Every summer I come to this moment. Some sooner than others. I say to myself, “I am not going to plant flowers next year, I will let grow what grows.” Well, earlier this year, we were blessed with a plethora of rain, so I had to plant flowers. My back flower garden is so beautiful. True to myself, I did not weed it this year, but more than enough blanket flowers, sunflowers and morning glory had reseeded, plus I threw out some cosmos and zinnia seeds. And it continued to rain, until the first week of July. Here it is mid-August, and not a drop of rain since then. My 6 rain barrels are empty and not a chance of rain in sight, plus the upper 90’s-low 100 degree temperatures are not helping. So, starting tomorrow, I will start pulling flowers. I pull them because at least they still have some nutrients that the donkey and goat can get out of them, and it also gives them a little more variety in their diet. I will salvage what flowers I can to put in vases around the house, but for the most part everything will be pulled up, except for the bushes. The lantana will be fine with a little watering here and there and the others I can use the animal’s old water when I put new water in their buckets. Yes, I could use our well water, but that also puts a strain on that too. A few years back our neighbor next door and across the street were having problems with their wells. We thought our wells were going dry. That is when Hubby put in the 6 rain barrels and also a bigger holding tank for our well water. And honestly, since we put the new metal roof on our house and the gutters that flow into the barrels, it doesn’t take that much to fill the barrels, it just has to rain. Come to find out later, the neighbor’s wells were not going dry, just problems with the mechanics of their wells. It will happen eventually, with all the new neighborhoods going in around us. We are one of the few neighborhoods that still have our own wells, most everyone else is on public water, which this week because there was a chlorine problem, everyone had to boil their water.
I do love my flowers, they bring a beauty to a world that can sometimes be ugly. But I have to be practical too. So I will start pulling. Maybe if I play a bunch of rain songs, I can bring the rain in. Who knows? Might be worth a try, although, I’ve played Christmas music in July, and the weather didn’t get cooler, but I will not be deterred!
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