I kept saying to Tom, "I can't believe how much I'm getting done!" It was that kind of day--not only did I pin up laundry, run the hated trimmer, deadhead flowers, transplant spinach, water everything extensively, but I also brought in a big harvest: a bushel of kale, eleven eggplants [!], a colander filled with Serrano peppers, bowls of tomatoes and peppers, plus an armful of ornamental grasses and hydrangeas. I spent the remainder of the day dealing with with the booty. Sauce bubbled on the stove; the kale was stripped, washed, cooked down, bagged, and frozen; the grasses and flowers are now hanging up in the back room to dry for winter bouquets; I cut up the eggplants, brushed the pieces with olive oil and salt, and roasted them for salads. And then I sat in the sunshine with a big needle and a roll of waxed twine and sewed the peppers into strings for drying.

So much richness from this tiny city homestead. On some days it's overwhelming, but yesterday I fell into the rhythm. I especially love sewing peppers. It is such a pleasant, satisfying task, outside on a warm September afternoon.

But, today, back to my desk again. I should finish the editing project this week, and then I will drop suddenly into my teaching year--a professional-development day on Saturday (FREE! in Portland! for all teachers and artists! you should come!) followed by day 1 with my Monson high schoolers next week. I need to realign my brain: I haven't been in a classroom situation since July. Mostly I've been moseying through my days alone, carving out my own schedule, seeing no one during my work hours, and now I have to remember how to build a day amid a crowd. It will be a sudden jolt, but interesting too, and I'm ready for a change of pace.

In the meantime I cast my eyes over the strings of peppers draped along the dining-room windows. I admire the bundles of grass and flowers, hanging upside down in the airy back room. I open the freezer door and count the packages of vegetables I've stored. I walk down into the cellar and lay a hand on a tight stack of firewood. Even in the city I can't step away from my homestead life. Each of these small accomplishments is a window into past and future, a self-definition, part of the story of how I tumbled up through so many seasons, so many years. There is no pride like harvest pride.