The Summer that Wasn't

 The summer of 2019 was far from the sort of summer I had gotten used to.  It ended with a kind of celebratory hike with my wife up a trail on Sierra Buttes that was new to me. This trail was a steady, uphill hike of about 3 miles along a southern ridge of the Buttes that offers a short side-trip to Volcano Lake.  I had summited the Buttes several times years ago, always approaching from Upper Sardine Lake on the eastern side, and more recently from the Packer Saddle campground, more to the North. Now, at age 78, I don't think climbing the eastern face would be wise.  Our hike, pictured above, on September 21, was a kind of celebration of still being alive, much less able to hike 6 miles on steep terrain, as I began the summer with a week-long stay at Renown Hospital dealing with prostate and kidney failure.  Before that event, which was at the end of May and early June, I hiked with my colleague Dr. Joan Parkin on the Keddie Cascades Trail and spring had not quite arrived.  No flowers or active bugs until the very end when I discovered a little "banana belt" of micro-habitat where a few Leopard Lilies were blooming. Below.  It had been quote a wile since I last posted anything to this blog, and quite a while since I had used my Nikon to take any serious pictures. 

I was looking forward to a summer of exploring and photography and was in denial over some slight symptoms of the medical disaster that lay ahead.


 
 Another springtime stimulus that I captured with my iPhone camera was the Diamond Clarkia at the edge of my driveway.  These beauties have diamond-shaped petal tips, and the overall shape of the inflorescence is also a diamond, or more mathematically correct, a rhombus.  Thus, the scientific name Clarkia rhomboidea.

 Then an oddball caught my eye.  a specimen with only three petals.  I loved it.  Sort of an inverse of the experience of finding a four-leafed clover when they are "supposed" to have only three leafs - or, more correctly, leaflets.

When the resumption of fall semester at FRC was approaching, and I was still toting around a catheter and pee bag, and wondering if I'd be well enough to resume teaching, I spotted this young and innocent ground squirrel on a little-used path behind the gym. Maybe it hadn't yet learned about birds of prey or coyote and mountain lions that inhabit the forests surrounding the college as it didn't immediately disappear down its hole when I approached.  In fact, it let me approach to within a foot with my Nikon and chattered at me a bit before disappearing down its hole. Very pleasant experience.
So, I've had only fragments of the hiking, photographing, and blogging experiences I'm used ot, but am encouraged.  Further encouragement came from cartoonist/artist Brian Fies who visited our classes at FRC a week and a half ago (find The Fies Files) and commented on this blog's most recent post.