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Miami’s seasons are an inexplicable wonder, aren’t they? I mean, we’re not exactly known for our traditional spring, summer, fall and winter. No, here it’s more like a never-ending parade of blooms and sunshine. One day it’s water lilies, the next it’s jade vine. Reading an article that suggested Japan had 72 microseasons, some only a handful of days long, I’ve always thought the same about Miami. Take a stroll through Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, the Miami Beach Botanical Garden, or the beautiful, mostly ignored free garden on the University of Miami’s campus and you’ll see what I mean.
As I take morning walks, I see this shaving brush tree beginning to bloom, Surinam cherries ready to eat for only a week, and a pink acacia resembling cherry blossoms. Then this frangipani blooms, that Poinciana turns orange, a purple one, a yellow tree, a sausage tree, and a Geiger tree. Where these thoughts began, props to Neil Diamond, I can’t begin to know when. Whether this was triggered by hearing Al Kooper, Mike Bloomfield, and Stephen Stills Season of the Witch, Lawry’s Seasoning Salt, or visiting Seasons 52, how can I be sure?
Many of us employ gardeners, some of whom cut everything in brutal straight lines and rectangles like – God forbid – Broward County, while others are more jungle artistic. As a fan of small businesses, I prefer nurseries like Galloway Farm Nursery or Richard Lyons Nursery. I buy orchids in horse country from Plasencia or Sunset Nurseries, listen to good music at Casaplanta, or buy fruit trees from Guacalina on Krome Avenue. They’ve all got character, and the workers know their stuff. I’m not a fan of the big-box stores; they’re just so… sterile. Give me a place with some local soul, you know?
I never took my children to a fast food restaurant in their lives; I much prefer any ventanita to every national coffee outfit. And while I am no pure perfectionist and occasionally participate in big business purchases – Amazon if you’re listening – I much prefer the exploration of Miami’s umpteen seasons by visiting the little guys. We see Jatropha or Mexican petunias blooming 365 days a year, and for those of us who are garden gangsters, we seek our favorites nearby. But here’s the thing: our gardens and parks shouldn’t only be just for the wealthy or the lucky kids who get to take a school trip.
They should be for everyone. That’s why I’m always preaching for ways to make these spaces more accessible. Fairchild, Vizcaya, and Deering should have a “pay what you can” day once a week or month? Just a thought, but c’mon my privileged people, fix this.
That said, as we begin to grumble about the rainy season, I would like to reminisce about my old coaching colleague Claude Grubair, who told me 30 years ago when I moved here how much he loved the end of May and beginning of June, and he helped me see it the same way. These long sunny end-of-school-year days, followed by, at least before our current administration ended climate change, the clouds rolling in for afternoon thunderstorms throughout July and August, these are precious. Then come the months of the year that we dread – gloomy September and the beginning of October. After that, of course, comes the beginning of the beautiful dry season at the end of hurricane season, Thanksgiving, Christmas, January, a couple of cold rainy days around MLK Day, and it’s like a whole new world opens up – the flawlessness of March and April.
As Ecclesiastes and Pete Seeger said, to everything there is a season.
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