I was ripping the roads, running errands and noticed late Springtime here in
Eastern Tennessee. I've been absent for way longer than I realized and
wanted to at least share some moments with you all.

The week prior has been cold and rainy and generally miserable, with
temperatures a bit cooler than usual, which, considering Spring started with
WARMER than normal temperatures around here, that had perennials and bulbs
frantically trying to keep up with the temperatures, was actually a welcome
change. With all the conflicting signals around here, I started out
wearing shorts and tank tops, opening windows, taking out all the
houseplants and cacti and succulents, and getting things settled for the
three seasons they'd be exposed to.

Then I started closing windows and screens on doors about two weeks ago, the
furnace kicked back on with night temperatures of low 40's F. and highs
barely in the lower 60's F most days. Some even not breaking 60o F. Back to
tee shirts and blue jeans and shoes with socks....................

The deficit in rain has long been eradicated, and I emptied the rain gauge
almost every day. (it was raining when I started this!, lol). But all this
rain has been a blessing to most of the gardens here in Fairy Holler and the
surrounding countryside and towns. All the feeding lightning has nourished
the leaves of everything that burst out early, to where there is almost a
summer greenery to everything now. The tender greens of Spring have long
been lost, and with exception to vines that still need time to toughen up
(my Jackmanii clematis, for example), things have gone almost in a fast
forward rate and pace.

I had to run do some important errands, and the day was cloudy, with
brilliant splashes of intense blue sky that was in huge patches above me,
white and gray and dirty cream colored clouds interspersed enough thru the
blue to remind me the rains weren't through with me and everyone else yet.

I slipped the dawgs, leaving them with son in the Dragon den downstairs, and
headed out. The air was warm enough with the filtered sunlight to give me
excellent visibility, and I remembered my camera, "just in case" g. As I
shot up the hill thru the stop sign at the bottom of my dead end road and
climbed Wine Road, I noticed little patches of white gleaming from the
roadsides. Then whole pastures of wild yellow buttercups like lakes of
soft, sulphur yellow. I slowed down and rolled the window down, turning on
the heat for my cold feet to compensate the cold air coming in, and took the
visuals in. The puddles of white were wild white daisies. Dotting the
edges of the roads, like little happy groups of tourists, they shouted out
at me to look at them! The yellow centers all cheerful and the white petals
on every one gleaming white.

At other intervals, I saw great clumps and wads of Cinquefoil thrusting
their lemony yellow rounded daisy like flowers above hairy stems. The
Cinquefoil is a different visual. I ALWAYS see them. And their yellow is
completely different from that of the pastoral lakes of wild buttercups and
sorrel. (Some patches that were taller turned out to be late wild mustard
that was blooming).

With all the rains, the woods were glowing with something white. A LOT of
white, as a matter of fact. As I tried to determine if this was
blackberries, (it was, but not what I was seeing so much of) I finally
pulled over to the opposite shoulder near the woods on the rise of Wine Road
and got out and peered into the woods and saw a few fleeting hens scurrying
deeper into the ridges of the woods that folded against each other. I
looked closer and finally figured out what all the white was........PRIVET.

And as I got back into the van, and pulled back onto the road, I started
noticing that ALL the privet was blooming. It was EVERYWHERE. How had I
not noticed all this privet blooming? and not just the older shrubs and
small trees of it wild in all the woods around here, but where people had
deliberately planted it as "poor man's boxwood" around their houses and
hadn't trimmed it into the shapes they cut them into yet thanks to all the
rainy, cold weather we'd been having. Privet was blooming
EVERYWHERE..........No wonder my sinuses were ****ed off at me. I can't
remember a time that this much privet has been blooming. (even small
seedlings of it were blooming!)

The top of the ridge was quiet enough, that I heard the faint, half hearted
peeps of some frogs in the mucky marshy ponds that are in my neighbor's
upper pastures. All this rain seems to have quieted them up here at the top
of the back hill that rises behind my own ridge. Other places where it's
truly flooded, they chorus in throngs of joy and it confuses me. I think
they;re just messing with me...LOL

I began to notice the uncut pastures that had grasses over two foot tall,
and the intense blueness of the cornflowers dotting the grasses. And as
exclamation points, blood red Flanders poppies dotting the grasses, drawing
your eye towards their solitary statements.

The yards I passed slowly (no one behind me to be in a hurry to pass me or
speed me up around all the hairpin curves and cow trails and horse trails
that are what these roads once used to be decades ago) were showing small
islands of irises. Bearded ones in every hue and coloration and
combination. LOTS of blue flags. Everywhere.

My own irises had peaked and finished a few days prior, but had lasted a
goodly time because of the colder temperatures. The only ones blooming in
my raised beds now was a Louisiana iris that Zhanataya sent me years ago
that acclimated that wows me (it has three more buds still!) and the last of
the yellow pseudo-iris that Karol had me dig up two weeks ago that I tucked
in with the Louisiana in the BBQ pit garden.

