A flower fills the afternoon post, for when there are no words.
29
May
2026
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May
2026
A Springtime Visit to Dad
My father’s resting place may house his ashes, but I don’t usually feel his spirit there. That’s partly why I don’t visit it that often, choosing to mostly mark his birthday or holidays with a stop-by, and not much else. I feel him elsewhere – in the garden, on a warm breeze, in the shadow of a a tree. Lately I’ve been missing him so I stopped by his grave to say hello. The stone was warm from a day of sun, and flags lined the place in honor of Memorial Day. A few other cars with visiting loved ones of lost ones were scattered throughout the place, but none in my vicinity. As is usually the case, I didn’t feel my father there.
Even in the shade of a row of ancient evergreens, where he might have been found on a hot day, my father was missing. I looked for him briefly, knowing he wouldn’t be there, and hoping that it was the looking that mattered. As is often the case, I drove away from the cemetery feeling empty, feeling robbed of something, feeling the fact of my father’s absence. And as is occasionally the case, I wasn’t ready to let him go, so I drove to the place where I’ve gone whenever I find myself missing him: St. Mary’s Hospital. My Dad’s most regular ‘office’, where he’d be at work at all days of the day or night trying to save someone’s life and make the world better for other families, the hospital is where I remember my Dad being at key points in life.
I always return to the same space near the entrance of the cafeteria, before a locked door of offices now, but which once housed a conference room where my Dad kept me when I came home early from school one day and he had to be at the hospital. My social anxiety had worked and wreaked its havoc, and I couldn’t handle being at school with the other kids anymore that day – I thought I just missed my parents, and this was the only way to be close to them. I’d expected Dad to be angry for me making him have to pick me up early, the same way I expected him to be angry when I broke one of the garden sprinklers as a child, but he was gentle with me that day, perhaps sensing that I was only there out of fear. The memory recedes at that point, fading away to a slight ache, an emptiness. But I felt my father’s presence there, in those halls he walked, near those vending machines that offered the sandwiches he’d get when his work required him to stay beyond any sort of reasonable hours. I could hear his laughter with Hector the head janitor, his joking with the OR nurses, and his caring comfort for a little boy who mustered all his effort not to cry from missing his parents and growing up.
28
May
2026
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May
2026
A Moonless Patch of Sky
I love when the phone refuses to focus – a reminder of the grainy way we used to have with film.
When life loses focus it feels less lovely at first.
Spring clouds portend spring storms.
The sky looks tumultuous.
Torturous, tortured nightwind.
Swirling clouds, shredding leaves, dancing wind – it all conspires to compose the season of spring.
28
May
2026
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May
2026
An Almost-Full Evening
Because it was just barely dusk.
Because the moon was not quite full.
Because the spring had not yet bloomed.
Because the summer refused to promise.
Because, because, because, because, because…
Because of the wonderful things he does.
28
May
2026
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May
2026
On the Wings of Columbine
These columbine blooms recall this post from earlier in the spring, a time that feels so close and already so far. A fancier and more petalicious white version of Columbine may be found here – proof that there’s a blog post for everything. When I think on that, it feels exhausting. We all live so many lives, mostly without even realizing it. One life is never just one life.
How strange that such a pretty flower elicits such difficult thoughts. Try getting your head around something like the multiverse. Younger people do it with ease, but they’re afraid of other things. Older people can make sene of it if they think long enough on it, but who wants to think very long on anything these days? For those of us somewhere in the middle – of life, of death, of the past and present – there’s something between grace and acceptance, a balance that is precariously perched on the bloom of the columbine, and such prettiness was never meant to last.
27
May
2026
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May
2026
27
May
2026
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May
2026
Riding Into the Sun
Looking for another place
Somewhere else to be
Looking for another chance
To ride into the sun
Returning from Maine, the road turned from rainy to sunny.
Summer whispered on the scattered days when the temperature reached into the 80’s.
