Things I Learned in March

I'm a few days late with this, but here is my look back at the last month to see what I learned from it.

1.  I stopped ordering from Amazon this month, after deciding I could no longer support their employment practices, and I learned that I could do without it except for hard-to-find used books, which is going back to the original Amazon business model.  All the other odds and ends I had gotten into the habit of ordering through them can be found in local shops, ordered from different online businesses, or we can simply do without them.

2. This lenten season my husband and I gave up alcohol for Lent, and learned just how much alcohol is part of the normal social life. I had expected to find it difficult to not enjoy a glass of wine or a cocktail in the evening with my husband, but I had not thought about the times when drinking is part of social interactions with others. Whether it is beer at soccer games, wine at a professional gathering, or drinks with a nice dinner at a restaurant, we just hadn't noticed how much alcohol moves the social scene.  I have a whole new sympathy for those struggling with alcoholism or who simply do not drink, when it seems to be so saturated in our culture.

3.  Reading the book Six Degrees has been horrifying and galvanizing, and I've been reminded yet again that I need to dedicate myself to a low-carbon lifestyle and advocating for a collective shift to a low-carbon society.

4.  My mother and I studied the Psalms this month in our Mother-Daughter Bible Study, and learned that we were both disappointed by the psalms and disturbed by how much "my enemy" language they contain.  I still struggle to pull the religion of universal love out of the religion of tribal loyalties and judgment.




5.  I learned that the kale I planted in August was able to overwinter and is perfectly lovely to eat in March.  I also relearned just how much I love my land and my garden and life here once we are past the winter.  The sun really does come back and spring returns and I can happily live here without ever leaving the gates of my own property.




6.  I had heard it was possible, but this month I verified that I can sprout leeks from the cut off bottoms of other leeks.  I kept the bottoms from some grocery store leeks, started them in my kitchen window, and then planted them in the kitchen garden after they were a few inches tall.  Now how well they fare will be the April learning. :)

Weekly Book Post: Mindful Parenting and How to Live in the World

Last week I read two more books that encouraged mindful living: Mindful Parenting by Kristen Race and How to Live in the World and Still Be Happy by Hugh Prather.

The first book is a mix of information on brain research and psychology, recommendations for common stressors, and then techniques and exercises for mindfulness suitable for various different ages.  I found it to be a reasonable, "middle path" in its recommendations, and to be practical and easy to understand.

A quote from the book:

But there is only so much you can control from the outside.  No matter where you are, there will always be stressors, and if you don't have the tools on the inside to manage the stressors in your life, your external environment becomes irrelevant.

Prather's book is a meditation on choosing happiness through mindfulness and gradual enlightenment.  It is about happiness from within, not dependent on external circumstances.  I found parts of the book very thought-provoking, and a few practical ideas for keeping my focus on my intention throughout the day.

A quote from the book:

True happiness is flexible because it is geared to an inner state that can be controlled and not to the world, which never can be.  There will always be interruptions, and this must become unimportant.


Both have been good resources for my continued journey to a more enlightened and mindful inner self.

Doing Lent as a Unitarian Universalist

The three Abrahamic faiths (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) all have times of fasting and self-denial (Rosh Hashanah, Lent, Ramadan), and self-denial also features in Buddhism and Hinduism in different ways.  (If you want to think more about all that, try this.)

But I'm not any of those religions - I'm a Unitarian Universalist.  And UUism doesn't have a tradition of intentional self-denial or a time to intentionally re-focus your life.  Why we don't probably makes perfect sense if you look at the evolution of our traditions (part of the whole point was that both Unitarians and Universalists held up the idea that people were good, as opposed to the Calvinist ideas that are decidedly more pessimistic about human nature), but understanding why this is so doesn't change the fact that I feel drawn to some sort of fasting as a spiritual practice.  And, strictly because I come from a Christian family, if feels most authentic for me to adopt a modified practice of Lent (in other words, it would feel like cultural misappropriation to me to try and adopt a Jewish or Islamic practice, when those traditions are further from my understanding and are not present in my family).

So I will be observing Lent, starting tomorrow on the traditional Ash Wednesday.  The point of this, for me, is to practice self-denial, self-restraint, and self-control, or as Simple Mom beautifully wrote, "Say No, to Yourself". It's all about a pause to make sure that I am living the life I choose to live, in accord with the deepest callings of my heart, and not just living a life of unthinking drives.  Matt Kinsi had a nice perspective on Lent and UU's when he called this the triumph of ego over id.

