Blossoming

Today, ah: the first glimmer of Spring and my twentieth birthday. James visited and we took a stroll around my historic hometown, and I for once let the gingerbread on porch railings and high peaked roofs fade into the background, and absorbed instead the inflorescence around me. I though of Wordsworth at Tintern Abbey, the scene a stamp on his memory:

  "...Once again
  Do I behold these steep and lofty cliffs,  
  That on a wild secluded scene impress
  Thoughts of more deep seclusion; and connect
  The landscape with the quiet of the sky."                  

Do we not all love to watch flower petals cup their pollinated crux? Or notice the withered leaves, skeletal, turned to lace, thin as eggshells? And look overhead to the branches coiled like telephone lines, supporting wiry florets against the backdrop of human edifice?

Here are some of our findings from the day, photo credits mostly to my lovely James, and a few to myself. Hope everyone enjoyed the weather as much as we did. And yes, I had a lovely birthday (eh hem, I managed to hold back the tears this year...usually getting older and feeling alone makes for an all too tragic twenty-four hours.) I can't wait to share with everyone some of the wonderful goodies I've been so fortunate to receive. Updates on that in another post?

♥ Vintage Betty