An Embarrassment of Riches

Mr. Moon went out hunting this morning and I went out gathering.

Although it's seventy-something degrees here, it's overcast and the wind is blowing. The windchimes are playing music all over the place and the magnolia tree's stiff, glossy leaves are making a rattling music of their own.

And it's supposed to get back down into the twenties by tomorrow night.

Ah well.

Last night, when we went out on the front porch to have our Friday happy hour drink, I noticed that the Sea Foam Camellia, which I transplanted here from the last place I lived, was FULL of flowers. Unbelievable.

So this morning I went out and cut them all because they're going to be brown and dead and hanging from their bush-mother in forty-eight hours if I don't. Now they're gracing my hallway, along with a few pink ones from the back yard. I do not know their name and I feel shame at that. What kind of an old Southern Lady Gardener am I if I don't even know the names of my camellias?

Not a very good one. Not a BONA FIDE one, I'll tell you that. Did you know that bona fide is two words? I didn't either. But I see by the dictionary that it is, and it comes from the Latin meaning, "in good faith."

For my favorite useage ever of the word(s) bona fide please check out the following:



And, to get us back to camellias, I give you this:



It's Saturday, the wind is blowing a coldness our way, the camellias are posing in their petticoats in my house. A train is going by, scattering the birds with its sound, and I am happy.

Oh. Mr. Moon was as successful in his hunting as I was in my gathering and brought home meat.

Children, that man is bona fide.