Spring On A Leash

The final diagnosis was stage 4 adenocarcinoma of the lungs with metastasis to the nearby lymph nodes and the lining of the wall of the lung cavity. It has kicked my butt. I am permanently tied to the oxygen tube. I had my first chemo last Friday.

Good thing I planned for a nice view from the front porch for my decrepitude.

The view from the dining room window is where my ashes go. Not many people have the opportunity to design their own final resting place.

I tried to rouse myself for a walk in the garden on Bloom Day and couldn't do it. The garden is proceeding with spring without me. The view of my front porch is nice too.

A couple days later I strapped on some oxygen and made a mighty effort. It will be the last walk in the garden until my breathing improves. I saw Celandine Poppies.

The trilliums are rising in multitudes. We will need that many to feed the damn deer.

All I can do is a weak holler now "Get Off My Lawn". I can't go chasing the varmints off.

This summer I will be getting chemo and immunotherapy tied to a leash and stuck inside. Robbed of the breath of life there is zero energy for movement of any kind. How will the maintenance gardener handle that?

The End Of Perky

Testing, testing, testing. A diagnosis of lung cancer has been confirmed. I won't be doing a cancer journey blog. It may get mentioned from time to time. I suspect the number of posts will dwindle since walking the gardens is difficult when you can't breathe. One more test to go and the first appointment with an oncologist is on April 7th. The waiting for some actual treatment is not fun.

The last two rounds of cold in the teens and low twenties did very little freezer burn. Daffodils like rhododendron curl up in the cold and that has a tendency to snap the flowers stems making it impossible for them to stand back up. The show of perky daffodils is mostly over. There are many more yet to bloom, so it is not totally over.

Spring continues on. The early trilliums have started to rise and they were unfazed by the frigid temperatures.

The Trout Lilies also ignored the cold as they must, being one of the very first spring ephemeral wildflowers. Their spread through the garden has been dramatic.

The snowdrops have been multiplying abundantly too. The original clumps are getting fatter and seedlings are appearing some good distance away. My heiau may be about as big as it is going to get. Like sands in the hourglass, these are the rocks of the heiau.

Some damn varmint dug up the chionodoxa bulbs right after I planted them. I wasn't sure how many would show up this spring. It looks like I got a good take. This isn't the more prolific multiplying plain species though. Maybe they will surprise me.

This is what I like, when one becomes many. Trillium luteum keeps expanding.

Spring In The Wild Cultivated Gardens

A walk in magic when the native stinze joins in. Click on a picture for the slide show.

 

Untying Hairballs

There was a successful attempt to get into the old Picasa photo editor as you can see by the copy right text in the first photo. On the second try I was locked out again. Something is amiss and remains so. I can't keep storing photos on this computer.

Computers have a mind of their own. I am starting to lose my mind. The forgetting has begun. This blog is extremely dated and is in desperate need of a makeover. Merging the computer mind with my mind to accomplish that seems like a rather daunting task these days.

I muddle along entwined in a hairball.

The snow melted quickly. I've been wandering about to see how fresh spring growth fared in the snowy cold.

The daffodils were still there with only a few more bent flower stems. Freeze damage of any form was undetectable.

All of that fresh green growth is bulbs. In two more weeks, Bulbarella's mountain will be covered in blooming Spanish Bluebells. If all goes well. That is never a given.

Trilliums and Celandine Poppy are multiplying with abandon.

Tomorrow, I go for my post-secondary cataracts eyeball checkup. Hairballs. Eyeballs. The garden grows on.

There Will Always Be Daffodils

After a week on the market, an offer for the asking price was accepted on the house my grandfather built. A lot of wheels have to turn before it is a done deal. Sometimes the wheels can fall off. It is certainly a good start.

The daffodils that survived the polar blast are coming into bloom. These are generally the later blooming varieties by habit. Micro-climate conditions spared some others. The damage was primarily loss of bloom. Foliage was burnt, but enough was left for the bulbs to grow and store energy for next year.

There are too many populations of minor bulbs living on the mountain to count. They were not so far along in growth and buried safely beneath the snow when the bitter cold struck. In the absence of mass daffodils their presence is more pronounced.

The earliest trilliums have risen.

Selling my mother's 100 year old house is just step one. We have to buy her a new house closer to one of her other children and move her into it. I told her we can plant southern bulbs like Rain Lily and Ipheion in the lawn.

One patch of the trumpet daffodils survived to bloom.

There are some trilliums that have been multiplying like the minor bulbs. I like that.

There will always be daffodils. One hundred years from now, people may still come to see the bulbs my mother planted.

The Bluebells On A Different Day

The Bluebells like the daffodils and minor bulbs that came before are having an exceptional showing this year. It's nice when that happens.

The small population of Phacelia bipinnatifida is even showing better than usual. You have to look because it can get lost in all the bluebells.

I went for a walk on a cool sunny evening.

Adrift in an ocean of bluebells.

Some primrose joined in.

Just beyond the edge of the wild cultivated gardens masses of trilliums were in bloom.

This week it is all about a rather spectacular display of the ever so invasive bluebells.

Will the Lady don her slippers this year? Last year they got eaten. This year we have three stems and a dash of cayenne preventative.

And evermore bluebells.

There is a white phacelia that blooms well before the blue Phacelia purshii. It is now species unknown because someone from Holland googled P. fimbriata and emailed asking for seed. A closer inspection made me speak up before getting their hopes up and sending the wrong seed.

High on the low spot of a North Carolina mountain top

Literally covered in bluebells.