Evanescent – a photo challenge

It’s the Sunday morning on the three-day Memorial Day weekend. The weather forecast for today called for rain, but it appears the rain bands have shifted north and we’ll be rain-free today and, possibly, tomorrow. I walked the backyard this morning in search of peony blooms for this post. The air was thick with humidity, yesterday’s sunny and clear day replaced by low grey clouds. Weather is evanescent, ‘tending to vanish like vapor’ according to Meriam and Webster.

coral is the color – it’s in the front yard and it blooms early

Admittedly, I’d never heard the word, I had heard of effervescent, but not evanescent. I had to look it up in the dictionary. I discovered it is the root of a word that IS part of my vocabulary – vanish.

We’ve had a warm wet spring. I checked the weather page in the Chicago Tribune to confirm what I had suspected – we’ve had almost twice the rain compared to normal. It shows in the blooms. The peonies are about to bloom and coincidentally, I have written about peonies before – two years to the day: Peonies and Time.

Two years. It seems like a long time, but it is evanescent in the scale of a lifetime, or the history of a nation, or the existence of Earth. A speck of time.

As I walked the backyard, I found the peonies at the beginning of their bloom, emerging buds. I had checked the yard yesterday, and this morning several of the buds had had emerged overnight. In the front yard, where there is more sun, the blooms are more advanced. Soon the flower beds will be ablaze with peony blooms, then they’ll be gone, vanished, evanescent.

Tomorrow is Memorial Day, formerly Decoration Day in the United States, it’s a day to honor those Americans who were killed in service to the United States, but it’s much more – and is the subject for tomorrow’s (planned) post. O will march in the parade, her final time with her middle school band. In the fall, she’s off to high school where she plans to march in the band. In a few days, I close the book on another school year. Summer vacation will be upon us.

Evanescent is perfect word to describe the passage of time. Today is gonna be a great day. It already is, so I’d better jump up, jump in, and seize the day. Making the Days Count, one day at a time, one evanescent moment after another.

Be truthful, had you ever heard of the word, evanescent?

Today’s post is inspired by LAST week’s WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge: Evanescent. This challenge is wide open. Evanescent can be any fleeting moment in time. It could be the moment you drop a seed into your garden, marking that promise of new growth to come. It could be a photo of the Eastern Phoebe that visits your deck each day, wagging her tail as she calls her own name. If you’re in the Southern Hemisphere, it could be that carpet of leaves that fell overnight, before the wind scatters them. It might be the moment you light the first fire of Fall.

11 thoughts on “Evanescent – a photo challenge

  1. I admit,I had to check the word in a dictionary too! Lovely photos.

    We too are enjoying a three day weekend – today is our late May Bank Holiday and we have had some glorious weather. Sounds like you had all our rain this spring – surprisingly for the UK it’s been very dry.

    1. thank you for stopping in and being honest…. I am sorry it has taken me so long to reply to your comment…. busy or not, it’s not what Making the Days Count is about.. have a great week and keep making your days count!

    1. thank you for stopping in and being honest… I apologize for he delay in responding to your comment…. busy or not it’s not what Making the Days Count is about.. have a great week and keep making your days count!

  2. GREAT word, Clay! I shall use it somewhere in my writing.

    Enjoy the remainder of the school year and the final performance of your sweet kiddo. I hope high school band is as exciting as she’s hoping. You can never go wrong with music.

    Happy Memorial/Decoration Day!! See you next week.

    Patricia Rickrode
    w/a Jansen Schmidt

    1. Thank you! She (O) got news last night she made drum line – she was very excited. I have our parade spot ready and am waiting for the parade to make it to me… near the finish and strategically parked to pick up the drums and the marcher! Have a wonderful day.

    1. ovided a colorful backdrop for the yard. I feel the same way about the south – the Gulf coast of Texas. Bugs, humidity, and snakes but weather warm enough for being outdoors year-round. I suppose it’s all relative. I enjoy following your chronicles as you migrate from one place to another enjoying the fruits of every season. Have a wonderful day – peace.

Thanks for visiting MtDC. How are YOU Making YOUR Days Count?