I wrote this way back in 2002, but September is still the most beautiful month to my way of thinking. Hope you enjoy this look back…
Once again, you missed September in upstate New York! The pungent, citrus smell of goldenrod lifts on the mild winds, mixed with the damp, earthy smell of freshly dug potatoes. Canadian geese awaken us each morning and are the last wild sounds of evening's onset. The light is softer as the sun dips towards the horizon to shorten the days.
Our female pheasant appeared once more, out of the shelter of heavy brush, to feed on our birdseed. All through the month, we were delighted to observe a doe and her two youngsters stepping out each afternoon to feed in the field next to us. After the farmers cut it for hay, the new green grass was just too tempting for her! We had seen the spotted fawns just a few times during summer, but now they are nearly grown up. Soon she'll leave them to start a new family for the spring.
The salmon run has the fishermen vying for choice positions in the Salmon River but who has time to fish? Leaves are turning colors but dropping almost as fast as they turn. The dry summer will make for a quick autumn, I'm afraid. We still haven't had a frost -- testimony to a long hot summer. Maybe that means a mild winter? I'm still picking tomatoes and fighting off the frustrated potato bugs. Once the potato plants are killed before the harvest, the bugs march across the street to my tiny garden and eat everything that begins with P or rhymes with "potato"!
Birds are a real barometer of the seasons. The huge flocks of grackles, blackbirds and cowbirds no longer come to us for seed. Goldfinches are losing their brilliant mating colors and beginning to all look alike. The bluebirds visit us as a family unit now, having raised two broods in our yard. The dying cat tails are alive with song sparrows too numerous to count! Chickadees and blue jays are leaving the trees again to feed at our feeder and the white breasted nuthatch has returned for the winter. Soon I'll have to hang out my homemade suet for the woodpeckers. The hummingbirds must be gone for good -- I've not seen one in so long.
My flower gardens continually change, too. Black-eyed Susans, daisies and sunflowers have gone to seed to be replaced by nasturtiums blazing like the sun. Zinnias tempt the last of the butterflies and the purple asters are full of bees. Dainty cosmos wave above sweet white alyssum. Soon I'll have spring bulbs to plant. A garden is always a work in progress. In this way, I suppose we are like a garden to God. Different seasons bring different fruit and some times are just "dry" times in our lives. May you be fruitful for Him no matter what the season!
“As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is My Word that goes out from My mouth: It will not return to Me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.” Isaiah 55:10-11
Love as always, Elaine (planting in hope)
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