middleblog-a suburban babble brook book

Firefly

The fireflies have arrived, specks of sparks flashing their codes in the night, bobbing through the high grass, twinkling in the trees.  Fireflies are a lovely cool color, like starshine.
There are red tailed hawks, perching on dead tree limbs, wheeling through the sky, complaining.
Dragonflies come in a myriad of colors; neon green, black and white, electric blue.
Despite the empty nests scattered everywhere that filled me with foreboding during the winter, we are relatively free of hornets.  I wonder if they are suffering from the sudden death syndrome that has been decimating the domestic beehives. I do not miss them.
We have three daddy longlegs spiders living in the corners of the shower, two in one, one in another.  The other night while I showered, the lone spider trundled across to the other corner for a visit, or perhaps a snack? We leave them in peace; no Better Homes and Gardens house, ours, but a lenient home for all.  Spiders munch less welcome insects.
My patio tomatoes, cucumbers, and herb garden are thriving.  Unfortunately my basil didn't survive, but we have parsley, thyme, oregano, lemon grass, and rosemary.  The morning glory seeds I planted are also doing well.  I stole them from a client who has them creeping up her deck banisters year after year;  I hope our guys come back as well.  I'm still not sure whether the poppy seeds germinated; I don't know what baby poppies look like! We had lovely cream colored irises bloom, their stems so heavy that I had to stake them.  I have found that sumac makes a great inexpensive stake; cut to appropriate lengths in the fall for the next season's use.  I placed the cucumber pots next to the chain link dog pen, so the vines can climb.  The zucchini, which I planted late and in rather poor soil, is an ominous yellow shade that bodes ill. We also have a citronella scented geranium, a pot of horehound (I plan to experiment with making horehound candy), and a patchouli plant.
Most of the lawn is one vast meadow; we still haven't mowed.  Oh well!