I almost feel like a fraud, these days, participating in the gardening threads. I mostly only can reflect on "Gardening Past." Most of my gardening is fantasy and daydreams about what I would do if I had time, these days.

However, I am very grateful that I confidently know all of my dear gardening friends on these threads will continue to welcome me. You can't know how grateful I am for that.

My Johnny's catalog arrived mid-November. It is the best reading and daydreaming book ever, as far as I am concerned.

Just home from spending New Year's with my parents. Snow hit up there before I had the chance to get their front garden cleaned up, but the ground was clear when I arrived Friday night. I had hoped to cut back all the frost-killed perennials, pull out the annuals, and pinch the pansies over the weekend, but it was too rainy to get out there and do garden clean-up. I noticed the irises had never been cut back. I'll be back up there in a couple or three weeks, and will be sure to do that so the iris borers don't have an opportunity in spring.

Yesterday I reflected that in years past, my New Year's tradition was to plant more spring bulbs. Haven't done that in 3 years now. Hopefully, the day will come again.

If you will bear with me for a moment, Melonoma is very erratic in it's growth. Since Thanksgiving, and especially in the last week, Dad is increasingly fatigued, sleeping much more, and his appetite has radically dropped off. He could plateau, however. Maybe he will live to see the early spring bulbs bloom one more time, and the pansies come on strong. It would be verging on miraculous if he saw the first of the roses bloom, but it could happen. Or he may be entering a steep decline and be gone within the next 3-4 weeks. He so loves spring and the flower and veggie garden in spring. I so much long for him to see at least part of one more spring. I don't know if he longs for the same or not. Our conversations recently focus being be grateful for each moment in the now, and what needs to happen to assure Mom is attended to once he dies. He considers anticipatory nostalgia to be This week I am going to start a planter indoors with seeds of lettuce and spring greens and onion sets. Maybe I will carry it to him, and maybe I won't. An early indoors planter is a sorry excuse for the season of early Spring, and his world and concerns are getting smaller and smaller by the day.

Once it sprouts, if it seems it might brighten his last days, I'll carry it on up to West Virginia. Otherwise, I will set it outside here in late February or March, and reflect on how much Daddy would approve each time I harvest a little salad.

Thanks for listening.