ANNOUNCEMENT

ANNOUNCEMENT: Reading/signing at Newberry’s Branch Library on Saturday, 19 July, at 2:00 p.m. Afterward, I hope to see a bit of contemporary Newberry where my grandfather, Malachi N. Strickland, delivered rural mail nearly a hundred years ago. Although I wasn’t born in time to visit my grandparents in Newberry and knew only their Alachua home, we sometimes visited their Newberry friend, a Mrs. Marable who allowed me to climb up into the wide arms of her backyard fig tree.

I had a beautiful walk this morning while the tall, green grasses along River Road were still covered with dew. Found a running deer’s tracks and the Partridge Peas, (Chamaecrista fasciculata of the Pea Family) are thick with yellow blooms. Many of one of my very favorite wild things, the Swamp Hibiscus (Hibiscus grandiflora of the Mallow Family),have opened the petals of their lovely white faces so that their scarlet throats can be seen. This plant is related to Turk's Cap, the Hibiscus so often planted in flowerbeds on south Florida lawns and the commercially grown cotton plant that I first examined in the Mississippi Delta. I am happy when it appears here each year.