Weather and garden
May. 8th, 2009 09:32 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lblanchardWe saw the sun for an hour or so this morning; now the high clouds are moving in.
This year the wisteria appears poised to bloom more prolifically. I stopped counting at 30 scapes. That's not prolific by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
kightp's standards, but it's a great improvement on the six or seven scapes we had last year.
We have ants on the peony buds this year! Teeny tiny little black aunts, not the big ones I recall from my youth, but ants nevertheless.
I think I will be gardening passively this year -- not going out and acquiring new plants, but accepting what comes up. I have a lot of seedlings: corydalis, four-o-clocks, aquilegia, rudbeckia, and what I believe are rose campion. I also have enough feverfew to medicate the eastern seaboard if I let them grow. Then, of course, there are the coleus and begonias I overwintered.
We moved the hostas, in their boxes, to a spot where they would get rainwater. They are tremendously happy after the rainy spell and should have a good start on life this year before we move them back to their regular place. I am also thinking of dividing them and putting them in the ground. All of my variegated hostas have sported out to plain green, but that's all right.
The days of rain have washed away a lot of Mr. Darcy's odor in the back yard, too. I don't mind admitting that I am looking forward to sitting out back more this summer as a result. On the other hand, the absence of pet product on the "litter box" means we'll be battling the sprouting birdseed more this year. Good thing we have a mower.
And so it goes. Leaving aside the emotional elements of losing a good friend, there are practical advantages and disadvantages to not sharing a house and minuscule back yard with a large, hairy, assertive, high-strung, high-maintenance dog.
On the practical advantage side: The house seems calmer. And it's starting to smell better, although we have a way to go on that. I habitually wear black and the only remaining animal is a black cat, so that will be easier on me. It will reduce the intensity of the asthma triggers for my nephew when he visits. We won't have to clean as often. I don't have to worry that he'll go out of control on the stairs while I'm on them too and knock me down. He also won't be losing his balance and hitting my knees, forcing them into a painful hyperextended position. He won't intrude into our conversations (with each other or our guests) with an insistence that we pick up his slobbery toys and throw them. We don't need to schedule our lives around his need to get out to relieve himself twice a day, and to get a daily walk. (The Scamp can get by for a couple days with kibble and litter, although he doesn't use the litter much, preferring corners in the basement for his solids.)
And of course, there's the expense. He was high maintenance that way, averaging $400/month on meds and special foods.
On the practical disadvantage side: we will have to fix our doorbell. We will have to start using the alarm system again and still won't have the immediate warning of someone approaching the stoop that we had with Mr. Dog. Roy can't meet me at the bus stop with the dog after dark. I may be uneasy home alone when Roy is out of town. Our vulnerability to the predators of city life has increased.
And of course we miss him, although we're adjusting to missing him (if that makes any sense). The reality of missing him, although painful, is in some ways preferable to the anticipatory dread of missing him that has been hanging over us for the last couple of months.
I went through my photos last night, the ones I took before we had a digital camera. Not surprisingly, there aren't as many, but I think I have about fifteen to add to the Flickr set.
Whenever I think we made the wrong decision, I go back and look at the pictures of him on the last afternoon. It was the right decision for him.
This year the wisteria appears poised to bloom more prolifically. I stopped counting at 30 scapes. That's not prolific by
kightp's standards, but it's a great improvement on the six or seven scapes we had last year. We have ants on the peony buds this year! Teeny tiny little black aunts, not the big ones I recall from my youth, but ants nevertheless.
I think I will be gardening passively this year -- not going out and acquiring new plants, but accepting what comes up. I have a lot of seedlings: corydalis, four-o-clocks, aquilegia, rudbeckia, and what I believe are rose campion. I also have enough feverfew to medicate the eastern seaboard if I let them grow. Then, of course, there are the coleus and begonias I overwintered.
We moved the hostas, in their boxes, to a spot where they would get rainwater. They are tremendously happy after the rainy spell and should have a good start on life this year before we move them back to their regular place. I am also thinking of dividing them and putting them in the ground. All of my variegated hostas have sported out to plain green, but that's all right.
The days of rain have washed away a lot of Mr. Darcy's odor in the back yard, too. I don't mind admitting that I am looking forward to sitting out back more this summer as a result. On the other hand, the absence of pet product on the "litter box" means we'll be battling the sprouting birdseed more this year. Good thing we have a mower.
And so it goes. Leaving aside the emotional elements of losing a good friend, there are practical advantages and disadvantages to not sharing a house and minuscule back yard with a large, hairy, assertive, high-strung, high-maintenance dog.
On the practical advantage side: The house seems calmer. And it's starting to smell better, although we have a way to go on that. I habitually wear black and the only remaining animal is a black cat, so that will be easier on me. It will reduce the intensity of the asthma triggers for my nephew when he visits. We won't have to clean as often. I don't have to worry that he'll go out of control on the stairs while I'm on them too and knock me down. He also won't be losing his balance and hitting my knees, forcing them into a painful hyperextended position. He won't intrude into our conversations (with each other or our guests) with an insistence that we pick up his slobbery toys and throw them. We don't need to schedule our lives around his need to get out to relieve himself twice a day, and to get a daily walk. (The Scamp can get by for a couple days with kibble and litter, although he doesn't use the litter much, preferring corners in the basement for his solids.)
And of course, there's the expense. He was high maintenance that way, averaging $400/month on meds and special foods.
On the practical disadvantage side: we will have to fix our doorbell. We will have to start using the alarm system again and still won't have the immediate warning of someone approaching the stoop that we had with Mr. Dog. Roy can't meet me at the bus stop with the dog after dark. I may be uneasy home alone when Roy is out of town. Our vulnerability to the predators of city life has increased.
And of course we miss him, although we're adjusting to missing him (if that makes any sense). The reality of missing him, although painful, is in some ways preferable to the anticipatory dread of missing him that has been hanging over us for the last couple of months.
I went through my photos last night, the ones I took before we had a digital camera. Not surprisingly, there aren't as many, but I think I have about fifteen to add to the Flickr set.
Whenever I think we made the wrong decision, I go back and look at the pictures of him on the last afternoon. It was the right decision for him.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-05-08 05:05 pm (UTC)It absolutely makes sense. Absolutely.
Wisteria: From here on out, you'll get exponentially more blooms each year; the harder you prune it back in the winter, the more (and bigger) the plumes. It'll be glorious in your little back yard.
(Mine should be in full bloom right now - it began opening two weekends ago - but then the weather turned cold and wet and everything went into suspended animation. The sun's out today, and assuming the rain didn't trash the blossoms, I hope to get home to full-blown wisteria whoopee. I look forward to it.)
no subject
Date: 2009-05-08 05:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-05-08 06:05 pm (UTC)