my hands are full                                       

i grew this and then i ate it

young elderberries
 

there was only the one but it did not seem lonely

something is happening and i do not know what it is but i am happy about it anyway

wagon load

“To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive”
 ~Robert Louis Stevenson

Hope

“Hope is the only love of life”

~Henri-Frédéric Amiel

The Tomato That Ate The World

(and then made a giant batch of salsa)

    Summer, Yellow Birds, Chocolate Torte, Garden,  Love

yesterday was Trevor’s birthday so I made him this chocolate torte with blackberries
(thanks for the recipe, J)

there are berries and berries and more by the day

love, all love, all the time, love

bowl of great happiness

goofy, happy, FREE

curvature

I have always loved the yellow bird

the fields feel like home

“Even after all this time,
the sun never says to the earth,
“You owe me.”
Look what happens with a love like that.
It lights the whole sky.”

~Hafiz

Gardening, Breathing, Sadness
(all of it true)

The words do not always come easily for me here.  I feel like I lost my fire a year ago when I had pneumonia and it has been very hard to find that spark again.   I would never have imagined what an overwhelming influence asthma could have on my life until I experienced it this past year.  When you cannot breathe well, it is hard to focus on anything joyful, or spontaneous or good; you can only think about how the air goes in and the air goes out.

 and this is true. 

Last winter I became so terribly sad.  This asthma made it hard for me to focus on all of the good parts in my life and depression set in like it never has before.  So many times I wanted to share this, to write it down and tell you; I am sad now and this is all I have. But i could not because, for me, depression makes the words get all muddled and lost and scarce.

 this is also true.

And so I posted photographs instead, or nothing. I commented less and less as the words slipped away and I hoped this was all right because it was all I could do. 
Sometimes when I posted a photograph it was only to say, “I wish I had the words but I don’t”







I am better now; so much better now.  About 5 weeks ago I went on the Feingold diet to see if I might be having some sensitivities to certain foods and it has helped me to feel SO much healthier.  My breathing has improved more than I could have imagined and my mood has become lighter and lighter over the past 5-6 weeks. There are days now when I feel like myself again, and these days are beginning to outnumber the ones when I do not feel like myself and if you are still reading here, then I want to say thank you.  Thank you for the kindness and for persisting when I post ever so little and share so few details about all of this.






And now, as I heal up and carefully regain my footing, I garden and garden and garden until I am so tired because it is what I need to do for my heart.  I need to rip the weeds and gently stake the things which bend. I need to catch up on the summer I almost missed and there are not enough moments in the day it seems.




But there is one
more truth;  the tomatoes are just

now beginning to blush and the
fields are in bloom and the apples are not yet ripe and I am stronger
than I was a month ago and the kids are wanting to play and there is
still time,

                                                    

My heart wants it all.

This one is about her dog