It’s the autumn equinox today. As I potter around in my garden, I notice how things are starting slow, cool, darken. I’m harvesting marrows every few days instead of watching them relentlessly swell as they did a month ago. The cucumbers are equally lethargic – I’ve made peace with that. We’ve had our fill of tzatziki, and I’ll pickle the remaining few for gherkins to add to burgers in February – if they last that long. My tomatoes ripen gently; they give and give and give. They split, too, swelling too quickly with the arrival of the rains. We roast them and freeze them – we’ll warm our souls with soup soon. The chilly evenings call for creamed spinach, and there’s a handful of green beans every few days which we sauté together with the tenderstem brocolli nursed through summer’s flea beetle swarms and endless outbreaks of cabbage moth larvae. The dahlias are feeding the slugs, but I’m winning that battle with beer. The peppers finally turn red. The chillis? I’m not so sure about them. I’ll wait and see. Dill, coriander, parsley sown in summer finally sprout; they’re everywhere now. We don’t use the chives enough, so this morning I add them to my scrambled eggs.

Early autumn is gentle, generous, and strangely hopeful in its greenness. If the summer has bleached and broken, autumn has restored and mellowed the world around me. It reminds me to slow down, too. That’s not so easy. I try to leave the weed that might be an annual I’ve sown for the spring. I sit for a minute in the sun which has slipped closer to the horizon, watching the lawn I’ve sown grow. I should do this more, I try tell myself. Just sit. It’s what Stephen tells me all the time. Just sit. It’s hard. Maybe when winter comes? Maybe with less to do I might just… do less? I doubt it.

I think of the frosts that are coming. They will decimate the tomatoes still abundant on the vines, and tear apart the tender beans. They will bring with them darkness and wet, the rain that will not cease. But the kale will be sweeter for it and the Christmas potatoes crispier in the roasting pan. And next year I can start again, with marrows and squashes and the fruits of summer. For now I’m planting bulbs that will brighten the spring, and sprinkling cornflower and limnanthes wherever there’s a spot of bare soil. I’m preparing for rain and for months of spinach. And that’s OK. Maybe I’ll just take it slow…