Thursday, November 15, 2018

The Witches Big Bloom Day

It has been a full week of bone chilling 100% humidity hovering back and forth around freezing. I managed to get quite wet the first day. That chill set the tone for the week and slowed me down. A good thing really.

I sit here for the very first time fully aware and with no teeth. The old ones are in a bowl on the kitchen counter. I was going to have to find out what this felt like at some point. I got a full set of new choppers instantly on Wednesday. The new ones are in a container on the bathroom sink. The old ones were shot. Gum disease, bone loss, big time bone loss.

I did check around enough to get the Kama'aina discount. $6000.00 for a full set of dentures. My period of indentured servitude will at least be cut in half.

Now I have to learn how to eat and talk again. Such is the way it is in the early winter of my decrepitude.


















I missed Bloom Day last month. And that is how it happens, the garden bloggers post less often and slowly fade away in a rapidly corporatizing internet. I have been slowly fading away.

At least I am trying to show you the very best of the wild cultivated gardens when I do manage to post. For Garden Bloggers Bloom Day of November 2018 I have a once in a decade super bloom of the native Witch Hazel, Hamamelis virginiana.




















Never before has the bloom been this full or the flower petals so long. This bone chilling humidity must be just what the witches want to extend the bloom period even longer This has been going on for two weeks and shows no signs of slowing down yet.




















This Witch Hazel super bloom won't last forever. At once a decade I should be able to see it again. I'll probably be going to take pictures of it with my new knees by then.

The solid humidity has frozen again. The snow has started to fall.


5 comments:

Lisa said...

I found your post interesting. I knew next to nothing about witch hazel. All I know about it is an old childhood friend's mother would put it on our bites. I'd never heard of it before, never had it, and until my adult daughter got some (for something or other cosmetic-wise) I never knew anyone to have it, or even that it was from a tree!
Now I learn it has weird looking flowers!

Lea said...

Witch Hazel does brighten up a dull day!

Lady of LaMancha said...

Beautiful scenery. Love your humor. If you get knee replacement before the next mega-witchhazel bloom, at least you'll still be standing. Which is my goal, too.

As for garden bloggers fading, I did fade for a while, because I felt my garden was making little progess. Or, rather, that I myself was making little progress. But, then I realized that there are quite a few bloggers out there who aren't really gardening in the way that I understand it. They are merely acquiring. Buying and planting, then buying more. And I cannot compete with that. As a low-to-no-budget gardener, I collect seeds that I find, propogate plants that I already have, and try to incorporate native species. The resulting product is somewhat monotonous, but someone out there might appreciate it. So, I am blogging again. For a while, at least.

Glad you participated this month in GBBD.

Lisa at Greenbow said...

Everything has a layer of ice and snow on it for this months GBBD. My witch hazel did the same thing this year. It finally has the look I was wanting. Here I blamed the drought. I figured it felt like it better reproduce so it will live on.
I am sure you are miserable with new teeth. Good luck with them.

Christopher C. NC said...

Lisa, witch hazel is a fragrance/perfume that went out of style at some point. This is the plant it comes from.


Lea they sure do. That's why I have plenty more for late winter.


Lady of LaMancha my big advantage as a low to no budget gardener is being a long time peasant gardener for the well to do. It is propagation heaven.

Lisa I woke up to a nice coating of snow. No drought for these Witch Hazels. This has been an extra wet year. No real pain with the teeth pulling so far. The gums and jaw are tender and need to heal though.