Thunderstorms this morning, then variable clouds during the afternoon with still a chance of showers. High 73F. Winds WSW at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 70%. Locally heavy rainfall possible..

A shower is possible early. Some passing clouds. Low 49F. Winds WNW at 10 to 15 mph.

Photo by Mike LunsfordSunday afternoon: Remarkable clouds made for a memorable Sunday afternoon in July.

Photo by Mike LunsfordRuby-throated at rest: A male Ruby-throated hummingbird rests on a limb near the entrance to the inn at McCormick’s Creek State Park in July.

Photo by Mike LunsfordGoldfinch breakfast: An American goldfinch pauses on a blackened coneflower bloom after eating breakfast in early September.

Photo by Mike LunsfordLilies of the field: “Surprise lilies,” also called “Resurrection lilies,” bloom in a hay field in August.

Photo by Mike LunsfordPuddling: A Zebra swallowtail butterfly “puddles” on a creek bank in June.

Photo by Mike LunsfordWatching things: An Eastern gray treefrog sits in the eye of a terra cotta decoration, enjoying the view.

Photo by Mike LunsfordAugust cottonwood: A fallen cottonwood leaf on a Parke County sandbar in early August is a harbinger of things to come this autumn.

Photo by Mike LunsfordRed sunflower: A red sunflower glows in sunlight of a late August evening.

Photo by Mike LunsfordMe and my shadow: A Ebony jewelwing damselfly lights on leaf in the July sunshine.

Photo by Mike LunsfordNearly there: A waxing gibbous moon, at 92 percent, would become July’s “supermoon” a few days later.

Photo by Mike LunsfordSunday afternoon: Remarkable clouds made for a memorable Sunday afternoon in July.

Photo by Mike LunsfordGoldfinch breakfast: An American goldfinch pauses on a blackened coneflower bloom after eating breakfast in early September.

Photo by Mike LunsfordPuddling: A Zebra swallowtail butterfly “puddles” on a creek bank in June.

Photo by Mike LunsfordAugust cottonwood: A fallen cottonwood leaf on a Parke County sandbar in early August is a harbinger of things to come this autumn.

Photo by Mike LunsfordRed sunflower: A red sunflower glows in sunlight of a late August evening.

Photo by Mike LunsfordMe and my shadow: A Ebony jewelwing damselfly lights on leaf in the July sunshine.

This has summer has been a season of surprises, the least pleasant for many of us being the blistering June we endured before the true and expected heat of summer ambled through in July and August.

So, this morning — 10 days or so early —  I say goodbye, in print anyway, to the season.

As I suspected beforehand, a nice cool and green spring abruptly gave way to smoldering temperatures and high humidity, and although I will never complain about having daily sunshine and going without socks, I did some grumbling about working or walking in the relentless griddle of those Indiana summer days.

Henry David Thoreau, whom I often mention in these features about seasonal change, wrote in “Walden” that we should, “Live in each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influence of the earth.” For that reason alone, I may regret that I ever wanted cooler weather to arrive, for too soon, we will be staring winter in the face.

When I say we had a surprising summer, I mean that in the most literal sense. Just today, as I walked out the back door toward my cabin, my wife — on her usual mission of mercy with hummingbird feeders in hand — told me that she had seen a frog sitting inside the open eye of a terra cotta sun I hung on a fence years ago.

Photo by Mike LunsfordWatching things: An Eastern gray treefrog sits in the eye of a terra cotta decoration, enjoying the view.

For some reason, woodpeckers have jackhammered away at the sun’s smiling face — their attraction to it making little sense to us — so I have taken to using whatever spare spray paint we have around to give the old decoration a bit of cosmetic repair each year; it has already been a bright green and a gaudy yellow, and is now candy apple red. When I looked for myself, an Eastern Gray Treefrog (yes, it is one word), that I suspect has been living behind the face all summer, was still perched inside the eye like an apartment dweller on a balcony, and it stayed there well into the afternoon, until the hot sun drove it to shade.      