The familiar roads were now showing me they were gearing up for the end of
Spring and first weeks before Summer temperatures hit them. I started
seeing strappy colonies of ditch lilies, where farmers and pasture owners
had attempted to kill the wild blackberries in their fence rows, I saw the
dead clumps but I also saw their children that had slipped unscathed and
filling out with flowers everywhere. And I also saw the wild white roses
that this year were happier than I'd remembered seeing them. I had to stop
to make sure they WERE wild roses and not blackberries....

And roses. Everywhere. Escaped pink ones that rambled along the edges of
yards and ditches and across the faces of boulders where I didn't remember
seeing them before (the slow crawl I was doing had a lot to do with it, I
can imagine how neat it would be if I WALKED these roads......). Yellow's,
deep reds, burgundies, blackish red ones. White ones, scalding hot pink,
colors I knew roses came in, but with the cold, wet weather, the roses were
triumphing and flourishing. A good spring for roses here this year. I
admire them, I don't grow them myself.

And the honeysuckle. EVERYWHERE the sweet, intoxicating smells of
honeysuckle poured thickly into the open window to wrap it's sweet aroma
around my head and shove up my nose and tempt my mouth with memories of the
miniscule droplets of nectar I used to try and capture from each blossom. I
love the smell, I love the flowers, I despise how tenacious and strangling
the vines are. My own woods are filled with it to the point I fear it will
reach inside the window's and snatch me out of my bed and fling me to the
waiting tendrils of Vinca and be smothered.....LOL

The roads kept revealing themselves, with the sharp notes of the Eastern
Tennessee Bluebirds cutting thru the revere I had slipped into, and as I
approached more traffic'd area's, I saw more and more puddles of white
daisies, more Cinquefoil, more lakes of buttercups. Interspersed with the
Bluebird's melodious notes, Mockingbird songs. Lots and lots of
Mockingbirds this year. More than I EVER remember seeing over here, but in
the words of Miz Mary, there used to be way more Mockingbirds than there
have been in the past. She even said that Niles Road used to be known by
everyone as "Mockingbird Ridge" before they named our road after her daddy.

Some yards that I passed, I spotted Dames Rockets, in one area, Dames have
jumped across the country road and reside in the ditch that rises up sharply
to a steep slope and then levels out twelve feet above the road. The
embankment literally glows that unmistakable purple of them. When the
Dames are gone and seeding their daughters, daylilies will bloom, as do some
blue flags that somehow meandered across the roadside as well.

My quick and learned eye spots the ethereal hot pink flowers of Heuchera's
at the edges of some yards where true dabbling gardeners have planted them.
And in little huddles, great masses of old fashioned peonies flopping about
or girdled with sticks and twine depending on how old the gardener is who
tends them. Mostly white ones, and some flowers so great and sodden with
rains they bend the stems to the grounds. Pink ones and a few red's jump
out at me in some rare yards as I drive down the familiar roads. More
houses. More variations of plantings. Some common ones, some unusual.

Baskets out hanging on porches. Petunia's, and Boston Ferns. A blue flower
that makes masses of little deep blue penstemon type flowers that the local
grocery store got this year to sell and everyone has them hanging
everywhere. The lady at the store called them the "Foxglove plant", but
for a gardener like me, this annual needed a more real name to locate and
there were of course no name tags in the pots........sigh.....

And with all this rain, I noticed once I got to town that the strawberries
were in season. and lordy how sweet and flavorful they are........there's a
local berry farm and this year again they're huge, sweet, smell strongly of
strawberries so much your mouth waters when you get near where they are in
the store or Farmer's Market. I should make jam this
year....................I spot a sign that says "Raspberries will be here
soon" and try and remember where I see the sign.....I don't have raspberries
anymore. And I'd still love to locate the evil and thorny boysenberry to
plant here in Fairy Holler. I know how to battle gall now that jumps off the
wild blackberries....

The colors of the different trees are wowing me as well. There is a maple
that blows my mind every time I see it. Huge great leaves of dark purplish
colors. I'd LOVE to have one of these in my woods. Everywhere, the yards
and median strips and "hell strips" along the sidewalks and parking lots are
bursting with plants, shrubs and small trees in full leaf.

My drive back had me itching to get into Fairy Holler and take inventory of
who was blooming. There are some new arrivals, and some magical ones
intermingled with the regular residents.

As I crested the last hilltop of my neighborhood, I slowed to a stop and
took in the mountains in their layers of misty, blue haze and the clouds
that wrapped around them, heading eastwards. The sun was trying to peel the
silky looking strips of moisture from the trees and hillsides, all to no
avail, and the scene before me reminded me that every day it changes. I
could barely make out the lines of each mountain ridge behind yet another
ridge.

