Carpe Diem…
I heard from a very dear friend today.
It made me realise how one really must make the most of every day, because tomorrow might be too late.
I heard from a very dear friend today.
It made me realise how one really must make the most of every day, because tomorrow might be too late.
Reading back over early posts written sometime between 2010 and 2014, I was struck by the way I used to be able to write about writing, about writers AND also write books. All at the same time.
These days, I can barely keep one ball in the air, let alone three and I wondered what the difference might be. What has happened since 2014 that makes me so much less of an acrobat?
It’s been such a long time since I SOS-ed.
The main reason is the ongoing drought where I live.
Deciduous trees are yellowing and losing leaves, not because autumn approaches, but because of lack of water. Our subsoil is dry for at least a metre, if not more. The above is one of two massive sixty year old willows in our garden, favourite hiding places of our grandson and our terrier.
My borders stopped flowering weeks ago and whilst we can keep the borders alive, it’s as though the plants are going into hibernation. So there’s little to photograph as even in the city, trees are beginning to shed, street verges are dry and in some cases just dirt. And gardens of the less interested are looking awful.
However, on a quick walk yesterday, I took pics of what caught my eye and gave me hope that this pervasive dry will end one day and it will rain.
Acorns in a street row of oaks. I love the trees – so shady in summer.
Down a little lane and shaded from the worst of the westerly sun, this tiny little clematis (unknown?) which I found so pretty. I wouldn’t mind a cutting, as I have a thing for clematis.
Which brings me to seedheads of Clematis Montana in my own garden.
Nasturtiums. Love the colours, love the taste of the flowerheads in a salad.
And finally, Pachystegia insignis. This plant that grows down the road from our little city-bolthole is the one that caught my eye a while ago with its leaves. It has papery white flowers and now these wonderful seedheads. It’s very hardy and I purchased three last year. All in tubs as a plantsman friend says they do best in tubs, she has found.
And that’s it from me for this week and probably for a little while because of the drought. It will soon be time to begin reading catalogues, to separate seeds and think about propagating, but without adequate water, it’s hard to divine anything beyond life-support for what one already has.
So pootle on to other wonderfully wet northern hemisphere gardens with The Propagator, folks. It’s envy on steroids!
Toodles.
Once upon a different place in time, the town of Triabunna lived and breathed an industry that clear-felled our native forests. The highways would thrum from before dawn till dusk with semi-trailers and B-doubles bringing their loads of huge specimens to be processed into woodchips and shipped to Japan and the island became split apart by those who supported the industry and those who wanted are more sustainable future. Aggression ran high in many towns across the state. In fact, the creation of the world’s first environmental political party began in Tasmania at this time and the Greens were born.
Japanese ships would arrive and pump their bilge into our bays and from them, we acquired unwanted marine pests like sea stars, weed and a voracious sea urchin. And yet the government paid no attention because the woodchips floated Tasmania.
But then a hole exploded in the market and places like Brazil began to market trees far more cheaply to the pulp industry and Tasmania’s market collapsed.
This post came out of a discussion on Facebook about Harry Wales ‘apparently’ (according to the media), avoiding a further discussion with his grandmother, the Queen, before delivering his statement on his family’s future.
“ “20/20” means “perfect vision”. Eye doctors measure people’s vision using two numbers. If the first number is low, your vision is good. If it’s high, you aren’t able to see well…”
So let’s take that a step further to envision what 2020 AD could be like with 20/20 vision.
Ah, that time of sparkle and glitter.
But do I mean summer or Christmas?
Truth?
It’s summer for me because here in Australia, summer means family, friends and fun for 3 or 4 months. Christmas is just another day in our summer as mentioned in a previous blog post on why I love summer more than Christmas.
This year of course, we celebrate with our little 17 month old grandson who, whilst still not understanding what it’s all about, will certainly understand presents and toys.
I’m the slowest reader ever.
I never was.
Once I would devour a book a week. But now I write and do many other things besides, and by bedtime, my only fiction reading time, I can manage a few pages if I’m lucky. It’s probably why I thank Matthew Harffy for setting me on the path of audiobooks after my first of three eye operations this year.