A sweet spring snow came down in fat round flakes, coating everything.
The tower beds are ready for planting, one half of the big third coming up garlic and the other half I don’t know, I’ll have to check the book; the second third calendula, the happy orange flower that blooms profusely. I didn’t want to cut them back at first, Katrina made me. “You’ll see,” she said, and she was right, as she so often is about these growing things. Calendula is prolific in this one patch and as long as it continues to self-sow I welcome it. And the third third, what did we choose to do with it? I don’t know. I’ll have to check the book. Thank god for keeping records. Planting time approaches.
Chris came and weed-whacked last year’s good grasses gone to seed so they can scatter and regrow, spread; and took to the ground some nasty bad grass. I guess the bad grass is not the worst thing in the world to cover some of this ground. There are things I’d far prefer, though, like the purple mustards that are moving in; I just need to keep the bad grass down. And afterwards, a sweet spring snow followed by a hint of rain. All the grass has grown inches in the few days since it was cut. The roller-coaster approaches the first crest. All I want to do is be outside and work in the garden, stay ahead of the weeds and the bad grass. My focus is consumed by the tasks ahead. And the Stardog stands on his head then lies on his back in the wet grass and wags his tail at me. He knows where my energy goes. He follows its direction and when it veers too far from him he comes nearby and does something unbearably cute.
Just a handful of dried rosehips remain on the canes. Tiny green buds begin to peek out. Maybe I will increase my apricot crop this year threefold or fivefold, from two to six or ten, maybe even twenty, who knows. The tree so recently laden with fertile flowers flocked with honeybees is now a haggard brown. A few blossoms remain in every stage of opening from tight white ovals through barely open to full-on bloom. Maybe I’ll have a few apricots after all. Maybe we all will.
The almond blossoms appear to have been protected from the freeze.
The almond on the other hand looks like most of its blooms have survived. There are a few brown, many wide open, many in bud and some wilting, perhaps from the natural course of things. Tiny green leaf buds emerge in shoots from the tips of all the twigs. The dormant winter apple buds begin to swell, and the first jonquil releases its paper shell. Hardy red tulips and royal purple pasqueflower bloom even after snow; these flowers bloom in sequence, ramping up. The forsythia didn’t suffer too much from the freeze, up against the west side of the house.
Jonquil buds in snow Monday are closer to opening today.
No time for a proper dog walk tonight, but I open the gate and let them run into the woods. I want to be a dog for whom going is its own reward. When I step out into the leech field full of winterfat, I can see the sunset. It just takes stepping out the east gate and I can see the glorious sunset to the west, peach and violet, light blue, and yellow-tinted white.