Gardens – Natural Musings

Stone Chicken

Earlier in the month-

Dear Self,

It is a fairly cool September morning. I am sitting on the back porch drinking coffee. My husband is doing the same. The lizard couple is emerging from their porch umbrella bed.

It is 8:23 a.m. and I am observing the stone chicken on the porch nearby.

She sits near our “Philosopher’s Rock”…so named because of the human and gargoyle statues that sit on that rock while pondering great thoughts.

The stone chicken is actually made of cement and is about a foot tall and heavy. Most of the paint that decorated her is long gone, weathered away by whatever elements she has been exposed to over the years. There is a hint of green at her base that is meant to represent grass, and a hint of yellow on one leg. Her beak is a bit chipped.

She was in our yard in Shreveport when I was a child, so she is at least 65 years old! We moved to Austin and for some reason my parent’s hauled her with us. After a year, they bought a house and she resided there for the next 49 years, until my mother died. Then her heaviness became part of our yard statue collection.

“Chicken” is often used to call out someone’s fear. This morning I am contemplating my own fears…some quite heavy. Fears that I have carried with me all these years…some acquired in Shreveport and some gathered here.

In the past few years I have been planning on painting the stone chicken’s bare skin. I might use bright paint in multiple colors. I might paint each feather a different color. This is only a plan. I do have the paint, but whether I ever paint the thing is to be determined.

It occurs to me, as I compare the stone chicken to my own fears…have I painted over and prettied up my own fears? In layers of…searching for words here…the word for pushing your feelings down…the words for pretending all was just fine…the words for pushing them, the fears and anger, away…I am in awe that I have carried these old feelings with me these many, many years. I know they have weighted down my spirit. Does knowing this allow me to release these old feelings? Well, that is a work in progress.

Maybe someday I will feel lighter, like this little wren perched on the stone chicken’s head.

Not Just A Name On The Map

(San Angelo Trip Part II)

Last month I shared my trip to San Angelo State Park with you. It had been the sole reason for our trip out there…well, I did tell my husband about the historic fort we could visit as a way to get him even more interested in the road trip. I ended up finding the town itself pretty neat and thought I would share more of our trip.

“a West Texas oasis” is the description of San Angelo in the Texas State Travel Guide, a wonderful free publication put out by Texas Highways Magazine (www.texashighways.com).

Where history meets geography meets art is how I would describe the town.

Here is a multiple choice quiz:

Which of these three things can be found in San Angelo?

Statues of painted sheep
International water lily collection
Air Force Base

I you guessed “all 3”, you are correct!

According to Wikipedia a Spanish mission was founded here in 1632 to convert the native peoples (Wikipedia say “to serve the native people”). As the years went by the area was under the rule of Spain, Mexico, the Republic of Texas, and the U. S. The city itself began in 1867.

Today there are at least 99,853 people in the town and at least 121,516 if you include the area surrounding the town (2020 U.S. Census). Goodfellow Air Force Base is here, as is the historic Fort Concho (1867). There is a growing art and music community, Angelo State University, and several reservoirs based on the damming of the Concho river. The surrounding area includes farming, agriculture, an oil and gas industry, and the wonderful state park we visited. Here are some of the things we saw:

Historic Fort Concho

Buffalo Soldier Exhibit In Fort Concho Museum

Old Barracks In Fort Concho Museum

Ground Squirrel Near The Fort

Flowers On Fort Grounds

Pond At International Water Lily Collection

More Water Lilies

Mural Of Willie Nelson

One of Many Decorated Sheep Statues In Town.

This one is on the grounds of a mortuary. We shopped at a grocery (HEB) that had one in its parking lot.

The train museum was closed the day we were there. And we also didn’t visit the downtown Concho River Walk. Maybe some day I will go back and explore more.

Lastly, I want mention that San Angelo was one of many smaller cities that had it’s own nice turnout of folks on the recent No Kings Saturday protest.

For more info: discoversanangelo.com

Photos by B. McCreary

Searching For Beauty

On either side of the stone walkway

flowers bloom, rooted and swaying,

Blue bonnets and yellow Texas Star

Purple verbena,

Scarlet clematis,

the five petaled amongst the four,

and I think to myself What a Wonderful World.

