I've written before about the drought Texas is undergoing. Add to that record heat, hottest AND driest on record and NO humidity (that happens just about, oh...never). The green life first got pale, then droopy, then brown, then crispy. Crispy is where we're at now. Well, except for the parts that are ash.
Texas is going up in smoke.
We've been plagued with some terrible wildfires the last week and new ones keep catching. 49% of all wildfires in the nation have been in Texas this year. Over a million and a half acres have burned since April. 63 new fires since last Sunday and a 500 - 700 acre wildfire popped up 25 miles from the country house yesterday.
Besides the big fire in the hill country, where thankfully both my friends houses have been spared albeit with a burned landscape all around them now, there is a three county fire just NE of Houston. The smoke from that fire is now hanging over the city.
And in the city, as we are this week, I am sad to see how many more trees have died, over 1,000 in Memorial Park alone. The city is turning from green to brown. Now it is not just trees but shrubs. The three large azaleas and the two ligustrum in the back yard here have died. They were here before me and I've been here for 35 years.
All grass that isn't watered...yards, easements, fields, swards, esplanades, parks...is brown, dry and crunchy. The dirt which was at first just dry and hard is now turned to dust.
I wish it would rain.
I know it will eventually rain again.
I hope.
We praying for you all Ellen. We have many friends there that we are worried about, you included and here we are with flooding. You would think that Mother Nature would spread this out a bit.
ReplyDeleteTake care and be safe. Sorry about the plants in the yard. Maybe they'll come back if you get some rain.
This is heartbreaking, every word. Makes me want to cry.
ReplyDeleteOh boy, I can just feel the drought from your description of it. The rain just has to come.
ReplyDeleteSorry to report that Pennsylvania is drowning under record rainfalls. I would love to send you some rain. We are starting to mildew. This too shall pass.
ReplyDeleteI'll stand in the hope line with you. I hope for rain for all the folks who need it and dry for all the folks who need that.
ReplyDeleteAs far as the smoke, I will also say I understand after this year's fires.
Take heart my friend, thing's will change...how we cannot tell but surely they will.
Oma Linda
I hate this for you all!
ReplyDeleteI pray it rains soon!
Sounds dire Ellen!
ReplyDeleteI need to remind myself of this post when the rains here do not cease. I hope your hope is answered soon...
ReplyDeleteMakes me want to cry too...
ReplyDeleteas do i. just none in the forecast again for this next week... and other parts of the country are evacuating for flooding...
ReplyDeleteI saw on the news tonight that Texas had the dryest summer of any state in the nation. Meanwhile, other states are practically floating away.
ReplyDeleteIt's funny. We had some nice rain for a minute, and now things are cool - for the moment, but everything is still dead. And, next week is back up into the 90's. Ah well... at least it's not the 100's.
ReplyDeleteThe weather has been horrendous in many places. Heartbreaking!
ReplyDeleteOh ellen, it is indeed heartbreaking. When the fires come that means water taken away from what we is used for human consumption, for irrigation, for life. It seems that it will never end. 3,250,000 acres in Texas burned this year.
ReplyDeleteIn Bastrop 34,000 acres and it is still burning. 1386 homes burned. It is terrible.
I've been up here in Canada, praying for rain in Texas for about a month. I saw a video recently showing the speed with which those fires have been roaring over the ground.
ReplyDeleteWhat a travesty. I cannot imagine losing trees you've had all along. My gawd, it's horrible.
We had a 6.4 earthquake today. It was offshore and I'm going to bed hoping that was IT. Hopefully that was the big one that been predicted for this Pacific fault line.
I'll visualize the rain...maybe we could all eat some of Ruth's 'shrooms. That may help! :D
Oh Ellen, Texas deserves a break! Gosh, this is just awful. The poor trees. Can't be very good for the lungs, either.
ReplyDeleteHope Mother Nature send a deluge of the good stuff your way soon.
every single time I complain about the rain here I stop and think of you all
ReplyDeleteI wish there was a way to balance out the elements!
I love your analogy of the giant stepping on people that you mentioned in your last comment, I have often used the very same :)
May the weather turn to kindly rain for you.
ReplyDeleteDon't even try to tell me that global weather changes aren't happening. I am old enough to know what is normal and what is not.
ReplyDeleteThe earth's thirst becomes our own whether we recognize it or not.
I hope for you rain. I do.