Daily Perambulations

Yum – Photo: L. Weikel

Ah, it’s so great to be back on the road. My life is immeasurably enriched by my daily perambulations.

The past two days have been especially delightful. Much as I love sunny days and blue skies, there’s something comforting when the heat and brilliance of a near summer’s day is muted by a layer of clouds so high that they just turn the sky gray-white. The beauty is in the slightly cool hint of a breeze and the chance for everything to just be, with no effort to outshine anything else.

Sometimes it feels like everything is trying too hard when the sun shines. Flowers burst forth in colors that tantalize the buzzing class, including us, vying for the attention of anything and everyone.

Clematis – Photo: L.Weikel

Blooming Clematis

In just the few days I couldn’t manage a walk, whether because it was pouring out or I was distracted by other responsibilities, our neighbors’ clematis bloomed.

Every year I say I want a clematis of my own, climbing our mailbox. While Karl finally planted one last year, it was ground up and spit out by the pickup that mowed down our box this winter. We’ll have to plant another. Soon.

Bees Know

No matter how pale the day may be under that stratospheric layer of overcast shielding us from the brilliance and blazing heat of the sun, the bees know where the good stuff is.

I could’ve stood for hours beside the wildflowers taking photos of them as they lured the baby bumblebees with their nectar and other sweet wares. “Come hither,” they teased, and the bees complied, probably just as happy the sun wasn’t glinting off the petals of more brilliant blossoms just down the road.

It wasn’t until I started looking at still frames of the live shots I took of the bees making love to the blossoms that I realized the bees were crowding the game of other creatures. In one shot an ant triumphantly climbed to the lip of the blossom, staking its claim and kicking the bee out of that sweet spot. Was that ant courageous or crazy? Hungry or simply living its biological imperative?

The bee had to be ten times the size of that ant. And yet the ant prevailed in staking its claim. Or did the bee just decide to bag it? Hard to say, I guess. We all pick our battles. Some days we want the flower we know; the sure thing. And some days we realize there are a bazillion other wildflowers out there just waiting to be loved.