They’re back! An annual perk of Winter – stumbling into the bathroom at dawn to be greeted by ice art on the window. It has only just begun and so far the daily frost landscapes painted by nature have not disappointed. I name them as I see them.
It looks like we might have our first significant snow storm of the season tomorrow. Of course that prediction could easily change, but I rescheduled a long-distance appointment anyway. As always, over the last month or so the geese in flight have alerted us to the seasonal changes as they head south with intention.
collage by Karen Schaffel Art
The Northern Lights once again made an appearance, spectacles of awe, various in intensity, shared across the country. From where I sat on The Urban Porch there was not much happening – or I missed it. It seems whenever there is any sky show happening around here (meteor showers, borealis, etc.) inevitably we end up with cloud cover. On the left side of my photo there was a faint green/pink column of the aurora, but I think the best takeaway was the dazzling cluster of Pleiades – the Seven Sisters – sparkling in the open space above a wisp of cloud.
My Red Tree dropped its leaves in two major purges. For a while the entire back yard was a blanket of crimson and rose. Of course I’m a bit biased, but I think Little Rudi in his striped sweater could be the month of November feature in a dog calendar.
Frosty mornings and windy days have taken the glow and left a faded browning.
Despite the dying back of everything, there is still just one Marigold flower in the front yard that has remained standing against the encroaching winter.
The continued resilience of this little yellow bloom has left me smiling. This morning it has finally begun to wilt, yet is still hanging on – soon to be buried beneath the snow.
And despite freezing temperatures, a geranium left over from the summer continues to bloom on the porch next to the front door. I keep thinking I should bring it inside, but due to my history of planticide (see Planticide 11/30/2022 for the awful details) I probably won’t.
A few plants did manage to make the cut and return to the safety of the house to winter over. The Hibiscus, which for some inexplicable reason did not produce even one flower out on the porch this summer, suddenly rewarded with an unexpected bloom once it came inside.
The season of spectacular starling murmurations has begun, as they take to the sky in a mesmerizing, shifting mass of wonder.
As the chilly winds have been an invitation to more time spent indoors, I’ve done a little cooking, although not really propelled into the thick of it yet. This Spicy Peanut and Pumpkin soup was pretty good.
I tried a few other NYT recipes containing winter vegetables that were fairly successful, but you know how unprofessional food photos really don’t come out looking that great, and some can look pretty awful. Given that, just imagine their tasty beauty in your mind. Brown-Butter Orzo With Butternut Squash was one (pretty yummy), Curry Shrimp and Sweet Potato another.
The Dutch Baby of last week was Blackberry Pear. And then there was the Pear-Cranberry sauce at Thanksgiving, which looked just gorgeous in my mother’s blue and white Arabia bowl. Were she still here, she would have admired the palette, which was just the kind of vision that would have prompted her to reproduce it in oil, pastel or colored pencil. It’s that time of year – missing loved ones, seeing little pieces of them everywhere.
Speaking of Thanksgiving, with all the ever-evolving dietary preferences, this year played out in a similar manner, presenting some minor challenges.
On to more esoteric ramblings – the Medicine Card I pulled for the week was The Antelope. The Antelope provides a Do It Now, Get Moving, Take Action, Proceed With Purpose kind of message. Given that, I’ve been making Multiple Lists in an attempt to organize my head and propel myself into The Future with a focus on Things That Need To Be Done. All these key words with capital letters here are meant to impart a sense of Serious Intention (to myself, if not to you). Much like the migrating geese, the direction is Onward. We will see how that goes. It’s a start for this first day in December.
This unexpectedly came across my social media feed yesterday. These simple words hold such personal impact that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it – especially the last number of lines. They encompass a different kind of loss and the social disconnections, struggles, exhaustion and grief that navigating this invisible disability entails. Reading some of the comments, apparently it touched the world of a number of people. In response to their comments, the author had given consent to share his words, so I will do that here, with credit.
Between the Sounds – by Barton Breen (2025)
Some days my world talks through water, voices bending round the edges before they get to me.
A friend says morning, but I hear more rain. Someone says careful, but it lands like air full, and I’m left smiling politely while my mind scrambles to catch the thread I lost.
It’s tiring… this guessing game, this fill-in-the-blank living where every syllable comes with a tiny jolt of “did I hear that right, or did I botch it again?”
High voices break first, light notes slipping out the back door before I can grab them. Soft words vanish in the turn of a head. I nod anyway. I hate asking twice. Others hate me asking too, So I stay quiet.
Truth is, I live between sounds, in the hush where meaning hides, where a simple yes can become guess, and a quiet love you turns into lost you for just a heartbeat before I reel it back.
People think I’m slow, or lost, or not paying attention. But really I’m working harder than anyone sees, stitching half words into whole moments, trying to stay close to conversations that keep slipping through small cracks in my ears.
