Pumpkins, Protection, and a Mad, Mad August
Summer 'Dog-Days' are from mid-July to mid-August. Our ancestors noticed Canicula, the Roman dog star, was in conjunction with the Sun - attributing mad dogs, irritable shedding snakes, and all sorts of vile behavior to Dog Days. Ponds stagnate, poison-ivy thrives, and the fetid air maddens us now with gnats, hungry mosquitoes, and flies; all of us enveloped in a humid miasmic cloud that hangs over these hills. -Linda Ours Rago, Blackberry Cove Herbal, Traditional Appalachian Herbalism I counted eight pumpkins, and felt a flutter of excitement in my belly. There were years when I wouldn't grow them because my allotted garden space was minimal and pumpkins were impractical - the plants took up too much room and their many fruits were more than I could use. But as the years raced by I arrived at this magical age when I realized that what was practical was less important than what brought me joy. I decided that life is too short not to grow pumpkins. The tomatoes that were in