When Maria throws herself into something, she is fierce and undistractible and unrelenting. She has amazing energy and focus. She decided this weekend to work on the gardens at the farm, and she and her faithful companion,  Fate, who has just as much energy and focus, kept watch.

Yesterday, Maria worked on the gardens and flowers on the back porch, today she dug up and began planting our expanded Three Sisters Garden, along the back side of the house. The Three Sisters is one of the great and enduring feminist legends.

The Three Sisters are Corn, Beans and Squash. They are seen as the three beautiful sisters because they grow in the same mound as the garden. The Corn provides a ladder for the Bean Vine. Together, they give shade to the Squash. The Cherokee Indians tilled the mound three times in a season.

My job is watering daily, I am faithful to it.

The Native American legend centers on three close sisters who were separated, and then came together again. The garden symbolizes the coming together of women, a fitting garden for our times. Maria loves this garden, and so do I. It is an unusual day that I don’t give thanks for living with such a proud  strong and loving woman.

She is my Willa  Cather Girl, a goddess of the prairie.