Lessons Learned in the Garden on Mother's Day (Mother may know best.)

It is Mother's Day, and my seeing my Paeonia suffriticosa (Tree Peony) enjoying its friends is cause for a pleasure to be shared — probably like a pleasure mothers have in taking photographs of their children and sharing them proudly with anyone and everyone who is kind enough to view them — as you are, dear reader, in viewing my chronology of this season's Paeonia suffriticosa and other things that are flourishing in my urban terrace garden. 

My Paeonia suffriticosa is truly enjoying her friends, as evidenced in the photograph posted above, which shows a view of the most southwest corner of my terrace garden. It appears to me that my Paeonia suffriticosa is bending down, to give my Fancy Leaf Coral Bells aka Heuchera 'Marmalade' a kiss; a kiss much like the kiss I gave my sister soon after she was born, and a gesture that inspired my mother to take the photograph posted below of yours truly with my younger sister —

— a woman I've blogged about in a previous post and where the same photograph is posted.

Meanwhile, as you can see in the "group" photograph at the top of this post, even though my Paeonia suffriticosa is kissing my  Coral Bells, they are hiding between my Farfugium Japonicum, or 'Cristata', as her friends call her ('Cristata' can be seen in the lower left portion of this photograph, but you may remember her from a previous post), and my Tulips which are just in front of a rod iron stand that supports a clay pot that is home to my Rubius calycindes (Ornamental Raspberry), who as you may recall can be a real Diva as the growing season moves forward.

Additionally in the upper right hand corner (of the picture at the top of this blog post), please note the "hint" of the magnificent burgundy color of my Continus Coggygria, whose burgundy leaves provide a beautiful setting to show off my Paeonia suffriticosa, a detail not lost on her, as she basks in her glory, enjoying the company and contrast of my Continus Coggygria (Smoke Bush) as evidenced in the photograph posted below — another photograph of kissing shrubs.

My Paeonia suffriticosa isn't always this loving toward her comrades, and they surely need to wait until she wipes the sleep from her eyes — an image I captured when she was'nt looking (seen below) before she gives them any kisses.

This image of my sleepy-time friend really makes me think of my mother, who constantly had a camera in her hand during my early years of childhood, and took pictures of my sisters and me doing anything and everything, which is a fact that I wrote about in a blog entry titled, Thoughts on the Creators of Photo Albums, this past December. 

Even though it seems I have many photographs of my garden, the fact is I don't alway enjoy taking pictures of it because I am too busy just enjoying the moment of my herbs, plants, shrubs and trees that bring such light to my life, something I often wished my mother would do instead of being behind her Kodak Instamatic.

But, on this Mother's Day, I've learned something, and like my flowers, I've grown too. What I have learned is this: while indeed sometimes the camera can be a barrier between a photographer and his/her subject, when I see the pictures coming into my computer from my Memory Card, I am thrilled — reliving the joy I captured. So today, I give out a shout to my mom — and to all moms who spend time behind the camera, capturing relationships and preserving memories for all time.