"Here Today, Gone Tomorrow"

May 21st eh?

According to some, that's when 'The Rapture' will occur. Don't know if I want to be a part of it or not to tell you the truth. I seem to remember something about the chaff being gathered and burned before the wheat. I love dispensationalists, I hope they won't be disappointed! It would be a shame for some to fall away from the faith because they have a flawed eschatology. That's the only point on the actual date of May 21st I want to make, and any further discussion will be an adventure in missing the point I will not engage in at this time.

I do think one good thing could come of all this talk about "THE End of the WORLD" Mainly, it has to do with Okra. Well not Okra directly, more to do with Okra Flowers because they are beautiful, intricate, simple, blooming reminders that life is a vapor, and we are here today, and gone tomorrow.

Some folks take pride in their ability for their floral arrangements to last. Then, you have a whole group of people who do almost anything to 'preserve' the flowers by drying them. I stand guilty of that. I got news for you and me, no flower lasts. They all wither and fade, some more quickly than others, but they will all go away. The best result we can expect from preservation is a dry, crumbly, shell of what a flower is, pressed between the pages of a book, or hung upside down over a window, or we can choose to encase it in a substance far removed from it's orignal composition, so that while it may look beautiful, it is nothing like the flower we want it to be. Shell or mockery, you won't have the flower forever.
God Knows us so well!
Isaiah 40:1-8:

1 Comfort, comfort my people, says your God.
2 Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
and cry to her
that her warfare is ended,
that her iniquity is pardoned,
that she has received from the LORD’s hand
double for all her sins.
3 A voice cries: "In the wilderness prepare the way of the LORD;
make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
4 Every valley shall be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill be made low;
the uneven ground shall become level,
and the rough places a plain.
5 And the glory of the LORD shall be revealed,
and all flesh shall see it together,
for the mouth of the LORD has spoken."
6 A voice says, "Cry!"
And I said, "What shall I cry?"
All flesh is grass,
and all its beauty is like the flower of the field.
7 The grass withers, the flower fades
when the breath of the LORD blows on it;
surely the people are grass.
8 The grass withers, the flower fades,
but the word of our God will stand forever.

Ah, we are the flowers!
Here's part two of my okra flower picture: The day after I took that picture, I picked that withered blossom out of the square with the okra plant in it, and I threw it in the compost! It was already on the ground, withered up into a tube, as okra flowers do wither. Such is the fate of you and I. We will feed the worms, barring of course, great things happen before we die. Until then, Because of Adam, this body is destined for death.

God's word is forever, and it has promised us great things. God has given us a promise of a new Kingdom, a new heaven, and a new earth. We'll have permanent treasure, new bodies, and great rooms. When I think of heaven the thing that grabs me most is its PERMANENCE!

I hope you pause and think about what is temporary, and what is forever as May 21st approaches.
I hope you pause and think about what is temporary, and what is forever once it passes.
I hope you are changed by what is permanent and not changed by what changes with the passing of the day.

Gardening in a Box.

Normally, I do things a little outside the box. This time, outside the box is inside the box!
HA!

I love getting my hands dirty in good soil. I also love reminding myself of the simple truth: "If I want to live, something else must die."
That's some hard philosophy for you, and it's not what this post is about. This post is about gardening using a technique I have modified from "Square Foot Gardening" . I bought the newest book at a big box hardware store so I could start raising the food I eat instead of just going to the store. Previous attempts at gardening have only been minimally effective, I wanted to try and do something good and right, and I'm finally starting to see fruit, literally, and figuratively!

I don't wish to critique Mel Bartholomew's book Square Foot Gardening because I didn't follow his instructions exactly. I didn't build the soil he said to build (and I don't think I will), and I used slightly different materials. I didn't do anything different out of spite, or because I thought I was doing it better, I did it because I've learned to be pragmatic, especially when time is of the essence. I was already late in getting the boxes built, I feared I might become downright hasty if I neglected doing something beneficial soon! I'm glad I did things when I did them, I was able to learn some valuable lessons:
1. The thing about a raised box garden is that the magic is in the raised box! I believe that is the single most important thing I learned. Building a box, covering the bottom with a weed fabric, and controlling the soil you use to grow your plants are the things that seem to provide the greatest results. Isolate the environment to compensate for a lack.
2. Watch it like a hawk. Because your environment is isolated, you may have to make a quick reaction to what's happening in and around the soil, especially when it comes to water. When you have a raised bed, with weed fabric accross the bottom, it's hard to water too much, but it can be very easy to water too little, especially as it gets hotter. plants can't develop deep roots, so you have to compensate.
3. Have a plant support system established before you build the boxes. One of the things Mel says do, that I didn't was build a netting trellis. I couldn't find the netting, and instead of pragmatically just getting some tomato cages or stakes, I neglected to do that, and the plants quickly went willy-nilly. Bad call. I finally staked the tomatoes today, and got them off the everything. My tomato production will probably suffer as a result.

Other general notes include, the next time I do tomatoes, i will do one variety at a time, just to keep seeds pure. I will also locate some netting, because I think I could get better tomatos if I'd been training to to grow on a net instead of just staking them, staking will damage the vine. I'll do fewer plants too. Ultimately, I'd like to have a group of cherry tomatoes growing overhead. I think I could do that, and have it be awesome.

The garden is beginning to bear fruit. it's gone from this:

To This:

The tomatoes are producing tomatoes, although none have turned yet. The cucumbers are going strong, we've already had one. I've gotten basil, rosemary, sage, thyme, oregano, radishes, and various greens. I've also had a hand full of blackberries.

updates as summer and harvest progresses!

Strange Daze...

It's a rainy day, so God is doing the work of wetting my garden, I did have to turn the compost today though, and did so in a light rain. No biggie, I still worked up a sweat, and was amazed at how warm the heap was. Composting works! When it gets ready, it will probably go in the front yard, around my landscaping, mainly because this compost is questionable, i keep finding grubs in it even though it's warm. I don't want to add problems to my garden, I already don't get enough sunlight for my taste. Why add grubs!
My garden is a square foot garden, although I admit the pepper plant is in a container, and is likely to remain in a container. My goal is to see how big I can get this cayenne, and how long it can survive. I would like to plant seeds from this cayenne though, I have three set aside, from my first red pepper, and look forward to planting them. Even though the plant was in only moderate sun, the pepper did turn out to be good and spicy! perhaps there's something to the old grape growers tale that struggle makes for good grapes.

On a side note, handling a shovel on a daily basis is reducing the wimpyness of my information service oriented palms. I almost got a blister!