These are the days where we giants are being reduced to less fairytale-like more human proportions, if not in actual size certainly in attitude and range, after months of playing lord and master, the supreme saviors of all things threatened to perish in the force of nature, with an emphasis on playing, as if life at Les Pierres would not have prevailed without us, or not have been as outstanding as we made it be.
It is remarkable how little effort nature needs to put an end to our rule of law, our dominion over what is mowed or watered when, who needs a cutback or a trim, us leading the way by placing sticks that enforce the direction of growth and it’s disquieting how heedless we abandon these self-invented ordinances we’ve put our heart and soul into for so long, convinced it was the only way forward, but suddenly it isn’t because it’s raining and we feel cold.
Stubbornly ignoring this annual embarrassing nemesis, we obviously have made some paltry attempts to protect the very weakest from the downfall by covering the bigger patio plants, but just one look at our Oleander, losing all its flower buds almost overnight, led to an inevitable and degrading identification with this phenomenon: we have to drop everything and admit defeat.
Last year we avoided these shenanigans through leaf peeping in Vermont, a wonderful trip visiting friends that enabled an unattached universe, a landscape we’re not personally involved in, to overwhelm us the best possible way, thus refraining from our incompetence to slowly and organizedly ease into winter mode.
By the time we got back to Les Pierres, the rain had stopped and temperatures were much milder, almost as if there had been no end to summer yet, engendering a stretched out withdrawal, much calmer for our self-confidence, but Covid has robbed us from such emollient opportunities this year.
All of this is just petty whining, I realized today on my morning stroll, observing the delicate life, still proudly defying or denying decay. Like the tiny yellow flowers of the Great Mullein, a common weedy but ravishing huge plant that spreads by prolifically producing seeds, without ever needing inadequate help from little giants.
It is remarkable how little effort nature needs
Trying to make ones life sustainable is more than a personal choice and almost automatically leads to a multitude of decisions you have never even thought of before. On this website we share what works for us, or woefully no longer works, obviously without claiming the same for you.
We hope that our journey towards a supplementary comprehensive celebration of nature’s beauty might just clear a pathway forward for you too, perhaps challenges a revealing reconsideration, or simply provides for an equally indispensable diversion.
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