I have never seen so much fleabane on the property as I have this year. This photo was taken in the secret garden. The flowers cover the both sides of the stepping stones and the entire area bordering the back of the house that faces the garden. It’s amazing. I have to do some hop-scotch type moves to navigate the stepping stones. (That’s the rain barrel in the distance.) The petals are a combination of lavender and white. If I observed them more, I might notice if they start out as lavender and then change to white. I’ll try to figure that out.
It’s time to mow again. I’m not sure when we’ll do it, but it looks like we haven’t mowed in weeks when, in fact, we mowed less than a week ago. That’s the way of the world in the spring.
I’m starting to work on the finishing touches on Dove Cottage. I’ve been playing with the same mini pea gravel that I used in the rooftop garden on Hummingbird Cottage. I like it, but as much as I try to glue it down, it’s sort of impossible. And now I’m thinking that I need some stepping stones leading up to the door, with pea gravel around them. This pot of mums arrived yesterday. I have a few other things ordered as well. I need to finish this up and move it elsewhere so I can start in on the Beacon Hill while I’m still “young” enough to do all the work.
A glimpse into my mind right now: I’m headed toward my 70th birthday in November, and like all decade markers for me, it’s a time full of introspection. My posts about being an introvert come from that. I wake up some mornings panicked about how little time I might have left. Or panicked about how much stuff I have and realizing I need to make lists, provide information about all the things I collect (prices, provenance, etc.) in some big notebook. At the same time, I want to keep growing and learning and playing and creating – I don’t want to fall into the trap of thinking that possibilities are disappearing or fading. And all of that is up to me.
Thanks. I needed to share that so I could get some perspective.
Livvy: all set for summer.
Stay safe.
Happy Tuesday.
I enjoyed your post as usual. I especially hear you about turning 70. I will be 70 in three days and I’ve been trying to wrap my head around that. It’s a strange feeling….not bad, just strange.
Take care!
Lorinda
I am a few years older than you and yes the years seem to go by so fast.
I look at it as I am closer to my heavenly home and my heavenly father. This is not my permanent home and for that I am so thankful.
Must be a turning 70 kind of thing. I did a home inventory app that involves taking a picture of everything and leaves a space where you could describe where it came from or anything else important about the object. I know they are just things but they are important to me.
Eileen
When I turned 70 had a great thing happen and one horrible…moving on…we celebrated in Florida of course…then a few months later two grand girls and my daughter spent a week in NYC in February…loved both celebrations…I now live in Florida within walking g distance of family…my daughter and I and at least one grand girl plan to celebrate my birthday late in NyC to see grand there…birthday September but will go later…just numbers…I received my teaching degree at Almost 50 also psychology …then Master.s three months before 50…almost finished doctorate by 70 but was interrupted…moved to a Indiana…I don’t have things to leave…but I have paperwork for my wishes…as you know I don’t collect…thatEnded in my forties… love life…despite the pain I have experienced since my 20.s…getting worse…and the strokes…I just love every single day…God has blessed me with the best kids and their spouses and grands…having come from a mixed up poor family, I have been so so lucky…thank you for your blog and your candid remarks…you look so much younger…
From my very young days I always thought that, for women, the 60’s and 70’s can be the very best time of life! Work days should be over, the kids are grown and taking care of themselves and many possibilities open up that were never there before, or at least there, in larger amounts of time. And now approaching my mid 70’s, I find I was right!! Yes, there are tradeoffs with health, but it is in all of our power to stay very healthy. I am loving my 70’s! I will welcome you to the very best time of your life Claudia!!
Another enjoyable post, Claudia and as always food for thought. I’m mid sixties and find myself thinking will I be able to get everything done that I want to achieve? I have a grown up son from a marriage that lasted seventeen years and have been on my own for most of my adult life.
I think about places that I haven’t visited yet and feel slightly worried when I think back to fifteen years ago and it seems like no time ago.
I was talking to my son recently and said “When I’m gone, what will happen to things like my collection of Girls’ Comic Book annuals from the Sixties, they might be worth something?”
He replied “Then, sell them now and reap the benefit!” But I don’t feel I could do that.
Happy Tuesday
I get the 70s thing. I’m still going through it (I turned last August). I know that within a few years I will probably sell the house, move into the other side of Rick’s duplex where we will hopefully live happily ever after and avoid the mess of nursing homes as we age. It’s a big duplex but it’s not as big as a house, even a small house (with a full basement) — and for a woman with loads of collections and family things it will mean some hard choices. Alas, the younger generation doesn’t much want that stuff anymore! I go to start and then get overwhelmed. There’s so much to do while I still can and sometimes I wonder how long that will be. My brain can’t handle that, so I turn around and go blog or paint or walk or read. I’ll pay for this big one day.
