MOTHER’S DAY:  Thanks to Ed, it will be Mother’s Day for the next four months.  The orchid has lots of buds, and the flowers that are open will stay open for a long time.  Friendship is a very good thing. David took his Mother for a special breakfast buffet and Nancy sent chocolate covered strawberries and cheesecake.  I got to tag along to the breakfast, I ate more than half of the strawberries and cheesecake, and I’ll enjoy the orchids… so I guess the cards should have read Happy Mother’s Day, Jerral.  

No text necessary for this BLOG.  David, Margaret, and Ed in front of the magnificent 

Moreton Bay Fig Tree in Balboa Park.  Life is Good!

Hummingbird babies:  Saturday there was one egg hatched into an ugly little gray bundle of fuzz that was a hummingbird chick.  I didn’t look yesterday, Sunday, to see if the other egg had hatched.  I did notice that the mother bird was sitting on the nest whenever I looked at it. Today I looked and found that the other little egg had hatched.  The nest was full of gray fuzz...breathing, throbbing, alive.  I wish all human mothers could be as committed to the welfare of their babies, children of all ages, as this little mother bird.  All through the afternoon she left the nest occasionally to stick her long bill into the bright flowers in the back yard.  She came back over and over to feed the babies.  Wow!  LIFE is good.

Today is Mothers Day:  Nancy's and David’s Mother was honored by the two of them and David Higgins, Ed Jirjis, and Michael, Elaine, and Patrick Lanoiselee.  I honor her, too.  She has been and is today a good Mother.  Nancy was clear across the country in Rockville, Maryland, and her not being in San Diego was the only thing wrong with the day.  The others in the picture enjoyed a Mothers’ Day Brunch in Margaret’s honor at the Waterfront Grill at Pier 32 in National City.  

The homeless population in San Diego at last count is 8,742.  We’ve had a rainy couple of days. but considered with the reset of the U.S. population, this little Southwest corner of the country has ideal weather for outdoor activities.  Homelessness is not just a matter of being without a roof overhead.  I can’t imagine what it might be like to have no closets or bathrooms or a million other little conveniences that those of us who have homes accept without a thought of what life might be like for us if we suddenly didn’t have them.  Not all of the people who are begging on the streets are homeless, but I am told that most of the people who are asleep outside in public places in the middle of the day have no other place to go for that activity or for any other things they want to do. Every time I see a homeless person sleeping in the middle of the day, I wonder what should be done by the government to take care of them, and I wonder how it is that in the best place in the world to live there are people who don’t have basic needs met. 

We are in the middle already of an election for leader of the world’s richest country.  We hear people explaining their plans for the country.  I am waiting to hear from a politician a plan to end homelessness.I believe it can be done. Tomorrow I will go to church with people who have homes.  I will hear religious talk.  I probably will not hear talk about addressing homelessness in San Diego.

Today I came from the San Diego Museum of Art where I had taken pictures of flowers painted

by Flemish and Dutch painters... then I went outside the museum with Margaret and on the way

to the car I saw and photographed flowers that could easily have been displayed in the museum.  

The Dutch and Flemish masters were painting three and four hundred years ago.  The fresh Day Lily 

and the paintings from long ago were of a present time which reminded me that the magic of art is

always exactly that.  Nothing grows older in paintings.  The flowers are forever fresh.  

This is some kind of Coral Tree, but I don't know what kind it is.  Balboa Park is a national treasure in a country of civic parks... and one of the reasons Balboa Park is very special is the climate.  Here in this region almost any living plant can thrive.  Redwood trees have a hard time because there is so little water, but the dying Redwoods in Balboa Park are dying for lack of adequate water.  It's not the fault of the tree that it is dying.  Whether we want to find a way to provide the kind of water needed for Redwoods to survive and thrive is a matter of choice for voters.  Perhaps we should not try to grow every kind of tree here.  Perhaps trees that require great amounts of water should be available to us through books and not by actually planting the trees.  Apparently the Coral Trees, there are several in the Park, can thrive here because they get the right amount of water and sunshine and everything else they need.  I took the pictures for today's blog on my way back to the car in a parking area between the Natural History Museum and the Zoo.  If you know the exact name of this plant, let me know. All of the pictures today were taken at the same tree.

Eucalyptus and magnolia…  This is a fine time of year.  Magnolia trees are putting out white flowers.  Eucalyptus trees are shedding last year’s bark.  It happens suddenly. 

I wandered around with my camera today and noticed the world is bursting with color… and the trees seemed to invite me to catch their beauty.  We had sunshine this morning, but a cold front has moved into San Diego bringing clouds.  The TV weather people are giddy with the possibility of rain in a couple of days.  We’ll see.

I wonder what the homeless people in San Diego will do when the rain comes this weekend.

Jacaranda Season in San Diego:  On my bicycle ride today I went to Balboa Park to see what the seasons are doing with Kate Sessions at the Western edge of the Park.  The Jacaranda trees are in full bloom.  Someone has decorated the statue of Kate Sessions with flowers and a cloth scarf.  Someone has left “stuff” from a hotel room in the box at the foot of the statue.  I hope a homeless person will find them useful.  The flowers have been placed in her right hand and her left hand is holding the familiar pine cone.  

I like Kate Sessions, the statue and especially the real person the statue represents.  She taught at Francis Parker School in the early days, but when I was headmaster there, the memory of Ms. Sessions was strong.  She planted something very important into the thinking of her students, something that led to San Diego’s being the botanically beautiful place that it is today… and eventually to the commemoration of her life with the statue at the Western entrance of the Park.

Whenever I see the Morrow Bay Fig Tree behind the Natural Science Museum and whenever I see the Eucalyptus Trees in the middle of their spring peel, I think of Mrs. Sessions, and I feel thankful that she lived and worked here.  I don’t know if she was responsible for the Jacandra Trees being planted along streets all over San Diego, but I do know that it is her spirit that lives in those trees.

Spring:  I keep noticing that blossoms are blooming more quickly and are a deeper color than usual.  It must be caused by the climate change that scientists are talking about and politicians whom I don’t respect are denying.  The bougainvillea in our backyard is always beautiful from the first blossoms in spring until the last ones in winter… but this year it is exceptionally red, a deeper red than I remember its being in other years.  The eucalyptus that peels every year is in the middle of the process.  I am wondering if eucalyptus trees in Australia are shedding their skins now, or will they wait until the beginning of spring there.  I also wonder if I would be as fascinated by the eucalyptus trees if I were living in Australia.  The bright orange blossom in the yard is brilliant this year.  The hummingbird that sits on the nest on our porch most of the time likes these bright orange flowers. The bird seems to know me.  She doesn’t fly away when I come close to the nest.  

At Patrick's and Elaine's House:  The Globe spider has found its place... so have the rest of us.

“Auld Lang Syne… a poem written in Scotland by Robert Burns.  It is set to a traditional folk song.  We sing it on the last midnight of a year to send out the old one and usher in a new one.  It is not a song just for old people, although this afternoon it came to mind as I took pictures of favorite older friends in San Diego.

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,

and never brought to mind?

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,

and auld lang syne*?

CHORUS:

For auld lang syne, my jo,

for auld lang syne,

we'll tak' a cup o' kindness yet,

for auld lang syne.