everyone’s favorite
I posted these wild carrot photos to Instagram today, and learned–not surprisingly–that queen anne’s lace is many people’s favorite wildflower. I think it may be mine as well. I had never asked myself “what is my favorite wildflower?”, nor pondered whether it is any different than my favorite flower in general. On further contemplation, I think I can say Queen Anne’s Lace is indeed my favorite flower and wildflower. How about you? What is your favorite flower? What is your favorite wildflower? Don’t stress about answering too much, your answer can be different tomorrow. I won’t hold you to it :-)
queen anne’s lace in mid-July (Daucus carota)
All hail the Queen!
They Queen has arrived. All rise.
Queen Anne’s Lace (Daucus carota)
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This was my favorite wildflower as a child, as an old lady it still is
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P.S. my favorite uncle taught me about placing the stems into a bottle of ink – that was how I learned about osmosis
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day 2
As it sometimes happen, Day 2 of my recovery from oral surgery has been more painful than Day 1. Perhaps on Day 1 the brain and body are still in shock, trying to make sense of what happened. By Day 2, they understand the magnitude and scope and of the violation, and are saying, in anger “WTF, man? This HURTS!” Anyway, I am feeling puny and spent a big part of the afternoon curled up in bed reading David Sedaris. I wish I would gve mysef permission to this more often when I am not sick, because it is a delicious luxury.
Here is the familiar version of yesterday’s defamiliarized image.
wild foxtail barley grass
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This grass is charming! Somehow, to my eye, it is reminiscent of the palm fans in Egyptian art. You tricked me yesterday. It’s not often I can’t ID your subject!
Sorry you’re feeling puny, but curling up with a good book is a cure for much in life I think. Hope the laughing (Sedaris) isn’t hurting too much. Hope you’ve turned a corner by this morning.reply
defamiliarization
One of the things I enjoy doing here on STILL is presenting familiar subjects in an unfamiliar way in order to help you resee the beauty of nature. Just a little reminder of the magnificence of this place we all call home. When I do workshops on The Art of Noticing, I sometimes refer to this as learning to see below the ordinary to the infra-ordinary: Learning to resee the things we have become so habituated to, that we actually stop noticing them at all. Recently, I heard an author being interviewed and he used the term defamiliarization, and I thought “That’s it! That’s exactly what I try to do!”, defamiliarize the subject so you can see it anew, as if for the first time. Case in point, this photo of foxtail barley seedheads.
wild foxtail barley seedheads (Hordeum jubatum)
dental day
I had major dental work done today: a new root canal on the left (#14), and oral surgery to repair a problematic root canal on the right (#30). So this is all I got for you today.
As the saying goes–“You get what you get and you dan’t make fit.”
white pine with new and old pine cones (Pinus strobus)
Time for more Tylenol 3. See you tomorrow.
xoxo Mary Jo
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Wow!! That’s a lot for one day! Take care, rest, and maybe some ‘escape reading’?
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Ouch !!!
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I have defamiliarized myself with these things as I plucked them my late Toby’s fur and a couple of times from his nostrils
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Aren’t they just the prettiest flower ever?? So lacy and carefree. They look so delicate and yet are so hardy, these stalwarts of the summer roadside. They are a required element in my summer bouquets. And who can resist their nest-looking seed heads or their ferny foliage? They 100% get to stay where ever they show up in my garden beds!