A Month of Orange: Construction Signs and Barriers

Janesville has had more than its fair share of road and street destruction/construction this summer.  First one half of Main Street, then the other was dug up right down to the water mains.  Stage one of the project is mostly done, though there are no plantings yet to replace all the trees and shrubs and planters that were removed.  At least half the street is finished.  The other half has some concrete now, though the sidewalks still must be reconfigured, lighting put back in, and who knows what else.

It is a mess, though we are assured by city officials that the downtown is experiencing a rebirth, will be better than ever when this phase of roadwork is complete.  I hope so, and I hope that people who have been scared out of downtown this year so far, gotten out of the habit of visiting downtown businesses, will return once all this orange disappears.

A Month of Orange: Impatiens

Now that it is flannel shirt weather, the impatiens that drooped during hot weather have perked up.  They'll look good until they get zapped by a hard frost.  The older I get the more difficult it is for me to maintain long beds of flowers, so I've taken taken to scattering around large plastic pots of the shade loving flowers in my garden.  An added benefit is that if frost is forecast early in the fall, I can drag the pot into the garage over night and keep the color going a little longer.

Sometimes less is more.

The Peace of Wild Things
By Wendell Berry

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

A Month of Orange: Mums

The weather is cooling down, and some of the annual flowers have already taken a one way trip to the compost heap.  Cool nights and damp weather agrees with the garden mums and the pansies that have stepped up to take the place of the summer exhausted plants.  I like this cobalt blue pottery planter, but discovered that any old plastic pot can show a pop of color with just some hardware store spray paint.  The blue pot on the left is an example.