Dear Curiosity Journal,
In the cool shelter of the pack shed, Karma and I process asparagus. She sorts the bins into #1s and #2s and I trim the ends, weigh them, and band them in 1 lb. bundles. If a spear is past its prime, getting woody, or starting to flower out, it gets tossed into the bin of #2s. I brainstorm ways to preserve the cast offs; pickling, freezing, or maybe making a soup stock. I roughly calculate the time and energy the projects require, dial back my ambitions, and figure it may be more practical to donate or trade the #2s to friends and family. We’re so flush with asparagus this time of year that we could eat it for every meal, work on canning some, put it in the CSA, sell it to wholesale markets, and spears still end up in the compost. Asparagus is one of the crops that has helped me to grasp the concept of abundance on the land. When it comes into production, there is always enough. For a stretch of time in the spring, it is our constant companion. Then, time passes, and it’s not. Abundance is like that; ebbing and flowing in our life. Always present, seasonally harvested.
~Joy