Confusion is Nothing New...

I dare admit I have been the witness to such perverse high drama of late--and I nearly squeal with delight at the thought of sharing with my readers!  If the drama were not so public, I would surely be labeled a gossip (though who doesn't enjoy a bit of gossip now and then?! Hence: there must be gossips!).

Autumn--one of the two remarkable bookends of the "growing season"--is dominated, if not "owned" in a figurative sense of the word, by the venerable (if deceptive) House of Asteraceae, just as spring is "owned" by the crocuses, narcissus, tulips, daffodils, and hyacinths, among others.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I saw these flowering trees yesterday morning on the University of Delaware campus. Cherry blossoms IN LATE NOVEMBER! Shocking!

And, bordering my backyard garden, this spring blooming Viburnum!

The Asteraceaes are in turmoil: upstaged by their spring antecedents.

True, there are autumn blooming cherry trees and viburnum, but these specimens belong to the spring. Odd weather we've had: an elongated, miserable summer of extremes, cold followed by a spell of moderate temperatures that confused these trees (and my narcissus which began to poke through the soil last week).

Confusion is certainly nothing new when it surrounds us in so many forms.