A Day in the Life

 I'll be honest: I'm coming down off the I have the whole house to myself! cloud and tiptoeing along the ditch of Is that all there is? I knew the shine would wear off it pretty quickly.


Make no mistake: there's plenty to keep me busy here, with a book deadline looming and me working at capacity. It feels really good to have my watercolor painting chops honed and oiled. But when you've been used to other living souls around to feed, clothe and care for, to share with and laugh with, it can feel weird to go all day without talking to anyone in person. So you keep yourself busy.

I decided I'd better get my sneakers back on the road. I ran down to check on the neighbors' place.
 On the way, there was the most beautiful mackerel sky. I wish I knew how the clouds form and line up like that. I'm just glad they do. I feel like a bug under a lace doily. It's all so huge and beautiful and incomprehensible.

 
I turned off the road and down a dirt path. I stopped and rested in the shade of a bulldozer. The smell of oil and diesel is comforting, because it reminds me of my dad. He was always messing around with things that used oil and diesel. I figure if he's going to accompany me, it'd pay me to hang around machinery that he's interested in inspecting. DOD was all about machinery.

 

I walked to the rise, where I could see the neighbors' castle taking its final form. I've been walking in and watching it, with their blessing, for about three years.  Phoebe and I even walked around inside it not long ago, and it's really, really cool. It's so amazing to see it turn from big skids and piles of block into a real castle. And it's interesting to live near people who have a dream, however unusual, and are willing to put all that money and work into it.

 

It occurred to me that there aren't all that many people in this part of Appalachia who could or would follow a dream like that.  So that's something special, to watch their dream take shape. I like people with dreams.

Also special to me: The morning glories are finally opening. I didn't have to wait quite as long this year as two years ago, when they were still in tight, tiny bud on October 12! Still, it feels like forever. I planted the durn things in the greenhouse in April! Fenced and barricaded them against rabbits and chipmunks. Only two of the six made it even so. The chipmunks climbed up and into the 2' cylinders of chicken wire to bite them off. The rabbits nipped off any stems that dared grow outside the cylinders. It's been a thing.

But being able to drown in that heavenly blue makes the battle worthwhile. Last year I grew "Flying Saucers," these ridiculous tie-dyed white and blue things that on the seed packet sound great. This was as good as it got. And it's pretty good, but they weren't all that nice by any means.

 

 The vast majority of their blossoms were this sickly bluish-white, and though they were nice against a pearly sky, I hopped off the Flying Saucer train.

 

 Nothing beats this plant. I'll be faithful from here on out, Clark's Heavenly Blue.

Let's face it. I'm a color junkie. Always have been, always will be. It's just getting moreso. Here are my impatiens stairs. You can't really walk up them any more. I don't care. I like the cascade of color flowing like spilled paint down the old sandstone blocks. From the time we were first laying the stones, I knew they would be no more than a backdrop for flowers. I used to grow sun-loving succulents like portulaca, purslane and ice plant here, but the Japanese maple that stands guard nearby had other ideas. Slowly its canopy overspread the steps, and I was emboldened to try shade-loving annual impatiens. It turned out to be just the thing. And the rabbits didn't touch them, go figure! I'll do it again! And they've seeded themselves nicely. Doubt the seeds will make it through the winter, so I'll start fresh in spring.

 

 As I work away in the studio, painting top-secret blue jays and wishing I could share them with you, my phone chirps and bloops, telling me when a message from the kids is coming through. I am still in a state of suspended disbelief that I can SEE them. Get photos from them. Sometimes talk to them, and SEE them talking. It's a Jetson's world. I'll never get blase about that. I think of my weekly telephone call to my parents when I was in college and just shake my head.

It's one thing to see Liam in his dorm room three hours away in Morgantown, but quite another to see Phoebe, sweatin' to the oldies on La Gomera in the Canary Islands! How can this be?

She's on a Fulbright fellowship, and she'll be a teaching assistant in an elementary school, where her Spanish is going to reach full fluency. I can hardly believe it, and I can't wait to see pictures of her school, her co-workers and students.

