Cherry (tomato) picking

It’s the Victoria Day long weekend and everyone on Gabriola knows what that means.

But before we get to that, shall we take a minute to ask why Canada, in the 21^st century, has a public holiday honouring a 19^th century prudish, colonialist British monarch? No idea? No, neither do I.

A couple of years ago a group of Canadian notables petitioned the Harper government to change the name of the holiday to “Victoria and First Peoples Day”. I hated the name, although I applauded the sentiment. On reflection, I do like the name, marrying as it does the name of the woman in whose name treaties were made and broken with the people whose land was stolen and culture almost obliterated. Of course, this suggestion was never going to fly with bizarrely anglophile Harper. Perhaps it’s time to propose the idea of a name change to the new Prime Minister. (And if he disagrees, suggest taking it outside.) Failing that, how about making National Aboriginal Day – which is also happily the first day of summer – a national holiday and day of atonement?

Anyway, what the Victoria Day weekend means on Gabriola is the official opening of the farmers market at the Agi Hall. And this means the lovely lady whose name I can never remember (but I think might be Linda) will be there selling her wonderful tomato plants. Which means it’s time to get going on the cherry tomatoes!

The market is heaving when I arrive. I clock that the lovely lady is there, then have a quick wander around. The market operators have stated that this year there will be a lot more actual food, compared to the tables selling crystals, tie-dyed apparel and other hippie dippie extravagances. Hmm. There is definitely more produce than there has been in past years, but I think the volume of New Age product is still considerably higher. Unless the tie-dyed apparel is actually being grown in fields, it’s still not clear to me why this is called a farmers market.

Never mind. The artisans need somewhere to flog their wares. Makes no odds to me. The stall I want is there. I head back to it. When I arrive I overhear some terrible news: The lovely lady is moving to Nanaimo. This is going to be her first and last appearance of the year at the market. Thank goodness I came today.

I ask about cherry tomatoes and she points me towards the large selection of pots behind the stall. I go to investigate. My goodness. They’re huge! I’m almost certain her tomato plants aren’t usually this tall this early in the year.

Two years ago, after fucking Bambo got into the garden and ate the tops of all the profusely flowering red cherry tomato plants, I bought a couple of yellow cherry tomato plants (all she had left by then) from her. The plants turned out to be prolific and the tomatoes turned out to be delicious.

So delicious that last year I bought another yellow cherry tomato plant from her. Not quite as much success.

Whatever variety these fairly large tomatoes were, they were not yellow cherries. Still, not a complete loss. Not being a big fan of large tomatoes for eating, I did end up making my first ever batch of tomato sauce, which was very tasty.

Despite last year’s not yellow cherry tomato mix up, I decide to take a chance again and purchase one purportedly yellow tomato plant and two reds. Time will tell what I actually have in these pots. 

The other thing the Victoria Day weekend always brings is my holiday-home neighbours. Their “house” is actually a glorified shed, fractionally less than the ten foot square maximum after which new homes must pass a building inspection. Not a lot of space in which to spend a lot of time, ergo the picnic bench and outdoor furniture which would be very pleasant if it didn’t bucket down every time they come. Typically, their arrival on Thursday brought rain.

This afternoon, however, was merely overcast. Fine for planting and staking the tomato plants. Oh, and what’s this? After the plants are in their pots and have been watered, the sun actually comes out.

Clearly I need to go into the house, make a cup of tea and return to the garden with the paper, in order to spend some quality time on the garden swing with Stella.

After a few minutes I realise something may not be quite right. The buzzing from the California lilac does not seem anywhere near as loud as it did this time last year. Is it my imagination (oh, lord, I hope it is) or are there substantially fewer bees buzzing around the blossom?  

I come back into the house and check the “buzzing” blog entries from previous years. Both seem to be from early June. Perhaps the word hasn’t got out to the wider bee population yet. 

Oh, lord, I hope that’s what it is.