Sunwashed Purple Iris in the Northwest Bronx

It may happen one day that you are walking down a quiet street in the northwest Bronx when you pass a field of irises. They are blooming in a churchyard, which seems so wonderfully quaint after a week of subterranean voyages in dirty and wet public transport vehicles in New York City.

The iris is kind of a funny-looking flower. But it’s breathtaking for precisely that reason.

I am shocked into wakefulness by the field of irises. Later on that same sunny spring walk, a friendly gentleman invites me into his backyard and then into his home. Am I more surprised by his spontaneous hospitality or by his charming country residence– a little splash of Westchester across from red-brick apartment buildings in Kingsbridge?

He proudly shows me his lawn, a perfect green rectangle that stretches between a recycled brick walkway and a gravel border in his backyard. “Bend down and touch it,” he urges me. It’s fake. He laughs.

His house is enormous by New York City standards, as though someone picked up a single-family home from the suburbs and air-lifted it onto this sweet corner. Inside, his wife is chatting on the telephone, less pleased to welcome strange guests into her Saturday afternoon than her husband is.

After a long chat, I leave him behind, promising to drop by again soon.