In praise of the unpredictable

This morning was just so lovely, waking to the sound of birds singing in the garden. I am so content now that the warmer and longer days are here. Having so many hours of daylight is like having another entire day to "play".

I'm counting the weeks until I can work outside in earnest and continue some of the projects I started last year. Only time will tell if I can make the gardens look the way I imagine them in my mind. (Alas, many projects never quite materialize as originally conceived.) I also have a list of house chores that I hope to get through and, of course, there must be time set aside for being restful . . . watching films, knitting, reading.

I recently re-discovered this poem by Langston Hughes:

Let the rain kiss you.

Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid drops.

Let the rain sing you a lullaby.

The rain plays a little sleep-song on our roof at night -

And I love the rain.

I love the rain, too. Especially drizzly summer nights and mornings and those days when it feels as if it wants to rain but just can't. The garden can get so dry in mid-summer and watering it is always such a spectacle as I lock wills with yards and yards of green hose. ("Take care that she not smite thee with her mighty tale!")

I was happily surprised by some new faces in the garden this week: Primroses, tulips, white and purple violets, and a host of greenery heralding the wakefulness of many other plants.

Ah me, so much about gardening has to do with those passages we can rely on year after year, but then there are those capricious moments we don't expect.  (Like this morning's gentle mist deteriorating into a full-blown gale with thunder, lightening and heavy rain!)  But I can't help thinking that it's the fanciful, rather than the predictable, that makes gardening so maddeningly enjoyable.