I have done Lent in the past, and given up sugar, which at the time was a real addiction for me.  I wasn't sure I could do without it, and I was a cranky bear at first.  But it was liberating to realize that I did not need sugar, and that I actually felt much healthier and had a clearer mind without it.  I have a healthier relationship to sugar to this day, finding that I can partake in moderation but also can go without.

This year my husband and I will be giving up wine, and actually all forms of alcohol (with an exception for St. Patrick's day).  We will confirm to ourselves that we do not need to have a glass of wine in the evening to unwind.  We will spend this time practicing more intentionality in how we relax and how we unwind.  I'm glad we're doing it together, too, and this might be a great time to be more intentional in how we relate to one another as partners as well.

We will be donating the money we would have spent on alcohol to a clean water charity (World Water Day is in March too, and that seems like a nice coincidence).  Turning Wine into Water.

Self-denial.  Self-control.  Reflection.  Renewal.

It's all perfectly timed for this season, isn't it?

A Poem a Day

One of my reading goals for 2014 is to read 14 books of poetry.  I haven't been much in the habit of reading poetry, although there are some poets I enjoy a great deal (Marge Piercy and Denise Levertov have been my favorites), and this goal of 14 books of poetry is a "stretch" goal for me.

But I quickly realized that sitting down and reading a book of poetry straight through didn't work for me.  Each poem seems to demand more digestion time before I move on and take another one in, and so they lose their beauty when I consume them too quickly.

The solution seems to be A Poem a Day.  Or more than one, but it just depends on the poems and the day.  The point being, I am trying to sit down at my desk, coffee and journal at my elbow, and start the day with a poem.  This comes right after my morning yoga/stretching, and right before reading out loud to my kids from their latest chapter book.

It has proven to be a delightful way to start the day!  So far I've read Sands of the Well by Levertov, and now I've started Leaves of Grass by Whitman.  Suggestions of other poets most welcome!

Mornings

I simply have to rise early.  It is the foundation of our whole day, as a family, what I do in the early mornings.  Morning chores, morning spiritual practice, morning stretching and sipping of coffee, or today early morning blogging - it's very true that if you want to make sure something happens, do it first thing in the morning.

My morning routine begins immediately with putting the kettle on.  Then, after personal bio needs are met, I set about unloading the dishwasher and frequently start a load of laundry.  Yesterday's coffee grounds need to go in the worm bin, and frequently worm compost tea needs to be drained out.  Worm tea gets mixed with water and I go out to water my plants with it.  It's the same routine every morning.  I could almost do it in my sleep.  Maybe I am asleep. :)  Then the kids need to be roused, and they need to head out to do their morning chores: feed goats, chickens, and turkeys, collect eggs, dump kitchen compost in the bin.

Time allowing, I get a tiny bit of personal study or reflection or spiritual practice time then.

From that foundation, I can usually face the variable nature of each day.  If lunches need to be packed, I can do that.  If we are doing a big school day at home, we can begin.  If we are leaving the house, we can load the car.

But it's all a house of cards.  I need to rise early.

Reading as Spiritual Practice

Reading and journaling are one of my (almost daily) spiritual practices, the most cognitive of my practices.  (If you're interested, I'm currently trying to do daily: read and write, clean something with mindfulness, show love and care to another human being or to nature, stretch/yoga/mindful engagement with my body, and sit in silence.  Each can be very short, and many are things I might be doing every day anyway.  The difference is in approaching them as a spiritual practice meant to further my own spiritual development as a calm, loving, and enlightened human being.)

