We’re seeing the first signs of fall here in Western North Carolina. Thistle and I had our first morning walk requiring a jacket this past week. The maiden’s bower and joe pye weed are blooming. And yes, there’s even a colorful leaf jumping the gun now and again.
Showy Orchis 
Turtlehead Flower
While the LAST flower of the season is typically gentian, the turtle head flowers are also late bloomers. But they LOOK like spring to me. Maybe because they’re so similar to showy orchis which blooms in April. Which got me to thinking about how these two flowers are matching bookends for the blooming season.
It’s been a rough spring and summer in quite a few ways–personally as well as globally. But here we have flowers doing what flowers do when it’s their time. Blooming. And in spite of everything happening in my life and in the world I trust they will do so again next year . . . and the next . . . and life does, indeed, go on.
Ecclesiastes 3:1 – For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven . . .
