Blossoms Around Town
I highly recommend, amidst all that is going on, pausing to recognize at least a bit of beauty.

I highly recommend, amidst all that is going on, pausing to recognize at least a bit of beauty.

It was, I think, after having been eaten nearly alive when painting the exterior of my house, that my handyman asked me whether I wanted him to put up a bat house. “Oh yes,” was my enthusiastic response. “I love bats.” The bat house is up. I hope against hope that some bats will make their way into my little yard in an inner city alley and come to feast on the mosquitoes. I am not holding my breath, but anything can happen. One day, a couple of years ago, a hummingbird appeared out of no where to hover in my garden.
Yesterday was the first day of the season working in the youth garden at the National Arboretum. Something made me look up. A bald eagle perhaps 40-50 feet overhead before soaring higher. “Look; follow my finger,” I called to my fellow gardeners, pointing to where the great bird was flying. They all looked up, and we shared a moment of awe.
“What made me notice?” one of my companions asked. I could not say exactly. I could have seen it’s shadow or perhaps even, without hearing it well enough to identify the sound, heard the wind in the eagle’s feathers. Or perhaps just instinct.
I went to an in person yoga class today for the first time since before the pandemic started. I was alone in choosing to mask and distance—but the ventilation was good. I really enjoyed being there. In conversation after, a couple of people whom I have missed seeing quietly volunteered to me that they were fully vaccinated. I appreciated that.
