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It was a fluke burst of energy that got me to bring all the plants inside before I went away last week. Frosty here this morning.

My motley crew. I draw the line at naming them (as it dawns on her that this is a lie)

The tall, gangly things are a forest of diffenbachia; the scions of the OG plant, Louie, a wedding gift from Donald Theall, one of Jim's bachelor friends who thought he had lost his damn mind.

Two scabrous Christmas cactii who bloom when they are not playing dead.

The center top photo is a descendent of a hoya plant my mother smuggled home from Hawaii in the late 60s. 

A strangely healthy-looking jade plant. Grocery rescue I think.

A tub of black hollyhocks I started from seed this year. Struggling to keep them from getting rust. Kind of plant acne.

The New York Moss is doing nicely. Has me thinking about having fish again. Neither of the boys remember my tall 20 gallon tank in the kitchen with big, black and white angel fish. They were a murderous lot. Each week the smallest fish would disappear until there was only one big bastard left. 

And last but not least, Swedish Ivy, Mr.&Mrs. Wilson (more downstairs) grown from cuttings snipped from the home of the founder of AA, Bill Wilson.  I have celebrity plants. My care is negligible. Much more attention and stuff starts to die.

All this green diddling has me looking forward to some horticultural wizardry next season. Now I will spend an hour at Seed Supreme revelling in the descriptions of their offerings. 

I've been in a funk since I cut the bird. The annual forgetting that rich, brown gravy raises hell with me. Two days in a row. Every year.

Social media is sickening. Well-trodden paths are as much as I can stand. Your place, mine. Little else has any integrity. Taking care of the plants is good. Planning for Spring helps the head. 

Maybe soup for dinner.

And for dessert, a favorite. Reminding me that words can turn worlds. 

"This is not life, Will. This is a stolen season."

Even without the gorgeous visual feast, the music and the writing--the story telling--always rights me.

"No...not the artful postures of love, but love that overthrows life. Unbiddable, ungovernable, like a riot in the heart, and nothing to be done, come ruin or rapture."      

                   by Marc Norman & Tom Stoppard