Frits, bumbles, and Bee Balm

I got some bad news last night, when my recent blood work came back and showed that, once again, I tested positive for Lyme Disease, the scourge of naturalists and nature photographers throughout the Northeast and elsewhere in deer tick country. In one sense, this is actually a positive, since I now know why the arthritis in my wrists has gotten so back I can barely hold my camera, but the cure means that I'm going to have to stay out of the sun for several weeks, while the antibiotic wages war on the spirochetes coursing through my body. In advance of becoming a troglodyte, I spent the afternoon at the Preston Nature Preserve and was dazzled by an unexpected display of flowers known as Bee Balm—an entire field of them. I'd forgotten that the various species of Monarda, which I grow in my garden, are true native wildflowers, and here they were, putting on a spectacular show for the bumblebees, the Great Spangled Fritillary butterflies, a couple of uncooperative hummingbirds, and this humble photographer, who drank in the beautiful scene before he'll have to spend the rest of this month in semi-darkness.