CYCLE OF AFFIRMATION

It was a quiet day here, today---no fireworks, no company, no cookouts. We started the day with our coffee outside, and then a three-of-us in planting mode---getting the great pot-corral between the outbuildings all cleaned up, with most plastic ones sent to recycle, and all the terra-cottas either put to use or stacked neatly. The little worn picket fence “concealing” them was moved back into the cleared space, with a neat iron lawn-chair, the long-ago yellow paint on its slender frame a mere whisper of itself, with a graceful white pot of pink impatiens dropped into the space where the seat would be.

Caro spent her morning setting sets-of-three pots of red, white, and “blue” impatiens into other pots set around the benches, the grapevine trellis, and atop the aging white pedestal by the bistro set. The blue is more a purple hue, but there seems to be no real “navy” in the flower world. And pastel blue gives the effect of a Cake-Wrecks flag cake, made by an inexperienced or unheeding baker and left to languish on the mark-down table the Fifth of July.


So we got our hands into the dirt, planting and grubbing, getting all the maple spinners out from between the heavy-leafed hostas, re-arranging the stones in the flowerbeds, pulling up hundreds of hopeful little maples, sweeping out sticks and debris, and filling a lawn-sack for this week’s Big Garbage Day.


We got out the round patio table and a couple of old wicker pieces too long in the damp dark back of the potting shed. The pale green piece went onto the porch, and the old rattan guy, wide of arm and sturdy of ravelly back, went out beside the back fence to garnish the hosta bed.


We found wrought-iron sconces and window-boxes and several other things several years in the losing, and HAVE TO STOP SOMEWHERE.


Caro brought a nifty cantaloupe-sized gazing ball made into a hanging lantern, its solar bulb glowing in the twilight, and one of the regular variety, in swirls of iridescent cobalt and copper. The old fishing float on the tree is still hanging on, the graying rope and the haze of the glass a testament to several year-round tours of sentinel duty on the Big Tree.

And last Sunday’s seed scatter has taken root and risen in beegrillions on the big round sandy plot of the back garden---I know a lot of them will have to be ruthlessly thinned, and there are enough wee maples in there amongst the flowers to make a good sized forest in a few years.


The tallest sunflowers---the nine-foot variety---are just tiny babies now, standing a couple of inches tall; they have a neat dicot atop like a propeller beanie, and just days ago, I walked out to see their first glimpse of sunlight. They were standing there just out of the ground, their tiny necks like white threads topped with the split seed---they had the appearance of peeking out from Hobbit-helms like Merry and Pippin, with the halves down over their ears on either side.

We were outside when it started to rain, big pelting drops shaking the leaves and drenching our clothes. We just stood for a moment, all of us out there in the beginning of the downpour, soaking in the moment as the soil began to soak up the moisture. We came in for a long time, cooked and ate our supper together, cleared the table.

Then we slipped on our mud-trusty clogs and went out again, just to see how everything looked, and it was lovely---dripping and very green, with the plants standing taller, leaves fuller and more rounded, and the darkening of the big garden bed showing up the greens like jewels on velvet.


It's not yet a sea of green, but a haze of it is forming from all the tee-ninecy leaves seeking the light. It’s a satisfying thing, making a garden. A holy thing and a good, and it was a day well spent, this day of remembering those gone too soon. The cycle of seed and season confirms our place in this chain, and commemorates theirs.

REMEMBERING . . .

It's holiday weather here today, with the heat of the sun and bright skies and the snap of flags in the sunshine, the smoke of a thousand backyard grills raising delicious scents into the Spring air. I awoke to the silhoutte-gleam of sunshine across the room, a hopeful sign for all the activities and memorial services and celebrations of this long Spring weekend.

But weather hasn't much to do with the feelings that surround this special day, this day of remembrance and honoring and taking stock of our nation's blessings. The placing of wreaths, the little flags stuck into the earth of countless graves, the floral tributes, the handful of limp posies clutch-wilted in a child's hand, the tears of remembrance---those will quietly and reverently go on even as the scent of charcoal drifts up and the promised rain comes down.

I have a deep-imprinted vignette in my memory-collection, of sitting there in a hot scratchy dress several years ago, to see my dear Mother-in-Law receive the folded flag "With the thanks of a Grateful Nation." And so we remember GrandDaddy, in all his twenty-something years of service, and I keep a secret, heartfelt gleam of pride for our other servicemen and women, and those we'll never know of as we sleep safely on their watch.

