The Summer Muse

Mid-summer is near and the first flush of our 1800s old garden rose, Baronne Prevost raises it’s sweet petals to the sun. The summer muse has arrived….she opens her arms showering pastoral, sylvan inspirations.

The gardens are thriving and I am busy in them – new varieties of herbs have been planted in the tea & herb beds. Established herb leaves and flowers are harvested and tinctured or dried for future use. Fresh herbs are plucked from the collection of metal grow tubs near the patio. I gather healthy additions for our food: abundant green chives and garlic chives to flavor our seedy bagel cream cheese breakfasts, silvery green sage leaves for brown butter melts, borage leaves with their edible blue flowers adorn our salads, as well as naturalized wild herbs that grow throughout the property. Gorgeous Italian parsley leaf and fresh oregano season our pasta dinners and eight varieties of mint are growing this year for teas, virgin mojitos, mint jelly and delicious mid-eastern foods.

The gardens never stop giving…..

Today the bees are busy working in the tiny flowers of the wild grape vines that shade the patio – their contented hum drifts over us. Its a soothing summer melody now that the chorus of cicada music is gone. A little Carolina Wren has made a nest in our hanging flower basket near the door. It’s away all day on wren business and wings back each evening to settle into it’s tidy nest. A troop of various other birds are at the seed feeders all day long. Their flitting colors and trebled songs delight. We have families of colorful hummingbirds that visit the nectar feeder. One little female hangs in the air chattering to me. Fat little ground squirrels come in for the dropped bird seed with mourning doves joining them. A large family of crows raise their young near us each year. We hear the little ones sitting in nearby trees mumble-pleading for food from their parents. A young fawn spends time near us, while it’s mother forages throughout the day.

I love living in the midst of this natural area, where the nearest neighbor is a long way down the lane, out of sight. This rural life feeds my soul, presenting unending inspiration for artwork. I am so grateful the wildings know they are safe with us and continue to grace us with their presence. We live in a small magical microcosm of mother earth, left intact to follow it’s own course of life progressions….undisturbed in it’s constant, yet changing beauty.