These lilies were blooming at the New Hanover County Arboretum when Adella and I stopped there a few weeks ago.  I remember a Japanese woman coming up behind me (like the writhing smoke of incense) to take her own picture and then apologizing to me for getting in my way.  She was not in my way but in my space, inches from my face.  She was with two women who, like her, wore long, slinky skirts and halter tops.  This detail is of no importance, but it made me laugh because her two cohorts were also slinking around with their iPhones taking pictures of everything regardless of the people they stepped over like proprietary cats.  They seemed to be in uniform on somebody's behalf from somwhere; they were so purposeful.  Someday, maybe I'll have the moxie to climb into a stranger's lap to get the exactly right shot and apologize later without looking back.  I mean it; I want to be the Japanese girl with the iPhone someday.  Meanwhile, I am the bemused mommy schoolteacher enjoying the hell out of life.  It's all so, so good.

Today's Flowers