October’s Fine Wares

The harvest is payday. All the planting, tending and careful work turns time for picking, gleaning and eating. This is true on agricultural fields everywhere.

And on the Vineyard, it is true more generally; fall is when we enjoy the fruits of a summer’s labor tending to our summer visitors. The demanding clients and traffic-snarling shoppers have departed but there are still day-trippers to occupy shopkeepers and tour guides. Mostly, though, now is when we enjoy a slower pace and more comfortable bank balances. Scalloping season begins, the beach guards are gone, and game swimmers are still plunging into bracing waters.

It all will come around again, and so as we harvest the cold crops we can also harvest some good sense, about living more gently on our land, at the weekend’s harvest festival. Among the many activities for children of all ages will be ways to educate ourselves on living sustainably. It all happens Saturday at the grounds of the Agricultural Hall, next to the ring where young riders will harvest dreams of blue ribbons in the annual, casual Fall Fuzzy Horse Show.

Harvesttime reminds us why we must keep working even when we are tired, uninspired or apathetic. Now is not only the time to relax and reflect, it is the seed time of hope.