As I dropped down the road and took the last curve towards my own dead end,
I slowed to allow some fleeing hens to run all silly and scatter brained
into the open creased edge of my neighbor's pasture that flanks the west
side of his farm and house. As I watched them running like silly fowl, I
noticed someone else I hadn't suspected to be out this early........two
deer, solemnly watching me as I slowly drove down the steep, sharply curving
road thru the wooded area and into the open. As they truly saw my van, they
bolted up to where the Jack pines rose to five story heights in the one area
that hadn't been devastated by the pine beetles years back, and fled into
the fallow area that the old farmer has let go now since he's quit pasturing
cows.

I shot down the road and up my dead end, slowing and stopping to park and
greet Barney, my neighbor's burro who is sadly in need of attention and some
good ear scratches. Miz Mary isn't around to tend to his scratchings and
talks now and it's up to me. I have another story about him and Sugar dawg
to share with you later (along with the inventory of flower arrivals in
Fairy Holler). He approached me and played his stand offish behavior and
as I talked to him, he finally came to me at the barbwire's edge and he let
me scratch his ears and between his eyes on his forehead. He loved it, and
eventually he decided he'd had enough of me and ran off, voicing his
opinions and showing his tempermentalness. I laughed at him and go back
into the van and climbed the road, looking Southwards towards the opening
between the woods and the rolling hills in front that let me see slivers of
Douglas Lake and the Smokies and English Mountain. Not much of the Smokies,
but a nice slice of Douglas Lake and a titch of English Mountain greeted me,
and I drove up the steep dead end road to stop at the top at the mouth of
the circular driveway and my gravel drive that curves around the north
backside of Miz Mary's old farmhouse.

The emptiness of the house saddened me as I felt her absence, the zinnia's
and marigolds she'd planted in the cast iron pot in the iron circle still
blooming, despite the shading of the maple tree now. I miss her, and need
to go visit her in the nursing home where she's probably going to spend the
rest of her life. It makes me tear up when I think of it now. I park the
van and get out and walk over to her Adirondack chairs and sit in one of
them and look out across the way, towards those incredible mountain and the
lake teasing at the bottom, and thank her for her kindness and hospitality
and notice that all her blue flags are ramrod straight and in full bloom,
with plenty of buds yet to go. The other patch of them along the side of
the asphalt of our dead end road is still blooming from decades past that
her grandmother grew, and mingled in with them, wild white daisies.

I sit and listen to the "tweedle tweedle tweedle" of some songbird that has
made himself very vocally known here lately. He sings his song every early
morning, and these gloomy overcast days. He then sings his "tweedle tweedle
tweedle" in the early dusk hours before falling quiet, and as I listen to
him and all the other birds, I rise and start back to my van parked at the
pink Acacia trees that bloomed weeks ago and wowed me that Mary
missed....and notice that the huge miscanthus ribbon grass returned for her
off the driveway near a small boulder where she dumped it last year. She
and I were going to check on it this year and divide it for me to have a
small piece of.

Near this strange grass that is growing new shoots along the "dead" stems
that she never got around to cutting back before her strokes and
hospitalization, her clumps of irises are almost done, the old fashioned one
with the dark purple falls and white standards still blooming, their heavy
grape Nehi scent obvious in the still air, and I walked around the huge
brush pile her yard man had not done anything with yet and noticed the
brilliant glow of Dames. She has some from mine I gave her last year. And
Money plants still blooming! And a bit further below the driveway that leads
to my house and drops to the pasture below, a wild white rose that is loaded
with buds about to burst. I have to check again to make sure it's not
blackberry. Nope, it's the wild rose. And it's about to explode into
flowers.

My fluffy tailless cat, Piquito spots me standing in the driveway next to
the van and he runs like a rabbit down the driveway in anticipation. He
does this whenever I leave. He seems to have taken up the gauntlet of
waiting for us to return and hangs out at Mary's house, skulking around,
catching whatever suits his fancy. He's done this since discovering that
Whacky Dew no longer lives with Miz Mary. How would he know that the great
Calico cat that used to belong to me is now buried in my woods in a large
cedar stump? Whacky long had left my house to live with Mary before he
joined the cat family.

I laugh at his rabbit like running, his seriously fluffy orange red puff
ball body tearing down the driveway, and darting thru the bursting foliage
of the Zebra grasses and Vinca that is swelling to disturbing proportions.
I climb into the van and go down the remainder of the driveway, thru the
gates and my eyes are filled with images of everything..............I'll
fill you in tomorrow gbseg....the sounds of Sméagol yodeling and barking
his excitement that "MAMA'S HOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" cuts thru the closed door
and I hear the creaking of the cat door in the living room window as first
he and then Sugar pokes their head thru to see and smell and voice their
excitement and aggravation that I LEFT them!! I will be assaulted by
delirious dawgs happy and jumping and acting all foolish that I am finally
home. Smeag will hit me with that curled night stick of his, Sugar will
rise on her back legs to put her front paws on either side of my hips and
"hug" me and as I bend to greet her, she'll ease up and nip my earlobes in
her anxiety that I left her behind.