You’ll figure it out. I think we all do and in any event, someone will. I’m the same thing with documenting provenance on some things. Rick wouldn’t have a clue!
I agree most young people don’t want our stuff
Mine hopefully brill go to Habitat for Humanity
Jeanie I agree with you young people today probably won’t want our stuff and probably wish we didnt have so much.
Claudia: You have oodles of time . . . and you’d better not go anywhere! Your friend you’ve never met, Chris
dear Claudia/Don — very nice pixs of your ‘secret’ garden — looks peaceful. turning 70 is definitely a milestone marker as was when our children turned 40 — that was a real ‘ouch’ for me!!! I know our remaining time may be short but trying to live and enjoy each day. I have a joke I stole from another blog. it really depicts me and my Mr. you must understand he is the original Mr. Clean and I am more like Oscar in the “Odd Couple”. I do not like dirty kitchens or bathrooms, which I clean religiously but dust, not so much. so enjoy — “Yesterday, my husband thought he saw a cockroach in the kitchen. He sprayed everything down and cleaned thoroughly. Today, I’m putting the cockroach in the bathroom !!”
Well Claudia….I celebrated my 75th birthday….still feel pretty good and according to my good friends and family look pretty good also(when I work at it). What we all have to remember is that we can make lists or not, accumulate things or downsize. It really doesn’t matter. Enjoy today everyone….you’ll never be as young as you are today. We are all on the same path so lets live in THIS MOMENT. I love the saying…DANCE AS THOUGH NO ONE IS WATCHING….We are all here cheering you on.
Well… I am pushing toward my 65th this October and truly, I can’t believe I am going to really be 65 years old. Where have all the years gone ??? Does not seem possible, lol.
So, so true; the comments today to your post; and, of course, THE post: “I wake up some mornings panicked about how little time I might have left. Or panicked about how much stuff I have and realizing I need to make lists, provide information about all the things I collect (prices, provenance, etc.) in some big notebook. At the same time, I want to keep growing and learning and playing and creating – I don’t want to fall into the trap of thinking that possibilities are disappearing or fading. And all of that is up to me.”
Claudia, we’re in the same age group; I live with your same kinds of thoughts daily; it’s controversial to say … but, statistically (medically; it’s just the science), I’m not supposed to live beyond six years from now (it’s a long story of unfortunate health). I try to push this out of my mind and accept God’s will first — but I’m not always successful.
This kind of worry just drags down a person if you let it. I of course seem always to talk of not much else but my overwhelming clutter problems (just too much personal ‘property’), which has gone on now for many years. It needles at me continually but then I seem to seek out evasive action to avoid the work because it’s so daunting. Which then makes me constantly unsettled; the stuff/project nagging at me. (Like Jeanie said, “I go to start and then get overwhelmed. There’s so much to do while I still can and sometimes I wonder how long that will be. My brain can’t handle that, so I turn around and go blog or paint or walk or read. I’ll pay for this big one day.”)
Believe me, I’ve tried to research people who declutter for a living; like those ‘hoarding’ shows on TV. There are none near me; I’m in an outlying area. And the fees for that kind of help/service are astronomical. So, it’s up to me. My husband, too, wouldn’t have a clue about my ‘heirlooms’ and collections. And he’s a strident minimalist who thinks everything I worry about (in terms of personal possessions-keepsakes and small inheritances/mementoes) is ‘junk’. If I predecease him and leave no notes behind, he’ll pull up a huge dumpster and just get rid of … everything. Right into the landfill. I’ve pointed out things which have monetary value, but he doesn’t care; says the headache of the clutter far outweighs any money he could get for any of it.
If we moved, he could pack a suitcase and hitch up the smallest U-haul trailer to the car, which is all the material possessions he’d need, mostly his prized kitchen pots and pans, and his garage tools. Everybody has their own idea of what is important. He’s minimally sentimental and throws out most items of a personal nature, sometimes before I can hold something back (like, when he retired, a whole pile of beautiful congratulatory cards with long and heartfelt messages — just went en masse into the garbage pail). We’re all very different, aren’t we.
