This site was down for days, thus my silence.  Thanks to my son, I’m back, not that anyone noticed; I barely missed myself!

Here is the predictable backlog of flower photos.

A lot has happened out there, including out in the “prairie”, especially with the much-needed rain (after-effects of the latest gulf storm).  Even asters are prematurely blooming all over.  The white (tinged with lavender) mountain mint is attracting its fascinating array of pollinators.  Light purple Bee balm (Monarda) is in full bloom in the sun perennials.  St. John’s Wort (Hypericum) has taken over the herb garden with masses of golden stars. The cutting garden out back (annuals, perennials, herbs, and even flowering veggies) is starting to bloom, particularly zinnias.  And the main veg bed is now officially a flower garden for the most part, from volunteer seeds.  Needless to say, bees, pollinators, and butterflies are happy.

One of these is not a flower.  Can you guess which one?

PS–Happy Summer!

The weather is perfect for getting stuff done outside and in, not too hot or humid.

E has been building handrails on the “un-deck” steps, and sprucing up closets and other areas of the interior.  And still she finds time to make beautiful challah.

I’m continuing to work on the landscape.  Today I tied up all the tomato plants, put down weed barrier between the rows, watered, and then fertilized the tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants.  The plants look very healthy and are covered with green tomatoes, and there are peppers.

Flowers get better every day.  Here are samples, including bees.

We’re getting into serious flora, dare I say florgasm, season!  The period when all my hard guesswork starts to pay off.  It almost looks like I planned it.  And it’s only the beginning.  I intend to go out with a big flower finale.

Without further ado, check it out:

It was a beautiful day for mowing, not a sauna, so I took the opportunity to grab a few more post-mow views of the property and house, some of which are included here.

While doing so, I noticed the pure black hollyhocks are actually a gorgeous deep red when the sun shines through them.

Out in the “prairie”, more flowers are blooming, including purple coneflowers, black-eyed susans, yarrow, and butterfly milkweed.

A new little dutch iris opened today in the front tree bed.  And my front cottage garden is looking quite cottagy.

Letting go of a garden for me is like prying one finger at a time from a ledge I’m hanging onto.  I’m invested in its creation, not so much materially as soulfully.  It represents my artistic collaboration with nature over a period of time.  As with a child, I look forward to watching it grow up, change, and mature.  I want to stick around as long as possible to see the outcome.  I never want to outlive it.  But at some point you have to let go of a child, a garden, the past, in order to move on.

What gives me perspective is watching all the adjacent woods and lands being stripped bare for development.  It’s only a matter of time before the destruction overtakes our property.  I can visualize the potential future and futility of remaining here.  This is not an eco-friendly environment or culture.  Between that and the disturbed, challenging soil I have to work with, it would always be an uphill battle.  So that helps me to let it go, and simply enjoy the evolving present.

Here’s some of what’s happening now, including Misu the Queen of the Closet, and a bee’s butt.

I was melting just standing outside, it’s so steamy.  It’s all I could do just to water stuff and prune out more cicada damage.  They really did a number to the trees.  But the buggers are definitely on the way out.  Yay.

So it’s back to cleaning out closets and thinning out belongings.  Happily, the giveaway, recycle, and trash piles are growing by the day.  The way I like it.

Here are some of the highlights of outdoor happenings.  The first of the balloon flowers (Platycodon) opened, always a cheery event.

It’s headed for the muggy 90s the next few days, and it feels like a sweat lodge already.  And yes, I do know first hand what a sweat lodge feels like.  All you can do is jump into an icy stream after that, or lacking a stream, AC.  Which I never take for granted.

Here are the latest finds out in the sauna.  The flowers are loving it, anyway.  The purple coneflowers (Echinacea) have started blooming.  Black-eyed susans (Rudbeckia) are open en masse, as are many squash blossoms.  I never get tired of the exotic-looking passionflowers (Passiflora).  The whole veg garden is full of volunteer marigolds and other flowers.  The leaf is sycamore (casualty of cicadas).  I’m glad I at least get to enjoy a summer of all these and more (minus cicadas), before we leave.

It’s been raining on and off for days, so in between drops I planted my new annuals, and some herb and veg seedlings, cleaning up the landscape as I go.

Mostly, I’m working indoors on sorting and moving stuff around so E can get at various repair projects.  I’m downsizing belongings in the process, a good feeling.  Can’t take it with you, even to Ohio.

Letting go is a tricky process, much simpler in your mind than in fact.  It’s easy to let yourself get attached to your ownership, your “territory”, future plans, a false sense of security.  In fact it’s a bitch constantly worrying about maintaining a house and property, and paying for it, only to have someone else inevitably take your place.  That aspect of it I won’t miss at all.  It was getting to be too much.  This is a good opportunity to let go of unnecessary stuff, travel lighter, and be more realistic.  I have to stop wondering if the new owners will tear out everything we accomplished.  Not our problem.  It’s just one of those existential challenges of being human in the developed world.

I don’t know the science behind this phenomenon, but for some reason there were very few of the usual suspects of insects, butterflies, and even birds around while the cicadas were in prime time.  It’s like they were all hiding out from the scary zombies.  Now that the latter are starting to wind down, suddenly within a day or two, I’m finally seeing bees, butterflies, pollinators, and my old “craven” friends.  During the peak of it, all I saw were herds of horny rabbits, and a young groundhog hilariously climbing up and over a tall fence!  I never knew they could do that.  Freaks.

The other day I saw my first respectable butterfly of the season, a blue and black one.  Yesterday I caught pollinators on most of the flowers I was photographing.  There are flocks of birds everywhere, hopefully eating cicada corpses.  Best of all, I haven’t been hearing the constant deafening shriek of cicadas.  Honestly, between the racket, the stink, and many young tree limbs broken by their activity, I won’t miss them.  Their “mulch” lingers on to remind me.

It’s been raining and muggy like a rainforest for days, with more to come.  Good excuse to work on indoor sorting and packing.  E continues to repair and paint.  We’re starting to have more boxes than furniture, a sure sign we’re at the point of no return.

Once again, I hang my head in shame to include some of the latest annual infiltrators, but whatever helps sell the place.  I have to admit they’re aesthetic, and of course most of them die in the end.

Here’s a freakish climate change effect–right now, there’s a record heat wave across the entire north, from the upper midwest to northernmost New England, like 20° above normal, into the 90s and 100s, while down south here, it’s relatively cool in the 80s.  In southern CA right now it’s even cooler, in the 70s.  Go figure.

Still, even for nature-loving me, the humidity after all the rain is making it feel almost intolerable out, so I can just imagine how northerners are freaking out.  It didn’t stop me from taking these flower photos, though.  Two of each = doubly pleased at my achievement.  I included a shot of a purple eggplant flower.

Misu, on the other hand, is smart and knows how to weather the heat, demonstrated here.

I must confess to being an utter sellout traitor.  Today at Lowes I sunk so low as to buy [gag] annual flowers!  My lame excuse is I’m staging the landscape for eventual sale.  It will look pretty as a hooker enticing customers with instant gratification.  How far I’ve fallen!  I should be shot!  But you do what you gotta do.