In a never ending quest to find peace and balance in my
daily life, I have hardly found time to breath and sleep never mind write. I
have been busy in the past weeks working my two jobs (I kind of cannot wait for
the summer to be over) and still finding brief quiet moments to make knit hats,
mittens, socks and some aprons that will be up on etsy in a month. I was
rewarded on Sunday though when I got home from work and spent some time working
in my garden to discover that not only would my blackberries be providing fruit
in a few days but my beans would be providing part of my dinner that night.
Working in the garden can be as soothing to me as knitting
and sewing unfortunately my strength wavers fast in the sun and so I have to
remember to take a break as I work. It is one of those task I remember doing as
a young child, helping my mom after my father had tilled the bed. I remembering
help to drag the hoses and watering pots across the driveway to water our
pretty decent size bed, weeding, and then harvest. I guess that sense
of duty is still weighing on me a little since on Sunday I only wanted to curl up on my couch and sleep but I pushed forward to water my garden since the
little rain we got wasn’t enough to water my food.
Much to my pleasure my push was rewarded, I found beans.
Beans were always something my family grew. So much my mother’s parents were
called G&G Beans by us grandkids. Even at his apartment my grandpa still
keeps his beans. Underrated they are beans, coming in all shapes, sized and
colors, and Archaeologist have evidence of them being grown for over 7,000 years.
In Native American culture the bean is brought by a crow with the corn and
pumpkins. Tribes in the Northern parts would plant their corn in mounds on top
of the local fish. On the coast line of New England when the herring (alewife)
ran up river it was not only a sign to plant the corn but the very fish that
would fertilize their food. They then would plant the beans around that and
then pumpkins to cover them. It was a tradition that they taught to the first
settlers that we call Pilgrims. One book I read even credited the Natives with
teaching the English how to cook the beans and I will give credit where it was
due but considering there were cook books with cooking recipes for beans
already from England and Holland that predate the English’s arrival so that can
be tossed out as a thought.
The first harvest of the year |
Underrated the bean may be but tasty and vast in types it truly is. They have inspired rhymes and stories, from Jack and the Bean stock to that lovely rhyme "bean, beans the wonderful fruit the more you eat the more you toot," For my family this vegetable has held more meaning and it will often hopefully
grace our garden beds for generations to come because after a long day at work
on Monday coming home to fresh green beans made a tolerable day not only
uplifting but superb.