Clematis and Rue

In a desire to make life less complicated,

I'm using my phone to take more pictures.

Remember, R.H. has been my cameraman most of the time.

He gets better quality but I know what I want in the frame.

And the poor man is often pooped after a day at work.

The last thing he needs is a list of things I want photographed.

I clipped one spray of clematis.

It was all I could reach without a ladder.

I don't climb ladders anymore.

Oscar Wilde wrote this about clematis:

"In a month there will be purple stars on the clematis,

and year after year the green night of its leaves

will hold its purple stars."

That's lovely but his The Picture of Dorian Gray

sounds far too depressing for me to enjoy.

I also clipped a few sprigs of rue,

an astringent herb

that reminds me of a book I love,

Elizabeth Goudge's Pilgrim's Inn, 

the middle book in Goudge's trilogy

of the Eliot family.

In Pilgrim's Inn, the Eliot family moves to an old inn

called The Herb of Grace, referring to rue,

Herb of Grace O' Sunday is its old fashioned name.

Doesn't this herb remind us of Rue

from An Old-Fashioned World?

Here's another vase I arranged in my bedroom,

some pretty pink astilbe.

And Nora is perfect with the pink astilbe,

don't you think?

I'm seeking a less complicated world.

Taking pictures with my phone is one change.

There will be more.

Everything doesn't have to be perfect, does it?