A sage plant sits on either side of my driveway entrance, a third sits opposite my kitchen window along the north fence, and a fourth sits behind the big oaks, ostensibly to block the view from the street of the space behind the workroom. They are all, in gloriously, flourishing full bloom, purple delights, beneficiaries of coolish summer weather and rain.

They’re the hill country replacements for the coral vine I left behind on the Gulf Coast. I need my summer color. The sage do the trick and they love the persistent rain. More is coming this week. Of course, it’s one of those things that have to be seen to be believed, and I’m blessed to see them in little bits throughout the course of a day, leaving and coming home, taking out the trash, that sort of thing. It’s oddly personal.

A garden, a yard, is like a painting that changes color with the sun and the day, one bit’s up, one bit’s down, with memory blending the pieces into a single vision. You live in it. It lives in you. I noticed the other day that one of the coral sage beneath the big oaks is nearly head high, an oddity for sure, with blooms still to come. And the Barbados Cheery is flush, with its color on the horizon, too. But the sage is today’s show, rich with life and color, and the gardener is happy he brought them home.