Appreciating August

This peach was so completely gorgeous, I felt moved to thank it before eating it  :)

The moment brought me back to an "al fresco" dinner I had with friends sometime in August of last year. Sitting there with everyone at a table out on the patio, I looked down at the plate that had just been placed in front of me, and I was unexpectedly transported to a place of quiet awe.

The colors were literally stunning — the deep, bright reds of the tomatoes against the blue and white plate, the glistening pale yellows of the white corn on the cob, the vibrant oranges of the fresh peach salsa.

It looked like a painting — a masterpiece, really.

“Wow ...This is Summer,” I thought to myself. “The bounty of the Earth's Summer.”

And indeed it was the bounty of the Earth — planted, grown, and harvested from the earth with human hands, arriving as a gift on these blue and white plates to each of us sitting around this table enjoying a surprisingly cool August breeze together.

I felt a sudden thankfulness not only for the extraordinary beauty of what was in front of me, but for how life-giving it was.

Deborah Kesten, co-author of The Healing Secrets of Food, says, “There is a subtle re-focus, a shift from mind to heart, when we appreciate food not only for what is measurable and visible, but also for what is inherently invisible, immeasurable, alchemical, life-giving and life-containing.”

She believes this is why, over the centuries, our spiritual ancestors have ritualized taking an intentional moment to express gratitude before a meal with a heartfelt blessing or a simple moment of quiet contemplation.

“Food becomes a gateway that opens to reveal an interconnected world, a mesh of relationships among human beings, plants and animals, among the elements such as light, water, and air — indeed the entire universe,” Kesten says.

Ripe, red tomatoes … fresh, just-off-the-stalk white corn … sweet, juicy peaches — as Thich Nhat Hanh says, "The entire universe on a plate."

Don’t wait for the August moment to shake you into awareness. Take a moment to take the moment in.

After all, it is still Summer. And the bounty of the Earth is making a show of herself.

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(as previously published in The Bucks County Herald)

photo credit: Apartment Therapy