Berries are bery bery good...

On the mornings that we walk the paved frontage roads together, we are tending to leave earlier and earlier. Summer in this lower part of the Midwest is hot and humid; probably not as hot and humid as it can be in other parts of the world, but hot enough and humid enough that one doesn’t want to do much walking once the sun is well above the horizon. The other morning though, it was very a big foggy and very cool and lovely.

Along the right of way, beyond the shoulder of the road, it is basically a no-man’s land

occupied by buried pipelines. It is seldom mowed -- the state doesn't care, and the gas company doesn't care. And nature is tenacious.

Wildflowers of all sorts spring up for a brief time and then vanish again. Many of them are humble plants. Clovers of various kinds...

Red clover


Yellow clover.


Some are used to flavor tea.



The roots of some are ground and roasted and added to coffee.


The roots of others are highly valued as a cure for all that ails you. And plant thieves have a nasty habit of digging them up.

Other than a half-whiskey barrel by the back porch, I am not able to grow intentional flowers at my house. Long story. But I love them. If I were a rich woman

(doooo be doo be doo be doooooo be dooooo be doo be doo be doo)

I would have fresh flowers in a vase every day by my computer. But I am not, and I don’t. Except once in a while. I have no real skill at arranging flowers, just stick them in a vase and enjoy.

Nature does a pretty good job of creating amazing bouquets all by itself, and it doesn’t take too much imagination to create beautiful arrangements in one’s head. We passed a woman the other day who I know to speak to, who was carrying clippers and, indeed, had cut flowers for herself to take home. A few days later, I took clippers and cut one of these...

the last one still blooming, and brought it home and put it in a vase.

And as we near our home, we walk through what used to be the front yard of our closest neighbor. Their house was bulldozed when the highway expanded. However, the yucca plants that used to grow there have shot their white spikes of flowers high into the air.




And then we are on the gravel of our driveway under the canopy of trees... And we note that the black raspberries along side the driveway appear to be getting ripe.


But are they?

So I pick one to see....

And there's the answer!