January 18th, 2011 – Desolation

January 18th, 2011 – Desolation

Summer down in Brazil means rain and hot days. While part of the country is under water, suffering from the worst flood ever with possibly thousands of deaths, our farm is pretty safe for not having rivers to overflow or hills to crumble down. It rains at night, dropping the temperature a bit. During the day, the muggy weather makes our house windows be covered with mildew. The end of the year was particularly hard on me; not because of the weather, but for some heartbreak other than bugs eating up my kale. I was so dismayed with my life, that all organic talk was left aside. I totally ignored my garden, abandoning it to its fate. Just a friend comes over to hoe, not knowing which one is stronger, the man or the weeds. He doesn’t know that I have given up on it for good. I have decided to move on with my life to a larger U.S. city, somewhere in Colorado State. I threw everything up and out of my heart, and I want to start over – my life, not the garden. I had considered going to live on one of those organic farms, but I have not had an answer for the only one farm I had applied for; therefore, I changed my mind and decided to live in the city, having already chosen the neighborhood. I read that it is an older neighborhood, so I imagine that it may be downtown, with small shops and restaurants, a little bit more crowded than the rest of the town. I have chosen Whittier for its elementary school. I thought that a public international school would be great for my daughter who no longer speaks English. So it cooled down this evening. I went to close the entrance gate, as we do every day. The walk was exceptionally pleasant, after so many weeks of humid and hot weather. On my way, I tried to knock down the giant board that announces the Organic Horticulture Program, with my name on it, without success. So I went by chayote vine to see if there was any fruit, observed how low the lime tree is growing, the guava tree displays dozens of green fruits and some ripe, eaten by birds (and other bugs) – this land is good for guava orchard – I observed. If I had plans for this land, I would plant guava. All the guava trees were abundant. Some even yield fruit the size of a melon. The orchard and the vegetable patch look desolate, covered with tall weeds and vines. The corn is way too ripe, improper for consumption; the okra is turning tough – I haven’t gathered any, even for myself. There are also leeks, scallions, parsley all under the vines. Only the smell of celery made me realize that it may have some under those suffocating plants. The wild and aggressive aspect of the weeds taking over reminded me of movies on the Southern States where abandoned properties look this way. Totally desolate. Not desert, arid, or empty. But full, crowded, airless, oppressive. Like very very sunny hot days can be oppressive, so lush green vegetation can be too. It looks abandoned, in spite of all the life that exists there. It rains right now. I love it. For as long as I remember, soft or hard rain always calms me down. It settles so many things inside my mind and my heart – at least, for a while.