it’s finally here!

direct from my garden’s recent past, in no particular order of ranking except that of the sun’s path across the earth’s sky, i hereby present to you The Best Flowers Of 2025:

january

february

march

april

may

june

july

august

september

october

november

december

bonus bouquet

this year in the garden, i spent less time.

for the first month of the year i was in another country, then i came home and was sick a lot, then i traveled for work a lot. there are always reasons. and also, it’s okay. the garden is still there. it will be there whether i am or not. whether i recognize it as “a garden” or not.

in May the roses came on strong, all at once and early, and by late June they were already done. the second flush was less a flush than a steady flow, none of the “i can smell it from the house” wow factor of a full-season onslaught of roses, but also fewer of those “no blooms! at all!” moments mid-July. and it kept on that way. in general it was a cold and grey summer here in coastal NorCal and things were… understated.

not understated were the bald-faced hornets, who in August began building a massive and intricately architected nest in the old, no-longer-fruiting plum tree in the backyard. it was unmistakable right away, when Max noticed it and texted me a picture with a text reading something like “wasps? :-0”. they were not wasps, these brawny worker hornets would look at wasps and laugh. the nest kept growing all season, until it was an acorn-shaped paper scroll of an apartment complex filled with generations of lil’ stinging guys — probably 2.5 feet tall at best guess? but i didn’t really want to get too close. (for the same reason, i have no photos.) we saw the hornets soon after - not bald at all, and definitely big, and i read a lot about them on the internet and got scared.

in yet another year of death and difficulty worldwide, it seemed to me one cruelty too many to pay a dude $400 to come in the night and kill them all (which is how to get rid of them - he would sneak up on the nest, wrap a garbage bag around it, throw poison in there and seal them into their Hefty tomb). the nest was just far enough away from the house to make it not necessary to remove, and money, ugh, and so the rest of my year in the garden was spent furtively glancing in the direction of the plum tree every few minutes, avoiding eye contact with it.

in the months that are usually hot but instead this year brought autumn rain (?!) crisp 68-degree perfection, my halfhearted routines of gardening and lounging and just passing through the yard became truly meditative acts, as i necessarily worked to avoid any sudden, loud, or percussive movements, even in my own respiratory system. anyway, everyone made it through fine, although for all the hornets but the queen “making it through” the season means dying as soon as cold weather sets in. whew, a year-long lifespan makes perennial flowers seem even more immortal than they already do.

late last month i went for a long hike on the Sonoma coast and saw lupines and wild roses blooming—in November!—but sometimes they do that. we forgot to plant bulbs in the fall, sometimes we do that. and so instead of dreams of future gardens, i’m working on having memories at all, today.

but in the future, perhaps:

more flower pics -
i’m trying to quit social media (for real, this time, i swear) so may be bringing some of the imagery i often post there over to this venue. i.e., MOAR FLOWERS N WAVES.

more stories -
i’ve been acquiring and editing some great stuff, both fiction and non, for my new gig at ZYZZYVA lately, and it will be making its way to mailboxes and newsstands very soon. the journal is only readable in print. i know that might sound confusing but, see, the way it works is, you hold in your hands, in real life, and it enters your eyeballs and goes directly into your brain, and from there it trickles down into your heart and body and it never leaves. amazing stuff, literature. and it’s really quite inexpensive; you should probably subscribe.

more ventures -
don’t you love it when creative professionals post things like, “i have news coming soon that i can’t talk about but it’s very exciting and you’ll want to know about it but there’s nothing you can do right now to further said news, so basically i’m just teasing this info for no real actionable reason and to assuage my own inner anticipatory ego”? well, yes, that. (no, it’s not a new book, although i’m working on that, too, bird by fucking bird, but it’s something else very dear to my heart that will likely be of interest to readers of this here newsletter.) so, don’t move that dial. (Don’t make me explain what a dial is.) and if you are somehow reading this newsletter and you are not yet subscribed, make sure you remedy that!

more #lifegoals -
one of my favorite things about visiting rose gardens is reading all the names of all the varietals. if you could name a rose, what would it be? in reality, if given the opportunity i’d probably name one after my dad, but if given additional chances to practice this most whimsical aspect of the botanical scientific process, i might go for something more like a phrase. lately i’ve been enamored of “free and easy wanderer”, which is also the name of a Traditional Chinese Medicine herbal formula i’m taking. hopefully it’ll do what it says on the tin.

‘til soon,
keep loving/keep fighting