CAT PLANTS and other THINGS

"......Cat among roses, under a quarter moon, the garden is very still. It is dazed with moonlight , contented with perfume."
                                                                   -Amy Lowell

 "A Garden without cats (by Beverley Nichols)

 will be generally agreed

 can scarcely deserve

Young Simon and Rona

to be called a garden at all!

 Much of the magic

 of the heather beds

 would vanish if...........

 as we bent over them,

 there was no chance

 that we might hear 

 a faint rustle 

(Sweet  Cordelia has been coming to visit for about 12 years).

 among the blossoms,

 and find ourselves

 staring into a pair .......

 of sleepy........

 green ( or in this case amber)....

eyes....."

(Spencer)

-Beverley Nichols, "Garden Open Tomorrow"

 With thanks to all the visiting cats: Cordelia, Spencer, Rona, Simon

 Photographs 2020

                                             ( CAT PLANTS RULE)

In Search of my Mother's Garden......

 "In search of my mother's garden, 
                      I found my own." - Alice Walker

 The porch in summer.....my place to be, either with friends or family. The old Royal Crown Derby China gets put thru its paces. The china connects me to my grandmother and mother, even though as of late I have been enhancing the Mikado with replacements pieces.My mother would be pleased.  I think it's good to use the old china. An antique teapot  bubbling with sweet peas...... 
                           
 With shortbread and Christmas cake, sliced thinly. My mother would have buttered it, and added a slice of sharp cheddar. Sometimes, when I remember, I do that as well.And Earl Grey tea. Hot. Or homemade Ice Tea......
"The  arrival of tea, should be exactly coincident, and not later than a quarter past four."
                 ~C.S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life, 1955

 The neighbourhood cats out in full force. Patience and his house mate, Cordelia, staring from the fence above. Even  roses are quiet in the heat of the day.  The teapot clinks against antique china cups, and tea begins to collect like a waterfall into a rock pool.

Even the Spencer and Smokey are full  of the heat.  They flop and droop.They dream of chasing garter snakes and dragonflies.

“Gardens and flowers have a way of bringing people together, drawing them from their homes.” 
― Clare Ansberry, The Women of Troy Hill: The Back-Fence Virtues of Faith and Friendship

 When I was growing up we didn't have a porch. My mother would take a small table and tuck it into a corner by the old  trees. She'd serve ice tea, spiked with gingerale, and hot tea with a plate of goodies, and watermelon. The non-seedless variety. My friends and I would see how far we could spit the seeds, as long as my mother wasn't watching.... 

Fiona, Kathy, Michelle, Lauren (back) Jean, Brenda ( front) 1977 Victoria Day

 " LET us have a sip of tea. The afternoon glow is brightening , the fountains are bubbling with delight, LET us dream , and linger in the beautiful foolishness of things." – Okakura Kakuzo

Today the Bees by the porch  are noisy. They sing of  summer . They buzz around  begonias and roses.Their song sounds a little staggered, as if the pollen is too much for them. The porch I sit on now has wicker furniture with big soft cushions.  Spencer likes to curl up on the wicker couch. 

 My mother and I lived a pretty simple life, after my dad died, when I was seven. She  would surround the back steps with flower boxes of geraniums. The dirt patch beside the steps always  displayed nasturtums, grown from seed, and beside that a towering wall of sweet peas. It was my job to pick them. I had to stand on a chair to reach.

 " Always think about creating. The future starts when you wake up every morning... Every day find something creative to do with your life." - Miles Davis

  Sometimes, in the summer and fall, my mother and I would sit on the back steps, which were quite wide, and covered. I loved it there. It was not fancy. It was just our quiet place. After dinner, she'd sit with a cup of tea and not speak. She'd wear a long caftan to dinner and balance the tea cup in her hands.

  I would listen to the trees rustle overhead. I don't think I actually appreciated those days, those meals, those hot cups of tea on the porch, till much later.  She  would be silent. That's all I knew. Even when I went away to college in California, that last night together, she never said what she was really thinking. We just sat there in  the twilight.

 Years later, and many houses later, I sit on our little porch, at this house on the hill, surrounded by flowers and bees, cats, trees, soft wind, the scent of sweet peas mulling about in their pots. And finally I understand . 

That time of quiet. That place  where time   stands still, ever so briefly, and I just want to "be".

 “Gardens and flowers have a way of bringing people together, drawing them from their homes.” 
― Clare Ansberry, The Women of Troy Hill: The Back-Fence Virtues of Faith and Friendship

VIEW from the PORCH

"Heaven is a house with porch lights..." -Ray Bradbury

 "So she sat on the porch and watched the moon rise.Soon its amber fluid  was drenching the earth, and quenching the thirst of the day...." -Zora Neale Hurston (1891-1960)

 "A best friend is someone with whom you can sit on the porch..."
                       -Paulo Coelho (1947-)

 "Nowadays, people are so jeezled up.If they took some chamomile tea and spent more time rocking on the porch in the evening listening to the liquid song of the hermit thrush, they might enjoy life more."

Tasha Tudor (1915-2008)

 "When you keep the porch light on for the prodigal child, you do what God does every single moment."

Max Lucado  (1955-)

 "My ideal summer day was reading on the porch."

Harold E. Varmus (1939-)

 "Yes, I heard my people singing!-in the glow of parlour coal-stove and on summer porches sweet with lilac air, from choir loft and Sunday morning pews-and my soul was filled with their harmonies."

Paul Robeson (1898-1976) 

 GOOD ENOUGH for the PORCH CHOCOLATE BANANA BREAD

 2 boxes choc cake mix, 6 eggs, 2/3 cup oil, 6 squished bananas, 2 cup pecans

Combine all together. Plop batter into two greased loaf pans. Bake for about 45 minutes ( maybe a tad more...you'll have to check and see). Cool. Slice and serve on porch. OR freeze. Really nice and no fuss. 

Photographs 2017