Autumn Equinox

Started... yes.  Today I began the garden clean-up.  It is the first day of Fall, and does feel so different than the Spring Equinox.  Tonight is as long as today was; I am so looking forward to climbing into the sheets and comforter and Wayne and the big black dog.  No really, Emerson doesn't sleep there all night, just long enough to where he feels me begin to relax then he moves his girth to the floor.

I picked most of the Heirloom tomatoes.  See that dark one?  Note to self: plant at least 100 of those next year.  It is beyond description for deliciousness.  It is dark, sweet, smokey.  This is the last one, and I only got about five of them.  Yes.  I do hope that there are 100 seeds in there.  The rest of these are from a plant called Cuban Yellow.  Hahaha.  Mislabeled.  The label also says that this plant will be covered with "yellow cranberry-sized tomatoes in profusion."  Nope.  Not.  Regardless, these too, are sweet and not to be missed.  It makes me melancholy to realize that the short tomato season of 2010 is o-v-e-r.

Shhh.  There is a miracle occurring in the pumpkin patch.  The vines are still green and strong, and I see that there are still tiny pumpkins setting on the vine, which will never mature.  There are these that seem to grow inches daily.  They are gorgeous and flat and serrated and the most luscious orange imaginable.

Startling.  You know what?  I read stories to a three year old girl and a two year old boy today on my daughter's couch.  I was the "substitute" daycare person.  The little girl chose fairy books, so I read several stories which ended happily ever after with a kissing prince.  I found myself making up more palpable details and saying to her, "What do you think of that?" and she'd smile a toothless, wide smile and say, "The Prince kithess her!  She'th sooo beautiful!"  Then we'd move to a tractor book.

These are Cinderella pumpkins.  Actually, they are a "French Pumpkin."  I can almost imagine the mice turning into thundering Budweiser Percheron's with flowing white manes and tails, huge pounding hooves, dashing footmen in scarlet coats, glass slippers, beautiful gown and strains of music settling in under the broad round leaves.

Yeth.  We do grow up and some fall "in love."  I notice that happily-ever-after takes on a moment-to-moment quality, that it is important to cultivate and nurture this in-love.   Humble is important.  Growth and letting go take on equal importance.  Support and acceptance seem integral to this process of growing beyond our Cinderella-meet-the-handsome-Prince bodies.   Love gets bigger.  

A line jumped out this morning in my Spiritual practice reading:  Faith without joy is not entirely genuine...  If you are not happier as a result of your faith there is probably something wrong with it.  Faith in God should bring a deep feeling of happiness and security no matter what happens on the surface of life.  The prayer for today:  I pray that my horizons may grow ever wide.  I pray that I keep reaching out for more service and companionship.

Sweet dreams:  May they be peopled with kissing and good things far beyond any heretofore imagined, wide horizons, joy, and a faith that carrys you lightly, sweetly, settling you in Love.

Blessings.

xoxoLC