus.

 I've also noticed this week, that while I thought of several ideas for blog posts about the thoughts that came to me while I was gardening, those posts never came to be. I'd think of an idea and tell myself I'd do it later, when I finished whatever gardening task I was doing when I thought of it. Then I'd find something else to do and promptly forget about it!

Ideas, like gardens and much else in life, are fleeting things, and sometimes it's best to act on them right away. However, I think there's something to be said for delayed gratification as well. "Seize the day", if acted on continuously, becomes "Look, a squirrel!" and nothing gets done. There needs to be a balance.

Although the photographer missed prime time for some things, I think he found plenty of things worth photographing. The nature of a garden, like that of the human mind, is growth and change. Like life, not everything in my garden is beautiful at the same time, and there is no such thing as a perfect moment. Roses give way to larkspur and larkspur gives way to coreopsis. Lettuce and peas will be replaced by squash, tomatoes, and beans, and those will in turn give way to eggplant, peppers, and melon. So it is with ideas, and with life in general.

"To every thing there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven."

"He has made all things beautiful in his time."

Photographing the photographer

A photographer from Phoenix Home and Garden came out the afternoon of April 1 and spent about three hours taking pictures in our backyard, and I sneaked a few pictures of him taking pictures. It was interesting to watch him at work.  He was assisted by a digital designer from the magazine, who turned out to be one of my former students.

I don't think I'll ever look at a magazine picture the same way again. They probably spent more time composing pictures than they did taking them. First, they walked around the yard and when they found something they thought might make an interesting picture, looked at it from several angles. Then they waited for the light to get just right before taking any shots. Parts of the experience were simply hilarious, mostly the ones that included us in the picture. The photographer posed us the way he wanted us, and then we had to pretend to be working while remaining looking in a particular direction. The sun was in our eyes, so Julena (the digital designer) had to stand up in one of the raised beds and put her arms out to block it so we wouldn't squint.

I'd love to have copies of the pictures he took, but I understand there are probably copyright issues involved. We don't know when (or if) the article will come out in the magazine...they said it could be two months, or it could be a year.

Is it spring yet?

Panorama taken on the first day of spring

We've been working to get the backyard ready for my retiree lunch this weekend, and a possible Phoenix Home and Garden photo shoot, date TBD. It's an enjoyable time of the year to work outside as we find new surprises every day..

Grape arbor and "Orange Bells" Tecoma

"Queen Elizabeth" roses and nasturtiums

Mexican primrose, rosemary, and mint

Baby squash!

Water lily and iris

Roses and larkspur buds

Roses and orange blossoms (I forgot to prune this bush!)

Tomatoes!

Every rose has its thorns.

The air is full of the fragrance of citrus blossoms, the roses are beginning to open, and I'm enjoying fresh roasted asparagus on a regular basis. It must be springtime in Phoenix!

Unfortunately this spring we are having a particularly bad allergy season in the Phoenix area, probably because of our mild winter, and it has been interfering with my gardening enjoyment. There is a widespread misconception that citrus is allergenic, because spring allergy season is usually at its worst when citrus is blooming. However, this misconception is a prime example of  the scientific principle that correlation does not prove cause-and-effect. The culprit as far as allergies are concerned isn't usually fragrant plants, which tend to have large, heavy pollen grains that require insect pollinators. The problem is the things you can't smell. Wind-pollinated trees such as ash, juniper, and mulberry produce huge quantities of small, light pollen grains that float around in the air, just waiting to be inhaled and set off a histamine reaction. Here's a handy link where you can enter your zip code and find out what's causing your sniffles and sneezes.

The way I see it, allergies are to be expected in spring, just as I expect to find thorns on a rosebush, and I don't plan to give up either spring gardening or roses.

Orange blossoms

Queen Elizabeth rose buds

Plant a radish, get a radish?

I corresponded this week with Cathy Cromwell, who interviewed us last spring for a possible article in Phoenix Home and Garden magazine, about the timing for a photo shoot of our Arizona Backyard Eden. I'm guessing the garden will be at its best in late March or early April, which is when we've scheduled our annual IHS Retiree Luncheon in the Garden. At least I hope it will...gardens, like children, are seldom predictable, despite what this song from The Fantasticks might claim.

The nasturtiums and sweet allyssum I planted as a border around the raised beds didn't come up as thickly as I would have liked, so yesterday I transplanted a flat of marigolds to fill in the gaps. The roses may wind up blooming ahead of the larkspur and hollyhocks this year. The bushes are loaded with buds and a few of them have begun to open.

Is gardening dependable? Predictable? I think not, and to me that's part of the fun. But I would agree with the song  that "a man who plants a garden is a very happy man"!

Squash blossom

Yellow Iris

"Don Juan" climbing rose

Tea rose

Tea Rose

Spring blooms

Things are starting to wake up around here. Each day when I walk through the garden, I see something new. Most of the fruit trees- peach, apricot, pear, apple, plum, lemon, lime, orange, grapefruit- have begun to bud and bloom. The rose bushes have leafed out and are full of buds; the fig tree and grape vines are showing their first leaves, and zinnia, hollyhock, larkspur, nasturtium, coreopsis, and galliardia seedlings are popping up all over the place. I like to let the flowers come up where they will, and fill in the blanks with transplants. 

Lemon blossoms

First rose of the season

Peach blossoms

Pear blossoms

Nasturtiums

Petunias and Swiss chard


The words of an old hymn we used to sing in the sixties kept playing through my head as I wandered through and worked in the garden this week:

What a wondrous time is spring, when all the trees are budding. 
The birds begin to sing; the flowers start their blooming. 
That's how it is with God's love, once you've experienced it. You want to sing; it's fresh like spring; you want to pass it on.