Summer seasoning

Surely I'm not the only person who, in the heat of summer, phantasizes about a cool winter's day. On January 1 in Denver, we can hardly say we've had TOO much of a winter--daytime temperatures for months now have been balmy enough so I've left my jacket in my office when returning home. Why, then, am I yearning for a toasty summer day?

Lilies for me epitomize summer: we are so lucky thus far to have escaped the plague of Lily beetle, so I have indulged in my love of these elegant spires. This album features various "Martagon" hybrids with fancy cultivar names I have jumbled. They're ridiculously inexpensive--I keep adding more each year...

I have a dear friend, who will remain anonymous, with impeccable taste in most things. But Bill hates lilies. There is no accounting for taste is all Ihave to say...

I suspect this has some Liliium tenuifolium in it.

 I've lived long enough that I remember lilies like this being sold as "Bellingham hybrids" often under the rubric of "Lilium x Marhansonii":I can definitely see some Lilium hansonii in this one.

I believe this is the same plant as the last, photographed last year--how different each lily looks in various lights and angles.

This nearly purple-black one hardly shows up in the garden from a distance--but it's one of my favorites nonetheless...

Wouldn't you know, Winter's hardly arrived and I'm yearning for a hot summer's day: such is the perversity of the human spirit!

Happy New Year!