Cactus Flower

The mobile home park where Mom and Dad live is an interesting place. It is located at the eastern end of Hemet, a town itself located on the eastern outskirts of the greater Los Angeles metropolis. In the 1960’s Hemet made a transformation from mostly a citrus-growing region to a retirement community dominated by mobile home parks. Arroyo Fairways was one of the parks built in this era, and most lots still have heirloom citrus trees – oranges, lemons, and grapefruit – producing prodigious amounts of fruit during the winter months. Another unique feature of the park is a 9-hole golf course snaking along the creek bed (“arroyo”) adjacent to the park, irrigated to a green splendor by a well located at one corner of the property. Each morning residents can be seen putting along on the manicured greens.

Also within the park are some heirloom cacti, undoubtedly as old as the park. On our last visit a particularly large individual was in full bloom, with 50 or more flowers that opened up to the morning light. The blossoms were eight to ten inches in diameter, and a magnet for bees that just seemed to bathe in the nectar. It has been a week since these photographs were taken, and the temperature in Hemet is in the 90’s today. My guess is that the blooms have withered in the heat, an ephemeral event which we were lucky to witness.

6/15/2007 Cactus update -- we pulled in for a visit, and the cactus is gone, along with the mobile home next to it. All is left is barren earth, a virgin substrate for the next generation of manufactured housing and landscaping.