The people come into the garden, some pushing strollers,

older tourist couples, mixed race families,

a young trans woman giving her family a tour,

three women in saris, royal blue, green, maroon,

and I think to myself What a Wonderful World.

A child wanders past the blooming pond iris, looking for the turtle,

while another runs into the limestone courtyard,

a paper scavenger hunt clutched in one hand,

his father lingering to admire the stone archway,

and I think to myself What a Wonderful World.

There is a Celebration of Life in the Great Hall,

and a baby shower in the Library.

A mocking bird sings nearby,

while laughter echoes from both buildings as a woman with a walker smiles at pink primroses,

and I think to myself What a Wonderful World.

The people come searching for beauty in the blooms and my wish is that they also find it in the faces of others.

(from What a Wonderful World by George David Weise and Bob Thiele)

Link to the song sung by Louis Armstrong:

Flower Photos by B. McCreary

Embracing Joy And Grief

As March progressed, I anticipated and looked for signs of Spring. I saw many and knew more would be coming…more flowers blooming…birds singing and nesting. But, there was also a gnawing at my soul in the background of the beauty. My mother’s death date approached, March 25th. It has been 15 years since her death and the pain of grief has lessened. But, I want to hug her and share my life with her and I want her to see the physical beauty she left the world. The tears are coming as I write this even though I have been thinking about writing about it for quite a while.

On the other hand, I am glad my mother is not here to see the destruction of our country. She who supported civil rights with her body and soul…she who always rooted for the underdog. She was a proud American and she voted. I’m sure that if she saw the video of the woman being taken away by unidentified men to be locked up and silenced, she would have felt that woman’s fear in empathy.

A couple of days ago, March 29th, I attended a Birthday party for my friend Joan who was turning 80 that very day. This was also my Mother’s birthday. As we sang Happy Birthday to Joan, I was also singing to my mother. My mother’s death was just 4 days before her birthday and as she lay comatose on life support, we had sung Happy Birthday to her.

Okay! Enough grief for now! Here comes the Joy. In my blog posts of April 2019 and March 2021 I shared photos and a few words on one of my mother’s legacies, the lovely purple spiderworts she transplanted from her yard to mine over 20 years ago. From a literal handful of plants to the current abundance of them is one of nature’s miracles. What started as one purple clump in the backyard has now spread all over the yard and into the front yard. And both my brother and my friend Laura have transplanted some from my yard into their yards, where they are now flourishing.

As you look at these photos, remember that a small, positive action can take hold and grow. This is something to remember as we navigate our way through the coming months.

Beauty Among The Rocks

At The Trunk Of The Bur Oak

Near The Rotting Hackberry Stump

Near Philosopher’s Rock

Growing Low To The Ground

Pink Colored With Bee Gathering Pollen

With A Tiny Bee

With A Big Bee

So Pretty!

And there are many more photos of the flowers that I will not publish here…the flowers next to yellow dandelions …some next to orange crossvine blooms…the ones I can see in the front yard outside my office window…the view of them through my kitchen window…

May the natural world give you peace and strength each day. And remember that each positive act you take may grow and spread

Photos by B. McCreary taken in 2025

Some Things Old, Some Things New III

(Musings on our trip to the Bay State- Part III)

By Betty McCreary

We just came out of an insane election time and I hope this did not put a damper on your sharing a Thanksgiving table with family and/or friends. And if you were alone, I hope you treated yourself well and found some things to smile about.

My husband and I listened to the music from Hamilton while we prepared our big meal. Just us this year, but we made our homemade mashed potatoes and I made my special spicy cranberry sauce. While I am nostalgic for the Thanksgivings of years past at my grandma’s table and later my mother’s table, those days can not be recreated. Our holiday celebrations morph a bit each year. I am thankful for getting to spend the holiday with my husband. I am also thankful for calls and texts from family and friends we could not be with.

As I get older I am working on a daily gratitude practice, which simply calls me to find small joys each day and share them with others. This practice has really helped me get past the anger and sadness I felt at the election.

