“How is your garden?” he asked, sincere and wanting to know. “I’ve been staring at a yellow squash that hasn’t seemed to have grown for a week—might’ve hit it with a little glyphosate enough to stunt the growth, but not enough to kill it…
The spaghetti squash vines are taking over. I’ll have more than I’ll know what to do with; but I’m looking forward to a good few months of it and sauce of tomatoes from vine. My first beefsteaks are finishing. They are stacked with flowers and we’re close to a whole bunch setting. The San Marzanos are waking up too. I’m looking forward to them—cut open longwise in halves—with basil and mozzarella drizzled in balsamic reduction,” he grinned thinking on the taste and, too, from speaking of food and garden in way he never imagined that he would. One learns themselves and true enjoyments and pleasures in time, and to work and eat of his labor with soil—freshness and richness of flavor when grown small and for self, not pumped with water and sold by mass on shelf—were two of his.
“I don’t know when the green beans will start to set. The bush beans are flowering, but I have not seen any beans in set. The pole beans are climbing. Most are taller than me, growing before they flower.
I like the pole beans better, even if I’m the only one that usually eats them. I let them grow a little too big for some; but it serves a whole helping from a very quick picking…I’m still learning—what I like to grow, what I like to eat; aesthetics as much as tastes; guess taste of a different kind.
I just wondered,” he spoke in ending. “I wondered on yours and wanted to tell you of mine—and now I have.”
He smiled, eyes going inward as he thought again of tomato and basil and mozzarella drizzled in syrup of balsamic reduction; juiciness of tomato slice, salt of the cheese, rich-sweet of balsamic and after-breath of the basil.
He thought of her too in enjoyment of treat, savor of taste distinctions stacked and layered to one another; run of the juice and catch with her tongue, smile’s laughing as she did; rich of the taste over palate and tongue, slow eaten in summer’s heat.