Behind the Lines: by David Heiller

David Heiller This is the time of year we all yearned for back in February. Breezy August days. Low humidity. Temperature in the 70s. Big puffy clouds floating like ships across the sky. The kind of day that puts a spring in everyone’s step, even when you’re working. Even when something goes wrong, when the printer doesn’t work right, when a customer is rude. It’s hard to get angry on days like these. Life slows down this time of year at our house. I think we are trying to slow it down, to make it last, it is so good. Our garden, our personal grocery store. Like at supper-time. You can’t rush supper this time of year, especially when it comes from the garden. You go out and walk around the beds and decide what you want. Potatoes, onions, beets, cucumbers, zucchini, broccoli, chard, kohlrabi, lettuce. Raspberries for dessert. Having a big garden is like having a grocery store in your yard. It’s always changing too. The peas are mostly done. The beans are just startin...

David Heiller My column last week on poison ivy brought a few comments. First Bob Dubois of Askov called to say that he uses Mylanta on poison ivy to great effect. He can also take a slug of it after he reads the Askov American. Phil Diers of Willow River swears by Fels Naptha as a treatment for poison ivy. He found a few dusty bars of it, vintage 1970, at the Willow River Mercantile, and washed with it, and it seemed to keep the P.I. at bay. Plus it gave Phil a much needed scrubbing. Just kidding, Phil! Harold Blatz of Willow River told me that he used bleach on some poison ivy. It worked one time, and didn’t work another time, but it sure whitened his legs. My poison ivy discussion got me to thinking that poison ivy season is just one of many mini-seasons of summer. There is also mosquito season, and wood tick season, and sun burn season, all of which fall on the same side of the scale as P.I. season. But other mini-seasons are much more pleasant. Biking season, always one of my ...