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As I was leaving the train station a few days ago, I noticed that a small farmers market had set up nearby. There were big, fiery red chili peppers, firm spring onions, juicy cherry tomatoes, basil plants with full leaves, boxes of purple-tinted blueberries and juicy raspberries. It was such a rich vision of abundance and life that I stopped dead in my tracks.
As August progresses, we become more aware that summer is coming to an end. But the abundance of produce reminded me that August is also the beginning of something: the harvest season, which extends into fall and when much of what has been planted throughout the year comes to maturity. For farmers and gardeners, this is a crucial time. But for many of us, disconnected from the rhythm of nature, it’s easy to forget that there is a harvest season. But there are wonderful ways it can help us reflect on our own lives.
So much happens in “The Harvesters” (1565) by Pieter Bruegel the Elder – it’s like an unfolding story that reveals itself the longer you look at it. The Reapers was one of a series of paintings Bruegel painted in which the different labors focused on the work required at each time of year. Amidst the golden fields and the green and grey expanse of land in the background, Bruegel seems to capture several elements of the harvest season in one image. The eye is drawn to everything at once, but what catches my eye most is in the foreground. Two men work hard cutting and sorting wheat while another man carries jugs of drink to a group of people eating and resting. The working men and women in the background gathering and carrying the wheat reveal the hard work of the harvest season. The earth will give us its gifts, but we must still do our part to reap them.
You can only reap what has already been sown, so perhaps August is a good time to reflect on what we ourselves have sown in our lives over the past seven months. Many of us start the year thinking about what we want to work towards in different areas of our lives. Whether we have set resolutions, goals or intentions, as the months go by, it can be easy to lose sight of these aspirations. Life gets in the way. But having sown those seeds, now might be the time to reflect on what shoots have grown from them.
The sleeping and eating group in Bruegel’s painting also reminds us that part of the harvest season is acknowledging the work we have accomplished by allowing ourselves rest and leisure. When we are literally planting and harvesting, we recognize the deep exhaustion we feel from our labor. When we are not working with our hands, when our bodies are not plagued by worn-out muscles or aches, it is tempting to ignore the call to rest. Yet our bodies, minds, and souls are still exhausted from a lifetime’s work. Perhaps this is the time of year to recognize all that we have accomplished during the year and allow ourselves a moment of appreciation for the fruits we have nurtured and cared for to maturity.
The 19th century still life “Blackberries” exudes a calm but inviting presence. by the American painter John F. Francis. On a table stands a delicate, bone-colored bowl of blackberries; on the tablecloth lie loose blackberries, some dark purple, others red and unripe, picked too early from the bush.
Sometimes it’s hard to know when the right time to do something is – when it’s time to finish a certain creative project, change jobs, move on to another phase of a relationship, or end something altogether. We often hold on to things that aren’t yet ripe, when they’ve already started to lose their nutritious qualities, and even when they’ve already spoiled. In the last stanza of Seamus Heaney’s beautiful poem “Blackberry-Picking,” he writes about recognizing a spoiled blackberry in a pile of picked blackberries, and how the tins they were collected in eventually smell of rot. The very last line of the poem is, “Every year I hoped they would last, but knew they wouldn’t.”
Both the poem and the painting make me think about how much we notice and appreciate that most things in our lives are seasonal, that change and development are constant. Timing is important. Perhaps it is also worth pausing and taking stock of what is still life-giving and nourishing to our lives and what is not.
The painting “Lady Making Corn Dollies” from 1979 by Diana Dorothy Rowell is a picture of a harvest tradition that goes back thousands of years. In the painting, an elderly woman sits at a wooden table by the window. The dark walls contrast sharply with her bright white dress and the bright white of the window. She stares intently at the straws she is weaving together. On the tabletop are her materials made of wheat and ribbons, as well as figures she has already completed.
The tradition of making grain dolls began at a time when people believed in the overlap of the world of spirits and the world of humans. It was common knowledge that a good harvest was the result of the kindness of a field goddess. Therefore, it became customary to make straw figures out of the last bundle of grain after the harvest to house the spirit of the grain, which had no place after the harvest. These grain dolls were kept in houses until the next planting season. Then they were either buried in the field or burned and the ashes scattered over the field to ensure that the spirit brought another good harvest.
People once thought their lives were connected to the spiritual, with room for mystery, miraculous intervention, and divine help. Whatever we think about weaving the spiritual through our lives, the tradition of grain dolls demonstrates a thoughtful and reflective approach to things we so often take for granted: respect for where our food comes from, knowledge of the changing seasons, the idea of both giving to and taking from Mother Nature, the recognition that the fruits of the earth also carry life force. When we can pick up our smartphones and have anything we want delivered instantly, the temptation is to consume mindlessly in ways that leave no room for gratitude. At harvest time, we are invited to remember that there are things to be thankful for. How can we acknowledge this abundance in our next action?
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