I’ve mentioned Spring Beauty before; a tiny flower no more than about 5/8 inch across (don’t you just love our SAE system of weights and measurements?), it never-the-less has a big place in my heart as a perennial visitor to the park. In fact, these little blooms are all over the park: between the Central Fields and the Steinberg Rink, around the edges of the Central Fields and next to the upper Muny parking lot. And there are a lot on the grassy knoll between the Zoo and the successional forest by the Jewel Box. It was there that I wandered today, lying in the grass and looking up at the clouds, working to get a bug’s eye view of the carpet of flowers that lay all around me.
There were a lot of other people in the park today, but most of them were motoring through, on their way to someplace much less interesting. It does make you think, though; what could be better than lying on the grass watching the clouds scoot by? Wouldn’t our time be better spent contemplating cerulean skies than the back of another motorist’s automobile? Isn’t the sweet sound of birds shouting “Mine! It’s mine, all mine!” in their inimitable bird fashion, preferable to the honk of horns and the endless cycle of top 40 tunes on the radio? Breathe the fresh aroma of leaves and grass instead of the noxious stench of gas fumes and auto exhaust for a change, right here in the oasis of the city. That’s what I did, being one of the few folks not in a hurry to be somewhere else. Follow the road less traveled by.
Spring Beauty, much larger than life sized. Click image for more photos.