Despair?

As little as I have posted here, a lot of it has been to complain about some assault or another mounted upon our attempts to raise food or support plants that feed the eyes and nourish the soul.

I think our most recent experience with weather extremes might just take the proverbial cake, however. Reports at least, seem to indicate this sort of thing has not happened for the hundred plus years of keeping weather stats, so that merits some sort of confection, wouldn't you agree?

Day before yesterday, here in Central Texas, we had an afternoon low of 81 degrees. Fairly warm, even for here, for an early December day.

This is Belize in January. It was around 81 there that day. Just like here, only with a gorgeous beach rather than a struggling garden.

The thing that elevates this above the weirdly normal however, is that the same evening, after a cold front blew through, we had sleet and light snow falling.

This is actually here - but not now.  This is from the MLK Weekend Ice Storm 2007.

From tropical warmth to freezing precip all in the course of one twelve hour span.

You tell me how to garden around that, because my imagination fails me.

However, the one thing we all have in common as gardeners, weather vagaries aside, is the need for a sense of humor about it all.

And along those lines, I offer this, from one of my favorite poets.

Despair

So much gloom and doubt in our poetry -

flowers wilting on the table,

the self regarding itself in a watery mirror.

Dead leaves cover the ground,

the wind moans in the chimney,

and the tendrils of the yew tree inch toward the coffin.

I wonder what the ancient Chinese poets

would make of all this,

thee shadows and empty cupboards?

Today, with the sun blazing in the trees,

my thoughts turn to the great

tenth-century celebrators of experience,

Wa-Hoo, whose delight in the smallest things

could hardly be restrained,

and to his joyous counterpart in the western provinces,

Ye-Hah.

~ Billy Collins ~

(Ballistics)