Here’s another picture from my spring morning churchyard stroll, posted about earlier. There’s something simply charming about the plain white door, neat sidewalk, plush bed of Vinca Minor, Periwinkle ground cover.
It was a perfect morning, very calming. I sat beside the Vinca Bed for some time, contemplating these crazy times. The solitude, except for the melodic songs of birds, gave me hope.
Wizz-Wazz, the donkey is the star of this story, and also a suspect in M. C. Beaton’s latest Agatha Raisin series installment, Beating About the Bush. Agatha forms a strange relationship with the animal who resides at the headquarters of a company with which Raisin Investigations has a contract.
Aging detective Agatha and her protégée, young, blonde Toni experience some relationship tension, but artfully work together with Agatha’s long time friend and policeman Bill Wong, and the investigation company’s other team members to solve the case.
Agatha is in possibly the greatest danger ever, as the case comes together.
Roy Silver, Agatha’s former protégée from her years in public relations, now a talented promotions man himself, arrives in time to assist with Agatha’s PR needs, relative to the murder investigation.
Sir Charles Fraith, with whom Agatha has an off/on relationship, is planning to marry a girl from a family of means, in order to gain cash to keep his estate running. The prospect has Agatha in a tizzy, but she is distracted from the distress by the attentions of Chris, a talented mechanic she meets through the case upon which she is focused.
A topsy-turvy fun and enchanting mystery in classic M.C. Beaton, style.
Springtime seems to finally be coming to the Midwest. This lovely seasonal view of a normally mundane parking lot seemed so unique I wanted to share. A momentary distraction from the recent worries we all face.
Science has never drummed up quite as effective a tranquilizing agent as a sunny spring day
– W. Earl Hall
Soon their branches will be filled with leaves, but for now these giants stand silhouetted against a spring sunset. This country road I take fairly often is one of most rustically scenic in the area.
Buttercups are symbols of childishness and ingratitude according to The Complete Language of Flowers by Sheila Pickles.
I don’t get the ingratitude part, but they do remind me of being a child, of finding true delight, amazement, boundless energy to explore woods and fields when spring pulls back the curtain of winter clouds, revealing a world of green and gold, the color of buttercups.
I remember when I first discovered these flowers, when I was about ten, hiding in a low spot in the field behind our house. I visited them there each spring, then one year transplanted some to the northwest corner of our house, where they grew reliably for years.
I also recall a kid’s book I probably still have in the depths of a closet, I think the title was Around and About Buttercup Farm.
It is said that buttercup juice blisters the skin but that it’s also been used as a remedy to cure gout and rheumatism, and, as a tincuture, to cure shingles and sciatica. (Don’t try any of those cures at home, or anywhere.)
This verse by Thomas Campbell (1774-1844) takes me back to childhood springs:
Field Flowers
By Thomas Campbell
Ye field flowers! The gardens eclipse you, ‘tis true:
Yet, wildlings of nature! I dote upon you,
For ye waft me to summers of old,
When the earth teemed around me with fairy delight,
And when daisies and buttercups gladdened my sight
Like treasure of silver and gold.