It's the way she greets me when I leave her behind. She holds herself back
in her excitement that I've returned, but she has to let me know she wasn't
happy that I left her. I don't very often, but as long as Mike is there for
them to invade his bed space and take comfort with him and company, they're
usually fine. They just go insane when I return.............it's nice to be
dog loved so much. Sméagol is beside himself, grunting and chortling and
making his hound sounds, Sugar is inhaling and making her noises as well,
and hugs me. I glance over from the deranged dawgs and see Piquito standing
off to the side all smug. The fat and waddly Polluxx is posing and acting
very amused, all one-eyed and happy that Spring is here, he is nonchalant
about my arrival until I walk up to the nook deck that son, Damon built for
me last year for a late Mom's day present. Then he bolts off to the side
and voices his greeting, holding his head all cocked to one side but quite
adapted now to having lost the sight when he got struck by lightning last
summer.

I look around me as the dogs take off to show off, pee and grapple with each
other in their dog games and spot ol' Krusty the Kat.....Rose's kitty,
Pester's who has a new protégée, Maggie, or Mags as I refer to her, or
"Little Evil" as she's sometimes referred to. He adores her, and she adores
him as well. They are partners in crime and cat passions. Racing and
playing with each other. Their bonding was quite the surprise when she
settled into the feline family.

Pest is lying at the edge of the nook deck, not stirring a whisker and I
look for Maggie and spot her, behind him, below in the NSSG foliage, about
to pounce. The manic movements of the dawgs hasn't deterred her stealth or
intent, but as she is almost upon him, he rolls over, spots her (he knew she
was there all along......LOL) and pounces on her, causing her to do one of
those kitten maneuvers that make you laugh out loud. She twists herself,
teleports to a spot opposite of where she once was and gives me a dirty look
like I gave her position up to him. Then she forgets her aggrivation
towards ME as Pest chases her thru the jungle and under the deck and that's
it...........

I whistle for the dawgs, they immediately come (well, they mind wonderfully
when I've been away from them, they want to please me, and Smeag ALWAYS
comes when mama calls him! ) and as I open the new screen door that already
has to be replaced thanks to another episode with 'Da BOY (Smeag) and
seperation anxiety, I feel someone soft and silky brushing past me and look
down to see Piquito has slid himself thru the legs of the two dogs, and mine
like some greased and silky fat fairy, and he scoots around the corner and
gallops down the hallway to slide to a stop, and sit on his fluffy butt,
legs outstretched and looking like he'd been holding the hall wall up all
along........I can't keep from laughing. He scatters when the dogs tromp
past him and upset his composure. I'm home now and it's time to grab the
digital camera and do some Fairy flower spotting...............

Thanks for your patience with me being gone all this time. I'll apologize
for my absence, but I've been too distracted. Tomorrow I'll regale you with
the stories of some awesome arrivals, textures to make you weep and grin and
the tales of fairies that amaze even ME!

madgardener, up on the bursting and exploding ridge, back in a busy, busy
Fairy Holler, overlooking a shrouded and cloudy English Mountain in Eastern
Tennessee, zone 7, Sunset zone 36 (feels like Oregon!)

Awwh, your nature story took me away for a little while and I could actually
see myself there with the mountains and the critters. Isn't is a nice
feeling to be the most important thing in an animal's world? To be loved so
unconditionally for no apparent reason other than just being yourself? We as
humans could learn allot if we just listen... And the human god of two dogs,
three cats, one bird and 20 goldfish (with their little mouths gapping open
looking up at me begging for a treat every morning as I do my routine garden
stroll) believe me I can relate.
Sorry to hear about your friend Mize Mary, God Bless her.

Welcome back Mattie

Elaine
"madgardener" wrote in message
...
I was ripping the roads, running errands and noticed late Springtime here
in
Eastern Tennessee. I've been absent for way longer than I realized and
wanted to at least share some moments with you all.

The week prior has been cold and rainy and generally miserable, with
temperatures a bit cooler than usual, which, considering Spring started
with
WARMER than normal temperatures around here, that had perennials and bulbs
frantically trying to keep up with the temperatures, was actually a
welcome change. With all the conflicting signals around here, I started
out
wearing shorts and tank tops, opening windows, taking out all the
houseplants and cacti and succulents, and getting things settled for the
three seasons they'd be exposed to.

Then I started closing windows and screens on doors about two weeks ago,
the furnace kicked back on with night temperatures of low 40's F. and
highs
barely in the lower 60's F most days. Some even not breaking 60o F. Back
to tee shirts and blue jeans and shoes with socks....................

The deficit in rain has long been eradicated, and I emptied the rain gauge
almost every day. (it was raining when I started this!, lol). But all
this
rain has been a blessing to most of the gardens here in Fairy Holler and
the
surrounding countryside and towns. All the feeding lightning has
nourished
the leaves of everything that burst out early, to where there is almost a
summer greenery to everything now. The tender greens of Spring have long
been lost, and with exception to vines that still need time to toughen up
(my Jackmanii clematis, for example), things have gone almost in a fast
forward rate and pace.

