Ramblings

 Summer Solstice 2021 is nearly upon me. Temperatures have been on  a roller coaster, 90 one day, 40 the next. that's F BTW. 

Today was a beautiful one, just right in the shade, just right in the su,n although some recent transplants didn't quite agree.  I spent the morning hauling goat manure down to revitalize a section of perennial bed that had gone rampant with Jeruselum Artichoke and a viral form of skanky aster, which was pulled by the handful last fall when I woke up and realized what it was doing all over the front garden.

Foxglove, recently given went in,  the roses (which are always finicky for me, but without a doubt my favorite flower) were tucked in,  I rescued one of the last fragments of purple coneflower which struggles here, ditto with a perennial bachelor's (Centaurea Montana I believe) button division from last year which wanted to be anywhere else but where it was.

The hops have taken off, placed in between the refuse-to-ever-bloom-in-20 years Chinese Wisteria and the refuse-to-give-a-grape-in-twenty year grape vine, on a tripod of rods, it reaches one way for the wisteria and the other way for the grape, themselves reaching their stride and reaching back in return.

The Wisteria appeared less than thrilled to meet Hops and every creeper turned the other way after they touched.  the Grape, a bit more tentaive, met Hop and thought that was ok.  Hop knelt in respect and gave Grape the upper hand.

I wonder which one I am most like, the Hop, the Grape, or the Wisteria?  

The WIsteria which just goes gangbusters and to hell with flowering.   The grape who hides until all threat of winter chill is gone and then goes full bore, eventually deciding it is just too much effort to fruit, or the hops, the gypsy orphan salvaged from a property up the road changing hands-usually such tentative divisions refuse to prosper away from their parent,  But not the hops, even after a bit of neglect, part of it jumped forth its first year and put on a nice streamer of hops blossoms.  

This year it took me by surprise, despite it's placement in the sandiest poorest soil in my garden, it sent forth a half donen vinelings this spring and is currently the Queen or King of the garden.

 

I feel lonely and horny looking at it. Eight long years.  sigh.