I feel this way often when I go to the grocery store: the same produce sits on the shelves constantly, in every season, and it makes me kinda sad. In the few couple years I've gone to the farmer's market often or purchased veggie CSAs and have found that my body really loves the seasonality of vegetables.
Eating seasonally is when my body feels best
I start craving salads as soon as the days start getting longer, and voila, the greens have come up! Along with radishes! I love my springtime breakfast of thin slices of radish on top of my avocado toast (hypocritical to eating seasonally, I know), garnished cheerfully with violas. In the heat of summer my body craves tomatoes and I can't get my fill of bruschetta and fresh pasta with a homemade sauce. By fall my mouth is watering in anticipation of butternut squash season and all of the delicious fall treats.
In the winter, it's hard for me to even want to eat anything fresh because the produce at the store looks so out of place and my body seems to reject it. Time for grains, soups, and the remaining squashes. This wasn't a problem for me until I really noticed how incredible my body felt while eating with the seasons, when I started paying attention to how nourished I felt after eating certain foods. After that, the produce aisle just didn't hit the same.
Seasonal flowers boost my serotonin
This is how I feel now with flowers, too. I walked into the grocery floral section today, the first week of May, and while a couple arrangements had tulips there were so many with sunflowers! I know they are so bright and cheery, but they are such an indicator to me of high summer, and the bouquet felt wrong in this 50 degree rainy spring week.
Maybe I'm alone in this desire to keep seasonality in our lives. But it just feels more special to me when you can only get tulips in spring, and only get sunflowers in late summer. I know it can be hard to exist in a cold and grey winter without the happiness flowers bring, but buying dried bouquets or having houseplants can make up for it.
Personally, waiting until spring and getting local flowers (and now growing my own!) is much more fulfilling. It gives me something to look forward to. It creates a deeper connection to this tiny rock we call home. There is a season for everything :)
Forever grateful to be here,
Lindsey Bea
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