The good life: free for the taking

Last night was a perfect evening for a walk - a light breeze, gentle swells undulating across a glassy sea, golden and pink sunset washing the landscape with colour. I grabbed the camera and the dogs and inhaled deeply as I drank in the beauty all around me.

The neighbour's Indian Bean tree has been providing me with pleasure for at least a couple of weeks now. It is a mass of beautiful flowers and large heart-shaped leaves. It will, I am told, develop long beans after the flowers have gone. Here's what it looks like from the distance:



And a closer look at a bough:



And then the beautiful white and purple flowers close up:




Further down the block, I admire a mimosa tree. I cannot get a shot of the flowers as they are high up like a pink blanket draped across the very top of the broad expanse of green foliage. I learned, as I searched for the name of the tree, that the flowers and bark of the mimosa tree are one of the most prized of Chinese botanicals, famous for relieving anxiety, stress and depression. The flowers can be seen in this link, but here is the top part of the tree, as seen from the street:



And beneath it, this cat keeps an eye on the dogs. Kitty is nearly always visible in this small garden, watching the parade of people and dogs passing by.



Splashes of colour are everywhere:




Down at the sea wall, we paused to take some shots of the water. I never tire of looking at the ocean, the boats, the islands in my little piece of the world. The evening air was so clear I could see Mt. Baker poking its summit above Salt Spring Island. (You'll need to click on the photo and peer very carefully to the right of the "hump" to see Baker in this picture - it was much more visible to the naked eye!)



More boats, more ocean, more beauty everywhere I look.








In the golden sunset, the trees along the seawall and up the hillside do a dress rehearsal for the fall performance:




In the grass by the beach, one of many feral and semi-feral cats watches us carefully before running off to the safety of the underbrush.




Back home, I stop to admire the sunset on the ripening apples on my tree.




And then I decide to have a little fun with the dogs, who cooperate by each taking a turn at modeling the visor which shades my eyes when the bright summer sun sinks low in the sky.









It was a good day. It is a beautiful world. There is so much beauty to be seen, and fun to be had. It is all there, free for the taking. A simple life, a good life.