July 17, 2025

Good morning!

It’s Thursday, and I wish to show you the world’s most sincere lavender bundle.

Our two plants in the upper garden are doing splendidly this year. My first instinct was to cut off all the sprigs in their prime, wrap them with string, and dangle them by their toes in the barn next to the strawflowers.

But then where would the bees go for their early and mid-morning, pre- and post-noontime, mid- and late-afternoon, and pre-bedtime nectar? Who am I to deprive them of such sustenance? I, who already have more than enough of everything—and the capacity to procure more when supplies run low?

And so the bees and I agreed that six sprigs would do just fine.

“Be charitable before wealth makes thee covetous.”

—Sir Thomas Browne

Onwards we go,

Clara