properties: one, a mansion built in 1913;
the other, one of the first brick houses
built in Hanover, in the early 1800s.
The older house is the museum house of the Society, restored 45 years ago to as near the original form as possible.
In the yard off the kitchen is a
four-square herb garden. This garden contains four small plots of herbs and other plants divided according to their primary uses.
The plots contain cooking herbs, medicinal plants, perfumery plants, and some used for household upkeep, such as flea bane and tansy. Yesterday, as I was leaving the office next door, I strolled, through drizzling rain, over to the four-square to see which of the perennials were up. I found several mints, one of which turned out to be not mint at all but stinging nettle (I must remember to wear my glasses and some gloves when poking around plants I'm not sure about!), oregano, sage (in bloom), lavender, chives, parsley and some others I didn't recognize. I picked a few to bring home to grace my desk here in the back room. Oh, my! what
wonderful aromas and delightful shapes and colors.
I had to pull a few of the lower leaves from their stems before plunging the bouquet into water.
That's when I noticed something extra on the
underside of a mint leaf. It looked like it
might be SPIDER! web, but without my
glasses, I couldn't be sure. So, I pulled out
one of my favorite things, which I never
lend out - my Bausch and Lomb
three-lens magnifying set.
Turns out, the SPIDER! web is
butterfly eggs. Tiny (half a millimeter),
perfectly round, glistening, pearl-like
embryonic butterflies, stuck to the hairy underside of the mint leaf.
These minute bits of life, secreted from sight of predators and protected from rain by their leafy umbrella, filled me with such profound joy that I forgot
about the nettles still burning in
my hand, and the rainwater dripping down my neck.
Sometimes, it truly is the little things that make us happy, isn't it?
(C)2010 Martha McLemore
16 comments:
Yes,Martha, it IS the small things......
Good post.
Scott
Hello, Scott! Glad to hear from you - I've been concerned you haven't been blogging lately, so I'm very glad you stopped by.
Don't know why I'm paying such attention to the usually unnoticed (by me, at least) things, but doing so makes me happy, happier than I've been in a long time.
Again, I am awfully glad to hear from you.
:)
It's always the little things, as far as I'm concerned. If we lose sight of those, we become numb.
Lovely photos and description, Martha. And I love that magnifying glass!
The big things we can very often do without... the little things are essential.
The infinite lives there.
I know that you are a soup person. Have you tried making nettle soup? Better than it sounds. The leaves lose their sting once softened in butter with chopped onions, cooked and liquidised.
Your post evoked that peculiarity of N. American pronunciation - herbs without the h. One facile (and very unlikely) explanation might be that you are paying tribute to the French but it doesn't wash: you say urbs, they say airb.
KaliDurga: It might be that I lost sight of them, stopped appreciating them, when I became numb.
The numbness is wearing off.
Steve: Yes, they are essential, and usually have the greatest value in the end.
Zhoen: I can believe that! I put the leaf outside, in my mint patch, in a sheltered place. I hope the eggs hatch and they all become the Infinite on Wings.
Plutarch: Your recipe intrigues me. Time to break out the soup kettle...and the leather garden gloves. I'm going to try nettle soup, and will let you know how it turns out.
BB: Your comment explains why I feel out of place in my own country. I don't say 'erbs' - I pronounce the 'h', though everyone else in my family drops it. My home-ec teacher from 9th grade taught us to say it that way.
Oh! I'm going to have a moth and you're going to have butterflies. Between the two of us, Martha, we've got night and day covered this spring.
Impressed by your acuity. Surprised butterflies use mint--the tiny fragrance sacs evolved to burst when insects walked on them, releasing a repellant (that we find so pleasant).
Hello, ER:
Maybe those are butterfly eggs, then, although they certainly look like it.
Is there an insect or moth which does use mint as a nursery? Seems the repellent would serve as a defense for the tiny eggs, perhaps?
Must always remember to look on the underside of things. Gives us a whole different perspective.
I haven't been by in such a long time. So glad I dropped in. Hope your butterflies (or whatever) are doing well...
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