In my mind, reading counts as spiritual development when I'm reading the sort of book that brings me closer to engaging with the transcendent mystery and making meaning of life.  There are many different types of book that do that:

• Literature.  Not all literature, and it is hard to guess what is going to be a spiritual read and what isn't.  Just because a book says in its blurb that its "a journey of discovery" or something like that doesn't mean that it will move me.  And then books that didn't seem like they would be transformative at all will surprise me.
• Sacred Writings.  While these seem like an obvious starting place for reading as a spiritual practice, I find the primary documents of most religions don't easily move me.  There are too many issues of translation, context, different cultural norms, etc.
• Writings about religion or spirituality.  I almost always am moved and provoked to reflection by the words of someone else who is thinking about or explaining religious ideas.  
• Personal memoirs.   These all depend on the person who wrote them, and whether I can relate to this person and "like" them.  
• Essays.  I love books of essays, whether they are Emerson, Kingsolver, Berry, or anthologies such as the one pictured above.
• Poetry. I like poetry, but I find it difficult to find material I will like.  I'd like to branch out more in this direction.  
• Psychology books.  There is a very wide spectrum of quality in the psychology for the layman section of the library.  "Pop" psychology can be awful, or it can be fantastic.  I just have to give a book a chance, no matter what the cover looks like and how many "Ph.D"'s the author has, and hope for the best.
• Meditation manuals.  There are actually books that have been put together specifically to be short reflective reads.  They can be really good.  Look in that section of the UUA bookstore if you're interested.

And so I set time aside to read every day, and live surrounded by books. 

Fun in the mail

Who doesn't love to get a package?

Fun things that came in the mail: our new trampoline (not assembled - Carbon claimed to be terribly disappointed it wasn't lowered down into our backyard by a helicopter) and a whole box of new study books for the RE Credentialing program.

Two very different kinds of fun, but I love them both.

Sabbath Keeping

From Gates of Prayer:

There are days when we seek things for ourselves
and measure failure by
what we do not gain.

On the Sabbath
We seek not to acquire but to share.

There are days
when we exploit nature as though it were a horn
of plenty that
can never be exhausted.

On the Sabbath
we stand in wonder before the mystery
of creation.

There are days
when we act as if we cared nothing
for the rights of others.

On the Sabbath
we are reminded that Justice is our duty
and a better world
is our goal.



I wish all a Happy Sabbath, whatever day of the week you observe it.

Day 28 of Gratitude: My Kids

I'm almost done with this month of Gratitude Reflections, and it would be wrong to end without talking about my children.

There has been a bit of conversation in the last few years about studies that show that having kids decreases happiness for the parents.  But then there are new studies that critique the old studies, and you can read more about that question here on Jezebel.

So, am I glad I had kids because they make me happier?  I like Gretchen Rubin's observation that having kids isn't happier on a day-to-day, moment-to-moment level, but that it is part of how she "feels right".

My children were dearly wished for.  And yet, they are not what I imagined they would be.  Who was it that said that in order to love the child you actually have that you will need to mourn and grieve for the imaginary child you carried around in your head for 9 months?  (I think it was Mr. Rogers.)  Well, for me that is true.  They are not my creations, not my imaginings, not what I expected.

And they're perfect just the way they are.

Day 26 of Gratitude: the life of the mind

This month of gratitude thing has actually been challenging to me - and possibly boring to my one or two readers - as it has started to feel like I'm bragging/repeating myself/not saying anything interesting.

But I'll finish it out, anyway.  Today, I pause to tell the world how grateful I am for the life of the mind.  My maternal grandparents were life-long learners, and modeled an engaging and inspiring life of the mind.  They subscribed to interesting magazines, read difficult books, took educational trips, and patronized and played classical music.

I knew I wanted to be like that.  I watched my mother also pursue her own life of the mind, and I am happy to think it's something I'm passing on to the next generation.

There is always something more to learn, and for that I am grateful.  Life will never get boring as long as I'm still able to engage with it in this way.

(For the record, and for full-disclosure, Carbon does not make a habit of reading Scientific American.  I had told him about an article I thought he would find interesting, and he was just trying to read that article.  In the end, I read it out loud to him.)

Gratitude Day 24: Skipping Black Friday

We spent Black Friday at the zoo, where this duckling tried to bond with Hypatia and follow her out of the avian area.

I'm very grateful to feel no urgency about my Christmas shopping.  My extended family does a Secret Santa gift exchange, so we all only need to get one gift.  My in-law's are a smaller family and are pretty laid back about gift giving also.  And my immediate family will only be exchanging small, mostly homemade gifts, and expecting Santa to come just to fill the stockings with some small things.

Our usual routine is to pick a shopping day and to make a day of it in our small downtown shopping area, for festive fun.  No real crowds, no parking lots, no lines to speak of, and no cranky mall employees.