I had to run do some important errands, and the day was cloudy, with
brilliant splashes of intense blue sky that was in huge patches above me,
white and gray and dirty cream colored clouds interspersed enough thru the
blue to remind me the rains weren't through with me and everyone else yet.

I slipped the dawgs, leaving them with son in the Dragon den downstairs,
and
headed out. The air was warm enough with the filtered sunlight to give me
excellent visibility, and I remembered my camera, "just in case" g. As
I
shot up the hill thru the stop sign at the bottom of my dead end road and
climbed Wine Road, I noticed little patches of white gleaming from the
roadsides. Then whole pastures of wild yellow buttercups like lakes of
soft, sulphur yellow. I slowed down and rolled the window down, turning
on the heat for my cold feet to compensate the cold air coming in, and
took the visuals in. The puddles of white were wild white daisies.
Dotting the edges of the roads, like little happy groups of tourists, they
shouted out at me to look at them! The yellow centers all cheerful and
the white petals on every one gleaming white.

At other intervals, I saw great clumps and wads of Cinquefoil thrusting
their lemony yellow rounded daisy like flowers above hairy stems. The
Cinquefoil is a different visual. I ALWAYS see them. And their yellow is
completely different from that of the pastoral lakes of wild buttercups
and sorrel. (Some patches that were taller turned out to be late wild
mustard that was blooming).

With all the rains, the woods were glowing with something white. A LOT of
white, as a matter of fact. As I tried to determine if this was
blackberries, (it was, but not what I was seeing so much of) I finally
pulled over to the opposite shoulder near the woods on the rise of Wine
Road and got out and peered into the woods and saw a few fleeting hens
scurrying deeper into the ridges of the woods that folded against each
other. I looked closer and finally figured out what all the white
was........PRIVET.

And as I got back into the van, and pulled back onto the road, I started
noticing that ALL the privet was blooming. It was EVERYWHERE. How had I
not noticed all this privet blooming? and not just the older shrubs and
small trees of it wild in all the woods around here, but where people had
deliberately planted it as "poor man's boxwood" around their houses and
hadn't trimmed it into the shapes they cut them into yet thanks to all the
rainy, cold weather we'd been having. Privet was blooming
EVERYWHERE..........No wonder my sinuses were ****ed off at me. I can't
remember a time that this much privet has been blooming. (even small
seedlings of it were blooming!)

The top of the ridge was quiet enough, that I heard the faint, half
hearted peeps of some frogs in the mucky marshy ponds that are in my
neighbor's upper pastures. All this rain seems to have quieted them up
here at the top of the back hill that rises behind my own ridge. Other
places where it's truly flooded, they chorus in throngs of joy and it
confuses me. I think they;re just messing with me...LOL

I began to notice the uncut pastures that had grasses over two foot tall,
and the intense blueness of the cornflowers dotting the grasses. And as
exclamation points, blood red Flanders poppies dotting the grasses,
drawing your eye towards their solitary statements.

The yards I passed slowly (no one behind me to be in a hurry to pass me or
speed me up around all the hairpin curves and cow trails and horse trails
that are what these roads once used to be decades ago) were showing small
islands of irises. Bearded ones in every hue and coloration and
combination. LOTS of blue flags. Everywhere.

My own irises had peaked and finished a few days prior, but had lasted a
goodly time because of the colder temperatures. The only ones blooming in
my raised beds now was a Louisiana iris that Zhanataya sent me years ago
that acclimated that wows me (it has three more buds still!) and the last
of the yellow pseudo-iris that Karol had me dig up two weeks ago that I
tucked in with the Louisiana in the BBQ pit garden.

The familiar roads were now showing me they were gearing up for the end of
Spring and first weeks before Summer temperatures hit them. I started
seeing strappy colonies of ditch lilies, where farmers and pasture owners
had attempted to kill the wild blackberries in their fence rows, I saw the
dead clumps but I also saw their children that had slipped unscathed and
filling out with flowers everywhere. And I also saw the wild white roses
that this year were happier than I'd remembered seeing them. I had to
stop to make sure they WERE wild roses and not blackberries....

And roses. Everywhere. Escaped pink ones that rambled along the edges of
yards and ditches and across the faces of boulders where I didn't remember
seeing them before (the slow crawl I was doing had a lot to do with it, I
can imagine how neat it would be if I WALKED these roads......).
Yellow's, deep reds, burgundies, blackish red ones. White ones, scalding
hot pink, colors I knew roses came in, but with the cold, wet weather, the
roses were triumphing and flourishing. A good spring for roses here this
year. I admire them, I don't grow them myself.

