August 25

The pace has slackened just a little across the road, now that all the late planting and transplanting has ended. The focus these past few weeks has been on corn, and the pumpkin truck (as we call it) has been making frequent round trips each day to Echo Farm to fill the bushels.

JD went today to lend a hand in picking, and I watched him climb in back of the pickup, stand on the metal flooring and hold onto the rough-sawn siding of the bed, grinning as Fred and Dan were seated in the cab. The trio drove slowly away up Grove, leaving me standing in the intersection of the driveway and the roadway, watching them move along.

I am pleased at his going, for his exposure to such work, hard and honest, walking along the rows with basket in tow, pulling and twisting the ears to break the nub. It is important that he do such things away from us and under the eye of one whom he so admires.

The ears have lengthened since mid July, and this late summer variety has more sugars for the flavor. To say that such corn is mouth watering seems insufficient and trite, but nevertheless it is a wonder. Now is the season for sweet corn and bruschetta, made with our own sun-ripened tomatoes and basil which have survived the July heat, only to thrive in this cooler August.

Soon we will start hoarding the corn, in the manner of the chipmunks and squirrels which are in earnest now as the acorns have begun to mature and even fall from the oaks. We’ll cut the kernels from the corn after cooking store them in freezer bags, two gallons worth, and save them till sometime in winter when we simply need a reminder of summers – those past and those that will be again.