The air outside my house is in an agitated state. Through my back window the mesquite whips about as does the Sumac and the trees along the far fence line.

I finally got around to trimming back the deadwood of the once vibrant Barbados Cherry. Turns out, it’s cherries, as in multiple plants.

The morning glory, bought at a little shop in Blanco, began its life with us on the fence behind the eve’s necklace and mountain laurels. They were short, the fence was tall, and the morning glory thrived.

The Barbados cherry will become a shorter plant today. Over the years it had managed to become a nice shrubby bush, about four feet tall.

Spring is like the movie you love to watch over and over, with every appearance a director’s cut so that there is always something new to see.

There is nothing like a night of music with friends, the drive home, and falling into bed, tired and happy only to be notified around 1:30 a.m. that you forgot to put the cat out.

Happy days in the gardens. Everything is growing, blooming, or getting ready to bloom. Even the pansies that I put in for winter color are having a go at spring.

Lavender. An unassuming star of our gardens. Star in the sense that it needs little water, has a lovely foliage color, and grows well in a relaxed sort of way.

Several years back I planted some walker’s low catmint. It did well. But since the southern garden on the back porch has a slope to it, the catmint migrated down hill. Natural thing to do.

Hackberries are the plague of my gardens. We live close to the wilds, there are lots of hackberries there, and lots of birds to eat their fruit. The birds visit our trees. Poop the digested seeds. Hackberries sprout.

On Monday, they play the finals. A Baptist school will play a Catholic school for the national title, and I still remember when John F. Kennedy had to convince a group of Protestant ministers it would be okay to elect a Catholic president.

The front flower beds flanking the drive are now trim and neat. The cactus is gone, twist leaf yuccas, sotol, and Sage have the stage all to themselves.

It’s possible, even, to imagine the tree thinking. Shutting down it’s systems when the cold hit, pulling back, going into survival mode. Making decisions. Moving energy here and there.

Roots. You put them down, you dig them up. They run deep. My two cacti, for instance, were happy where they lived. They put down some serious roots.

A new book is in the works. The Seasons: A Caregiver’s Tale. It will be a nature book about the hill country from the vantage point of my little home, which is a tiny spot, but so was Walden Pond, and I’m making no comparative claims, except that you can sit in one place and think.

Like an old dog, I stood in the sun yesterday and did nothing. Three times.

Once again, it’s the small things. Went on a tour of the yard yesterday with my son, the arborist, and discovered the Mexican Buckeyes are blooming. Delicate little flowers, and another spring joy …

The marie pavia roses are going to need a pruning. But I’m going to let them reveal where the cuts need to come.

The spineless cacti in the beds on either side of the drive are as limp as melted butter. The recent freeze did them no favors. But the peach tree. Oh, my. In a day or two, I do believe it will put a redbud to shame.

It’s always the small things. They make or break things. Relationships. Jobs. Moods.