And the honeysuckle. EVERYWHERE the sweet, intoxicating smells of
honeysuckle poured thickly into the open window to wrap it's sweet aroma
around my head and shove up my nose and tempt my mouth with memories of
the miniscule droplets of nectar I used to try and capture from each
blossom. I love the smell, I love the flowers, I despise how tenacious
and strangling the vines are. My own woods are filled with it to the
point I fear it will reach inside the window's and snatch me out of my bed
and fling me to the waiting tendrils of Vinca and be smothered.....LOL

The roads kept revealing themselves, with the sharp notes of the Eastern
Tennessee Bluebirds cutting thru the revere I had slipped into, and as I
approached more traffic'd area's, I saw more and more puddles of white
daisies, more Cinquefoil, more lakes of buttercups. Interspersed with the
Bluebird's melodious notes, Mockingbird songs. Lots and lots of
Mockingbirds this year. More than I EVER remember seeing over here, but in
the words of Miz Mary, there used to be way more Mockingbirds than there
have been in the past. She even said that Niles Road used to be known by
everyone as "Mockingbird Ridge" before they named our road after her
daddy.

Some yards that I passed, I spotted Dames Rockets, in one area, Dames have
jumped across the country road and reside in the ditch that rises up
sharply to a steep slope and then levels out twelve feet above the road.
The embankment literally glows that unmistakable purple of them. When
the Dames are gone and seeding their daughters, daylilies will bloom, as
do some blue flags that somehow meandered across the roadside as well.

My quick and learned eye spots the ethereal hot pink flowers of Heuchera's
at the edges of some yards where true dabbling gardeners have planted
them. And in little huddles, great masses of old fashioned peonies
flopping about or girdled with sticks and twine depending on how old the
gardener is who tends them. Mostly white ones, and some flowers so great
and sodden with rains they bend the stems to the grounds. Pink ones and a
few red's jump out at me in some rare yards as I drive down the familiar
roads. More houses. More variations of plantings. Some common ones, some
unusual.

Baskets out hanging on porches. Petunia's, and Boston Ferns. A blue
flower that makes masses of little deep blue penstemon type flowers that
the local grocery store got this year to sell and everyone has them
hanging everywhere. The lady at the store called them the "Foxglove
plant", but for a gardener like me, this annual needed a more real name to
locate and there were of course no name tags in the pots........sigh.....

And with all this rain, I noticed once I got to town that the strawberries
were in season. and lordy how sweet and flavorful they are........there's
a local berry farm and this year again they're huge, sweet, smell strongly
of strawberries so much your mouth waters when you get near where they are
in the store or Farmer's Market. I should make jam this
year....................I spot a sign that says "Raspberries will be here
soon" and try and remember where I see the sign.....I don't have
raspberries anymore. And I'd still love to locate the evil and thorny
boysenberry to plant here in Fairy Holler. I know how to battle gall now
that jumps off the wild blackberries....

The colors of the different trees are wowing me as well. There is a maple
that blows my mind every time I see it. Huge great leaves of dark
purplish colors. I'd LOVE to have one of these in my woods. Everywhere,
the yards and median strips and "hell strips" along the sidewalks and
parking lots are bursting with plants, shrubs and small trees in full
leaf.

My drive back had me itching to get into Fairy Holler and take inventory
of who was blooming. There are some new arrivals, and some magical ones
intermingled with the regular residents.

As I crested the last hilltop of my neighborhood, I slowed to a stop and
took in the mountains in their layers of misty, blue haze and the clouds
that wrapped around them, heading eastwards. The sun was trying to peel
the silky looking strips of moisture from the trees and hillsides, all to
no avail, and the scene before me reminded me that every day it changes.
I could barely make out the lines of each mountain ridge behind yet
another ridge.

As I dropped down the road and took the last curve towards my own dead
end, I slowed to allow some fleeing hens to run all silly and scatter
brained into the open creased edge of my neighbor's pasture that flanks
the west side of his farm and house. As I watched them running like silly
fowl, I noticed someone else I hadn't suspected to be out this
early........two deer, solemnly watching me as I slowly drove down the
steep, sharply curving road thru the wooded area and into the open. As
they truly saw my van, they bolted up to where the Jack pines rose to five
story heights in the one area that hadn't been devastated by the pine
beetles years back, and fled into the fallow area that the old farmer has
let go now since he's quit pasturing cows.

I shot down the road and up my dead end, slowing and stopping to park and
greet Barney, my neighbor's burro who is sadly in need of attention and
some good ear scratches. Miz Mary isn't around to tend to his scratchings
and talks now and it's up to me. I have another story about him and Sugar
dawg to share with you later (along with the inventory of flower arrivals
in Fairy Holler). He approached me and played his stand offish behavior
and as I talked to him, he finally came to me at the barbwire's edge and
he let me scratch his ears and between his eyes on his forehead. He loved
it, and eventually he decided he'd had enough of me and ran off, voicing
his opinions and showing his tempermentalness. I laughed at him and go
back into the van and climbed the road, looking Southwards towards the
opening between the woods and the rolling hills in front that let me see
slivers of Douglas Lake and the Smokies and English Mountain. Not much of
the Smokies, but a nice slice of Douglas Lake and a titch of English
Mountain greeted me, and I drove up the steep dead end road to stop at the
top at the mouth of the circular driveway and my gravel drive that curves
around the north backside of Miz Mary's old farmhouse.

