Posted in Beautiful Savannah, Humor

Always Leave Room

This is a fairly long post, so you might want to put on some comfortable shoes and grab a snack.

Yesterday Robert and I visited the most SPECTACULAR garden center hideaway here in the greater Savannah area: Savannah’s Secret Garden.

But wait. Let me back up a second.

On Monday, we went over to the backyard of our friends and fellow church members Pat and Mary Prokop.

“Hmm, why their back yard?” you are surely asking. “Won’t they let you inside their house?”

Well, because they (primarily Pat) are incredible gardeners of flowers and vegetables (and friends).

Now I’m going to plagiarize a bit from HR‘s recent blog post about the same garden party.

But first he is forcing me to include the link to HIS blog post about the garden party.

SKIP OVER IT VERY QUICKLY SO YOU WON’T READ HIS BEFORE MINE!

Whew!


The plagiarism: Pat and Mary open up their garden each Memorial Day weekend to be enjoyed by all: gardeners, garden lovers, photographers, solar panel enthusiasts, astronomers (all Prokop hobbies). Sit a spell under a cool patio with fans and cold drinks, pet the garden cat “Grizabella” who roams freely (yes, from the “Cats” Broadway play).

A few of my photos from the garden party:

All the dahlias are darling! But this off-white beauty is my favorite.

While we were sitting in the shade, chatting with Pat, Mary and guests, for some reason HR (Husband Robert for any newbie readers) brought up the pitiful fact (pitiful since we were sitting in a glorious backyard garden) that he and I only have some potted plants and a tiny tree lawn in front of our place in downtown Savannah. But that we are looking to plant some milkweed to draw the butterflies!

“Then you HAVE to go to Savannah’s Secret Garden!” one of the guests immediately exclaimed!

“Wow,” a secret garden,” I thought. “Then I wonder how you ever find the place.”

Next my mind wondered a while back to when young actor/singer/grandson Daniel played the part of Colin in the Savannah Children’s Theater production of The Secret Garden and I presented him with an “Academy Award” …

“Neal!” Robert (rudely) interrupted my yesteryear thoughts, “Let’s remember to go to Savannah‘s Secret Garden to look for milkweed.”

Fast-forward (backward?) to yesterday, which indeed found us at the delightfully hidden-away secret garden nursery.

We spent about an hour meandering around the lovely place …

… until we finally came across this secluded little corner … filled with the cutest Faires!

HR was mesmerized!

Moral of the story:

Oh, and here’s our marvelous milkweed …

Always leave room!

Posted in Beautiful Savannah

There’s a Story Here Somewhere

Walking through Savannah’s Colonial Park Cemetery this morning with HR, we came across this bench.

There has to be a story somewhere. Is the story’s central character Mary Helen Ray, whose name is on the bench?

Or maybe one of the nearly 700 folks who died during a yellow fever epidemic in Savannah: “The most macabre bit of history involves a subtly tweaked fact on a historical marker about the yellow fever. According to the marker, ‘nearly 700’ victims of the 1820 yellow fever epidemic were buried in a mass grave, but historical records allegedly show that exactly 666 people are buried in the grave. Nearly 700, indeed.” savannahnow.com.

Here’s a link to an interesting story about Colonial Park Cemetery: 

https://www.savannahnow.com/story/lifestyle/2021/08/04/savannah-history-cemeteries-colonial-park-yellow-fever-deaths-graves/5476392001/#

Oh, and for extra credit, here is Robert sitting in a bunch of ginkgo biloba leaves at one of the entrances to Colonial Park Cemetery …

That’s probably a story in itself.

Posted in Beautiful Savannah

Winter Morning Stroll

Winter’s Chill here in Savannah (28 the other night — COLD FOR US!) can’t hold back downtown’s blooming colors.

Columbia Square

Winter azaleas

Reynolds Square

And the delightful winter yellow blooms of the Tractor Seat plant (Farfugium japonicum)

And don’t forget the camellias.

Robert, look what I found on the ground!

May you find pretty sometime today.

Posted in Beautiful Savannah

Seriously? Seriously!

So early this evening, Robert and I went for a walk along the Savannah River a few blocks from our place.

There’s a fairly new development along this evening’s trek, “Eastern Wharf” …

Eastern Wharf is the lower right quadrant of this photo.

Their advertising is obviously meant for “non-early-evening casual walkers” …

Seriously?

The only thing I saw that was worth $3 Mil to $9 Mil was the Stunning Sunset …

Seriously!

May you have a joyful million dollar view soon.

Posted in Beautiful Savannah, Issues with Race

“I (Still) Have A Dream.”

One of my favorite Savannah squares (we have 22 in all) here in my Historic District neighborhood is Greene Square, just a few minutes walk from our place.

See the building behind the lamp post and the centuries-old live oak tree?

It’s the Second African Baptist Church, founded in 1802.

And one of my favorite places to sit and read is that little wooden bench in the lower right hand corner of the photo above. See it?

Here I am sitting and reading a couple of nights ago.

Oh, if buildings could talk!

But wait, they can!

Listen …

visitsavannah.com

AMERICAN HERO MARTIN LUTHER KING JR. FIRST PREACHED HIS ICONIC “I HAVE A DREAM” SPEECH RIGHT HERE.

May we continue to have and share his dream.

Posted in Beautiful Savannah, Where Happiness Finds You

Subtle Magic

As I have said, probably far too many times on this blog, I love living in downtown Historic District Savannah.

And one of the reasons? The beautifully unique twenty-two extant squares (two were lost to “progress”).

[Did I punctuate the above properly?]

This evening I am hanging out in Warren Square, the square closest to my own, Washington Square.

Hello!

This house is not mine.

Those houses are not mine.

But the sidewalk is.

Yes.

And that magic is free.

Posted in Beautiful Savannah

Shipshape: “And I Sleep”

One of the unexpected joys of living in Savannah’s Historic District, just a couple of blocks from the mighty Savannah River, has been regularly seeing (and hearing) the massive cargo and container ships making their way into our busy port.

The Port of Savannah, the nation’s third largest seaport, is special because the ships leave the Atlantic Ocean, navigate their way inland about 15 miles to downtown Savannah, and pass directly in front of our busiest tourist strip on River Street …

It’s always fun to be on a walk along the river when a huge ship comes into view and watch the shell-shocked tourists gaping at the ships’ sizes.

Here’s a short video from last year when the largest container ship EVER came to Savannah.

And here are a few random shots of ships Robert and I have enjoyed seeing as we walked along the river.

Just the other night …

My shadow and HR

Others …

But, perhaps somewhat weirdly, the greatest Ship Joy of all to me is SOUND.

Robert and I will be in bed (most commonly with HR peacefully asleep and me slowly, slowly heading in that direction). But all of a sudden I will hear it. And perk up. Sometimes even sit up.

From a few blocks away, down on the river. The night ships. The sonorous, plaintive, somehow both exuberant and unexplainably sad horn, sounding from the ship, finally, finally making its way, exhausted, from who knows where into our little city … and past the sleepy little dwelling of Neal and HR.

Listen …

And somehow, that sound, time and time again, makes me realize that we can get from Where We Are … to Where We Need to Be. To a port of rest, to a place of quiet. To a place of, at least temporarily, no more movement.

And I sleep.

Posted in Beautiful Savannah

I Can’t Help It …

… I know I’ve already posted my Five Friday Happy Bringers today, but I just got back from a late afternoon walk in my neighborhood here in Historic District Savannah, and I MUST show you what I saw …

The azaleas are just glorious this spring late winter.

The church spires kept urging me to look heavenward.

But there is just so much beauty here below!