over grown garden

This time of the year I’m ready for the green of summer to be gone. I walk outside and wish I had a magic wand to wave it all back to where it came from until next spring.

With today being the eighth day of September, I know ole Jack frost will soon do the magic wand thing for me.

This dying of bloated overdone summer foliage is not my favorite time of the year. There is something haunting and mournful about it.

As I look at the land around my house and even along the roads as I travel back and forth I marvel how a landscape that looked so lush and promising a month ago can now look like it’s been flecked with brown paint from a brush. In places you can already see the death that will surely come in a few short weeks.

I haven’t a doubt that the woods would completely engulf our yard and house in just a few short years if we didn’t continuously beat back the onslaught that happens every summer.

Although there are still tomatoes ripening on the vine and okra that needs cutting my mind has moved on to brisk fall mornings and dazzling blue skies. To the hope of an early snow and the desire to sit around the woodstove and warm.


Last night’s video: Making Pickled Beets in Appalachia

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18 Comments

  1. I’m so happy the Blind Pig family is totally back on line, A bit of spit, some bailing wire and a little prayer was all it took. You never know how much you’ll miss something til it’s gone!

  2. Tipper, in addition to reading and enjoying your daily posts, I also enjoy the older posts. where subsequent rereads often bring new insight. You are indeed a outstanding ambassador and promoter of Appalachia – its folk lore, music and such. I am reminded of the wrong impressions that those outside Appalachia often assume. Shows like Gomer Pyle, Beverly Hillbillies and others contribute to the stereotype of a people who are perhaps seen as “unsophisticated” and less than literate. How wrong they can be. Your blog goes a long way toward dispelling such myths and demonstrating just how beautiful the dialects, grammar and such can be. Thank you!

  3. I saw an all black wooly worm today!! Yay!
    I love snow!! Almost as much as I love you Tipper. Thanks so much for reminding us of all the Beauty out there.

  4. I do love summer, but by September I’m ready to enter the resting phase of our lifecycle. Our garden has been put to bed, although I still need to do some soil building this fall. I’ll probably start getting out the fall decorations this weekend.

  5. Tipper, I agree with you. I too feel the haunting and sadness of summer dying but I enjoy the colors after a killing frost and the cooler temperatures.

  6. I agree with Ava’s comment. As I was reading, I could almost see what you were talking about. God has given you many gifts. I am so thankful I live in NC where we have 4 seasons. I enjoy them all – but really look forward to Fall. God bless you, Tipper.

  7. On Monday I worked taking up tomato and pepper plants and gathering the green tomatoes to put on a table to ripen. Since I live in the city, it’s time to clean up so my yard looks nice and some grass needs to come up before the rain turns it to mud. As I look around, the trees are starting to turn and many birds have left. The spiders are trying to get indoors too. The mornings and evenings are cool . It’s all signs fall is on the way!

  8. Fall is my least favorite time of year. I wish I could see the beauty in the fall colors like so many of my family does. When the summer sun beats down and there doesn’t seem to be enough hours in the day, I never complain. Winter seems to last forever, but just knowing the most beautiful time of the year will soon follow makes it easier to tolerate.

  9. It is time. Time for the green to put on gold, flaming red, magenta, orange and bronze. Time for plants to rest above ground parts and grow roots.

    It is easy to see you love all the seasons. I doubt if you could live in the subtropics or tropics. i don’t think I could either; no seasobs and no mountains. I have heard that a primary reason a goodly portion of those retiring to Florida move back north to about Tennessee is because they want the seasons again.

  10. Well said, Tipper, this is a contimplative time of year and sometimes even sad as everything outside is dying down for a winter rest. I imagine folks in older times were glad to see fall come, it would mean a rest for them with less outside hands on labor. People would turn to the inside labor of cleaning, mending and making warm things with crocheting and knitting.
    Their life was more planned around the weather than we are now.
    It is a sad time of year when everything that was so important to us in the summer garden is now dying.

  11. I too am looking forward to my second full fall in the north GA mountains! Our blueberry bushes have some color on them and there are a few leaves falling, but not a lot of color yet.

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