I often delude myself into thinking that I’m in control of my garden, but in moments of crystalline clarity I realize that it is nature, not I, that bends the garden to its will.

Recently I had to right, and then anchor my heirloom tomato pots after strong winds caused them to topple over.

And, just last evening I was furiously trying to snap a few photos of first-bloomers and complete some garden maintenance before the dark clouds opened up to end the day as it had begun: with driving rain.

The upside: I was spared my nocturnal watering ritual for the day. Nature gives, but sometimes, nature withholds…

Just reading about the Texas drought has really driven home how important rain is, and how we need to conserve this precious resource whenever we can. (Hopefully, those of you with the space have taken to heart my earlier post about constructing a rain barrel to collect runoff.)

Another example of nature’s preeminence is the slow progress of my garden. In addition to the man-made delays I’ve experienced this season, we’ve also had an extremely cool summer here in Chicago, so one of the things I’ve found is that plants seem to be about a month behind their normal development. (And that’s in addition to the days tuckpointing kept my containers hostage inside.)

Remember way back when I told you I’d ordered lisianthus in a combination that had blue, yellow and green blooms? Well today the first of the flowers opened, and whether by nature’s design or mere coincidence it was one in my favorite garden color — blue!

This new development in the garden is shown in the first photo above: The rose-like purple-blue lisianthus is surrounded by a delicate bed of light blue lobelia and unopened lisianthus buds (yellow? green?), a red-orange cluster of lantana, and of course, the chartreuse leaves of my sweet potato vine.

The second photo shows another first-bloomer — the lime green zinnia that I direct-sowed into my outdoor container. [You can click on the photos for a larger view.]

So now I’m hoping that Mother Nature will tag an extra month onto summer so I can appreciate the full bloom and beauty of her many gifts struggling to come into their own in my balcony garden.