Reflections on Wildflowers 1

When I looked forward to retirement, I thought about identifying the wildflowers around my home. I pictured myself, guidebook in hand, stooping low over tiny petals and learning the names of the plants surrounding me. Now that I am retired and have honored my vow, I am ready to report that naming wildflowers has been even more fun than I imagined it would be!

Common Spring Beauty, Photograph by Wild Flower Preservation Society

In Norman Taylor’s Wild Flower Gardening (D. Van Nostrand, 1955)

In May, I found Spring Beauty around the trunks of two of my oldest and largest trees. I had noted the white blossoms with touches of pink when I first moved to the property over a dozen years ago, and I had always avoided mowing the areas where the flowers bloomed. Spring Beauty is aptly named. I am embarrassed to admit that, during the years when I was working, I felt too rushed to take the time to identify the small blossoms that I so admired.

In the midst of the grass in the broad yards fronting the barn, the tiniest spikes of white flowers opened above a plant creeping outward through the grass. I found that Common Speedwell has faintly bluish stripes embroidering the petals. It purportedly has astringent and diuretic properties. Hmmm. I doubt that I will sample the plant to see.

I almost overlooked Shepherd’s Purse, which grew in my beds of iris. Its many heart-shaped mittens waved at me. Oddly enough, when I knew its name, I no longer considered it a weed. I left it where it was with as much right to be a flower as the iris that I had planted.

The stylish Garlic Mustard put forth white blossoms on my hill of walnut trees and along my creek. Since 1868, the plant has spread westward from New York.

Reminiscent of the Queen Anne’s Lace that would appear much later in the season, Sweet Cicely ornamented the shady bowers at creek’s edge.

Ground Ivy (also known as Creeping Charlie) bloomed everywhere. Its violet-blue flowers painted large sections of my yard.

By identifying the wildflowers around my house, I began to live more consciously than before. I felt a kinship to the plants. While I recognized that their task is to survive, their blooms appealed to my artistic sense. They completed pictures delighting the eye with their harmony. The changing display of blossoms satisfied me as correct for spring and for summer as separate seasons, each with its own aesthetic expression in the part of the world where I am fortunate to reside. I realized that I, too, am living through seasons—that I, too, express myself differently in summer than in spring, in autumn than in summer. Every season settles into its own responsibilities and pleasures.

Good Morning, Springboro! The Giant Sycamore

Springboro, Ohio, is two hundred years old. This blog installment is the first of six that will feature my original watercolor paintings depicting scenes in the vicinity of Springboro. If you would like to purchase one of the paintings, send me a message through my website at roberttrhode.org or via Facebook. The art measures 5″ by 7″ and consists of Cotman Water Colours by Winsor & Newton on acid-free Montval watercolor paper.

Giant Sycamore Near Springboro, Ohio

Original Watercolor Painting by Robert T. Rhode

 

Not far from the charming downtown is a gigantic sycamore tree. My mother always urged me to create a painting of a sycamore, and I have finally gotten around to honoring her request that was made so many years ago. The patterns and colors of the bark fascinated my mother, and she loved the curves of the heavy limbs.

One day, I had parked to appreciate the majesty of the giant sycamore, and, from across the street, a resident called to me, “That tree is over two hundred years old.” Imagine that! A tree older than Springboro itself! A tree that was already growing in that location before the Quakers had come to build blacksmith shops, houses, and mills to form a community! The resident said he had lived nearby for fifty years and that, when he first moved to that location, he had conversed with a woman who was approaching a century; the woman had told him that her father had said that the tree was standing there when he was a boy.

I wonder what the tree could tell us if it could talk. In a way, it does talk: that is, it expresses itself through the artistic arcs of its branches and the dappled canopy of its leaves. The immense trunk amazes me! Despite the colossal size of the sycamore, the tree comforts me. Even though I am a writer, an explanation of what I just wrote will not be easily conveyed. Something in the softly varied tones of the bark, in the leaves spread like broad hands, and in the steadfast posture of the tree lends a feeling of security. The sycamore is parental. It gathers its happy children beneath its branches.

The township has provided a table or two for picnics in the shade of the mammoth tree, and, when driving past, I have noted people enjoying lunch beneath the towering sycamore.

Creeks are favorite spots for sycamores to become established, and (Sure enough!) Clear Creek runs its sparkling course just behind the picnic area.

The patriarchal sycamore may well have been growing near Clear Creek during the American Revolution. Miami or Shawnee people may have camped beneath it. The tree could easily have been standing there when Ohio became a state in 1803 and was almost certainly in place when the War of 1812 began. Thinking of how many sunrises this living tree has witnessed dwarfs my imagination. It has stood serenely in one spot for so many days, while I have darted hither and yon in my hectic life. By comparison to the tree, I am a firefly flashing across the landscape for relatively few summer nights.

Peace is the message of the sycamore, which yet celebrates the rolling seasons. The tree stands as a tranquil philosopher—as nature itself, proving day by day a good way to live.