So far it’s been a cool, wet June. But that’s not unusual around here. Some call it Junuary. The forecast is for rain and showers for the next seven days. The bees don’t mind the mild temperatures. They swarm the cat mint and California lilac. Our cat goes bonkers if I weed around the cat mint. When I come inside, he rolls all over me in ecstasy.

I grew up with rainy Junes. Japan has a rainy season, the Plum Rains, 梅-plum 雨-rain, from early June into July. Though instead of being cool, gentle rains, they are hot and muggy, at times torrential rains, Rain pouring so loud, you couldn’t hear yourself think. The frogs love those rains. I remember being kept awake all night by the hot, muggy temperatures and tree frogs quacking up a storm all night long.

Each year the landscape changes. The sequoia we planted fifteen years ago is now a stately tree. It would be nice to see it five hundred, a thousand years from now, the tallest and thickest tree for miles around. Hopefully, no one will cut it down. I could put a plaque on it, “Cursed be the one who fells this tree.” That should work.