Sweat

We were away from home for a few days and when I stopped by my community garden this morning, I noticed that my tomatoes appear to be taking over the world. Yes, I started them early from seed and yes, they are all indeterminate varieties but still I was unprepared for the frightening amount of growth they have put on over the last week! They are as tall as I am, twice as wide, and many times more vigorous, stretching their furry arms out into the paths. I will have to reign them in a little, with stakes and rope, lest they smother the gardens of my neighbours.
On the other hand, my beans, which I started a little late, are lagging behind the beans of the other gardens. The pole beans are beginning to climb but have no flowers yet, unlike the beans across the path, which are blooming madly. My so-called bush beans have developed some distressingly viney growths which make me think I will have to give them a trellis to climb on. However, it is 31 degrees outside, with a humidex of 37. (In case any of you are older than I am, that is 88 farenheit, and it feels like 100.) The air quality is disgusting, by any measure and the UV index is very high. I am therefore not enthused about the prospect of dragging a trellis several blocks for the sake of my confused and malfunctioning bean plants.

Ever since my appallingly premature menopause, (starting at 41) I have been what can only be called sweaty. As soon as I eat or drink anything hot, (or spicy) or experience temperatures even slightly above cool, I begin to sweat freely from pretty much everywhere and I don't stop until I'm sorry I was born. Fortunately, I'm not disgusted by sweat, as some folks are. I've never worn "antiperspirants" and I was not surprised to hear them being implicated in various cancers. Smearing a paste of aluminum and other dubious metals and chemicals all over your lymph nodes can't be a good idea. And the skin is a semi-permeable membrane, selectively allowing direct access into your blood and lymph circulatory systems. Your armpits are full of lymph nodes. I'm not sure of the relationship between lymphatic fluid and sweat but I am sure there is one.

For eleven years, until this January, I was a registered massage therapist. There is quite a bit of sweat involved in massage therapy and I have to say that I don't miss that aspect of it. If I am to be really honest, I don't actually miss any of it, except the earning of money, which in my world is a necessary evil. I have always liked working on people's feet though and I might miss that part, although I often found that my hands smelled like feet for hours after work, no matter how much I washed. I think this must be another example of the semi-permeable membrane in action. (If so, we must be exchanging molecules with one another each time we touch, mustn't we? I wonder what scientists say about this.)

Anyway, I must turn off this hot machine and go rinse the sweat off. This morning, I took the dogs for an early walk and we watched a young doe walk along in the water on the other side of the river. She was browsing in the shade of the trees and many swallows were darting low over the water, eating bugs. When we left she was standing up on her hind legs to get at some particularly appealing leaves. I thought that would be a nice way to breakfast; standing in the water, eating leaves and listening to the sounds of birdsong and the river passing by.