It was Cucumber Summer.

The wettest summer these mountains ever simmered. Even when it wasn’t raining, the air was steam. Heavy… hot… wet air that left every crevice soggy.

The garden loved it. I did not. Everything grew like it had something to prove. Vines crawled over vines, weeds grew faster than I could cuss at them, and somewhere underneath all that green were the pathways I made in spring. By July, I’d mostly quit pretending I was in charge. The garden had gone feral and apparently elected cucumbers as its leader.

And wormwood. There is so much wormwood. And mugwort keeps hiding and only popping its head out when you aren’t looking so she can cast her spell before you realize she is there.

I spent three years trying to grow that damn plant. Now I’m pretty sure she’s been growing me. Every time I go looking for her, I find something else. Chicory. Zinnias. Wormwood. Ragweed. Cockleburs. A bug down my shirt. By the time I finally give up and start heading back toward the house, soaked through with sweat and wondering why I ever thought gardening was a peaceful hobby, there she is. Mugwort. Standing right beside a path I swear I already looked at twice.

But those cucumbers I thought I’d plant next to the driveway and train on my way into the house, they’re easily found, decorative, and untamed! My counters are piled high in every size and shape, greens, and yellows. Then, the giants that I plan to rape for seeds, those are bagged up on the table next to the giant cutting board. Then there’s the baskets full of different bunches of herbs, I had picked, laid up to dry, and then stacked on top of each other next to the tea cabinet.

And somewhere underneath all of it is my kitchen table. I think. I haven’t actually seen the whole thing in weeks. Every flat surface in the house has become some stage of harvest. Something waiting to be washed, something drying, something needing stripped from a stem, something I was absolutely going to deal with yesterday. The whole house smells green. Not the clean little green smell they put in candles either. Real green. Damp leaves and cucumber guts and dirt and herbs drying a little too slowly because even the air conditioner can’t wring all the wet out of Cucumber Summer.

Lately, my life looks a whole lot like my garden. Overgrown in places. Things I planted growing somewhere other than where I put them. Things I spent years trying to grow finally showing up after I quit looking. Good things piled everywhere, waiting for me to figure out what to do with them. I can’t keep up with half of it.
Maybe that’s not the same thing as being behind.

Maybe some seasons just grow faster than you can harvest them.
And maybe this one will always be Cucumber Summer. The summer I turned fifty with a kitchen table I couldn’t find, mugwort playing hide-and-seek in the weeds, more herbs than I could dry, more cucumbers than anybody ought to have, and a life that had finally gotten too damn big to keep neat.

I think I like it that way.