There are some things that, to me, say country. It’s not always something that is necessarily in the country but something that when I see it invokes in me that sense of peace that I get when I’m actually in the country…
Sunflowers… no matter their setting they lower my blood pressure and induce an immediate relaxation of tension.
The fact that this particular sunflower is growing up by a weathered wood post only enhances my relaxation.
An old pump, child size rocker frame next to it or not, sitting in the garden makes me want to make it into a water feature because when I was a child I loved to pump the handle and get the water to come out. I found it fascinating to watch especially when the sun was just right the water looked like little streams of diamonds yet make a little move one way or the other and I found rainbows.
Phlox… I’ve always seen phlox around the homes and barns or sheds in the country. Maybe because once it gets started growing it requires no care and farmers and ranchers wives found some joy in the beautiful colors when their chores and chasing after children might prevent them, time-wise, from planting a decorative type of garden.
Iris or, as a lot of country folk call them, flags. Especially along fence lines. If you go for a drive most anywhere in Oklahoma or Texas and I imagine other states also you will see iris that have naturalized growing along the fence lines, usually leaning toward the ditches along the sides of the 2 lane roads. They not only invoke a deep, relaxing breath from me, they also make me want to come back in the night and dig ‘em up to put in my own garden. It doesn’t matter if I know that the property has been abandoned long ago and no one would really care if I dug up a few it gives me a funny feeling kind of like I’d be stealing.
What’s weird is I’m the same way about rocks, whether in a ditch or along a creek which is one of those really weird quirks of mine. It’s like displacing something that was put there by a power greater than myself and they aren’t mine. What weird things does that say about me? I mean I have rocks that we picked up when I was a child and on family vacation to California that are from the Petrified Forest, for Pete’s sake… Of course way back then it was not illegal to pick them up and they’ve been in my family for so many years I look after them like I do my favorite memories.
Like old wagon wheels leaning up against the house with flowers growing up through the spokes.
Succulents growing in fissures and holes in rocks.
And wildflowers that grow most anywhere… yards in town or out of town, along the ditches besides the country 2 lane roads or in the grassy right of ways along major highways.
All of these are, to me, country feel comfort. All of them make me smile and a smile always makes life easier.
