glory in the seasons
I can’t remember the last time I leapt out of bed. I don’t make a secret of the fact that we sleep with a coffee machine by the bed and it takes two cups of coffee (one peaceful one prior to Morag and Maud piling into bed, and one chaotic one after) for me to start the day. But I smelt the cool mist before I saw it, the soft, sharp, cool tang of the first truly autumnal morning, and I was up.
For once, I timed it to perfection. The exact moment that the sun started to come over Pickeridge Hill. The first thing I noticed was the cobwebs. Everywhere. Overnight, the kitchen garden had been threaded with silver. Or had they always been there, and it took the dew hanging on every thread for me to see them? Some long strands from one fennel seed head to another. Some intricate nets between rose hips, one even with a big brown spider sitting in the centre.
In the field, the fence I finished building yesterday glistened with droplets of dew. I have been drying woodchips in the greenhouse for my first biochar burn tomorrow and I am grateful that I had had the foresight to leave them undercover. In bare feet and pyjamas, the grass is damp under my toes and the air is thick with mist.
In amongst the relief that the autumn is finally here is the sadness that the blackberries are starting to turn. If you are going to collect any for jelly or freezing, today (a biodynamic fruit day) is probably your last chance. I will be harvesting other fruits (beans for drying and making cider vinegar from the apples in the orchard) as well as sowing rows and rows of broad beans. You always need more than you think with broad beans. I don’t find them an efficient way to use space, but they are popular in my house and they do come as a pleasant surprise in the spring.
One thing I am not ready to let go of is the dahlias. Is it just mine or are they incredibly late this year? So many of them have sat, not quite sulking but definitely not joining the party, in bud for what feels like months. However, true to form, one café au lait plant produced six glorious blooms all at once on the morning that Matt Austin came to photograph to the turn of the seasons. Luck is so often on my side, although I really could have stacked the odds in my favour by giving them all a big feed of fermented plant juice three weeks ago.
In between relishing the warm low sun, today will be about starting to put the field to bed. We still have perennial plants to get in the ground but earth that is going to be left fallow over the winter months has been sown with phacelia as a green manure. The apple trees have had their summer prune, and the hardy annual beds topped with compost. The seed fridge is full of neat, labelled jars and the long wooden benches are under the protection of the thatched eaves at the front of the cottage.
And then I really must clean my windows. These low, late sunrises don’t half show up the dirt on the glass.
