late February

The skies have been incredible of late. This one was above city hall in San Francisco in the second week of February. I have been more than a little obsessed with the buds and the trees.

Spring really starts in February in California, sometimes as early as January if there isn't a lot of rain. It seems counter intuitive like you need rain for spring to come, but not in California. The air gets warmer and this happens:

Even though there are many buds, there are still trees that look like this:

Then there was this tree that looked like an unfinished sculpture.  It was irresistible with its roots pretending to be molten lava.

Of course, rain makes everything more interesting. Just ask the folks who had to evacuate San Jose last week. San Jose! Rain is a strange and powerful thing.

It brings out all the mushrooms and gathers the pretty leaves everywhere.

It creates sculptures on the leaves of the succulents.

Rainy Days Poetry Thursday

The pretty Rain from those sweet Eaves
Her unintending Eyes —
Took her own Heart, including ours,
By innocent Surprise —

The wrestle in her simple Throat
To hold the feeling down
That vanquished her — defeated Feat —
Was Fervor's sudden Crown —

Emily Dickinson

The sky last night

We were waiting for rain, again.

This is what I saw when I got to my office yesterday afternoon. By 8pm, it was pouring. And my dad was plotting what he would do with buckets of water he hoped to collect.