Errr . . . excuse me . . . did you know it's fall?

The end of October, and the garden performs as if time was moving backwards towards winter through spring.

How else to explain these exuberant clusters of roses . . .



. . . the joyful labor of these sweet peas . . .



. . . or the stray blooms of sweet william, phlox, and ladybells?



Even next summer’s larkspur has set itself in!



We have not even had a killing frost yet. Sure, there are signs of the season: golf ball-sized dogwood fruits, fallen leaves, and autumnal winds.



I generally believe in letting nature take its course. Plants, like people, should not be hastened to their inevitable ends but rather allowed to find their way at their own pace. Foliage, in time, ripens, turns color, and dies. Those brittle and brilliant yellow fronds of astilbe, amsonia, and hosta deserve to stand undisturbed. (Although, last weekend, my horticulturally cultured sister-in-law did give me a gentle lecture on the need for good garden hygiene--as she cleaned my columbines of leaf miner.)



So although DRS and I did do some clipping and cutting today, I’m waiting until next weekend . . . or maybe the one after . . . to face the season.