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It took me years to believe that some people are just plain mean. I’m sure I had passed my 50th birthday before this realization occurred, and it didn’t happen overnight. In fact, it took some time, going over family history and life experiences before I realized: some people are just mean. They go out of their way to hurt others… to put down a co-worker…nit-pick someone’s performance, their appearance, financial status, house, car, children, educational level, etc.

Caution: If you are not comfortable reading about death and dying, you may want to skip this column.

A funny thing happened on the way to May... I have what looks to be a million tiny yellow flowers. It happens every year for about 4 to 6 weeks but no one talks about it some even look away. In fact, Lemon Coral sedum was the 2019 Proven Winners Annual of the Year, yet I don’t remember flowers being mentioned. While I am at it, I will add, I have never had one die either. The truth, or caveat to that is that I have lived my whole horticultural life in zones 7b-10. In other words, fairly mild to warm climates.

My first remembered encounter with a nurse was in the office of our family’s pediatrician. It was time for some type of inoculation and I didn’t want to play. Dashing out of the examination room, I eventually reached the waiting room, where I sought refuge under an unoccupied chair. Not a good decision!

Aqua Blue Pots in the landscape and staggered on the side of a hill, was not my idea, but my bride, the person who pops up on my phone as Jan My Love Winter. This is the color I have avoided like the plague for most of my life. To modify the French phrase this project was going to be my ‘Peace’ de Resistance. You see Jan is a gifted and natural plant groomer when it comes to our mixed containers, so making ‘Peace’ is the goal.

I’ll admit, I had to look up Ukraine to find it on the map when this needless war began. I knew little about the customs, the religion, the ethnicities of Ukraine — and really, in the final analysis, none of that really mattered.

After three months in its new brick-and-mortar location, Fortis Therapy Center celebrated its opening with a ribbon cutting, sponsored by the Dripping Springs Chamber of Commerce.

Swallowtails were early at The Garden Guy’s house this year. Thank goodness I had Superbena verbenas in full bloom. It is as if they had been given the task of announcing the arrival of spring and the butterfly season. March 22, I photographed an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail on Superbana Royale Chambray verbena.

Texas was hardest hit by the polio outbreaks of the 1940s and early ’50s. As scientists raced to find a vaccine, local officials, celebrities and ordinary people came together to raise funding for the desperately-needed research.

Small children fear darkness, crying at the possibility of bad guys hiding under the bed or monsters in the closet. These imaginings are usually erased by hugs, reassurances and under-thebed inspections. When my boys were small, I used room spray to banish bad guys and monsters. In some cases, an invitation to spend the night in mom’s and dad’s room calms the frightened child…or perhaps a warm place in the parents’ bed was the goal all along.

Before you read this week’s humble offering, please know – this is not a statement on anything as controversial as political ideology, critical race theory or even your picks for this year’s Oscars. Conversations regarding what has become “The Slap” have gone on, ad nauseam…and perhaps these conversations were needed and necessary. But this column is written for all of us to think about “the human condition.” No hidden agendas. No political or racist undertones.

Today, which as I write is April 3rd, and the day the Ruby-throated hummingbirds returned to my house. Oddly it was a feast of the Superbells calibrachoas. This story, however, starts the first week of October which is when I planted them.