In some cities there is already the bane of a heatwave, driving the warmth into the concrete, into the labyrinthine subway stations, into the headache-inducing unbearable afternoons where the only relief is in a cold shower, in lying very still as a fan does its damnedest to no real avail.
Ride into the sun
Ride into the sun
Ride into the sun
Ride into the sun
Somewhere, this song was here before. In a melody, in a riddle, in a dreamscape between sleep and wake. That first brush with sun and heat after a cool spring is disorienting. Giddiness and loveliness and a pretty little mess as we adjust to the new intensity in the sky. Sun – my sun – my beautiful sun – shining solely on my way…
Where everything seems so pretty
When you’re lonely and tired of the city
Remember it’s a flower made out of clay
While I’ve often found myself in New York for at least one summer weekend, the only city I find summer somewhat bearable is Boston, where the bedroom offers easy respite from the hottest part of the day, and the nights cool down enough to allow for restless, aimless walking. It’s the only thing to do when summer heat prevents easy sleep. The only thing to do in a city…
To the city
Where everything seems so ugly
When your sitting at home in self pity
Remember you’re just one more person
Who’s living there
The roads lead back to summer.
The journey that started in the spring…
How far will it take us, how hot will it get, and how will we get there from here? Impossible to make out the twists and turns to come, even if the end – the destination – is in the beginning, in those earliest days of spring, when houses of glass and green gave the only glimpses of hope on those nights still so cold.
Summer rises from the other side of the ocean bed, laps at the harbor of Boston, and stretches out across the Atlantic from the docks of New York – connected by salty tears, ocean droplets, the crying of the sky…
It’s hard to live in the city
It’s hard to live in the city
It’s hard to live in the city
27
May
2026
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May
2026
The Very First Peony Bloom
There is something special about the very first peony bloom of the season – that initial intake of its perfume is a collision of beauty, nostalgia, and all the hope of summer to come. It brings me back to Suzie’s childhood birthday parties, to the garden in her side-yard, where I’d escape when the other kids proved to be too much for me to take. Despite the risk of ants in the blooms, I’d always lean over and deeply inhale their magnificent fragrance.
The Itoh peonies are full of bud and ready to burst, but that’s a show for another day. For now, this one single peony is enough. An old-fashioned bloom who is nameless but no less beautiful in its anonymity.
26
May
2026
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May
2026
This Little Linden Grove
This is the time of the year when a little linden tree grove near my office building comes into its own, budding with the inconspicuous green blooms that will soon shower the area with its gorgeous perfume. No one gives the linden tree its props, mostly because no one knows that it’s the source of such enchanting fragrance. I also happen to enjoy being one of the only people I know who love the linden tree – like some little secret known only to me, so no one else can ruin it. The last thing I want to see is the linden tree go the way of the Bradford pear – overexposure never helped anyone.
The next few weeks will find these trees in bloom – seek one out and sit beneath its bee-buzzing brilliance – it’s the perfect welcome for summer.
26
May
2026
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May
2026
Tea Cup for a Rainy Day
When the burdens of basic life become too much, and in this present moment of world history, it is most decidedly too much, I find it helpful to take a pause and make a cup of tea: for the ritual, for the meditative moment, and for the calming effects of chamomile coziness.
26
May
2026
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May
2026
A Rainy Ending to Begin
Our Memorial Day weekend in Maine closed with a full day and night of rain, which also made a mess of things on the first part of the ride home. Still, there is something romantic about the rain, and leaning into that aspect of a rainy ride made for a balm on a scary rainy day Monday. You don’t get a double-downer like that all too often, and perhaps that’s the reason for my melancholy of late. We usually get more sun than we’ve had, and maybe that’s contributing to it as well.
Rain hasn’t always been a balm on my heart. It formed the backdrop to several suicidal months of my youth, ruined just about every spring weekend last year, and ransacked an Arabian Night party (which stressed me out so much I drank until drunken oblivion hit, then had a piece of cake and threw it all up). So no, the rain has not always been a friend, but it’s had its moments.
