My friend said.
Yes, enough of the sordidness and world sorrow
I need some beauty tomorrow.
So out to the fields I fled.
Camera in hand, Chayanne in the ear, what better place to flee for beauty but our Carlsbad Flower Fields, 50 acres of giant ranunculus overlooking the ocean and historic Highway 101 in North County San Diego, flowers farther than the eye can see.
Beautiful, delicate flowers with paper thin petals...
Twelve million flowers, but any San Diego fifth grader will tell you there are no bees and no butterflies. The flower has no nectar, no pollen, no fragrance for attraction.
Thousands come to the fields, especially on the weekend, most like myself with cameras hoping to "capture the moment".
It's not long, however, before reminders of the real world intrude.
San Onofre Nuclear Power Plant, about a half mile from the fields... radiation levels 16 times higher than allowed in drinking water in the groundwater, security breaches, news the plant can withstand a small plane but not commercial jet - what would happen with a tsunami?
And, silently, seemingly invisible to the tourists, our Mexican brothers working the fields... life is more complicated than it appears.
14 comments:
K.
"For better or worse each one will follow their path...." J.D.
Thank you for the beautiful sign-posts marking the path you walked today.
T.
K.
AND, the worm is dead. Amen.
T.
I remember seeing that field on the way to GIA. In August, it looks like any other field between crops. A stranger would never guess that such beauty lies in wait.
Querida T. Should we identify J.D. as Jorge Drexler for those wondering JD Salinger? John Denver? And that the title is that of a Jorge Drexler song. K.
Patty. How astute you are to connect those empty fields with the Flower Fields! Indeed, watering of the flowers stops in May, and after the plants die down in June and July the bulbs are harvested like potatoes for shipment around the world. Ah, the good old days of GIA.
Beautiful!
Last year I splurged and bought a straggly rose bush. Today for the first time it bloomed. I made my husband and son go and see it and smell it at leat three times already.
Flowers are such optimists.
Wow. The fields are beautiful - but how convoluted. Such contradictions. I tend to support nuclear power (over fossil fuels) - but there are still questions.
I've heard of the fields, but i've never been there. Now, of course, I have to go. Thank you for sharing!
Kappa NH, I am thinking how much pleasure that once scraggly rose bush is going to bring the family. I always thought it curious the scent becomes most wonderful when the flower ages and loosens up.
Pam, Reconciling those convolutions and contradictions -- what a struggle.
Sonnjea - Get down to the fields this weekend. Watering will be shut off soon to let the plants die back, and come early in the day. There is a little strawberry stand just by the gate where you can buy huge, sweet Carlsbad strawberries fresh from the field. Patty is working on an ode to my strawberry -- coming soon to this nearest blog!
Stumbled upon your blog and noticed you've misidentified the power plant in the background of one of your renuncula field pictures. San Onofre nuclear power plant is actually located about 15-20 miles north of the flower fields, and are actually two domes that bear a slight resemblance to Dolly Parton. The power plant in your photo is not nuclear, it's just an electrical power plant that uses coal, i believe.
Viva la huelga !
Kathy,
This is truly exceptional. Thanks for sharing the flowers, the poem and that part of you that is so often masked.
Pat D.
Pat (a West Coast Pat, not the Charleston Pat) - Welcome to patand kathie. I know you have been reading for a while, thanks for the comment!
Wow...they look like the tulip fields in the Netherlands. Amazing.
Joan, These pictures don't begin to capture the extent of the fields. You have to have an aerial view, preferably in a balloon with a glass of champagne.
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