And I am so thankful for the big trip to Massachusetts that we took in July to visit our family members there.

Because of a resurgence of Covid, we tried to find things we could all do together outdoors. The whole group of 7 of us met at the New England Botanical Gardens at Tower Hill, west of Boston, at Boylston, Mass. We ate lunch at the little cafe there. It has an outdoor seating option. Then we hiked around the grounds. It was hot and humid trekking, but was fun being together and sharing the joys of this beautiful outdoor space. First we walked down a hill to a pond. There was a pavilion for sitting and looking for birds and pond critters. Then we continued on through tall trees until we came to several interesting structures and statues. Here is one of them:

Temple In The Woods

Then we headed up hill to the more landscaped part of the gardens.

Saw some plants I was familiar with like this milkweed:

Monarch On Milkweed

And some others that were new to me:

Anyone Know What These Are?

There were a couple more ponds:

Frog On Lily Pad

And some interesting landscape choices:

Plants Planted In A Pattern On A Vertical Wall

The next day we headed to another outdoor spot, minus one of our party. Mirror Lake is on the old grounds of Ft. Devens, north west of Boston. Ft. Devens was an old army base from 1917-1996. Part of it now serves as a training center for the Army reserve and National Guard. A small township has evolved there.

Mirror Lake

We parked and walked down a hill to the entrance station and paid our fee. After staking out a spot for our chairs, we all went swimming. The water was perfect for a hot day. My husband was experiencing a bit of nostalgia at being here. When he was in the Army, he did his Individual Advanced Training (AIT) at Ft. Devens. The 4 months he spent here training was in the winter and so he had not been swimming here before. This is a family friendly area with life guards and boat rentals. One of our group was a regular there this summer, getting his exercise after work. We splashed around and laughed and looked at fish in the clear water.

And then this happened:

On Our Youngest Member’s Finger

A little dragonfly took turns perching on our fingers. Dragonflies can be symbols of change and transformation. I think our family bonds changed a bit and got stronger on this trip. I am thankful for that.

I hope you enjoyed this little personal trip report and maybe will visit some of the places I did. And I hope you find some small joys each day.

For More On The New England Botanical Garden:

http://www.nebg.org

(Photos by Betty McCreary)

Slow Walking At The Botanical Gardens

I missed my slow walk this morning. I missed my slow walking friends, but right now it is too hot for me to be outside.

The Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center is visited by thousands of people each year. Young and old, locals and tourists, the people come to view the flowers and other native Texas plants. Trails wind around the 284 acres and people can move at their own pace. There are fast walkers that get their steps in and medium walkers moving from one patch of spectacular floral colors to the next. There are parents pushing strollers and kids running around the lawns in the children’s garden. And then there are the groups of very slow walkers. They can be seen in groups of 6 or more, huddled around a flowering bush, taking turns to get the best angle to get a good shot with their close-up camera lenses. Some carry binoculars that they point at the trees and grassy fields. These women and men are participating in the weekly Fauna Survey, finding, identifying and documenting all the non-plant life that call the Wildflower Center home.

The Fauna Project is a weekly survey event led by Val Bugh (check out her website: http://www.austinbug.com). She has been at this since 2010 and has amassed quite a record of the bio diversity contained within this site. Her special area of expertise is entomology. The walking is slow because there is so much to see. At least every other plant will have a little insect on it doing something: eating another insect, mating, hunting, etc. Each survey is different. Here are some of my photos taken on the surveys so far this year.

So, get out and do a slow walk. You never know what you might find.

According to their website, the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center is home to at least 1,800 insect species (93 of these are butterfly species), 148 bird species, and 15 mammal species.

Wildflower.org/facts

Where Flowers Bloom…

My part of Texas is awash in wildflowers right now. In the past month I have taken numerous trips to Austin’s Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center to walk and to marvel at the bounty of Spring. So much beauty to ooh and aah over, especially our Texas Blue Bonnets.

On some of the outer trails my eyes are drawn to the large patches of blue. I am reminded of our ubiquitous Blue Bonnet paintings.

