I was fussy because the women's Mabon weekend retreat I had attended for 12 consecutive years was killed by Covid. Yet, the day we would have gathered, I saw three sisters who would have been there this weekend. Then Saturday, when we made our feast to celebrate the second harvest, I received gifts from the garden: zucchini, peppers, basil and "Gram's Tomatoes" that everyone in the family knows are the best plum tomatoes on earth. It began when my mother’s mother brought seeds from her native Sicily. Each year, she'd save the seeds from the meatiest tomatoes. The following spring she'd plant them in the greenhouse and that summer she'd save the seeds from the plumpest tomatoes. The tradition is now carried on by a fourth generation at Scratch 'N Earth Farm with a self-serve farm stand at 3267 Oak Hill Rd, Williston, VT. I was also given a can of carefully packed fresh eggs, a perfectly ripe juicy peach, fresh blueberries, and a slab of cranberry bread quickly turned into a butter sandwich.

The day the circle would have opened and sisters scattered, I had my mother's youngest brother and her only sister visit. Gloria took me to see my mother's eldest brother – my godfather – and his wife. That visit included still-warm-from-the-oven apple pie and coffee, and three fur babies. I am not fond of puppies, but Milo quickly won me over. This year, my biological family replaced my spiritual sisterhood, and there was a bountiful harvest of ingredients for me to have my own feast. The pink cosmos on the altar reminds me of my grandmother and the white anemones remind me of my mother. Sunday I got to add a compact hiking tool that had been my dad's; it has a compass, magnifying glass, mirror, and a calendar wheel for 1962-1977.

The way this year's Mabon came together these past three days was magickal – and there's still a tiny bit more of official summer still to enjoy.