Of rain, flowers and neighbors

Rain rain… I’ve never seen so much rain in the 30+ years we’d lived here. We’re high desert people, and around here, rain usually comes only in the form of snow during our long cold winters, and the tin-tin-tin light showers of early spring…. Then, it is only in the form of the sprinkler systems we see water.

Not this year thought—the year of changes, and strange happenings. 

In Nature, things are following the same pattern, I’m afraid.  Spring came super early this year.  And it came with some drastic fluctuations and uncommonly seen patterns—mildew infestations, leaf-feeding insects and weeds of all kinds. It was the sun shining on the rain and the rain falling on the sunshine kind of a thing.

The worse thus far it had to be having to prune so early in the year. By the end of May the garden had already grown so much, that it was starting to look like a lost garden of sorts…

Usually, that's the time when things are barely starting to blossom… this year, however, it was such lushness as I’d never seen around here.

...roses everywhere

I won't complain!

 

 

Beyond the garden, on the other side of the fence, things are not as pretty, though... you can always see our neighbor's monster of a motorhome park there, like an eyesore behind the roses...

 

 

One must concentrate on the pretty... 

one must bring her soul onto the lovely side of the fence

and she have to train her heart to dwell only on the good 

and the ephemeral and the everyday eternal...

 

 and I do...

I have enough with my pretty side of the garden

the lovely sounds of birds

and pastel colors of roses...

The neighbors?

What is there to do?

Keep filling the garden with more prettiness;
keep trying to cover unpretty things up this side out

then, dwell on possibilities...

It was almost painful having to prune all the beautiful flowering trees and native bloomers such as the Columbine and garden Phlox the other day… but it was a job it had to be done.

For years and years, I had Mexican Evening Primrose growing at the feet of some of my favorite roses, but this year they were finally pulled out, and I am so glad I did what I did, for “where you tend a rose my lad, a thistle cannot grow.” (The Secret Garden)… 

Evening Primrose are such invasive little flowers, they keep moving to places you don’t want to see them grow, they don’t ask for your permission either, and they can get very lanky and unruly past their prime.

My idea was to only keep the snapdragons that are also growing in those beds… they’re so pretty and come in such variety of colors… but I know that the Mexican Evening Primrose is an aggressive grown cover and sometimes can be difficult to eradicate. So they will come back, I’m sure of that.

Peonies are done...

until next year!

Nothing better than them to remind you how ephemeral life is... 

As for man, his days are like grass, 

he blooms like a flower of the field, 

when the wind passes over, it vanishes, 

and its place remembers it no more 

(Psalm 103:15)

The Dr. Huey roses...

I am so glad I decided to keep this wild rose bush standing.  The spring we moved back to our house in the roses, I removed about 5 or 6 rose bushes from the garden... these were roses that had become wild... however, on wanting to experiment with one and see what'd happen, I left this one standing.  Later, that spring I started training it up the wall.  And I am so glad I did what I did.  For what a beautiful, beautiful display they are at the beginning of the spring! 

These are what came out of my original roses, which were grafted onto Dr. Huey rootstock which sends out incredibly long canes like a rambler...

They grow and grow and grow such big canes.  This rose blooms only once, and after its done putting on its flowers in early spring, it is done until the following year.  It is no rose for a garden for sure and I should had removed it that spring, as I did with the rest of all those roses which had reverted back to Dr. Huey... 

...but even without flowers for the rest of the year, I thought their green leaves would have to be better than looking at a bared big wall.  And I was right! 

 ...what a show they are at the beginning of spring!

One thing I have noticed with these roses is, they have an unfortunate tendency to mildew, and as it has been, this is my fourth time treating them thus far... they do respond to treatment, but what a shame it is to see the beautiful blood-red buds belittled under such infestation.

Birds love to built their homes in this area of the garden, they come and go and babies are born here as if it is a magical garden... because, well, I really think it is! 

