The pumpkin patch is planted. The tomato plants are planted; garden commencement. We christened the patch ‘Patty’ and the edgings of tomato plants ‘Tommy’. I preferred ‘Tuppence’ but they are after all, beefsteak tomatoes and the name rang false.
I assume the fox, who runs scattershot on the rim of this neighborhood, will leave our labor unscathed. In recent weeks, a rabid cousin of our community’s artful-dodger, while running wild and crazed around one of the nearby streets in Brighton, managed to bite and sufficiently terrify six individuals, including a friend of mine. I am therefore, watchful. My friend, after having been badly bitten, fought off the fox with a metal hanging flower basket rod and with assistance from a kind neighbor who walloped the animal with a large rock; subsequently, everyone ran for his and her lives. The nearby woodlands are filled with our own fox’s food and I have observed nothing out of the ordinary.
I have promised pumpkins to the four year old twins next door who watched the planting with great earnest, calling out ‘Hello! Hello!’ until they were sufficiently acknowledged.
It rained today; a damp, off the lake soaking which saved us watering time. Nothing left for this evening but the wind chimes, the faded chatter of children giving up the street to go home and the imagined tread of the fox; watching from the edge of the woods…
690 Saint Paul 