Are You Ready for the Fifth Season?

Nature’s four seasons bring order to our daily routines. Do you know about the fifth season? This year, Summer got a delayed start due to late snowstorms and early spring rains. I’m not quite ready to see it come to a close. My garden is still in Summer super-production mode!

Classic Chinese Medicine adds Late Summer to the four familiar seasons to give us time to pause, shift and prepare for the upcoming longer, often harsher seasons of Autumn and Winter. This fleeting season is tucked between Summer and Autumn and brings a powerful time of transition. It seems to say, “Get ready, get ready, get ready!” This brief time allows us to rejuvenate our health, energy and well-being as we prepare for the new season.

You’ve probably already noticed the cooler morning air and later sunrise. September 22 marks the official first day of Autumn and on November 7, Daylight Saving Time ends. These dates confirm that a new season has arrived.

How do you prepare for this seasonal shift? Do you have seasonal rituals or traditions? As we savor these last days of Summer, and near the final pickings from the garden, I’m curious, “how did you grow this summer?” What new things did you try? I received several notes from some of you with summer produce recipes that you tried. Several of you shared your amazing travels and the new foods you tried.

As much as I enjoy planting my garden in the spring, I also enjoy putting it to rest. That “clearing out” time is approaching. I do have a few Winter Squash that will take my gardening into late Fall. I’ve ordered a Food Saver device so that I may enjoy Summer’s flavors into the next season.

I hope you savor these fleeting days of Late Summer, and all the flavors that it brings. Change is in the air. Are you “in balance” for change?

There shall be eternal summer in the grateful heart.
~Celia Thaxter, 1835-1894, American writer, poet