And just looking at the flowers in the picture above, the two tall, stalwart reds and the smaller, just-as-strong pink, I think of all our sisters and daughters in uniform, the strong, brave women who step up to the mark, who serve standing proud beside the men whose strength and bravery have stood true for centuries. We feel a surge of gratitude, of pride, of thankful praise for all the ones who take our well-being and our freedom so seriously that they live and die for it, and us.

And so I say "Thank you," to each and every one, and give a prayer of thanks for all of our servicepeople, past and present---those standing proud in uniform today, those who have served, no matter what the term, those who have retired from their service, but remain ever soldiers, those lying beneath the brave small flags, and those known only to the angels and remembered in the hearts of those who loved them.

Taps for remembrance:

HAIL, HOSTAS!

The hostas have been loving this weather. The long rainy season gave them a wonderful start, and they've grown lush and lovely, thick with their life-juice, and now towering taller than their usual August heights. And quite a few have already sent up their waxy flowers, mostly white but with a few lavender blooms tempting the bees.

They're a vast palette of greens, lushly hanging over the damp earth of their four-years-now home. This time last year a quickly fleeting hailstorm burst down through the not-yet covered branches of their sheltering tree, and ripped the smooth leaves into raggedy shreds, in just five minutes. They hung there all Summer, never recovered, but enough of themselves left to make their way to Autumn.Their valiant stand in the face of such decimation was a lovely testament to their hardy natures, and I did not prune, I did not trim. They were who they were, like injured soldiers returned from war, shining even brighter through their wounds.

Last night's roll of thunder gave me an ache of apprehension for the lovely green beings flanking the lawn, as the temperatures have been right to nurture a high nest of hail, but all is well in the beds this morning. The leaves drip great round drops like bright lenses set on the velvet, and the green, crisp with their great overnight drink, hang full and heavy.

BAAAAD DOG

This bad boy was in no way injured in the telling of this tale---the colorful bandages were applied the morning after Easter by Sweetpea. She was not given free rein of her Easter Basket goodies, and in lieu of Reese’s eggs, was placated with a box of bright Bang-Daids, with which she soothed the ails and injuries of her arms and legs, the dog, her high-chair, the refrigerator and the clock.

But yesterday. Ahhhh, yesterday. She and her Mommy had already left for the day when this saga unfolds; I think it a blessing, for I cannot think what I would have DONE with an almost-three young lady who is coming into her own MIND, as they say. She’s not yet a THAT CHILD, but then, that would not be so bad, now would it? Except for that "I don't WANT to," part.

We’d had a rompin’ stompin’ bike-riding, neighbor-visiting, pool-splashing day, with both breakfast and lunch on the patio, (right now, you Mamas out there---you know how hard it is to truck stuff in and out of the house, to butt-bump the door and plead, with your hands full of lemonade cups and puzzles and towels, when the little one just doesn’t WANT to come in?) Well, it was THAT kind of day.

She went home, and I took the last microt of my meager energy to pick up cups and bib and errant shoes and all the other attendant necessaries to spending a day out-of-doors. I opened the gates, as Chris would be driving in very soon, and then I dragged myself and one armload into the house and down the stairs---OH-so-ready for a shower and a big icy glass of tea. I poured the tea, headed for the bathroom, kicked off my clogs. Then I remembered, I had Caro’s phone in my pocket, where I’d been carrying it all day, having no time to find my own in the milliseconds we’d been in the house to teetee or to grab something. It had to go back in the charger upstairs.

I heard barking from outside---FuzzyPup’s dinner hour had crept by, and so I trudged out onto the concrete, mustering the strength to go get him, and, since I hadn’t paid much attention to him all day, talking to him in a Kitchy-Koo voice about dinners, and we were going to GET those dinners, yes, we WERRRRRE. He bounced excitedly as I feeble-footed my way across patio and grass, and I, flattered, mistakenly took the enthusiasm for my charming company, or my really special way with Alpo, take your pick.

The second that leash-clip left the collar ring, he was off like a shot, over and out the driveway and across the street. I know this, because I winced my way after him as fast as I could go. I got to the end of our drive to see him disappearing into the far back yard of an across-the-street neighbor. Now the choice: Go back for shoes, or tickle-toe on across the pavement and driveways, hoping to keep an eye on his trajectory.