The emptiness of the house saddened me as I felt her absence, the zinnia's
and marigolds she'd planted in the cast iron pot in the iron circle still
blooming, despite the shading of the maple tree now. I miss her, and need
to go visit her in the nursing home where she's probably going to spend
the rest of her life. It makes me tear up when I think of it now. I park
the van and get out and walk over to her Adirondack chairs and sit in one
of them and look out across the way, towards those incredible mountain
and the lake teasing at the bottom, and thank her for her kindness and
hospitality and notice that all her blue flags are ramrod straight and in
full bloom, with plenty of buds yet to go. The other patch of them along
the side of the asphalt of our dead end road is still blooming from
decades past that her grandmother grew, and mingled in with them, wild
white daisies.

I sit and listen to the "tweedle tweedle tweedle" of some songbird that
has made himself very vocally known here lately. He sings his song every
early morning, and these gloomy overcast days. He then sings his "tweedle
tweedle tweedle" in the early dusk hours before falling quiet, and as I
listen to him and all the other birds, I rise and start back to my van
parked at the pink Acacia trees that bloomed weeks ago and wowed me that
Mary missed....and notice that the huge miscanthus ribbon grass returned
for her off the driveway near a small boulder where she dumped it last
year. She and I were going to check on it this year and divide it for me
to have a small piece of.

Near this strange grass that is growing new shoots along the "dead" stems
that she never got around to cutting back before her strokes and
hospitalization, her clumps of irises are almost done, the old fashioned
one with the dark purple falls and white standards still blooming, their
heavy grape Nehi scent obvious in the still air, and I walked around the
huge brush pile her yard man had not done anything with yet and noticed
the brilliant glow of Dames. She has some from mine I gave her last year.
And Money plants still blooming! And a bit further below the driveway that
leads to my house and drops to the pasture below, a wild white rose that
is loaded with buds about to burst. I have to check again to make sure
it's not blackberry. Nope, it's the wild rose. And it's about to explode
into flowers.

My fluffy tailless cat, Piquito spots me standing in the driveway next to
the van and he runs like a rabbit down the driveway in anticipation. He
does this whenever I leave. He seems to have taken up the gauntlet of
waiting for us to return and hangs out at Mary's house, skulking around,
catching whatever suits his fancy. He's done this since discovering that
Whacky Dew no longer lives with Miz Mary. How would he know that the
great Calico cat that used to belong to me is now buried in my woods in a
large cedar stump? Whacky long had left my house to live with Mary before
he joined the cat family.

I laugh at his rabbit like running, his seriously fluffy orange red puff
ball body tearing down the driveway, and darting thru the bursting foliage
of the Zebra grasses and Vinca that is swelling to disturbing proportions.
I climb into the van and go down the remainder of the driveway, thru the
gates and my eyes are filled with images of everything..............I'll
fill you in tomorrow gbseg....the sounds of Sméagol yodeling and barking
his excitement that "MAMA'S HOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" cuts thru the closed
door and I hear the creaking of the cat door in the living room window as
first he and then Sugar pokes their head thru to see and smell and voice
their excitement and aggravation that I LEFT them!! I will be assaulted
by delirious dawgs happy and jumping and acting all foolish that I am
finally home. Smeag will hit me with that curled night stick of his,
Sugar will rise on her back legs to put her front paws on either side of
my hips and "hug" me and as I bend to greet her, she'll ease up and nip my
earlobes in her anxiety that I left her behind.

It's the way she greets me when I leave her behind. She holds herself back
in her excitement that I've returned, but she has to let me know she
wasn't happy that I left her. I don't very often, but as long as Mike is
there for them to invade his bed space and take comfort with him and
company, they're usually fine. They just go insane when I
return.............it's nice to be dog loved so much. Sméagol is beside
himself, grunting and chortling and making his hound sounds, Sugar is
inhaling and making her noises as well, and hugs me. I glance over from
the deranged dawgs and see Piquito standing off to the side all smug. The
fat and waddly Polluxx is posing and acting very amused, all one-eyed and
happy that Spring is here, he is nonchalant about my arrival until I walk
up to the nook deck that son, Damon built for me last year for a late
Mom's day present. Then he bolts off to the side and voices his greeting,
holding his head all cocked to one side but quite adapted now to having
lost the sight when he got struck by lightning last summer.

I look around me as the dogs take off to show off, pee and grapple with
each other in their dog games and spot ol' Krusty the Kat.....Rose's
kitty, Pester's who has a new protégée, Maggie, or Mags as I refer to her,
or "Little Evil" as she's sometimes referred to. He adores her, and she
adores him as well. They are partners in crime and cat passions. Racing
and playing with each other. Their bonding was quite the surprise when she
settled into the feline family.

