lunch in the garden (at 9PM)

The end of the school year is as busy as the holidays:  kids are finishing up spring sports and starting summer swim team practice, one is getting promoted and will start middle school next year, one will be going to Rwanda for 6 weeks, one may or may not have a  boyfriend…the to do list includes mounting self portraits of the 5th graders for the promotion ceremony, getting our oldest vaccinated for yellow fever and stocked with iodine,  arranging a pool party for a bunch of 6th graders so we can meet the new ‘boyfriend’ whom my daughter seems to be constantly texting, cleaning the house, changing the sheets on beds for visiting grandparents, and so on.

After Desmond’s last baseball game of the season, I came home to find my friend Meg finishing up an evening gardening session.  Morning glory vines had taken over her tomato cages.  Maple seedlings were sprouting everywhere.  The garden must not have understood that single moms need time to get through their to-do lists before weeds should be allowed to take over.

8:45 at night, we grabbed a couple of flashlights and went outside to see what looked ready to harvest and where to cut the vines from the cages, tasks a bit easier to do in daylight, but a bit more fun with flashlights. 

We picked large lettuce leaves to go with the even larger radishes Meg had harvested before we got home, a few carrots not quite ready to eat, and a couple of fava beans so I could post the pictures on my blog for Jen, who is not sure whether her own favas are ready for harvest. 

(Jen:  here are the photos:  Pods were about 4″ long, and the beans inside the warted pod were as delicious as those from the one with no deformities)

If my husband weren’t in Amsterdam and I working 12 hours a day, maybe I’d sautee them in olive oil and snip a bit of precious rosemary from the new plant that went in as a replacement for one lost in the snow storm this past winter.

However, right now, I am happy to “do lunch” by sampling raw beans and slightly immature carrots,  bagging up lettuce and radishes for Meg’s lunch box tomorrow.  I’ll take time with friends and the taste of fresh food any way I can get them.