Tag Archives: Alabama summer

Notes under the August Sky

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I learned something this week that I never imagined before. What is referred to as “ground clutter” in weather radar is often, this time of year, showing migrating birds at night. I wasn’t sure I heard correctly so I looked it up. I found several reports from all over that attributed the radar images to millions of migrating birds flying toward the Gulf of Mexico in the dark of night. In fact, I learned that the other ground clutter can be filtered out to give an accurate view of the birds. A few nights ago, the night sky was filled. Further research found evidence of mass early-season avian immigration throughout the eastern United States. For me, it was one of those who knew? moments.

No matter how I try, the Spring plantings that I took such pride in “look like August” after the harsh heat of July and August. Plants that once bloomed prolifically look a little spare, the petunias (which I never really cared for to begin with) are faded and leggy. Even the Peggy Martin “Katrina” rose looked like it might die a few days ago; it’s springing fresh leaves again and might still manage a fall bloom. The lantana soldiers on but didn’t flower quite as much in the hottest heat; that’s okay, since I like the citrusy fragrance of lantana leaves even more than the flowers. I still have a hard time believing that lantana is an invasive species elsewhere. The hibiscus, a slow starter, seems to flourish in the heat.

The three pottings on the front porch don’t miss a beat unless I miss a watering. The sweet potato vines are swallowing that corner. I planned to prune it back but my mom likes it “as is” so I leave it alone. The volunteer caladium in one of those pots enhances the sweet potato vine and begonia sharing space. I used to explain that it was a happy accident but now I just smile and thank passersby for the compliment. I probably couldn’t repeat that accidental planting next year if I tried.

After much pruning, weeding, and sweet talk, the ageless wild rose in the backyard, taken from a cutting of my grandfather’s “mother” plant years ago, looked grim but  pushed out a couple of blooms recently and looks like it might live to bloom another year. Another cutting from that mother plant flourished in the backyard of my house in north Alabama. When I sold the house to move back to Birmingham, I left a note for the incoming residents explaining the long history of that rose in hopes that they would keep it there and alive, but I doubt they did.

We’re going through a faux fall for a few days here. The temperatures are unseasonably moderate and humidity is down. These portents of fall are a break from brutal heat, but I’m already regretting the shorter days.

The quality of the “light in August” into September has long fascinated me. I don’t remember which came first – my notice of the August sunlight or my reading of the Faulkner novel that gave it a name. It’s a clear sky, often adorned by what I call “biblical clouds” – the fluffy pure white piles of cloud sitting majestically in the vivid sky. I started calling them “biblical clouds” because they remind me of the skies in the illustrations of Renaissance paintings that always seemed to be in those large family Bibles that were once sold door-to-door. The light, the shadows, the breeze all work together to create an otherworldly feel. It’s not there all the time, but when it happens, it stops me in my tracks and often creates magnificent sunsets.

Remember in elementary school when we would stick balls of cotton on a skyscape to represent clouds? Looking at these clouds, I’ve figured out why I never got my desired effect — why it just looked like a cotton ball plopped down on a piece of paper. Now, if I were back in elementary school, I think I’d  shred the cotton ball a little and carefully spread it across the sky …  Yeah, that would work.

Today’s Sunset from Shades Mountain

Rose of Sharon

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I take mental refuge in watching nature, even just the plot of land where I spend the bulk of my time these days – halfway up the western slope of Shades Mountain, just below Bluff Park, eight miles from my own house which is mostly fending for itself in terms of outdoor maintenance. I’m grateful for the HOA to keep the grass cut on my own home front.

At different points in the year, certain flora gets my attention. This week, it has been the rose of Sharon tree that has drawn the bulk of my notice. It started as a twig soon after my parents moved to this house almost sixteen years ago. Mom asked her friend Margaret, at Brown’s Nursery in Tuscaloosa, for a suggestion of a flowering plant to place in a backyard location; the twig was her response. Margaret didn’t tell her what it was.

Back in Birmingham, Mom told Dad she’d like it planted in a place where it would be visible from the street – if it ever grew that tall. He chose a spot visible from the front gate and from the back door and the large window in the breakfast nook. Before too long, it grew tall and spread wide and the fuchsia flowers, which began to burst forth a couple of weeks ago, are visible from the street and fill the windows in that door and nook with magnificence. It’s hard not to smile when the blinds are opened in the morning and that abundance hits.

I didn’t limb up the rose of Sharon last year and the last time Joseph, the man who keeps my mother’s lawn mown, was here, he had a hard time getting under and around the tree, its branches hanging low due to the weight of hundreds of blooms and buds and recent heavy rains. He asked if he should prune or did I want to handle it. I enjoy pruning and the rose of Sharon had been on my to-do list since late-winter.

The next day, I worked my way around the tree, pruning the obstacles to passage and trying to retain the tree’s natural integrity, while preserving as many low buds as possible. The results are pleasing, I think.