La pinche calima is a Saharan dust storm! Ack!

Meanwhile, Liam shares his wry observations from WVU, where he's taking four art courses at once. He's drawing from life! I just keep shaking my head. They were both here all summer, and now they're off and doing amazing things, and I get to watch.

Both my fledglings have a good command of the language. Liam in particular has a really interesting vocabulary, and an always unexpected choice of words. I love to read their writing. 

As part of the Fulbright fellowship, awardees are encouraged to keep a blog. As a result, Phoebe is blogging, and I can't imagine anything that could delight this old Blogosaurus Rex any more than to see my girl spread her writing and photography wings for all to take in. Maybe it's seeing Liam's art on Instagram ( @lht_artwork). That delights me, too.

Phoebe's already got several posts up at canarycurrent.blogspot.com 

 and preliminary results indicate that the child can tell a story. I knew that already, but it ought to be a pleasant surprise to those of you who have been reading this blog for years. Check her out. I'd recommend reading from the first post!

I find it all pretty incredible. And it's happened so fast. One minute I'm asking them what they'd like for breakfast, and the next he's in a dorm three hours away and she's halfway around the world. And I'm reading her blog. 

Today I got buried in my work, preparing for a talk tomorrow. I ripped my talk apart and hammered it back together again with a bunch of new parts. I loaded the car with all my merchandise. And only when that was all done did I turn back to composing painting number 11 of 19 for Saving Jemima. 

And when I couldn't work any longer I got up to look out the south window of the studio. I could see just a bit of the sky, and I could see there was something serious going on out there.

Maximilian sunflower in the prairie patch

Better, I think, with goldenrod. It lets the clouds be their magnificent selves.

While I'd been working and thinking and absorbed, this incredible cloud parade had been filing silently past, unannounced and unbidden.

I walked out to the meadow and literally fell to my knees, looking for the right angle from which to record it. They were so huge and beautiful and growing, growing, growing, ever upward, their cauliflowery heads expanding, reaching higher and higher into the stratosphere.

It all reminded me of what has happened with my kids. While I was busy, they blew up into these magnificent proto-adults. And then they marched off to the south, like these clouds are doing. I can't stop them; I wouldn't even try. I just have to watch them go. 

In Case You Missed It

photo by Anne Babcock

 

 In Case You Missed It: Which, of course, all but about 60 people did...but let's consider what it's like to have 60 people arrive in your yard on a sprinkly, trying-to-be-fine Saturday noon. It's a trip, that's what it is! I'll confess that I spent several weeks in preparation for the Indigo Hill Garden Tour and Plant Sale, thinking of all the things that need to be thought of when that many people come to visit.
 Things that I'd not paid much attention to before suddenly loomed large. Here, purple coneflowers are struggling to raise their pretty heads above all the sumac in the prairie patch. We can't have that! The Garden Tour is coming!

  Some weeding was effected. I started off clipping the sumac with a pruner, but later figured out that I could pull it and break it off at ground level. It wasn't easy, but it was a lot faster than clipping.

 

Piles of sumac formed all along the borders of the bed. Why, I could do this every year. Maybe I can take the prairie patch back from the sumac. Mowing doesn't do much; just makes the sumac shorter. The spreading roots remain, ready to throw shoots up and keep on walking in their inexorable takeover of the entire bed. If I pull it in midsummer, then mow in March, maybe I can discourage it a bit.

 

I wouldn't say it was fun, but it was satisfying to slow the sumac down and reveal all the marvelous composites that are blooming their heads off in the prairie patch. 

  

The brushpile grows and melts, grows and melts. I dump head-high piles on it and they just go away.

  

Gray sunflower (a prairie native), with tickseed sunflower and ironweed, among many others. There's coneflower, partridge pea and even a little liatris in there. When I was done, I threw about a dozen seed spikes of my garden liatris in like javelins, as a final salute to native takeover.

