It’s time to talk about the tiny garden on the north fence. It was created to give the Chinquapin oak more fertile ground in which to thrive. All seems to be going well. The upright rosemary is having a hard time, but most everyone else is doing fine. I have noticed something odd, however, and it has to do with the plant I like to call a Yellow Bells.

Well, my gray day yesterday lasted about as long as it took me to write about it, eat breakfast, and start my yard work. I mowed and edged and looked at my flowers. All four of my sage are in bloom, and it’s a heavy bloom, which is a real treat because they’re all at least six to seven feet tall and nearly that big around. For a subtle touch, the Ironweed my son planted is also blooming. But you have to look for it. It’s in the shade.

Spent most of Thursday driving around looking at the river. My river. The Pedernales. It runs through town, under highway 281. A powerful amount of rain fell west around Fredericksburg and gathered itself to run down the foothills of the Llano Uplift into the river. In Fredericksburg, the river crested at 34 feet. It spread out and lost steam as it got to slightly flatter ground. But it still rose to 25 feet in Johnson City.

It’s sticker burr season. I think mine are sentient. I know the common ways they get into the house. Pants. Socks. Shoes. Pets. But we have no indoor pets, and I’ve found so many recently in the house that mine have to be traveling on their own. It’s either that or I’m being inordinately careless when it comes to my shoes and socks. I’m going with smart burrs.

It may seem odd, but I’ve loved all the places I’ve ever lived. East to west, north to south, any place I’ve ever called home always brought something to the table. I imagine part of the reason for this is that I never heard my parents complain, although there is a chance I wasn’t listening. After all, for most of it, I was a child, just happy to be. The bottom line, however, is still the same. I remember my surroundings with fondness.

There’s a plant growing in the middle of my driveway, with tiny, tiny white flowers, each touched with a dab of yellow, bunched around a lavender seed. You can see them on your hands and knees quite easily. I have no idea what prompted me to look closer, but I did and now I can’t unsee it. It’s attractive, and I believe I’ll try to grow more of it. It’s called Texas Frogfruit. It will fit right in with the Straggler Daisies, also known as Horseherb, that occupy most of my yard.

Yesterday I wrote about driving slow through the night, but I’ve even started driving slow through the day. It takes an effort, however, because it feels as though I’m hardwired for finding the quickest way. But lately, I’ve opted for the back roads and the side roads. The slow roads, the ones with twists and turns. The ones with things to see.

Drove home in the dark last night from a musical event. Part of the trip was down a country road. Narrow. Winding. Twisty. Full of deer. I was going slow. I had the windows down, too. The woods pressed in around me. I could hear the cicadas, crickets, and frogs singing their nighttime melodies. It would stop as I drove through pasture, start again in the woods.

The weather feels uneasy these days as though it is having a hard time making up its mind about what it wants to do. Should it rain? Should it shine? What? How about a strong wind? Maybe a good calm? We’re having hot days, but there’s so much moisture in the ground it hardly feels like summer at all, and its nearly July. By now we should be baking. Instead, we have a sauna.

Another new plant has come to the garden, Ironweed, again courtesy of my arborist son. As with the bluebells, this is their second year but first to bloom. Maybe it was all the rain. Whatever the cause, the flowers are out and they look great. Now we hope they propagate. It’s not always as easy as one might think. Nature is relatively capricious that way. For instance, the false mallows he planted long ago, are still just two.

Yesterday was a day of riding around. Went to a lake, went to a river, sat and watched the sky. There was a big rain. I reported three inches at my house, but it was closer to four. When those rains come, the rivers and creeks really run. I like to go see them. Yesterday it was the Blanco River and Miller Creek. They were both running hot and muddy. It was particularly nice to see water in the creek, because lately it was a creek in name only.

It’s been a wet June. Last night I woke up to thunder and lightning and found the rain gauges nearly full this morning, registering close to three inches. That’s a hard rain. My freshly mown grass likes it as do the plants. The Barbados cherry is now bearing fruit. I refer to it in the singular, but I’m fairly certain there are now seven or eight plants clumped together. Too bad the cherries are only slightly larger than pinheads.

The yard is in need of edging, which means grass is thick around the edges in various spots. But I got a new book the other day, and I’d much rather sit and read. Of course, that’s not really the responsible thing to do, but I wonder if I’m aging out of the need to be responsible, and is it really responsible? After all I am getting soft around the edges so maybe my yard can be soft around the edges. We’d be a matched pair.

I like some of the little vagrant plants that call my gardens home. One’s that caught my eye for several seasons is cutleaf evening primrose. It grows close to the ground with lovely little yellow flowers that are pinkish when they close up. Several plants call the north fence garden home. It makes sense they’d show up since the ground is freshly tilled and I’ve taken no steps to stop wild seeds from sprouting.

On the highway between Johnson City and Dripping Springs lies the unincorporated area known as Henly. When we first moved to the area, it was simply a wide spot in the road. Now, it’s way more than that. As you drive through and look north you can see the valley and the hills beyond. We owe that nice view to a company that sells aggregate. In 2016 they started clearing away the vegetation before they began carting away the hills by the truck load. Strip mining old sea floors. There’s no telling how low the hills will go before they get done.

My wildflowers are certainly enjoying the cool embrace of our recent wet weather. The Lemon Bee Balm is coming up along with some Queen Annes Lace that was in one of the wildflower packets I sowed. Not many consider the Lace a wildflower. But there it is so I’ll take it. It bears a small resemblance in its flowers and leaves to hedge parsley, which I pull from my gardens when I can. We’ll see how the new visitor matures.

Two, two-inch rains, back-to-back, is a good soaking in anyone’s book. And if I kept detailed stats, I’d be able to comment on just how much rain has fallen this month of May. But my stat keeping is nonexistent. I might note it in this blog, but there’s no other record. So, let me sum it up. Monday and Tuesday were wet, rainy days. My rain tanks are full, and the ground is as soft as butter.

We had another good rain yesterday. My gauge clocked in at 2.5 inches, and a lot of that fell in a very short time. I suppose that’s why my phone started blowing up with flash flood warnings. More is promised today once the day warms and the air gets stirred up. We’ve had a nice wet month of May, and some of the local lakes are benefiting. So, it was a nice Memorial Day.

Walked into the carport yesterday to get my gloves and came face to face with three wren chicks learning to fly. One fluttered off to get stuck between the shelves and the carport wall. The remaining two just sat and looked at me. The mother or the father, I don’t know which headed back to the nest. In deference to the birds and the training session, I backed up, forswore the gloves, and moved on.

It’s a lovely morning in the neighborhood. The sun is out, the birds are singing, there’s dew on the grass. The air is cool and kind. I’m in a good mood. I have a slightly sore finger from the prick of Mesquite thorn. I started trimming a tree yesterday and got careless. But overall, I feel fine, and I’m doing the best I can to maintain that spirit.