it’s 11am and almost 80 degrees…it’s been an incredibly lazy morning which for anyone who knows me is very out of the norm….but when the insomnia hits, i just let it take over and do what it must do. shortly after my earlier post i crashed suddenly, and i guess i was holding a pen in my hand as there were pools of ink next to me…well whaddayagonnado.
you know when you are still long enough, it lets everything seep in. you notice the details in everything around you. for example, the picture above is where i’m sitting right now on my front deck. i was blessed with florio across the street from my house (literally – when i go in they give me my the pastry on a plate and say ‘just bring it back when you’re done, honey’), a recent addition to my quiet street, so this morning i meandered over in my semblance of pj’s (i don’t own pj’s and don’t normally like to sleep in things especially in summer but, as i said, i crashed pretty hard earlier) and am sitting here enjoying a fresh boysenberry muffin and fresh squeezed orange juice and watching the world go by. it’s a truffle making day for me and so i’m getting in the last of my mellow before i put on the apron and kerchief and do what i gotta do.
so i look to my right. rainbarrel is about half empty now as we haven’t had a drop in a while, and my roses and such in the front are quite thirsty. the laurel hedge that gives such great privacy is getting ridiculously tall but my clippers are broken and there are power lines involved at this point. the himalayan blackberries are making their ominous entrance again (and they don’t even taste good since they are just pretty weeds), sneaking their long arms out of the laurels to cause mischief. and there is the pile of dead branches and vines i’ve already pulled a day or two ago . i get a little ADD in my garden so sometimes wander off (ooh! pretty!). the right side of my yard is the shadier side, but the ‘beloved’ red roses i planted this year after mister lincolns died (which ironically were planted in memory of my father, talk about symbolism for time to move on…) leaning into the sunlight. the one sole mister lincoln that has survived looks like a giant long stemmed rose – literally one stem that has survived the aphids (beloved, which is actually the french translation for my name, is much stronger…interesting, huh), five feet tall. my silver pots on the deck are mostly empty now, having used them to grow veggie starts, of which most are transplanted. looking beyond the roses i see my ground cover of vine leaf maple, hens & chicks, various sedums, roving strawberries and deer ferns, and they are loving the speckled shade.
looking directly in front of me i see my feet. woops. i take my feet off the other chair and see my seven blueberry bushes, now 3 years old, with a good number of blueberries hanging fat and purple on the vine. the yellow and orange tinted roses look like one gorgeous bougquet at the top – i think they realized like mister lincoln that they’d better get tall and maybe the aphids wouldn’t reach them (psst – tomato leaf spray is working wonders this year…way better than detergent water). the lemon mint is gangly and oversized, ready for another trim, and the everbearing strawberries are trying to assert themselves and sneak up and around my other plants. they pay me back with some small shiny gorgeous berries, even in mid-july. the lavender scented thyme is in bloom – to put some between your fingers, rub it a little, and hold it up to your nose – it’s luscoius. the red pineapple sage flowers are starting to bloom and my hopes are that the hummingbirds are on their way to enjoy once again. the delphinium i’m not as hopeful for but there are leaves. fuschia is valiant and still giving me the pink and purple i love, and the other thyme plants are finally getting their muscles. they seem weak in the beginning but the ones that make it seem to do well.
i look to the left of me and see my dwarf meyer lemon, begging to be repotted into something bigger. i get blessed with many blossoms but have only seen one lemon. but she’s pretty either way. the green onions are starting to enjoy the sun – probably one of my favorite veggies if only because you chop it and it grows back. awesome! the small herb garden i’ve put together of parsley, sage, lavendar, and oregano is flourishing – the bees love it and as we know, bees and their honey make the world go ’round (and sweeten my truffles, i might add). i planted woolly thyme between the stepping squares i put in last year, and theyve filled in gorgeously…i would love to have a yard full of woolly thyme to walk barefoot in…and i digress. the valerian is still nearly six feet tall and has added some interest but i am mainly watching the yellow pineapple sage to see her get her flowers next month. and finally, oh finally, there is my wall of sunflowers i planted this year in the divider area between mine and my neighbor’s driveway…they are reaching to the sky! i am giddy when i look at them because when they bloom it will be a sight to see. seriously – 40+ sunflowers in two rows of 20.
i close my eyes and i hear the traffic a block away, i hear the windchimes of the little old lady across the street (she has about 15 on her front porch yet amazingly, not annoying), and i hear, more importantly, the breeze rustling through the trees. the sun on the front porch has just reached the tips of my toes as my legs stretch out onto the other chair, and my girl daisy is passed out on the cool cement of the stoop, trying to maintain guard but loving morning with mama.
the ganache is still unmade and i have a cobbler that’s due around 6pm to a friend’s BBQ but right now, i’m just so mellow. soon i will have my hands deep in chocolate and be rolling ganache in my fingers, splitting the vanilla bean with a blade and scraping it into the pot with the honey and singing along – today seems like an aretha day so i’ll be pulling out lady soul from the stack of albums and putting her on (best theft from my mom Ever!). you know that song ‘ain’t no way’? love it.
enjoy your saturday…
