In remembrance of tomatoes yet ungrown

Our dreams for a vegetable container garden did not come true this year. Here is to some hope for next summer. This book comes out in February just when I begin to tire of winter squashes and long for fresh tomatoes.

A thought to tuck away

August is my favorite month. The smell of newly sharpened pencils. The rich, dark colors of sunset and night sky showing up in shops and flower beds. The succulence of dripping, ripe fruits in the markets. The tingle of coming fall and the muggy, warmth of ending summer mixing on my skin. The last days of swimming and beach and freedom. The promise of new ideas and toasty sweaters and cozy soups just around the corner. These words in a children's book we found in our library sum up August completely:

"The hazy, lazy rich
ripe taste of August."

from Harry's Song, by Lillian Hoban, New York: Greenwillow Books, 1980

My August this year feels hasty and exhausting right now as we prepare for our new little girl to arrive. I am tucking these words away for the last days of August when I hope to at last feel "ripe and lazy." Or maybe next year. Or maybe this minute I will stop to taste an in-between ,warm, muggy moment of quiet before it washes into the bustle of activity and falling leaves. Ah, I love hazy and rich and ripe.