I love the Christmas season, and am grateful to start it the same way I want to end it: with family and togetherness and hopes for a peaceful, better world.

Day 21 of Gratitude: Flexible Work

I have a great job.  What you do for work is going to take up a huge part of your life, and although this is a pragmatic transaction (your time in exchange for the money you need to live) people almost all agree that a happier life results from finding work that you love - work you want to do even if you weren't being paid for it.

As a Director of Religious Education, working full-time, I have quipped that I have the reverse of what many working people I know have: They have 5 or 6 days a week of rigid work and 1 day to figure out how to get everything else done, while I have 1 day a week of rigid work and 6 days a week to do everything else and get ready for that one day.  It's a pretty sweet deal.

Don't get me wrong - flexible work does not mean No Work.  A flex day is not a day off.  And sometimes flexible goes both ways - most of my meetings have to be in the evenings and that means less time with my husband, I work weekends and that means no normal weekends with my husband, I get random work calls on my cell phone at any old hour, and I find it hard to go out for coffee by myself without running into someone for church who would like me to sit down and talk with them for a bit ... sometimes for impromptu pastoral care sessions.

When I go on errands, they are usually mixed, with a list for church and a personal list.  I'll separate my purchases at the check out line and saying "I need to use two different charge cards today" rolls off my tongue on a regular basis.  My family is used to the line "I just need to run into church for a little bit ... I'll try to be back soon".  And of course holidays have no real meaning for a religious professional, and I'll never get to enjoy a 3-day weekend with the rest of the world.

But ... if you can take your work to the beach with you, how cool is that?  I love 85% of my work, and would do it even if it wasn't my job.  (I'm giving it 15% for attending boring or unpleasant meetings, which not all meetings are, cleaning up after others, moving heavy furniture around at church, and the other less-fun but necessary tasks).  And I get to read or write or plan while watching my kids play on the beach, or at the park.  And, yes, I've also brought my work to less fun places, like dentist or hospital waiting rooms - but that is also a blessing to be able to do.

I am very grateful for this flexible work.  There is a lot to be said for a change in work culture that requires a bit less "face time" in the office and transitions us to a focus on productivity rather than time-spent working.  If you can get it done on the beach, why the heck not?

(Caveat - I do see some necessity for face-time for work teams, and it is nice to be able to pop down the hall and ask a co-worker their opinion real quick.  But overall I still think a lot of professions and groups could have less face-time and more flex-time if we had a small culture shift and worried more about product and less about controlling people.)

Day 16 and 17 of Gratitude: Libraries

I'm a day behind on my 30 days of gratitude, but I love Public Libraries so much that I think I can give them two days worth of my gratitude. :)

Without libraries what have we? We have no past and no future.
Ray Bradbury 

I have always loved libraries.  As a child, my mother would take us to the library and we'd haul out a radio flyer wagon full of books to take home.  We always had as many books out as we could, and although we ended up paying a lot in overdue fines because of having too many books out to manage properly (a problem I still have - the bane of homeschoolers, autodidacts, and avid readers alike), but I think paying fines to libraries is only right and just.

Libraries are the one American institution you shouldn't rip off.
Barbara Kingsolver 

What do I get from the library?  Books, of course.  Audiobooks, as well.  Music CD's, sometimes.  Children's DVD's.  Bilingual books that we use to try and learn spanish.  But we also get children's story hour and other educational events, author talks, meeting rooms available for community groups, internet access, printers, reference librarians, children's librarians, summer reading programs, and more.

People can lose their lives in libraries. They ought to be warned.
Saul Bellow 

The kids and I go the library at least once a week, and habitually have out about 150 items (our limit with three cards).  I end up paying between $5-$20 a month in fines, but the service we receive is priceless.  

Day 15 of Gratitude: the town we live in

A new building for the local Children's Museum just opened this week - and it is amazing.  The kids love it.

Today I'm grateful for the town we live in.  It has so many wonderful amenities like museums, performance art centers, art galleries, bookstores, public transit, and parks, a great local culture with lots of artists and cool people, a good Farmer's Market, and yet it isn't too big and the traffic and crime are pretty low.  It's also the sort of town where you can get from downtown to a small farm in 15 minutes of driving.

