Less green I see

That hard frost last month really kicked my psychological rear end.  The mango tree doesn't seem like it's going to come back.  The dwarf poinciana was just starting to leaf out, and now (almost two months later) there is no sign of life. We pulled out two huge ixora and will miss their constant flowering.  The bougainvillea are bare and bony.  We disagree on what to do about that.  I say cut it way back and either it survives or not.  Tom is less violent than me.   

I cut the crotons back, and one of the plants has new sprouts, but at the bottom.  I fear 12 years of growth is lost and we must start again. Sheesh! I'm not sure I even have 12 more years. The cabbage palms (native) survived just fine, but I notice some of the more exotic palms in other yards are still brown and limp. I'm beginning to understand these Southern plants a little after 12 years of befuddlement and wonder.  They are not meant for that kind of cold, and they like a little sand in the soil. How should I proceed to replace the dead, not knowing if the hard freeze was a fluke or a portent of things to come?  Native plants!

Gardening is different down here. I lived in the north for 62 years, and I appreciated the death and rebirth of the flora. I enjoyed and then managed the cold and snow as one must. Spring was pure magic as old friends poked up through the soil. They were hardy, magnificent, and I trusted them to come back.  Like I said, it is different here in Central Florida.  Still, the bromeliads, azaleas and cannas survived!  Actually, quite a bit might grow back, and it has been fun reimagining some of these garden beds.  I need to trust a bit more.  Everything is going to be okay.  

a bromeliad bloom

Changing people's minds

When I was an employee union organizer a million years ago, I was taught that there are two kinds of belief systems.  

One is rational/intellectual.  If you provide the proof and facts, then you can change the mind of a person like this.  

The other kind of belief system is simply belief - not based on facts, just based on what a person “believes” in their heart to be true because of how they were raised, or taught, or just want to believe.  This is the tough one - you have to grab people like this by the heart in order to change their minds.  It hard because it upends their entire belief system, and they don’t necessarily want that to change.  

Persuasion is very tricky, and requires a lot of listening and appealing to other parts of their belief system (love, faith, and other non-rational beliefs that guard their mind from change.)  

Cold

It is actually cold in Central Florida right now. It was 26 degrees F (-3 degrees C) when I woke up this morning at 8:00. I have yet to do the walk around to see what survived this bitter night, but the azalea's out the back door look pretty sad. The flowers are on the ground, or hanging limp. They are spent. We'll see if the buds are lost over the next week.  

Still, I remember the first killing frost of years gone by in Upstate New York.  Everything was beautifully alive in the evening and frozen dead the next morning.  This wasn't that.