And the secret garden bloomed and bloomed and every morning revealed new miracles (Frances Hodgson Burnett

The gypsy room - another change

Its been raining all day long today, and temperatures have come down quite a bit... it feels much like a late March, early April than a June around here.  We went to church this morning, to pray and sing, saw some friends that left as quickly as we did after service, and everyone went their own way without much ado... 

I feel so lonely at times.  And it isn’t much to do with me needing friends, as much as me needing people.  I need people, see people, talk to people, say hi to people, and smile to people, and then, hide in my garden again.  I miss my sister and I’m terribly missing dad.  I want to go see them so bad, but things are not quite right in our little world to travel yet, thus, today I’m staying inside, drinking a favorite latte right now and keeping cozy in our cozy room upstairs where I can see the sky whenever I lay down in bed...

I love this room.... sometime ago I decided to change things around here, and give this room another look and another feel to it... I wanted to see a more subtle and peaceful atmosphere than what I had there... a room without the many faces of Frida watching us from the walls at all time...

 

I didn’t want to see all those frames and boho banners and things hanging above our heads either... it was like having an entire audience watching down at us every night for the entire night... besides, the colors were too bright, too orangey; the room too unrefined... I do love color, don’t get me wrong... in fact, many a time I crave color; particularly orange, and I passionately loved this decorating style, but I totally understand that it could also be somewhat gawky and unsophisticated... I guess my soul is divided between a gypsy and... what else?

so I changed everything...

 

 

 ...to my simple look of whites and grays.... with a leafy back wall!

 

 

I had so many ideas for what I wanted to see in that behind the bed wall, for example, I wanted to paint that wall dark... a real pretty dark gray/bluish paint color and then add a shelf to put some plants.  Another option was a leafy removable wallpaper to cover that entire wall back there, but that was above my budget, so I opted for this leafy-green tapestry for the time being... 

The tapestry ended up looking too cheap and too small and not exactly what I had in mind... so I took it down soon and opted for something else...  I will blog about it at another day thought, for now, I'll leave you with some more pics of how my cozy gypsy room used to looked like this past month...  boy this room has seen so much change in these last few years! 

  

Ok... more rain around here.  I just finished having my second cup of coffee.... now to the upstairs room to watch TV!

Peony Season

Peony flowers are so ephemeral.  They come and go with the winds of late May.  They are the ‘Oh! Be still my heart’ kind of moments in life when you see them, but prepare yourself to say goodbye to them for another year as soon as you see them bloom.  So, enjoy the moment and be content!

If I could find more space in my garden to plant more peonies, I definitely would. I would look into planting other varieties for more blooms in later seasons.  What a dream!  But my garden is packed to the core and I can only sit down and enjoy all the beauty which surround me... and think, too, that I most let it all go one day... the beauty, the scent, the little eco system I have created here.   

We are not keeping this house after retirement, that’s for sure. I want more light inside, less walls more windows more natural nature outside. Less work~ It is strange how our soul changes with time.  Who we are, what we like and what make us happy can fluctuate with time and age, and I want to say too, ‘with health’. 

I am not the same energetic gardener I used to be just a few years ago. In fact, I am not the same energetic anything anymore.  And it has to do, I guess, with despondency and loneliness and age. 

And it has to do too with me having a regular job again and the long hours at the office, and who’d want to work in the garden after a long day of sitting down and being tired?  

Certainly, our long winters and long days of inactivity have done something to my spirit, not to mention to these old bones of mines, and I am not the same I used to be anymore.  I have lost some of my zest for life, and sometimes I have to wonder why did we ever came back here?  And why is our human heart so hard to understand, I just don’t know. 

I used to miss my girls so much when we were living in the south, and when my husband was called to come back from his old job to a higher position, we didn’t even had to think about it... we wanted to come back to our girls, and I would never regret that, but aside from being close to them again, nothing hold us here, and I miss our little white cottage and the happy days we lived there... and I wonder everyday if we made the right decision of coming back.  I guess that love is the ultimate ruler, and love is what keeps us alive.  So we are OK... know this, my heart, we’ll be find.