It seems as if August has flown by with little to show for itself. I try to update this blog at the weekend, at least once every week, but I’ve been very remiss recently and two complete weekends have passed with no word from me. If the updates happen at the weekend, and I’ve missed two weekends, that’s actually three weeks without an update. Nothing since the first of August.
Strangely, there have already been more visitors to the site this month than in any month since May 2020. Perhaps I should continue not to post.
But there are still ten days (including today) until the thirty-first, and I feel that some sign of life is warranted.
Despite the intermittent weather and the general greyness of things, I have managed to walk across the park most days. So, as always, when wondering what to post, I’ve been looking through the photos I’ve taken recently.
The aspirational rosebay willowherb spires at the top of this post, were photographed at the start of the month, but there are still plenty of them to be seen. That said, there are also plenty of the plants that have already gone beyond the flowering stage to produce the seedpods that jut out fiercely from the stem like strange purple ribs from a central spine.
As time goes on, these pods or capsules will dry and then split open to reveal the tiny tufted seeds that will – perhaps – be caught up by the wind and carried away to set root elsewhere, or perhaps lifted to the heavens to tangle together and form the high clouds of late summer.
I think it’s a little early to start mourning the season, but it’s hard not to when the park is so full of these skeletons of summer in various stages of decomposition.
don't confuse the narrator 