Signs

Just overnight, it seems, several white blossoms have opened on our old apricot tree, harbingers of sweet summer fruit and announcing the advent of spring. 

    Other signs of this season of hope are surfacing in our garden: the first fragrant freesia blooms, fragile California poppy seedlings (I’ve marked off their area with small sticks to protect them from the gardener’s shovel), pink snapdragons and blue forget-me-nots. Birds know it’s almost nesting time. Our resident turtle doves have taken to chasing each other, warming up for mating. Regular as clockwork, the juices of renewal and birth appear. Small miracles. The air is still cold, yet trees, flowers and birds know it’s that time.

    All these signs of spring inject me with energy and hope, a time of looking forward: to the warmth of the spring sun on my back, more time in the out-of-doors and the upcoming visit of our youngest son and his girlfriend. Like the birds, my nesting instinct is activated. I’ve contacted a painter to do some small jobs around the house. We just bought a new barbeque and can’t wait for warmer days to invite family and friends to enjoy our backyard and share a meal. I’ve contracted spring cleaning fever, anxious to clear out accumulations of junk and papers. I’m giving the paper shredder a workout.

    The gardener and his son (Daniel and Daniel) pruned our avocado tree a month ago. The tree, now over thirty years old, grew from a pit planted by our son, Nico, as a child. The pruning allowed us to harvest over 400 avocados. What pleasure to give the fruits of our harvest to family and friends. Suddenly, they’re all ripening at once, which has me racing to find takers. Another small miracle in our garden is an heirloom tomato plant that wintered over and now has its first tomato.

    Rain is predicted for tomorrow. A spring christening that azaleas, the camellia, the hydrangeas, the sequoia and all their garden neighbors will welcome .

Sparkles

The first of October. A new month means I get to turn a page on my wall calendar. What scene awaits me? Aah- a watercolor depicting Half Dome and the Merced River in Yosemite Valley in soft brushstrokes of blues, greens, grays and yellows. A soothing painting that matches this warm spring day. So warm that I decided to bring Speedy Gonzalez, our tortoise, out of his hibernation box in the shed. He looks a little stunned, head down in the grass, eyes closed. In past years, I learned he needs time to adapt and rev up his metabolic engines. At first, I must coax him to eat a ripe banana. Soon he’ll find his own snacks around the garden, munching on leaves and the grass.

One of the delights of spring is simply strolling about my small city garden, noticing which flowers are about to bloom. The snowball bush is laden with pale green, soon-to-turn-white balls. The buttery-yellow irises are flowering. Neighbors’ wisterias perfume our block. I breathe in deeply the heady, intoxicating scent.

I am grateful to have time to notice these small sparkles all around. I've learned to slow down and pay attention. Yesterday I went to a crafts village to buy a few gifts to take with me to California. In a ceramics display window I discovered this scene which made me chuckle out loud.

I sent the photo to my hubby and sons. The New Yorker son messaged me: “Is this about the guy making out with the girl on the floor or about the cat sleeping on them?”

“Take your pick,” I wrote back.

California Dreamin’

Hints of spring are in the air, though officially it arrives in another six weeks here in the Southern Hemisphere: yellow acacias blooms perfume the air, the cherry trees are donning their pink party dresses and birds are already checking nesting sites. We recently found a plump robin’s nest left from last year. I saved it for a while just for the pleasure of looking at it. Today I was about to toss it into the garbage when I thought: Wait a minute. Maybe the robins would like to recycle these perfectly preserved materials for building this year’s first nest. It would save a lot of scavenging. I placed the nest in the garden. If the robins aren't interested, it will make good compost.

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Jack Frost is still with us though. A few days ago we had a very cold rain. When it cleared, the Andes glowed brilliant in their fresh mantle of snow, and now rooftops in the mornings are white with frost.

At the supermarket, I gave into temptation. Weary of winter fruit, I bought some very pricy and delicious California grapes. Although a firm believer in buying locally, I have difficulty resisting California off-season fruit. Another time, I bought two peaches just for the exceptional pleasure of savoring their sweetness in the middle of winter.

The first bloom just appeared on the one California poppy I have in my garden. They winter over easily here and often bloom through the winter if in a sunny location. I’ll sow more poppy seeds soon, in hopes of having more luck than last year. The introduced poppies do best in wild, neglected terrain rather than a tended garden. Their preferred habitat in Chile is along railroad tracks.