So I went, hip-hopping, missing rocks, finding some, easing my way back and through between the houses---no sight of him, just alleyways, garages, one big fenced yard.

No choice, now---I’d lost him. I’d called “Fuzzy, COME!!” til I was hoarse, so I came home, grabbed shoes and Caro’s phone AGAIN, and went out once more, down the very same drive into the same back yard, where I spotted Fuzzy. I called him once again, then realized he was INSIDE that big fence, with no gate in sight. And he was taking a poop IN THEIR YARD.

Mortified, getting REALLY grumpy and VERY tired and hot, I retraced. Out and around the longest house in the county, to find a sign on the door: DO NOT KNOCK---day sleeper. Hoping to make free with their gate and somehow clean up after Pup, I headed for the fence. STILL no gate in sight, but a big flap in the fence, from which he’d escaped during my LONG walk out and around.

Thought I heard barking over my shoulder. Went that way, around ANOTHER block, through the strip mall, over and around and through, and back to the same place, finding quite a few dogs minding their own dogly business in their OWN yards, bless their hearts.

Across the street once again, shading my eyes against the sun, and waaay ahead, I saw a very small form, moving very slowly in my direction. I walked toward him, calling out “Good Boy, Come” in my most syrupy, enticing voice, wanting only to get my hands on THAT DOG.

He has such a shaggy coat, and had run in the heat, and he was just exhausted, panting and tongue hanging, so I picked him up like a baby and staggered the blocks back home. I hope the neighbors thought I was talking sweet baby-talk to him all the way home as I gazed down on his cute, lolling face.

I was not. I set him down at our driveway, and he ran for his water dish, drinking long laps of water, then came into the house slowly, where he spent most of the evening near his indoor water, sprawled like a flat frog on the cool kitchen slate.

And I still haven't found my phone.

WORK IN PROGRESS

Today I'm working on this:


More pruning, some clearing, a thorough washdown of the bench, clearing and planting of the pot with some red,white and blue petunias, and later in the season, when we have some of the tea parties we have planned, I'd like to festoon all the small cut limbs with ribbons holding a cascade of pretty teacups.

And see the little bistro set hidden in the background?

It started out set just slightly inside the ivy, but over several years, the encroaching spread had made it impossible to go sit with a cup of tea without bruising the beautiful green with your feet. So the little set (rusted and hazy when I bought it at a yard sale) has become weather-worn and grubby. It was a pretty little vignette as you drove into the drive, and now Caro has suggested that we bring it out right onto the pavement a bit, for easier use, and added a pedestal with a graceful pot for more of the petunias.

She's also going to put a pretty little lantern-shaped white "chandelier" on one of the shorn tree-limbs right above the table.

It's so uplifting to see everyone's gardens, the progress and the blooms and the care and work and tending which show in every bed, every shrub, every plot and place and vignette and area and room and space which has been made into something beautiful.

I love those glimpses into the handiwork of others, their way with plants and rocks and water and statuary and small arrangements of pretties which brighten the landscapes.

And I wish I had the touch for that---and the inclination, I suppose. I have absolutely NONE of the generations of genes which have coaxed fruit and vegetables and glorious bloom from the deep richness of Mississippi soil. Anything I touch (or neglect) turns to one of two extremes: Arid and dead, or jungle. There's no middle ground. I pot, they perish. I leave things alone, and you get swallowed up in the green.

I DO love the rich luxuriant growth of the grapevine across the garages; the spread of the shining ivy from eight little slips a few years ago has reached lawn proportions, creeping tendrils out and out, until the carpet gleams way out into what used to be grass.

The kudzu-tendencies of all the vines on the fence, the honeysuckle trees which shade more and more of the lawn each Spring, needing ruthless pruning to keep them under control, and the constant force which through the green fuse drives the flower---those are rampant and raging their way up onto the patio and into the potting shed.

I DO love the shaggy overgrowth, to see the lush swell of the buds and the leaves, to watch a rusted fenceline entwine with green velvet, then disappear into the shady cloak. I'd probably leave everything to kudzu itself into a landscape of blobby shapes-of-trees and house and cars, had I not the wise and guiding hand of Caro to keep things in check.

Angel seems happy to be sitting amongst all the overfill; all she needs is a little cleaning, a little fresh water for the chipmunks in the cup of her skirt, and all will be well.

PS This morning also included weeding the hosta bed, and using Sweetpea's tee-ninecy little yellow yard broom to get up all the maple spinners. At last.