Pest is lying at the edge of the nook deck, not stirring a whisker and I
look for Maggie and spot her, behind him, below in the NSSG foliage, about
to pounce. The manic movements of the dawgs hasn't deterred her stealth
or intent, but as she is almost upon him, he rolls over, spots her (he
knew she was there all along......LOL) and pounces on her, causing her to
do one of those kitten maneuvers that make you laugh out loud. She twists
herself, teleports to a spot opposite of where she once was and gives me a
dirty look like I gave her position up to him. Then she forgets her
aggrivation towards ME as Pest chases her thru the jungle and under the
deck and that's it...........

I whistle for the dawgs, they immediately come (well, they mind
wonderfully when I've been away from them, they want to please me, and
Smeag ALWAYS comes when mama calls him! ) and as I open the new screen
door that already has to be replaced thanks to another episode with 'Da
BOY (Smeag) and seperation anxiety, I feel someone soft and silky brushing
past me and look down to see Piquito has slid himself thru the legs of the
two dogs, and mine like some greased and silky fat fairy, and he scoots
around the corner and gallops down the hallway to slide to a stop, and sit
on his fluffy butt, legs outstretched and looking like he'd been holding
the hall wall up all along........I can't keep from laughing. He
scatters when the dogs tromp past him and upset his composure. I'm home
now and it's time to grab the digital camera and do some Fairy flower
spotting...............

Thanks for your patience with me being gone all this time. I'll apologize
for my absence, but I've been too distracted. Tomorrow I'll regale you
with the stories of some awesome arrivals, textures to make you weep and
grin and the tales of fairies that amaze even ME!

madgardener, up on the bursting and exploding ridge, back in a busy, busy
Fairy Holler, overlooking a shrouded and cloudy English Mountain in
Eastern Tennessee, zone 7, Sunset zone 36 (feels like Oregon!)

Oh Maddie! What a wonderful journey! Wish I was already moved there - will
be soon, I hope. Then I can plant bulbs in the fall and do lots of
flyfishing!
Love ya!
--
gloria - only the iguanas know for sure

thank you Elaine.......I've been caught up in way too much drama lately and
my gardens and animals and fairies have been sulking for way too
long.............and Elaine? gbseg that would be "maddie" as in
madgardener.........LOL it's great to be back. I've almost careened past
Spring and not shared nearly enough of the magic that abounds here in Fairy
Holler..........good to be back.
madgardener, up on a BEAUTIFUL SUNNY late Spring day, up on the ridge, back
in Fairy Holler, overlooking a georgous English Mountain in Eastern
Tennessee, zone 7, Sunset zone 36
"Elaine" wrote in message
. ..
Awwh, your nature story took me away for a little while and I could
actually see myself there with the mountains and the critters. Isn't is a
nice feeling to be the most important thing in an animal's world?

it makes dealing with some of the human world sometimes way less complicated
and easier. but critters are as insistant as three year
olds.............LOL
To be loved so unconditionally for no apparent reason other than just being
yourself? We as humans could learn allot if we just listen..

I listen and learn from them all the time........it's what makes my life
here on this little blue marble so magical at all these times. humbles me
too....I still am grateful I find such magic around me (in people
too........that's why I'm ME)
And the human god of two dogs, three cats, one bird and 20 goldfish (with
their little mouths gapping open looking up at me begging for a treat every
morning as I do my routine garden stroll) believe me I can relate.
I am goddess to two dawgs, four felines (they consider me more not as much
as an equal but as someone they have let into THEIR world......well, two of
them do, the other two love and expect me to cater to their needs more.....
like ol' Pudd, aka Polluxx...and don't get me started about the new little
Queen here in the feline household.......lol)

Sorry to hear about your friend Miz Mary, God Bless her.
well, the saddest part is that she's not here up on her hilltop. enjoying
life around her, missing her moments, her flowers, not feeding illegally her
many many feathered children (wild turkeys and any other winged dinosaur and
sneaky critter who came and feasted at her huge rocks she'd so generously
spread out with cracked corn) and that incredible view of English Mountain,
the rolling hills below and beyond and that sliver of Douglas Lake. This is
HER ridge. HER family who settled here. I live off WINE Road on NILES,
which is named for her daddy..........which reminds me, I gotta go cut some
of her red roses, shove them into a vase that's probably lying out there in
her cluttered yard and take them to her so she can enjoy them at her room at
the N.H. in town. thank gods she's at least here in Dandridge.....I just
hope she blows them outa the water and heals and comes back to her
clutter..............
maddie

Welcome back Mattie

Elaine

FLYFISHIN??????? honey, if'n youse moves up here, I'll go FISHIN' with
you......................I just rod n reel fish....fer bluegill, crappie,
catfish.........anything I can roll in cornmeal and fry crispy in hot peanut
oil! LOL and bulbs? I'll call youse later and you can lay in yer fall
order early! roflmao.........................it's good to be back, can't
wait to have you up here in the woods to smooze and hook up on occaison!
maddie
"glenon" wrote in message
...
Oh Maddie! What a wonderful journey! Wish I was already moved there -
will be soon, I hope. Then I can plant bulbs in the fall and do lots of
flyfishing!
Love ya!
--
gloria - only the iguanas know for sure