I grew up Seattle, and by the time I was leaving I was so sick of the traffic.  I love our little slice of rural life, but there are also some things that I will always want somewhat near me: a UU church, a place to see live performance, access to local shops and not just big box stores, a public library, good restaurants and coffee shops, and a fabric store.  I could live without them, and I would if I had to, but I am glad to not have to give them up.  This town is a wonderful balance for me.

Urban, suburban, and rural are the only categories we talk about anymore.  Technically, we're suburban.  But what happened to the category of "Town"?  I love my town/small city.

Day 14 of Gratitude: Head, Hearts, and Hands

Today I am grateful for a varied work life that keeps our whole selves busy and active.  I think of this sometimes when I am planning our To Do Lists or packing for a time away from home:

What is our Head Work right now?  What are we learning, reading, thinking about?

What is our Heart Work right now?  What is calling us to care for others, feel beauty, express ourselves?

What is our Hand Work right now?  What are we making, doing, and building?

(And then there is also Body Work, which is running, playing, jumping, etc - but that doesn't fit into my "H - Work" alliteration theme.)

I know many people - adults and children - end up in routines that specialize in one of those types of work, but I personally feel out of balance whenever I'm too much in Head, Heart, Hands, or Body.  My job, home, and our homeschooling are so wonderful because they all allow for a balanced approach to the types of work in our lives.

Today I spent time comforting a sick child, driving to and from a meeting about 70 miles away from home, meeting with colleagues for mutual support, giving a presentation to colleagues about systems theory and a specific book we had read together (How Your Church Family Works - great book), ruminating on a passing comment that caused me some anxiety and self-reflection, meeting with the youth advisors in my congregation for a check-in and planning meeting, reading another study book (Congregational Leadership in Anxious Times), supervising a child with Spanish and math schoolwork, watching a nature documentary with a sick child, washing dishes, folding and hanging laundry, cooking dinner, knitting a hat, emailing, playing Words with Friends, watching Dexter with my husband, reading blog posts, ranting to my husband about said blog posts, writing thank you notes, and tidying up and sweeping in my home.

With a life as varied and rich as that, no part of me has a chance to atrophy or get out of balance.  I am very grateful for the sheer variety life provides.

Day 13 of Gratitude: Dance

Tonight the family got to see Le Ballet Jazz de Montreal.  Despite the challenges of taking two young children to adult art, it was so worth it - especially the second half where they performed this piece "Harry".  Very interesting and accessible.

Ballet was a huge part of my young life.  Much as the song from Chorus Line says "Everything is beautiful at the ballet ... whenever you lift your arms someone is there ...".

I dreamed of being a ballerina.  I attended the best local dance school (a national level ballet school) from the age of 9 to the age of 16, with private lessons and intense dedication.

It didn't work out for me ... I am not built for it and no matter how hard you try (and I tried - anorexia and torn muscles and deformed feet to show for it) in the end I found it impossible to defeat my own physiology.  Spirit didn't beat out biology.

That hurt.  It was the greatest heartbreak of my young life - it far outweighed any sort of romantic heartbreak I could have experienced.  Giving up on ballet was giving up on my dream ... in a way it felt like giving up on myself.

For years I couldn't appreciate dance as an audience member, because it still hurt too much.  Now though, I can see the beauty again.  I can appreciate how marvelous the skill and dedication (and lucky physiology) of the dancers truly is, and I am glad to be able to appreciate the dance.

Gratitude Days 11 and 12: Veterans Day

(My husband and daughter, a couple years after he returned from Iraq.  She was our post-deployment baby, and I remember on this day as I watched them both walking ahead of me that I was pierced with gladness that he had come home and that she had been born.)

Today I am grateful for all who have served.  I believe in service, and I my time served in the National Guard was an important part of my life.  I met so many people that I never would have known if I hadn't taken time before college to attend Army training.  I'm extremely grateful for the experiences I had, the training I received, and the opportunity to serve my community in times of fire, flood, and riot.

I am also grateful today for my husband's safe return from his time serving in Iraq.  We met in the National Guard, but my time in was peacetime.  His luck was different, and his year of combat was something we never expected.  I am so proud of him for self-lessly and stoically honoring his commitments, and I am so grateful that he was one of the lucky ones to return relatively unscathed.

