ME AND LITTLE BESS

Saturday (July 13) I was up early. Little Bess was ready and willing when I opened her kennel. It was a big day for us. We were going to the farm by ourselves. Mike, Jack, and Nellie left the day before to backpack at Harrison Lake with Hallie and Nick and their friend Ellen.

I was sure that Nellie was enjoying her backpacking event without the interference of pesky Bess. And I found that I was enjoying the opportunity to become acquainted with Bess without those canine rivalry issues. (Dogs are such strange people!)

We arrived at the farm about 8:00. As we approached the lane, we passed our neighbor walking his dog, a big Shorthair male called “Tick.”

“We had plans for this weekend but they fell through – so I got to come here,” said the neighbor with a smile that lit up his whole face. My sentiments exactly.

It was a big day for Bess and me. I meant to make the day trip count. I carried with me things we haven’t had room to take – a framed picture and yard ornaments and such. I also took the laundry and changed the guest bed in readiness for the next guests. In the end, I hung four big loads on the clothesline. And took it down. And folded it – some to stay at the farmhouse and a large basket for town.

And I picked raspberries. My dream of a viable raspberry patch has finally been realized. I estimate that I picked at least two quarts – and I probably picked at least two quarts last week. And I tell you what -- I’m jealous of every berry – that is, I really don’t want to share even one with Bess. Too late – she can squeeze under the fence and she loves raspberries. But, after all -- she wasn’t picking from the top. What few berries she was able to reach were payment enough for her company, I suppose.

Mike thought it would be easier to keep little Bess on the farm, and I think he was right. She’s easy to spot in the open yard. She loves to curl up with Mike’s grilling mitt in the wood box at the kitchen door. She won’t be doing that forever.

I also picked sugar snap peas. My small planting in the big tire yielded big results. I planted densely, fertilized with 10-10-10 slow release, and packed horse manure under the rim of the tire. Peas like it cool, but despite the heat, the sugar snaps are producing wonderfully. I also picked another variety of shell peas, also doing well but not as prolific.

I didn’t take my laptop, but I did take my iPad. And I finished reading a book I had downloaded a few days before. You’ll laugh when I tell you it was Daddy Long-Legs (1912) by Jean Webster. I have a vague memory that Chris mentioned reading it many years ago – many, many years ago -- like 50 years ago.  I loved it for its old ideas on life and womanhood.

And – I took my project box filled with American Girl patterns and fabric and treated myself to a couple of hours of cutting out clothes for Emerson’s doll. I knew I was being silly because I really couldn’t hope to finish all that by the time Jack leaves on Monday, but I was having a thoroughly good time. The doll clothes are our gift to Emmy for her fifth birthday, which happened July 6. Jack will deliver them. “Tracking by Jack.”

The rhubarb we planted this spring isn’t looking so good, but my old plant looks great under the regimen of fertilizer and manure. AND – two of the plants we set out near the pond and which I thought were lost, are growing beautifully.

We were ready for the return trip to town at 5:30 when I noticed a few ripe pie cherries on my little tree, so I took the time to pick, pit, and freeze them. That additional half cup made a pint of cherries off the tree this year. I’ll make a little tart when Hallie and Nick are here later in the month. Hallie says I should fertilize the tree. Maybe I will.

The thimbleberries on the grade will be ripe soon. That thimbleberry jam that Hallie and Nick made last year was wonderfully wonderful, but I don’t know if I want to take it on by myself. Hmmmmm . . . KW