Rose of Sharon is the common hibiscus (Hibiscus syriacus), also known as “althea.” I have always preferred to call hibiscus “rose of Sharon” due to its evocative literary use in the Old Testament, especially in Song of Solomon, and its Christian adaptation as a symbol for beauty, grace, and love. John Steinbeck memorably creates the character named Rose of Sharon Joad (“Rosasharn”) in The Grapes of Wrath and the plant is referenced in other literature.

But I do not always view the backyard tree with such lofty significance. It has become a spectacular harbinger of the summer. From the moment in early spring when the tree begins to leaf and the buds begin to pop forth, the anticipation of that first flower mounts until, one sunny morning, a flower appears. From that point, more flowers arrive – quickly, vividly, profusely – and the tree itself buzzes with the sound of bees busily at work. Most years, a nest is tucked away in the upper branches. Always, the perching of birds, especially the cardinals, adds a bold splash of color to the already gaudy mix.

I had thought this essay might lead to a life lesson. Perhaps not. Just this: Spring has sprung and summer awaits. Savor the moment.

 

 

 

Figs. Finality. Fall.

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Summer 2018 went out on a hot note, with September temperatures lingering in the ‘90s and not a lot of rain recently in my parts of the South – despite the hurricane devastation in the Carolinas. The heat does not bother me; the last days of summer are the sweetest because it’s almost gone. I always lament the things I didn’t do to take advantage of the longer summer days.

This year, I didn’t sit in my back yard much and that’s a loss.

I measure the progress of the warmest months by the fruit that comes and goes. Strawberries appear in April and are disappearing by the time the first Chilton County peaches arrive around Mother’s Day. Blueberries and blackberries come soon after, with local watermelons and cantaloupes appearing near Independence Day.

Figs come around a little later. The fig tree yield has been iffy in recent years. Even though I heard a grocery clerk bragging to a neighbor about the bounty on his family’s fig tree, I didn’t see a lot of fig action at the various farmers’ markets. 

I have often written about the community that comes together at the special dinners at the Alabama Chanin Factory in Florence. It has enabled me to meet people I might have never known.

In the years that I have been attending the benefit dinners in Florence, two gentlemen were among the most regular attendees. We did not actually meet them until we were seated at a table together earlier this year. They are Milton and David, a father and son from Corinth, Mississippi, who regularly make the trip to Alabama Chanin’s factory for the singular dinner series that happens in that place.

On that first meeting, Milton, the father, entertained us with stories of the historical research he and his late wife, Stephanie, have done in and around Corinth, his hometown. He also mentioned, in passing, the fig trees on their property – collected over the years of their marriage and annually producing a nice harvest. My friend, Anne, was particularly interested in acquiring a fig tree for her house and Milton shared a recommended source, www.ediblelandscaping.com.

At the end of the most recent Florence dinner in August, Milton handed me a small jar labeled “Stephanie Sandy’s Figs.” Inside were “Milton’s North Carolina Style Whole Fig Honey-Lemon Amaretto Preserves.” I saved the jar for the last days of summer and ate the delectable fig preserves with some of my favorite local Humble Heart goat cheese and a piece of Mrs. London’s bread, another favorite from local farmers’ markets. The combination was delicious; it tasted exactly like the last days of summer should.

In the last week of summer, when I got home from work on a late afternoon, a deer was calmly grazing across the railroad tracks behind my house. I got out of the car and watched him. It’s rare to see a deer out in the open in the hottest part of a hot day. I normally only spot them behind my house at night. This daytime deer stopped grazing and looked back at me for a moment. Then, he slowly disappeared into the cool of the trees. It has been so dry here for the past few weeks, I suspect he had gotten bold in search of food and water.

On the morning of the last full day of summer, I woke before sunrise to the sound of rain against the windowpanes. By the time I got up and looked out the window, it had stopped. As I packed my car, I noticed single drops of water hanging on each of the berries of a backyard shrub. They seemed to be a token of a summer passing away and a promise of new seasons to come.

That evening, on the last full day of summer in Birmingham, it was hot and dry with clouds worthy of a biblical Renaissance landscape floating overhead. The neighborhood ice cream shop in Bluff Park atop Shades Mountain was packed to overflowing with people gathered in the parking lot and on benches outside the little shop. Suddenly, from one of the overlooks along Shades Crest Road, the sky turned pink and gold and the setting sun shone bright orange across Oxmoor Valley. I had left my camera at the house, but stopped to savor the display.

The next day, just after the Alabama game, I drove back up the mountain with camera in tow to see if I might catch a repeat of the previous day’s stunner. But fall had arrived; the sky was grey and overcast and the setting sun was a dingy circle partly visible through ominous clouds. On the other side of the mountain, an almost full moon peeked through more clouds in a still and colorless dusk.