There are certain people/relatives in my life that I’m going to let down if I don’t get on top of this problem of personal possessions (family things from the ancestors) SOON . The PROBLEM keeps winning. The problem-solver (that would be me) keeps losing. Again, it pricks at me; I’m very aware of the obligation and pressure of TIME, so you’d think I’d push thru my lack of energy and get it DONE. (Focus, focus, focus … )
This is the kind of thing that derails me (or I allow it to derail me): I’m so apprehensive this morning because I have to stop taking a prescription drug I’ve been on daily for ten years, and replace it with something else; and, of course, I read and read about it before taking a new medicine and, wow, with this one, I don’t want anywhere near it (forbidding/likely side effects, are you kidding me), so now I’m faced with what I’m going to do. The new drug has to be a response to a worsening medical condition. But I’m feeling like the drugs are gonna kill me before the diseases do. I just keep staring at that bottle and won’t do it. If I show up at my doctor’s in a couple of weeks, only to tell her I couldn’t take the drug (a medical error, is what you’d call me), her frustration is going to boil over.
But, such is life, the big stuff and the little stuff. We all have our ‘trials and tribulations’! Courage!
You know what, though? I’m listening to a train rumbling through town! I love that sound of the choochoo and its horn. Moments of little happinesses; aren’t they what we live for?!! When I was growing up, we had a lot of packing houses which would sort the oranges and lemons brought in from the orchards; get them ready and crated to be shipped out by train; was never trucks in those days. The packing houses would run all night (as would the trains) in peak season. I grew up on the poor side of town, so we were near the tracks; all those sounds are indelible in my brain, but they evoke good memories, not bad.
The years of the big packing houses around here are gone now; hardly any oranges, lemons on a smaller scale (the groves/orchards replaced with row crops like cilantro and strawberries; of course we still have avocados; however, I can think right now of three what-were-major packing houses which have now sat empty in our town for a few decades, such that we only VERY-seldom get any freight trains [and never a passenger train]).
That train just helped diminish my pill-taking stress!
And we’ve had a week of this mountain lion scare in my next-door neighbor’s backyard. The police have been out twice and I believe Animal Control is putting Fish & Game on it as of yesterday. We have to be SO vigilant when going out in our backyard/rear-yard hillside, day and night. We think the mountain lion is injured because the neighbor two doors down hears some kind of heavy animal dragging itself over her gate at 3am ever since, so it’s going rear yard into front yard and this is awful; I have neighbors who are out there at their cars, leaving for work at 4am. Anyway, my elderly feral cat (outside cat; a child of the bushes) disappeared and was gone six days. I couldn’t know if he got sick, was hiding from the mountain lion; got killed by the mountain lion? But my kitty appeared this morning; so — so far, so good. I nearly fell to my knees I was so glad to seem him alive.
Blessings in abundance this morning; important to not let other worry take away from the blessings!!
I am there too Claudia. Stuff and collections and just work has to be done. I work on keeping my mind busy, read a lot, make and follow my home list of daily must do jobs. Music (thank you Don) helps too. I listen to how I am and rest or read or have a coffee or tea when I need to. I like what Marie (above) wrote. So true. (ps I was avintagegreen until my blog disappeared).
Joy
You may have several different species of fleabane growing on your property. Typical in your neck of the US (NY) are Erigeron philadelphicus, E. annuus, and E. strigosus. These 3 species are quite similar in appearance and preferred habitat, and together serve as a food source for a large variety of bees, flies, wasps, small butterflies, and moths.
Erigeron philadelphicus have pink or white flowers.
E. annuus have white flowers.
E. strigosus have white, pink or bluish flowers.
Stay safe & well.
Hi Claudia,
I am right there with you about thinking too much about the time issue. I have a couple years before I am 70, but my sister is 72 and that makes me feel old. I wanted to tell you about the lovely time I had at Briar Patch Inn, but I just turned on the TV. Should not have done that…more
guns and dead children. Stop this madness! I really feel sick to my stomach😰😰
Oh, Claudia. The news this afternoon. It takes my breath away. How can a human do this?
lovely flowers and photo, as always. thanks.
and dove cottage is almost done … also lovely and quite an accomplishment!
also, livvy’s outfit today is very much in my style … t-shirt/sweatshirt /cardigan, skirt and comfy shoes. :)
agree about the age thing (i turned 64 in march) … lots of thoughts about time and what i want and what the future may bring, getting things (papers, goals, nutrition, etc.) in order …. i have a list of details about family heirlooms and things i’ve bought, also about my final earthly arrangements and what i’d like for my service. not much fun, but good to do for my family.
thanks, claudia, for raising an important topic as well as everything else you share.
rainy or at least an overcast day here today … my favorite weather! :)
hope you all have a good day and stay safe!
kathy
Falling behind again… just wanted to say that the Beatles tshirt is too divine!!!
Thanks so much, Leanne!
Stay safe.