War is never a good thing.  I wish our leaders the wisdom and will to always work for peaceful solutions.  But for those who fight, it is different.  They serve, with the very safety of their bodies, hearts, and souls on the line.  Thank you to all who have sacrificed and served.

A few quotes I like from this article:

"The more we sweat in peace the less we bleed in war." -Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit

"In war, there are no unwounded soldiers." -Jose Narosky

"We often take for granted the very things that most deserve our gratitude." -Cynthia Ozick

"How important it is for us to recognize and celebrate our heroes and she-roes!" -Maya Angelou

"When our perils are past, shall our gratitude sleep?" -George Canning

"Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of readiness to die." -G.K. Chesterton

"As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them." -John Fitzgerald Kennedy

"I dream of giving birth to a child who will ask, 'Mother, what was war?'" -Eve Merriam

Day 10 of Gratitude: Home

I am so amazingly in love with this place that we found to call home.  Instead of talking wistfully of "someday" when we have "a few acres", now we actually have them and we're just busy enjoying and taking care of them.




I've been reading Making Home by Sharon Astyk (one of those rare books that I enjoyed so much from the library that I bought a new copy) and it has inspired me to appreciate and love my home even more.  It's also inspired me to want to do even better, to settle, to be a better steward, to plan for the future in responsible ways.



One immediate change I'm making is to break my dependence on the dryer.  If I have a "laundry day" once a week, the only way to get all the laundry done is to use the dryer.  But dryers use a lot of unnecessary electricity, when the same job could be done by passive energy and a sunny corner of my living room.  So I'm not doing the laundry once a week anymore, and am drying everything on my wooden drying rack.  That means I need to do laundry three or four times a week, and have a better system of storing dirty laundry as it waits its turn.  But I've made the changes, and everyone still has clean laundry as they need it, and our dryer now just sits empty.

I am very grateful to have a home, to have the resources that give me the freedom to make choices in how I want to live, and to have found this corner of the world to settle down on.

Day 9 of Gratitude: My Husband

Today is my 10th Anniversary of being Handfasted to my dear Husband.  We were handfasted in a lovely pagan and not-legally binding ceremony held at the Supreme Court House of our State (with the Chief Justice coming in to unlock the building and be there for us, but the officiant being a family friend and member of my mother's Full Moon Circle).  A few months later, we would be pushed to make the union legal because of my husband's impending deployment to Iraq, but the date we care about is the day we stood before friends and family and bound ourselves to each other with vows and symbolic cords, then jumped over a broom together.

We were young (I was only 23) and we jumped into it all very fast.  But we had been living together for a year, had decided to have a baby as I faced endometriosis and felt my fertility to be a ticking time bomb of scar tissue and troubles, had been strengthened/tested through the experience of miscarrying our first pregnancy, had bought a house, and were again 4 months pregnant by the time we took those vows to each other.

And since then those vows have been tested again and again: babies, deployments and war, graduate school, bouts with depression for both of us, escalating debt and money troubles, home daycare, illness, our bodies aging, stressful jobs, long hours and commutes, family members moving in with us, personal growth that doesn't always go in the same direction for both of us, snoring, different "love languages", my tendency to throw hissy-fits, and all the times I've had to pick up his dirty socks from all over the house.

But a commitment doesn't happen just once.  It's made over and over again, day to day, moment to moment.  It's a choice, and we make it.  Sometimes it's a hard choice, when I'm so mad I could spit fire.  And sometimes I marvel at his choice and how he can be so amazingly patient and supportive of me.

Did I find Prince Charming?  No, of course not.  But I've been plenty lucky, to find a good man to walk by my side for these years.

Once the realization is accepted
that even between the closest human beings 
Infinite distances continue to exist
A wonderful living side by side can grow up
If they succeed in loving the distance between them
Which makes it possible for each to see the other
Whole and against a wide sky.

-- Rainer Maria Rilke

Day 8 of 30 Days of Gratitude: Bulbs

Today I am reflecting on how grateful I feel for the amazing property of bulbs to be planted in the ground in this time when everything else is dying, and that they will be growing away and seem to just appear by magic in the spring.  When the rest of the garden is a dreary place, there is something so comforting to be pushing the garlic cloves into their new bed.

 

They have been planted and tucked into bed for the winter, and now we can look forward to lovely garlic scapes and garlic bulbs next year.