Letting go of summer

Fall crocus remind us to look forward to spring.

Jill Severn | For The JOLT News

Apples are all over the ground. The trees have let go of them, but the humans haven’t picked them up. This could spark hours of thinking and talking about ingratitude, waste, hunger, careless planting, fruit flies, and the process of rotting.  

It’s weird that the harvest season — for gardeners, a season of abundance and a sense of accomplishment — could also be so depressing. 

Blue skies have started to turn gray, and our list of complaints is shifting from too much heat to too little daylight. The ever-earlier darkness drains our energy. 

In a month, the brilliant blue skies of October, the crisp cool air, and the sight of orange, red and yellow leaves will revive us. But right now, rotting, wasted apples reek of sorrow and regret. 

It’s almost time for us to let go of another growing season, and sometimes it’s a challenge to let go gracefully. 

It’s hard to resist the impulse to see fallen apples and faded flowers as all-purpose metaphors for every kind of death. But resistance is the order of the day. 

Let rotting apples just be rotting apples. Their remains enrich the soil. Accept that faded flowers are simply finishing one cycle in their lives. Remember that many are dropping seeds that will bloom next year.  

Fallen fruit and fading flowers don’t herald the the decline and fall of civilization. They’re not a harbinger of any sort of doom, unless of course you think winter is doom.  

A young teenager, overhearing front yard conversation on this topic, offered a blunt summary: “Dude, it’s just the circle of life.” That caused a brief episode of speechlessness.  

Then we changed the subject and admired the blooming fall crocuses. We were determined to cheer each other up. 

The crocuses reminded us that it’s time to think about tracking down the best bulbs for fall planting. Is this the year we remember to plant saffron crocuses? And speaking of letting go gracefully, is it the year we give up on tulips? Have the squirrels won? What shall we grow instead?  

This led to consideration of scheduling our annual visit to Satsop Bulb Farm, whose website says a fourth generation of owners will open this year on Oct. 1. The delight of browsing through the free White Flower Farm Fall Garden Book was also recommended as a source for both bulbs and perennials for fall planting. 

Then we wandered over to the tomatoes. They cheered us up even more than thinking about next spring. We ate as many Sungold cherry tomatoes as we could, but didn’t make a dent in the population. We each took a handful to toss to the chickens. 

Past the semi-tidy vegetable garden we came to the backyard, which looks like an unmade bed. 

Fortunately, it’s now accepted wisdom to let our gardens get messy in the fall, and to turn them over to the birds, insects and spiders who can live through the winter or find food in the tangle of seeds, weeds, stems and foliage. This is one of those happy times when we do the world a favor by doing nothing. 

This much mess gives a lot of gardeners the willies, but many more actually like it. This semi-wild state is a different kind of beauty, like the difference between the beauty of people when they’re dressed for a formal banquet, and the next morning when they’re relaxed and disheveled.  

None of us looks our best all the time, and neither do our gardens. But both are almost always lovable to those who know them well. 

Something like that might be true of the changing seasons too if we school ourselves to think about them in the right way. 

Shorter, cooler days and weeks of harvest abundance? Looking forward rather than backward? OK, we’ve adjusted our attitudes and found acceptance. We’re ready to move on now. 

Jill Severn writes from her home in Olympia, where she grows vegetables, flowers, and a small flock of chickens. She loves conversation among gardeners. Start one by emailing her at  jill@theJOLTnews.com.