BARREN SHADE —— That’s no fresh-fallen powder you’re seeing, no fluffy snowfall somehow snuck in overnight. It’s surely not smoke or a low-lying fog. What you’ve got here is the leavings of dandelions, all scattered where the wind would carry. Just south of here are a few fields gone feral, overrun with wild yellow flowers only just last week. A stretch of drought has set them free in near-unison, floating to a place where they’ll try to put down roots. I don’t rate success so highly in this barren shade. But don’t you worry about that, just come committed to an attempt at living, and the adventure survival sends us all on. The wash of rain will run away this briefest beauty, and maybe a place to put roots between here and a downstream destination. You don’t have to get there. You just have to go.
June 5, 2026Granville Centre, Nova Scotia
Year 19, Day 6781 of my daily journal.
When I first saw it I thought it was poplar tree seed. I thought I posted a video where poplar seed covered the ground an inch deep. It was set on fire and burned in a mesmerizing slow even way. I don’t see the post and anyway this is dandelion seed. I never heard of it like this before. A neat bizarre ephemeral event.