Sweet Gum

As Xris pointed out on the recent tree tour, Liquidambar sytaciflua reveals a surprisingly acrobatic spectrum of colors this time of year.

River Birch and Shadblow

Two more trees featured in last Saturday's Victorian Flatbush Tree Tour, at top the bark of a River Birch, one of the few trees whose trunk elicits the word plush, and the salmon-colored leaves of the Shadblow or Serviceberry. Xris explained the tree is named for coming back to life so early in the spring, blooming when the Shad spawn, when the newly thawed earth permits the undertaker's shovel.

Long Straight Road

Coney Island Avenue is alternately fascinating and depressing, and last Saturday, returning from the tree tour, I realized that it is no more depressing in gloom than in the sun. A stone's throw from the flat and vast Avenue that leads to the Atlantic is genteel Victorian Flatbush, which, for all its picturesqueness, looks much better in fair weather.

Argyle St. London Plane

On the Sustainable Flatbush tree tour led by the Flatbush Gardener Chris Kreussling and Tracey Hohman, we passed this ancient London Plane with an appetite for metal.

Naturam expellas furca tamen usque recurret: You can throw out Nature with a pitchfork, but she'll always turn up again.

Pre-K and Irises

My head's been spinning from how bizarre things have been lately. My daughter got an acceptance letter for a Pre-K program, but when I went in to confirm her spot, I was told she might not wind up with it in the long run. The poor parent coordinator was so aggrieved that she might have to take away the "lollipop" the board of ed had just served us.

Ugh.

...But aren't the irises lovely these days? This one was growing on Matthew's Court in Victorian Flatbush. There were some at Lonelyville so purple they nearly broke my camera.

I'm off to a weekend in Wildwood for the wedding party of a High School friend. And already feeling toasted.