Back to the event planning: I knew I couldn't lead two garden tours and cook, so Phoebe suggested a 12-5 pm time frame. As an inveterate nurturer, I needed to be released from the obligation of feeding everyone, or catering the event would be all I'd do. Been there, done that. This was going to be different, and a whole lot more fun for me. No food, I declared. Herb tea. And Anne and Phoebe added the cookies.  Perfect!

The day dawned rainy and humid, the tuberoses going wild with fragrance. I still had to set up my plant shop and bookstore, get the kitchen and studio ready to receive, finish some weeding,  make some signs, and get myself clean. An angel had arrived the evening before in my dear friend Anne, shown here marveling at the touch of bluebird feet five years back. This is still my favorite picture of Anne, lost in the magic of being chosen by bluebirds.

Anne arrived like the angel she is, unbidden, but ready to work, and bearing two enormous containers of home-made cookies: Chocolate Crinkle and her grandmother's crispy sugar cookie recipe. They were amazing. And thank goodness, because everyone lit up when they saw the platters, and the ice-cold herb tea I'd made for days in advance. I used the pineapple sage, spearmint and lemon verbena from the Heritage garden, sweetened with leaves from my longsuffering Stevia plant. Just three leaves will sweeten an entire quart. It doesn't have to be a full lunch, but nice refreshments are mandatory. 

Other guests brought gorgeous shortbread and brownies. We all ran on sugar all afternoon. 

Photo by Anne Babcock

The other absolute essential was my beautiful Phoebe, who not only kept me sane, but cleaned the greenhouse, vacuumed the whole house (including the tower), baked a big batch of Italian wedding cookies, then attended to several small children who came, showing them where to get golden raspberries and Stevia and other delicious treats around the gardens. There were two adorable infants among the garden fans, and Phoebe gave them lots of loving attention. She helps where she's needed. She gets my crazy and reels me in when I'm spinning. I love her so.

photo by Anne Babcock

This is what it looked like around 12:30 when the first tour started. My dear friend Dawn Hewitt --managing editor at Bird Watcher's Digest-- volunteered--imagine! to put herself on parking duty, staying out at the end of the driveway. She asked everyone who was able to, to park out on the township road, and walk in the driveway. Those who needed to could park on the lawn. We figured the yard wouldn't be very scenic if it was chock full of automobiles.  It worked great, with a few umbrellas for the noontime showers. Thank you, Dawn!!!

photo by Anne Babcock

We staged at the porch, and I yakked about plants and horticulture and gardening practices, moving from one thing to the next, and it was tons of fun. Here, I'm cradling my dwarf pomegranate, which put on extra flowers and a nice ripe red fruit for the party. I explained how I trained it into a bonsai pot over a series of years and prunings of both root and top.

photo by Anne Babcock

Admiring the scarlet runner bean gifted to me by my friends Carol and Daniel way back on March 9, when I was speaking to the Burroughs Nature Club. Carol handed me these three Jack and the Beanstalk lookin' seedlings in a half-gallon pot. When I expressed my doubt that I could keep them happy for another two months until it was safe to plant them out, she said, "Don't you have a greenhouse?" 

I replied, "Yes, and it's tiny and stuffed full!"

Somehow I managed to keep it going, looping all around the inside of the greenhouse and I'm so glad I did! Planning to take some beans off it and repeat the performance. But next year I'm going to start it in late April! The beans it makes are edible, but they aren't much. But they make more scarlet runners, and that's a good thing.

Photo by Anne Babcock

 On the back patio, where one astute visitor located one of our copperheads in his favorite lair without being told where to look. It was nice to give people what might have been their first look at a wild (but very placid) copperhead.

We love the Faks.

Got a bit carried away with the hot crayon colored zinnias. I do that in early spring--go for the maximum color bombs.  Going to plant some gentler shades next year to balance things out. Tasha Tudor would be appalled at my gardens.

photo by Anne Babcock

A volunteer fancy sunflower in the vegetable garden.

The composites were showing well! Late summer is their domain.

A very cool thing happened while I was discussing bonsai culture. A digger or katydid wasp called Sphex nudus, one I've been watching for several days, came buzzing in with a freshly paralyzed leaf-rolling cricket (Camptonotus carolinensis).

