An endemic wildflower
In the United States Spigelia texana grows only in Texas.
On the morning of September 18th I got to see some
at Brazos Bend State Park southwest of Houston.
If Texas pinkroot has pink roots, I never got to see any.
I did see that the buds look yellow and turn whiter as they open into flowers.
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As woke as some segments of American society have rapidly become, the United States has nothing on our great* neighbor to the north, which in its sprint to claim the title of the Wokest Country on Earth has been leaving everyone else in the dust. If you haven’t heard about the latest in-your-face transgression at an Ontario high school, you can read accounts of it in the September 23rd Toronto Sun, the September 21st National Desk, and the September 21st New York Post. Scroll through each article for photographs and embedded videos. Alert: you won’t be able to unsee what you’ve seen. You can also watch a four-and-a-half minute video that interviews people protesting this affront. And you can read Brendan O’Neill’s take on this as confirming what he calls the cult of validation. It’s also possible that the teacher in question is trolling everyone and the whole thing is an outlandishly clever hoax.
* Canada has a greater land area than the United States, which is in fourth place. Canada is second, behind Russia and ahead of China. No known correlation exists between the physical size of a country and the extent to which its institutions promote freedom and sanity.
© 2022 Steven Schwartzman
Portraits of Wildflowers 
It’s going to be hard to fight off the temptation to make another trip to Brazos Bend today or tomorrow to see how these flowers are developing. Right now, it’s 74 degrees with only 50% humidity: quite a change. But, work deadlines demand attention, and the flowers will be there on the weekend.
The change in color from the bud to the bloom is noticeable, but I’m rather taken with the change in shape, too. The folds in the pinched-up bud still are present in the open flower, but I don’t think I would have imagined them if I hadn’t seen the bud. You did a good job of making them visible.
shoreacres
September 27, 2022 at 6:41 AM
And here now it’s only 64°, the first morning that I’d say qualifies as fall, even if the weather forecast calls for an afternoon high of 92°. I hope you’ll soon be able to add to the pinkroot saga, photographically speaking. As “the Child is father of the Man,” so is the bud of the flower.
Steve Schwartzman
September 27, 2022 at 7:13 AM
It’s lovely! It’s neat that you’re seeing flowers that only grow in Texas.
circadianreflections
September 27, 2022 at 8:21 AM
It is. The distribution map shows the species in one border county, so it’s possible that it grows across the Rio Grande in Mexico as well but I haven’t been able to verify that.
Steve Schwartzman
September 27, 2022 at 9:36 AM
If this pretty flower only grows in Texas, I wonder about the reason why it would not grow in states with similar climates.
Peter Klopp
September 27, 2022 at 9:36 AM
Some species grow only in a small area while other species cover large regions. It’s a big mystery why some are so much more adaptive than others.
Steve Schwartzman
September 27, 2022 at 12:20 PM
I like the flower’s pose and your angle in both the second two … elegant looking.
denisebushphoto
September 27, 2022 at 4:39 PM
I’ll take elegant, thanks.
Steve Schwartzman
September 27, 2022 at 5:12 PM