266: Dogwood evolution

April 30, 2011

To see a hillside white with dogwood bloom is to know a particular ecstasy of beauty, but to walk the gray Winter woods and find the buds which will resurrect that beauty in another May is to partake of continuity.

~ Hal Borland

Although I don’t have photos of the dogwood tree from the winter months, April was such a gloomy, rainy, chilly month that it at least qualifies as being gray (as in walking “the gray Winter woods” in the quote).  Posting every day has given us all a chance to see things as they unfold.  I thought it would be interesting to see the unfolding in one post.

May 10, 2011

May 10, 2011. Processed in Picnik (using Cross Processing, which is what gives the flowers a yellowish coloring).

After all, I don’t see why I am always asking for private, individual, selfish miracles when every year there are miracles like white dogwood.

~ Anne Morrow Lindbergh

May 19, 2011

Look at the trees, look at the birds, look at the clouds, look at the stars… and if you have eyes you will be able to see that the whole existence is joyful.  Everything is simply happy.  Trees are happy for no reason; they are not going to become prime ministers or presidents and they are not going to become rich and they will never have any bank balance.  Look at the flowers — for no reason.  It is simply unbelievable how happy flowers are.

~ Osho

June 13, 2011

I have gotten to know the dogwood better over the past few months.  Not in the sense that I can spout factoids about the tree, the flowers, and its uses (although I can tell you that the wood is prized for making loom shuttles, tool handles, walking canes, longbows, mountain dulcimers, and other small items that require a strong, hard wood).  I know it better as an inhabitant of our land and woods, one that brightens up its little space by the side of the pond every spring, its delicate white flowers bringing joy and the hope of spring.

See you tomorrow when I return from my at-home retreat.

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