an abundance of flowers

IT RAINED last night. It was a heavy downpour, the kind that dug holes in the lawn and came along with lightning and a thunderstorm.

The storm started late. I was already in bed when I heard the first roar blending with the hefty pitter-patter on my roof. This rain better help abate the wildfires, I thought, then another (less altruistic) idea came to mind: Thank goodness I don’t have to water the lawn tomorrow.

I have been neglectful of my gardening duties this summer. If not for the occasional rainfall and L’s genius scheme of rerouting the sump pump water into the garden, my flowers would have already suffered an unfortunate and premature midsummer death.

An abundance of daisies

Yesterday afternoon, way before the rain had fallen, I finally had the gumption to get my hands dirty in the garden. I deadheaded the flowers to encourage new blooms and to hopefully get another round of fresh buds unfurling their petals and opening up to the sun before the season ends.

My plan was to cut off all the flower stalks – all of it, even those with vivid colors and sturdy petals – just so I didn’t have to do another round of deadheading in a couple weeks when signs of wilt begin to manifest. But as I was snipping the stalks with my shears – and with AirPods in my ears so I could happily hum to ancient pop tunes like Gabrielle’s Sunshine and TLC’s Unpretty – I noticed that I wasn’t alone. I was in the company of bees and butterflies and moths.

These, uh, “flower friends”, hide in the bushy stalks or fly from pistil to pistil – pistil being the center of a flower, I think, which holds the small bulbs of nectar that insects drink in order to survive. (I am no botanist though, so don’t quote me on that.)

A bunch of wilted flowers that I had to cut off so fresh ones could grow

A mild pang of guilt hit me. I wanted to nuke all the flowers, even the good ones, so I could be proactively lazy. Apparently the flowers aren’t the only ones that need my TLC. I ended up leaving the healthy daisies in tact so the bees and the butterflies could sip on their sweet earthy juices and, I dunno, make more babies (“babies”).

I don’t need to water the garden today thanks to last night’s rainfall, but I need to remember to water it again in a few days to keep the flowers blooming. I say that, but I know that I probably won’t remember. Or, more accurately, that I will remember, but I’ll end up with a million excuses to not go out there and actually do it.

Oh well. Maybe I’ll actually do it this week. The bees and their furry butts would appreciate it.