ROADSIDE PRODUCE

This is not a stock photo. It's a gathering of real produce from a roadside stand, assembled quickly one late afternoon after work.

This past weekend in central and east-central Indiana has been rainy with if not exactly a chill in the air, the kind of air where a sweatshirt feels good. I'll come around to fall, as I always do. But for now, I want to relish the end of summer.

Since schools open in early August now, the pool has been closed for weeks, the season's trip to Cordry Lake a memory, and the 4-H and Mooreland fairs in the books for 2018. Tonight, Bible Study Fellowship resumes in Middletown, a sure sign that a new season is approaching.

I don't want to close out summer without a thank you to folks I don't know and don't even see, but they provide so much: those flowers and vegetables placed at the edge of roads throughout our state. They leave glass jars and even cash boxes encouraging passersby to use the honor system of paying for the produce.

There's something humbly refreshing about this kind of random trust. And apparently it works because these stands are there daily for folks to pick up luscious red tomatoes to slice and top off our burgers and flowers to arrange in Ball jars for the center of our kitchen tables.

One site has a scales and a cash box. One day I didn't have the right change but decided to leave a tip. The extra coin wasn't for the merch -- although it could have been -- rather, it was a tip for the stand owner's faith in humanity.

At a flower stand though, I picked up two beautiful $5 bunches. I only had a twenty so I delved into the glass jar for a ten and went happily on my way.

In a few weeks I'll see some pumpkins along the road and stop and pick up a few. I'll dig out my best fall wreath for the front door and fill my wooden bowl with gourds. Brian has already mentioned Halloween candy.

But for now, at least until the calendar tells me I'm out of season, I'll enjoy the last of summer's in-season goodness, its bounty, its harvest. Summer remains for a few more days. I'm not rushing it away.

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