Go to an art gallery showcasing Texas landscape art and you will find paintings of Blue Bonnets…Longhorn cattle in Blue Bonnets…barbed wire fences and Blue Bonnets…old trucks and Blue Bonnets. These have been popular for years and they sell well. People ooh and aah over them. Somewhere there is probably a painting of a T-Rex in a field of Blue Bonnets.

And then there are the photos. People trample swaths of these flowers to pose their children and dogs next to them. The Wildflower Center does have a couple of designated areas where visitors can pose with the Blue Bonnets without destroying them. I have done this myself with family and friends. They are pretty, but this kind of gets boring after a while. I seek out the other flowers sprinkled among and near the blue ones. The real Texas landscape has many kinds and colors of flowers. Every color you can imagine.

Chocolate Daisy (leaves smell like chocolate)

Variety is the spice of life. Each living creature adds to the beauty of the world. I like to think of each human as an individual flower with a unique beauty. What if, in our urban and suburban landscapes, we celebrated the diversity of the people we see as we walk through our towns and shop in our stores? What if we oohed and aahed at the beauty of each person? It might be a bit weird if we did this out loud, but we can do this inside ourselves. And maybe we would greet them with a smile and the world would be a better, more loving place…at least for that one day for those people…the admired and the one admiring.

(I was going to subtitle this month’s blog “Pollyanna on her soapbox with pretty pictures”…I do believe each of us who model this sort of love for our fellow creatures can influence others. )

*(All photos taken by the author at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center except for the last photo which was taken at McKinney Falls State Park)

Check out the website: wildflower.org

Natural Saviors

According to The Austin American-Statesman newspaper, we had 21 days of at least 100 degree highs in June, including 12 days in a row of this nastiness. We got a break late Monday the 27th with some much prayed for rain. Yay! I can now sit comfortably on my shaded porch and enjoy my coffee and read. It is still hot, but bearable.

As I get older I do not handle the heat as well as the younger me could. And our summers are getting hotter. June was not all bad. The beauty of nature carries on and helps me carry on. It sustains me. Here are some photos from my yard taken this month:

I want to express my gratitude to Mother Nature for sharing this beauty.

(photos by B. McCreary)

Small Blessings

As New England gets hit hard by winter storm Kenan, we Texans are keeping our fingers crossed that we make it through the rest of winter without a repeat of last February’s tragic freezing storm. That prolonged cold snap inconvenienced so many of us with loss of power and loss of running water. It also maimed and killed so many people.

But, instead of rehashing that event and being anxious, I am going to share some of the little blessings of nature that I got to enjoy in December and on New Year’s Day.

On December 14, 2021 I spent some time in my yard snapping photos of insects on still blooming flowers.

The insect pictured above was on a chrysanthemum flower. I googled the symbolism of these flowers and white ones are associated with death in some cultures. They can also represent happiness, love, and longevity, and rebirth. I see them as representing both death and rebirth.

Two weeks later, on December 28th I spotted this little fly on a dandelion flower

And this lovely butterfly on a milkweed plant

And this majestic being visited on December 30th

And on the first day of the new year

and

And last, but not least in beauty

I am thankful I got to see all of these sweet critters and am looking forward to more blessings from nature in 2022

*All photos taken by B. McCreary in her yard

* The following reference books were used to identify the critters (Don’t hold these books accountable for any mistaken ids on my part):

Kaufman Filed Guide to Insects of North America-Eric R. Eaton and Kenn Kaufman

A Field Guide To Butterflies Of Texas (Texas Monthly Field Guide Series) – Raymond W. Neck

Peterson Field Guides- Eastern Moths- Charles V. Covell, Jr.

Peterson Field Guides- Birds of Eastern and Central North America (fifth edition)- Roger Tory Peterson

Nature’s Distractions

I turn away from the once again worsening pandemic, the sadness of refugees and war, and the tragic realities of life in our world. I want distractions from the worries of the day. Despite what we continue to do to her, Mother Nature gives us plenty of things to enjoy and be in awe of. I especially appreciate her gifts right now. I am not turning away from reality. Her gifts are part of our reality too.

I am distracted by the colors…

Red