When my fifth grade year started at McNulty Elementary School, we had a rainy stretch of a few days when we were cooped up inside, beneath the florescent lights of grade school design, and for some reason the idea of the rain forcing us together indoors felt safe and comforting. When it broke days later, and we were allowed to go outside for recess, I reluctantly joined everyone outside, when I still wanted us to all be together indoors. (Yes, I was a strange child.)
My first trip to London was blessedly rain-free, but for a second excursion there, on my own, it rained for some of the trip, and, having expected it as part of London’s charm, I flipped open an umbrella and went about my business, ducking into pubs when it got heavy, having a cup of tea when it got cold, and waiting it out always seemed to work. There was a cozy romanticism to rain in London, one that I still hold close to my heart.
For several vacations in Ogunquit, it rained for the entire time – and not just showers – heavy, down-pouring rain with driving wind that made any sort of outdoor walk impossible. We had to miss the Marginal Way for a few of those vacations because it simply wasn’t possible – but somehow it was always all right.
Rain is a part of life, and I’m learning to embrace it.
25
May
2026
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May
2026
A Moment Aflame
A weekend in Maine has come to a rainy close, and while my mind processes rejoining the working masses, this post is just to mark time with its brilliant begonia blooms. The patio plantings went in a little later than usual, and the cool weather we’ve had hasn’t really inspired them with much confidence, but the plants will catch up when the sun and warmth do. I’m placing my faith in the universe to nudge us along to where we are supposed to be.
25
May
2026
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May
2026
A Memorial Day Monday Recap
The unofficial arrival of summer (though we’re waiting until it’s official in June for our summer reveals) comes with Memorial Day, and we’re off to the races – but first the weekly blog recap for all that you may have unintentionally (ahem) missed…
My mandated dates of touching grass were more needed than I realized.
Dahlias continue to be the stuff of dreams.
A quick lilac lesson continued the magic of the spring season.
This Greek salad by the pool was all about the chopping.
A merry magnolia for your viewing pleasure.
Only a moron does a thing like this. (Guilty.)
Two strangers, a few lost boys, and my mother = our annual Mother’s Day weekend on Broadway.
Living for this colour palette.
Why oh why must it be this way?
Dazzlers of the Day included Charles Melton and Hamish Powell.
24
May
2026
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May
2026
Venus & the Moon
This is Venus and the moon, playfully skirting each other on a recent early evening following one of those impossibly warm 90-degree days we had before it all turned cold and rainy again. Brief spells of magic, tantalizing glimpses of summer, and prayers for more beauty and charm to come… late spring weaves and works its enchantments like no other season, offering hope and promise for those of us still smarting from winter.
In the spring night, the mind unspools like the whorls of a radial flower – spreading and sending out feelers for warmth and comfort, luring in potential pollinators, and beauty is almost an incidental afterthought. What is Venus whispering to the moon on this evening? Secrets of love and naughtiness perhaps, secrets of wanton desire, of tenuous connections of the sort traced by planets and moons and lost to time and space and distance. The missed cries of orbits uncrossed sound from and for another century, and what would it mean if two orbits ever did in fact cross at the same time? Nobody wants to see the sayings through.
And so the moon whispers back to Venus, and it is something we mortals will never hear – even if we did, we could hardly understand it. We are basic and limited creatures – to Venus and the moon we aren’t even here.
24
May
2026
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May
2026
Dazzler of the Day: Hamish Powell
This Dazzler of the Day is casting his spell across the pond in waves of floral glory and bountiful beauty. A floral artist based in London, Hamish Powell is easy on the eyes, and endeavors to bring the natural world into fashion and art. In his own words, “Flowers are my muse and my medium.” His exquisite creations have adorned galleries, fashion events, and advertising campaigns for the likes of Burberry, Diptyque, Loewe, Claridges, YSL and Penhaligons – all the finest that London has to offer. Check out his charming website here.
