Does absence make the heart grow fonder?
Absent the ones we love
Memories of times gone by
An empty house
An empty building long ago abandoned
Those absent
Are what we covet
Appreciation grows
For those we no longer have, can no longer touch
Love grows
For our dearly departed
A home we had to leave
Empty shelves, empty nest
Beauty we no longer see
Music we no longer hear in the silence of our mind.
Absent is what is no longer remembered
No longer reachable
Absent is the past.
Photos: A shuttered warehouse, an abandoned trailer, weavers’ nests no longer occupied, my mother in her empty apartment.
To see some amazing flowers and add your own, visit 
If you touch a butterfly’s wings, you might rub off some of the scales, but it is a myth that the butterfly will die if you do. 
If you handle it roughly, however, the loss of these delicate scales may cause it to fly differently or to lose some of its coloring.
Did you know that monarch butterflies, whose population had decreased dramatically in the past decade, are making a comeback? Monarch butterflies migrate each year from Mexico to the United States, as far north as the upper Midwest. They depend on milkweed to lay their eggs, but milkweed had been decimated in recent years due to the cutting down of roadside foliage and the creation of “managed” gardens. Now people are creating monarch friendly gardens, which include the things monarchs like: milkweed (there are several varieties), coneflowers, and Queen Anne’s lace, among other flowers. Because of this, I have been seeing monarchs in my own garden and around the neighborhood – the photo above was taken in my garden alongside our driveway.