This year we seem to be waiting on spring to give us some of those warm sunny days that wake us up and get us outside working in the garden. Of course, we are awake early to get the goats milked and the days cheese set. Spring seems to call on all the senses like a long stretching of our muscles, first the damp musty smell of the soil waking up with wafts of scent from the composting goat bedding, heating up in the new piles beside the barn. Then the sound of bird song fills the air as the migratory wildlife return. My ears remember the tunes and trills that are coming home to Pleasant Valley. With just a little more warmth the spring peepers add another layer of sound, frogs are here, flies and mosquitoes can’t be far behind. Our taste buds come alive with the first tang of the seasons fresh cheese and we start to scout the gardens and herb beds for something fresh and green. Limbering our senses for the heady full days ahead.
The first act of spring here at Quillisascut takes place in February when we start the onion seeds. The flats are filled with soil and compost, next the onion seeds are spread out in short rows, covered with soil and set by the wood stove to keep them warm. As soon as the seedlings push up from the ground they are placed on heat mats in front of our south facing windows, soon to be moved to the green house. Onions are unsung heroes. Have you every heard anyone say their favorite vegetable is the onion? But what other vegetable do we use with such abandon; in soup, on pizza, in salad. The onions in our pantry are starting to sprout, they are feeling the pulls of the spring sunshine.
Here is a poem about the onion:
“The Traveling Onion”
by Naomi Shihab Nye
“It is believed that the onion originally came from India. In Egypt it was an object of worship-why I haven’t been able to find out. From Egypt the onion entered Greece and on to Italy, thence into all of Europe.”
When I think how far the onion has traveled
just to enter my stew today. I could kneel and praise
all small forgotten miracles,
crackly paper peeling on the drainboard
pearly layers in smooth agreement,
the way knife enters onion
and onion falls apart on the chopping block,
a history revealed.
And I would never scold the onion
for causing tears.
It is right that tears fall
for something small and forgotten.
How at meal, we sit to eat,
commenting on the texture of meat or herbal aroma
but never on the translucence of onion,
now limp, now divided,
or its traditionally honorable career:
For the sake of others,
disappear.
