I’ve been reading and listening lately about being enough and having enough. 

About “I am enough” and having an abundant vs. a scarcity mindset.

And I realize there’s one thing I have an abundance of right now, and its cucumbers. 

The Japanese cucumber that I planted this year from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds, Aonaga Jibai, has been amazing. 

We’ve dubbed it The Kuken because it’s a monster.  It bears fruit nonstop and continues to grow even through our 100-degree days.  I have to use a stepladder to harvest from the top and I fear for my life hoping that the plant won’t use its tentacles to drag me to my death.  The cucumbers are never bitter, so if you miss one in harvesting and don’t see it until it’s the size of a baseball bat, you can’t just toss it in the compost bin, because it’s still quite edible.

August 8, 2020 was national Sneak Some Zucchini on Your Neighbor’s Porch Day (really!). Just replace the word zucchini with cucumber and you get my predicament.

I asked for an abundant life, and, like Robin Williams snarky genie, lifes’ response was to release the Kuken.

Which has me thinking, we really do live abundant lives. We just don’t get to pick and choose where we want our abundance. Abundance, like life, isn’t always pretty. The definition of abundance is a great quantity of something. Not a great quantity of something great.

When I stood in the garden trying to get the perfect picture to illustrate the monster, I was standing in an abundant pile of fire ants, which resulted in an abundance of bites on my feet.

I have an abundance of joint pain. 

It sounds much nicer that way, maybe I should start calling it abundant pain instead of chronic pain.

Abundance can create both delight and devastation.

We’ve had a lovely rain in North Texas for the past few days, a nice respite from the heat, but has left our neighbors to the south, in the gulf cities, reeling from the abundance of rain from Hurricane Hanna.

Life is full of abundance, some wanted, some unwanted. What will you do with your abundance?

I have to go now and terrorize my neighbors with more cucumbers.

Happy gardening!

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