Swing In A Tree: drainage

Tuesday, July 14, 2026

“As It Should”

July 2025

Heading out this morning to document the impact on last night’s continual rainfall, my memory dipped back onto a different July deluge that flooded homes of friends and family. That time, the highway construction nearby added debris that dammed huge parts of the drainage ditches designed to take unexpected, heavy rain.

This morning’s walk by those same areas showed everything working as planned. Further into the park, sections normally dry pooled with new swimming areas for our ducks. Some parts, normally sidewalks accessing the lake for fishing, sat submerged. I left feeling confident that all of the predicted weather for the rest of this week will spread out toward the wide banks and lower areas surrounding the park, with the lake, parched from previous droughts, absorbing most of the water.

Everything going as it should.

2025 debris

Monday, June 2, 2025

"Patience"

Jan 2022

            A few years ago, my well-loved mother-in-law plants grew seriously ill with root rot. My own neglect, not moving them into larger pots and replacing their soil, coupled with letting someone else water them for a few weeks after my knee injury resulted in near disaster! I hurried out for pots with drainage and soil with nutrients. Sitting outside in the shade of the live oak tree, with hose in hand, I separated out the rotten parts. With optimism, the original plants went into new, better homes and the undamaged rhizomes settled into different containers with new soil.  All of them went onto the front porch with dappled sunlight. From my original two plants, I propagated a total of eight possible survivors. By Christmas, they all looked healthy enough that I gave away two as gifts for my sister.
  Six of the plants remained with me, coming inside during winter freezes to sit crowded around the front window. Each week, I’d rotate them to make certain they’d get enough light. To be honest, they snaked into the background of other plants around the house. When we decided to move all of our pothos plants from water jugs up high in the kitchen to pots out in the back yard, I placed my mother-in-law plants back on the front porch with confidence that they’d thrive, and they did!
  Gardening takes patience. One plant, place inside or outside, may take several years to mature. Serenity becomes my companion whenever I putter in the gardens. My persistence, though, grows slowly with each new propagation.

June 2024

Original two plants that suffered root rot now thrive and have six healthy offspring!

June 2025

Six new plants from the original 2!