Poppy Peepin'

It's been a long time since I last posted. The winter quarter (speaking in academic terms) has been brutal. On top of my regular work I have been teaching a course for a colleague who is out fighting cancer. And I was bringing up a new doctoral program and participating in all the interviews of applicants for it. And I was fighting the university's CFO and Provost on some budget issues related to the new program; their philosophy of budget differs greatly from mine, and I see it as an ethical issue, so I have refused to budge. And on the deepest emotional front, I was signing my mom onto hospice care per the doctor's recommendation, and making a field trip to the nearby cemetery to learn about arrangements and costs, because the hospice paperwork requires that.

I have learned much. 

And there has been neither the emotional reserve or time block to write, which I so much love to do, so there you go.

Sunday mornings tend to be a wee bit slower, so I'm going to take the opportunity to share with my readers a collection of pictures from our recent poppy-peeping trip to Walker Canyon, about 15 miles from our home. The California rains this winter have not only replenished the reservoirs, they've provoked a showing of rare effusion in terms of flowers on the hills and in the deserts. And people are heading out in droves to enjoy them, creating traffic jams all over the place. No gripes, though; this is such a healthy way to spend a day.

It's a good thing we left home early, as there were only about 10 people in the first blanket of poppies we came to. By the time we left there were five times that many.

The highway you see in the distance goes to Las Vegas and Utah to the north, and San Diego to the south.

These sweet little faces are the emblem of California flora. They just get prettier and prettier, the more of them you get together in one place.

We hiked on up the access road into the canyon and rounded the first bend to see a frosting of poppies covering many surfaces ahead of us.

One of the best things about flower color, I think, is when you put complementary colors together. Here's the complement to poppies.

It's like someone pulled out a paintbrush and placed big sweeping strokes of orange on the hillsides.

While husband employed the "big guns," I shot with my phone camera. I do pretty well with the one he's using, but I think it suits his detail-loving temperament to be the guy using the Nikon when we're traveling together.

See what I mean? Complementary colors. Oh, the joy of this feast for the eyes!

Walking further up the fire road we came upon interesting vistas like this one, with the poppies creating almost a highlighting to the folds of the hills.

The southern California landscape is typically dry and golden at best. It was so lovely to see all the green as a background for the blooms.

Nothing prettier than backlit blossoms!

The frilly poppy leaves create a balance of texture for the flowers, I think. Nature is so often just perfect.

Here we are, the happy poppy-peepers--Husband sporting his slouch hat and me sporting my usual chia-pet vibe, de rigeur for getting out and walking together. Our souls full after a couple of hours out in the hills, we headed for home.