​Caught My Eye and Got Me Wondering...

My October surprise was a massive pumpkin vine taking over the manure pile behind my barn.  I had thrown last October's pumpkins out on the pile and thought no more of them until back in the early fall when a vine covered with yellow blossoms and wandering all over the manure pile caught my eye.  Mother Nature then did her growing magic and, lo and behold, a magnificent crop of fifteen huge pumpkins, elegantly ribbed, green slowly turning orange, just in time for Halloween. 
 
That got me wondering if manure pile pumpkins would make good pie for Thanksgiving.  Hmmm...I sure had enough of them.  But maybe they would have absorbed a tinge of horse manure flavoring.  Not a pleasant thought.  And maybe they were so big that they had turned tough and lost their flavor.  Perhaps I could channel Miss Lucy Burrell, Miss Edith's lifelong friend who loved to bake, and get some culinary advice from her spirit. 
 
That got me wondering if Miss Edith grew pumpkins in Underhill's large vegetable/flower garden.  Ah hah!  There is a winter homework assignment for the FTSF house tour docents:  go through the Topsmead archives looking for mention or photos of pumpkins and talk to Bob Orintas, the chauffeur's son, who surely would know if there were Halloween pumpkins at Topsmead.
 
Walking about Topsmead one early November morning, something else caught my eye and got me wondering. Overnight, the gusty winds of the day before had completely cleaned the landscape of its fall leaves.  You know, like when Guinevere and Arthur were talking in the movie Camelot, and she says, "And I suppose the Autumn leaves fall in neat little piles?"  And Arthur replies, " Oh no my lady!  They blow away completely!  Wooosh!  At night.  Of course!"  Without leaves cluttering the landscape, what caught my eye was the magnificent network of pine tree roots along the roads leading to the cottage. 
 
That got me wondering what stories those roots could tell:  stories about how they clutched the earth during the winds that sweep across Jefferson Hill, the highest place in Litchfield; stories about how they have enabled the pine trees to stand as tall and elegant sentinels along the road; stories of how those sentinels had provided shade for Miss Edith as she drove her carriage along the roads of Topsmead; and perhaps stories of endurance and possibly even tree wisdom. 
 
So after we have done our civic duty and voted on Election Day, as Miss Edith did faithfully and gratefully after the 19th Amendment finally passed when she was 29 years old,  let's give ourselves permission to take our eyes off of the tumult of the national situation and let them notice and savor natural things like pumpkins and tree roots.  Let's give ourselves permission to find serenity in encouraging our minds to wonder about those seemingly small things. 
 
 
Margaret Hunt
BlogMistress