(SAN
LUIS VALLEY, CO)-Autumn, here in southern Colorado, when I was a kid, used to mean bitterly cold winter days ahead- like minus-40
degree-temperature days and nights, compounded by the occasional blizzard. If you accidentally left a rake, hoe, or water
hose on the ground, after the first big freeze, you could forget getting them out until Spring.
With that introduction,
from hindsight, let me tell you that, in retrospect, I did a lot of the gardening and my mom got all the credit. She got the
“ohs” and “ahs” from people who tasted the delicious home-canned vegetables (yes, I did much of the
canning too, and she got the credit). She certainly had a green thumb, and she was out in the garden at first light, just
about every day, hoeing and working the soil. I can remember doing all the groundbreaking of the new garden, though, and fertilizing
it and reworking it, and Mom never had a "small" garden. Planting, watering, weeding, and harvesting. But it didn't
stop there. There was spinach to wash in the old tubs in freezing cold well water (I think that was the coldest water of any
well in the Valley), and then the canning process. All this, in between plucking chickens (a job I do not miss.) At least
we didn't have to kill them- that was Dad's job. He never let my mother do it, probably because years before she had attempted
to kill a chicken while he was away, for dinner that night, and ended up with just a very angry, dazed rooster. Instead of
placing the hoe handle on its neck and pulling its body to dismember the head quickly (yes, it's gross), she pulled the other
end- its head. That was one mad chicken walking off into the barnyard after his near-death experience. She never tried that
again, as far as I know. We had biscuits and gravy that night, as I recall, and that rooster never trusted humans again.
But
back to the gardening. I remember that when September came, I had to perform the evening ritual of gently laying tow-sacks
(most people call them burlap bags) over each and every plant to extend the growing season for tomatoes, green beans, eggplant,
and a myriad other things we had growing there. Our garden was in a depression that once served as overflow for a creek, in
seasons of flooding, so it was very good soil. But cold settles, so we had to cover plants, nightly.
We also had fruit
vendors that frequently stopped by the farm. I haven't seen any of those in years. Maybe they're afraid of the dog. Or maybe
they don't exist anymore, I'm not sure. My apologies to the name-brand companies and all the other canned peach providers,
but nothing tastes as good as home-canned peaches. Nothing. It's just as well that the peddlers don't come by anymore, because
I don't can anymore. Just thinking about how heavy that huge pressure canner was makes me cringe. Hot jars on every kitchen
surface, sterilized and ready for the goods to be placed in them. And, after all the canning was done, they were so beautiful
on the shelves; that I remember well. I don't know if it was the colors, the textures, or the fact that it represented so
much work that made them so beautiful. I know a shelf at the old home-place of my grandparent’s holds a jar of homemade
something-turned-dark since my grandmother canned it sometime in the 1930's or 40's. The kids just couldn't throw it out.
My other grandmother, my mom's green-thumbed mother, stored her canned goods in a storm cellar. Every wall of the cellar was
lined three or four-deep with jars filled with the bounty of her huge raised-bed garden. She was a very in-shape grandmother,
even in her 60's- she mowed grass with one of those mowers that are powered by elbow grease- no motor. They're called rotary
mowers, and she kept a lawn the size of New Hampshire, I think, with Bermuda grass, flowers, shrubs, and vines that produced
the most beautiful fragrances. She had a separate patch just north of the Chinaberry tree- the thorny patch of blackberries
that we knew would go into her delicious blackberry cobbler one day. Her gray water from the kitchen ran through a ditch to
some fruit trees out back. Grandmother didn't need to cover her plants in September, if she had been able to cover that many,
because it doesn't get as cold there.
They say you should pull out all the old stubble and burn it, to prevent insect
infestation, or fungus, in the fall, but I don't remember ever doing that. Not in the Valley, anyway. When we lived in Texas,
I can remember thinning out a few watermelons from the vines, when my mother wasn't looking. I later found out she was looking,
and she told everyone. "I could see a blond head bobbing up and down, heading for the watermelon patch, and I'd find
where she'd just dropped it on the ground and ate it right there." Ok, so I really like watermelons. Watermelons- plural.
Yellow or red...makes no difference to me. But, alas, those big striped things (Black Diamonds) won't grow here in this part
of Colorado- the growing season's too short. Asparagus will have to suffice. Or tomatoes. I haven't had a decent vegetable
garden since I moved back to the Valley. I tried to grow okra. Don't do that, unless you want a few ornamental plants that
are six inches tall and don't flower. I still plan to figure out a way to get it to grow here. I know I will find myself--at
least in my head--planning for a garden next year. You can look at seed catalogs online now, and dream. Tilling the garden
after each harvest is good, for the soil and the gardener, psychologically, preparing it for the next year. That might be
a first-step for my next-year garden. Come February, maybe I'll plant some tomato seeds indoors. Or not. That’s the
great thing about gardening. You can change your mind, and no one’s the wiser. I usually plan it out on paper (with
a pencil for all the changes and rearrangements of seeds and rows). There are places that specialize in selling standard (non-hybrid)
seeds, which you can save from your own bounty and plant next year.
Bible Gateway is a quick
way to look up scripture, however the text is not an internlinear text. This
site will give you an idea of what an interlinear Bible looks like.
Do you remember the old story of the ant and the grasshopper?
The grasshopper goes out and eats galore like there is no tomorrow while the ant stores up a little bit at a time.
The ant makes it and the grasshopper goes without. The ant knew the secret; the grasshopper did not.
Go to the ant, O sluggard, observe her ways and be wise,
which, having no chief, officer or ruler, prepares her food in the summer, and gathers her provision in the harvest. PRO 6:6-8
In the days ahead, the world will be changed.
Our country will be changed and our cities and towns will be changed. In the days ahead, the wise will have prepared
for these changes. The unwise will be wondering what happened and be in great need.
The parable of the ten virgins is a classic teaching on preparation. It speaks
of preparing lamps for the darkness and the coming of the Lord. The wise prepare; the unwise go without and are left
behind. The story of Noah is a good example of preparation. Noah built an ark as God instructed to provide refuge,
food, and deliverance from the flood for both the animals and his family. The story of Joseph is another good example
of using the time before the calamity to prepare for the need. There is a secret element, however, in all these
examples which is critical for us in preparing for the great tribulation.
The Great Tribulation will be a series of events on the earth far more devastating than anything we have known before.
Yeshua and the prophets tried to warn us. They tried to let us know about the changes that are coming.
And there will
be a time of distress such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time; and at that time your people, everyone
who is found written in the book, will be rescued. DAN 12:1
For then there will be a great tribulation, such as has not occurred since the beginning
of the world until now, nor ever shall. And unless those days had been cut short, no life would have been saved; but
for the sake of the elect those days shall be cut short. MAT 24:21-22
The Scriptures tell us much about what will happen in the Great Tribulation.
We are told what judgments will fall, their sequence, and the cataclysmic changes that will come to the earth. There
is enough information for serious believers to prepare initially for those days and wait for God's great deliverance.
Read more here...
Do you remember the old story of the ant and the grasshopper?
The grasshopper goes out and eats galore like there is no tomorrow while the ant stores up a little bit at a time.
The ant makes it and the grasshopper goes without. The ant knew the secret; the grasshopper did not.
Go to the ant, O sluggard, observe her ways and be wise,
which, having no chief, officer or ruler, prepares her food in the summer, and gathers her provision in the harvest. PRO 6:6-8