 

I got extremely excited and managed to show the dramatic scene to the group. The wasp stings the cricket, paralyzing it, then drags it deep into a burrow it's dug, lays an egg on it, and lets its larva grow up eating the cricket from the inside out. What I'm wondering is just how many crickets that wasp stuffs into one burrow, because this has been going on for days. It's all I can do not to dig up the burrow to find out. And I wonder how it finds these crickets in their rolled-leaf shelters. It must have a search image for the shelters. I find the whole thing amazing. And the cricket preys on aphids! So. There are stories piled on stories here. I made the video below several days before the garden tour, before I figured out what the cricket was. And she was still stuffing crickets in the same burrow on Tour Day. It's all I can do not to dig it out to see how many crickets are down there!

photo by Anne Babcock. I'm telling the digger wasp story to some very interested young gardeners.

Photo by Debbie Bryant

Part of the fun of the whole day was meeting people I'd only known as names and profile photos on Facebook.
That was really cool. Debbie Bryant took a bunch of  photos that she's graciously allowed me to use.

Photo by Debbie Bryant

 In the hummingbird garden outside the studio.

A particularly nice framing of my Impatiens Stairs. That's a new thing this summer. I think it's going to be an annual event, because rabbits (at least mine) don't seem to eat impatiens! You'd think they'd be delicious. Here's to plants the rabbits don't eat. That includes cardinalflower and tuberoses. I told everyone that what they saw in the gardens is what the rabbits didn't eat.

Photo by Debbie Bryant

Photo by Debbie Bryant

 Debbie said her favorite part was climbing the tower and catching the views from on high. I never made it up there, being too busy flapping my gums, but Annie took it upon herself to be the tower guide, helping folks clamber up the folding tower stairs and get out onto towertop. Thank you, Angel.

Photo by Debbie Bryant



 Part of the fun of the whole event was growing plants for sale. I've always wanted to be a grower of special plants, and that dream came true this summer. I scrounged around the recycling center for just the right pots and got busy, growing dozens of my favorite Achimenes longiflora "Pink Nighty," Chrysanthemum "Sheffield Pink," native Ohio born and bred Cardinalflower, the magical fast-opening evening primrose, and  propagating a bunch of jewel orchids, too. It was pure fun. The Achimenes were a real project.

 
 I started them in April, and they were only just coming into bloom in late August. But they'll bloom hard until it gets cold, and they're worth it! I set up a store in the Groanhouse, which Phoebe had thoroughly cleaned out for me. I'm gonna miss that girl...

Cardinalflower babies, waiting for new homes.

Jewel orchids, ready to enchant.

 

Just inside the house was a bookstore with all the Zick bling you could ask for: books, puzzles, notecards, fine art prints. The 12:30 tour ended there. Those who wanted to climbed the tower. And the 2:00 tour started, a bit late, but I think everybody had a good time. By 5 pm the place was mostly cleared, and I was done crispy.

 I'm happy to say that the event helped defray the cost of buying two Macbooks, one for each kid. They'd been struggling along on 5 and 6-year-old laptops, and it was past time to upgrade. Buying two at once was a financial blow that I'm finding hard to juggle, given that my dual home HVAC system has chosen this summer to go to pot. As I write, I'm looking out the window at my friend Chuck,  an HVAC repairman, who is peering into the guts of an air conditioner. He probably ought to just stay here rather than go back to the shop; they break down that often. Add Liam's tuition bill and a couple of whamtastic car repairs, and writing and illustrating bird books, wonderful as it is, falls a bit short. Time to get creative with income streams.

Lots of folks who had to miss this Indigo Hill Garden Tour and Plant Sale are asking if it will happen again. I'll watch the weather. If we have another fabulous summer with gentle, perfectly spaced rains; if the gardens are looking extra-boffo next August, I may just do it. Most of the work I do toward the event is work I'd be doing anyway, and it sure is fun to share all this beauty with such appreciative people. To all those who made the drive, thank you!! I'm grateful to you for your support, and I hope you had as much fun as I did!