The Garden of the Seasons: When the Journey to the Sun Takes a Detour

 

Morning glories like the sun. Especially, as the name implies, in the first half of the day. To get closer to the sun they climb. They climb on whatever they can find, light pole, flag pole, nearby shrub or tree. If you put them along the wall of your house, they climb the wall. As a rule they need some sort of trellis, something they can wrap their viney claws ('tendrils,' I suppose) around. 
          A few years back we tied strings from tacks in the wall to get them going. They do get going. Climb, baby, climb.
          They're annuals. So you have to plant them from seed every year. Sometimes their seeds drop into a planter and they seed themselves. 
           A few years ago, when we had solar panels installed on the sunny half of our roof, a thin pipe protecting some sort of wiring was also installed to run from the hardware near the ground to the solar tap on the roof.
           The climbing vines of the morning glory found that pipe a convenient stairway to heaven. 
           They are currently seeking the sun on the roof. Competition for the panels? I believe there is plenty of sunlight to go around.
            This year, for the first time, a new route to the top attracted some of the vines.
            We have old windows in most of our house. In the room I use for a home office, I lift the window on the hottest days of summer to let the breeze in. This requires pulling the screen down, lest the insect population discover a new habitat to explore for their possible benefit and our certain annoyance. And of course, lifting the storm window. Because of the imposition of a wide, hopelessly immobile writing table between my fingers and the window, I can only manage to lift the storm window a matter of inches, not feet. 
            To lift it any higher would require extreme exertions such as climbing up on the desk and lying on my back with some portion of my anatomy, namely my head, stuck out the window. This would frighten the morning glories. 
             Or, perhaps, hanging by my feet from the ceiling so that I could get a natural purchase on the balky storm window and shove it the rest of the way up.
              No matter. A six-inch screen exposure provides fresh air. And most days the inside window is closed.
              This year, the first time ever, the morning glory vines found that gap.
              They are now climbing, and blooming, in the inch or so of space between the lowered screen and raised storm window.
               It's like having a greenhouse in the window of your home office. 
               The flowers that blossom in this space are of large size and a magnificent sky blue color.
               I think, however, their ascent may have been stalled at this elevation unless they find a gap between storm window and frame sufficient to slip through. Perhaps they will be content to pack as much vine and leaf, plus occasional blossoms, into this protected space as possible. 
               Those I live with, however, have another explanation for this uncanny penetration of outdoor-growing plants into the indoor space occupied by yours truly.
                They believe the flowers are coming in to get me. I trust their intentions are benign.