Walking home from the farmers' market this morning, the scents of basil, tomatoes, peaches, corn, wafting up from my Downton Abbey bag, my happy cup brimmed over. Because, not only do I live within five walking minutes of the market every Saturday morning May through October, my walk takes me through sun-dappled trees of every description - towering, low, evergreen, leafy - and the immediate coolness is such a delight. A pleasure that grows dimmer and dimmer in this era of air-conditioning.
In childhood, the trees were our absolute refuge. We would sit under the trees to husk corn, peel peaches, hull peas, shell lima beans. Trees had chairs under them -sometimes just house chairs but in lawns there were often big wooden chairs that we later called Adirondack chairs, but surely they were Lancaster County chairs before that! And if those chairs didn't contain working women and children, they held visiting relatives, friends - talking, commiserating, gossiping, laughing, sometimes singing. Even the hottest summer day seemed more bearable with a breeze. The trees were our staying point all summer long,
And for me they still are. Often escaping from the air-conditioned indoors I go out on our patio and look high up to the blue sky beyond the tall greenery and feel instantly at peace. And judging from the cascading symphonies, all the birds and cicadas agree.
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