Less than a month ago, it was pink “surprise lilies” that supplied the wonder. On a drive toward town with our grandsons past an orchard grass and alfalfa field, green and ready to cut, we noticed the tall-stemmed blooms standing in a group where we had never noticed them before. It didn’t take long, however, for me to remember the days many years ago when my school bus made a stop at that field, a portion of which then was a small lawn that sat before a small house in which a small girl lived with her grandparents. I can’t remember when the house was torn down, but it is easy to see in my memories those lilies growing there just below a brown porch and its wooden swing, both now gone for decades. I stopped there on a gray evening with my camera and braved a bit of rain and an interested county sheriff’s deputy to get a photograph.

Photo by Mike LunsfordLilies of the field: “Surprise lilies,” also called “Resurrection lilies,” bloom in a hay field in August.

Nearly every day this summer, we have been surprised by something in the greenness outside our house: a painted turtle that inexplicably tried to lay her eggs in our open and quite dry and brittle front lawn in late June; the two pairs of Baltimore orioles that persist to this day in expecting either grape jelly or a turn at the one hummingbird feeder that can handle their big beaks; the trio of ducklings we encountered on a Michigan beach that somehow managed to negotiate the rough surf that tossed them about like blowing leaves; a day when upon reaching for work gloves in a box that hangs on a wall of my barn, a Carolina wren, deep in the dark box with a nest and three brown eggs, blasted out of the heat of that airless space into my face.

Then too, I recall the morning I walked out of our bedroom after a mostly-sleepless night to spot a mature bald eagle having breakfast in the road in front of our house. I tried in vain to grab my camera and slip on shoes and get in position to snap a photo, but an oncoming car forced it to flight, and it never came back. So too, a half-dozen turkeys paraded in my back yard just a few weeks later, they too so camera shy that they were gone the second they noticed me lurking.

Photo by Mike LunsfordRuby-throated at rest: A male Ruby-throated hummingbird rests on a limb near the entrance to the inn at McCormick’s Creek State Park in July.

Not long after our tall pink phlox bloomed in late July, I spied a hummingbird moth, a rare-enough visitor to our place that it was memorable, as were the bluebirds I saw visiting a mealworm feeder that had seen only cardinals and titmice this summer — I had thought our bluebirds were gone.

We were surprised by a 30-40 degree drop in temperature as we walked down just a dozen or so tall steps to see and hear the “sinking springs” of the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historic Park when we visited Hodgenville, Kentucky, in late July. It was a sweltering 95 degrees that day in the sun, but near that little trickle of water the Lincolns depended on so much, we were amazed by nature’s air conditioning. Just a few days later, we both watched blue gill through the crystal clear water of a McCormick’s Creek pool that was fed by no more than a seep in what was proving to be a very dry month.

Early in the summer — perhaps a day or two before the calendar even said it was summer — I remember seeing a zebra swallowtail butterfly on the banks of the creek, “puddling” on a sandbar. It was very early to be seeing swallowtails, but it was there nonetheless. Spotting it was encouragement that we would have a good year for butterflies, but we haven’t. Perhaps it was the early heat or extended dryness, but we have seen few swallowtails, and even fewer monarchs this year. We haven’t seen a single caterpillar on our milkweed at all.

But, we have continued to be pleasantly surprised, nonetheless. A bright full “supermoon” in July appeared on such a clear night that we could see the rough outlines of its craters with the naked eye; I saw goldfinches, braver than usual, posing on withering coneflowers as if staking a claim; we have been watching bright red sunflowers bloom in a backyard planter when we expected only the yellow ones we thought we planted; we were amazed to find five inches of rain measured by the gauge near my cabin door just a few mornings ago …

Photo by Mike LunsfordNearly there: A waxing gibbous moon, at 92 percent, would become July’s “supermoon” a few days later.

We have become expectant of these daily surprises, but I have learned to hardly take them for granted. Several nights ago, a bit weary after we had spent a day getting in and out of our car and having been on the road for hours, I walked to our front door with a load of bags and boxes. Joanie came around the corner of the house to join me, not with her purse or jacket in hand, but with a little white and black kitten cradled in her arms, its purring loud enough for even me to hear.

Despite our already having a pair of feline malcontents that barely get along themselves, I could tell that unless an owner could soon be found for that collarless stray, she would be fed and bedded down and staying on for good.

She is still with us, and that is no surprise at all.

You can contact Mike Lunsford at hickory913@gmail.com; his website can be found at www.mikelunsford.com. Mike’s books are available in many Wabash Valley stores and at Amazon.com.

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