Hedges seem to have things under control this time of year. There are more surprises in hedges than in carefully constructed gardens. Here are two surprising blooms, or are they rather a hundred small blooms in two distinct packages? Little things that burst forth when everything else, or almost everything has died away and gone back to dirt. Here very quietly life continues, and with such shapes and coloration that one almost suspects it is springtime rather than mid-fall. Is this what happens when winter is a season that happens somewhere else? Things die back, but others bloom, and somehow the end never comes. The earth is not covered with ice and snow. Fog lingers until early afternoon, and then the sun comes out and sweaters come off in sudden warmth. Tiny blooms on hedges. Life upon life upon life.