And at the end of the day, when I finally rest, there’s a strange kind of peace in letting the world go quiet, no more chasing sounds that never quite arrive, just me, and the soft truth that I’ve been carrying more weight than anyone ever knew.
If there isn’t anything too pressing going on that I need to get up for and if it is still early enough, I enjoy playing a few word games before getting out of bed in the morning. These are mostly from the New York Times line up. I don’t feel compelled to do them every day and I don’t keep any running scores or tallies or engage in any kind of competition. It’s just a sometimes relaxing thing, which I will do until I become bored with them, eventually moving onto something else. These games and puzzles are also useful to indulge in while waiting for an appointment. I’m not really sure if any of them are keeping my brain sharp or not, but I figure at this stage of life, any brain-sharpening couldn’t hurt.
The veterinary office where I take my dog sits in a weird little valley which does not have decent cell service and they don’t share their Wi-Fi connection. It was during an interminably long spell in their waiting room where I could not pull up any of my word games (or anything to read besides pamphlets for tartar control and kidney diets), so I opened up some of the installed games that did not require Wi-Fi access or cell connection. That is when I came across The Dots.
The name of the game is not actually “The Dots” – I’m not really even sure what it’s called, I would have to look on my phone. But it’s a series of mixed up dots on a grid and you try to connect them by making a maze-like pathway from one to the other. They are as simple as 5×5 dots and as complex as 15×15. In general I’ve not been interested in any of these types of graphic games, but I was stuck there, and it was free, so I turned off the sound settings (I hate sound settings on games) and did a few.
Aside from the gratification of being able to complete the more challenging ones, what I found most pleasing about them is that there are haptics involved, creating a satisfying, tactile “click” when you complete each connection of colored dots. I think that is what kept me going back to it – if not for the haptics I probably would not have continued to play. I looked up what it is about the touch sensation that was so appealing and got this AI synopsis:
Haptics are pleasing to the brain because they create a sense of immersion and control by leveraging our brain’s natural reliance on touch, which is a primal sense. This feedback enhances experiences by providing immediate confirmation for actions, simulating the feeling of interacting with a physical world, and activating regions of the brain associated with emotion, memory, and attention. Haptic technology tricks the brain into believing it’s touching something tangible and can even trigger positive physiological responses like the release of endorphins, leading to greater engagement and satisfaction.
Being all in favor of the release of endorphins, I added The Dots game to my regular word game lineup. They offer many options but I just focused on the daily game, which – depending on the size – often only takes seconds to a couple of minutes and is rather calming.
When babysitting my young grandchild overnight, she crawled into my bed the next morning while I was completing the daily dots and asked “Can I play The Dot Game on your phone?” She very much enjoyed it, finding it challenging enough that she requested more difficult levels. I’m guessing the haptics were probably tweaking her endorphins too.
Unaware of the regularity in which I was playing, it came as a Big Surprise when one morning upon completion, the little screen which popped up at the end said “Streak Extended!” It told you how many days in a row you had been playing. Disinterested in tallies, I had never really noticed. My “streak” was 302 days – almost a year – which I supposed could be considered A Habit.
While not horrified by this revelation, it still was bothersome on a few levels. First, I didn’t like the idea of having A Habit. It’s not as if I don’t have enough habits already; good, bad or otherwise. It amazed me that I was doing the same thing daily for close to a year without realizing it, apparently as natural and unthinking as brushing your teeth in the morning. But what was disturbing about discovering this “streak” was now that I had unknowingly devoted all this time to actually having a streak, I felt loathe to possibly breaking that streak. And so what had become a mindless little game suddenly became something in the back of my mind to have to remember to do. These days it’s already hard enough recalling almost anything that needs to be done.
If I break this unintentional streak that I am now feeling somewhat committed to, it might be slightly disappointing (“awwww!”) but it will not be the end of the world. Thankfully, I don’t have any other streaks going concerning any other games. It has occurred to me that had I devoted as much thought into maintaining other types of daily streaks (studying a new subject, getting rid of the excess of “stuff” I have accumulated, writing, exercising) it might be a bit more productive.
Time has been spinning out and streaking by. This morning before getting out of bed and completing the daily dot puzzle, I checked the little “Streak Extended!” pop up, which let me know that next week it will be two years straight of playing this game.
Habit? Addiction? Mindless Time Waster? Tool for Relaxation? Will I care when this streak is inevitably broken?
I have often used the word “exposure” regarding my initial connection to the Grateful Dead. Having been in a series of relationships starting back in high school with fanatical Deadheads, tapers and jam band musicians, it was just natural to be accompanying them to many shows. I always felt the “exposure” part was a bit like absorbing radon. You don’t know it exists but it seeps into your living space (or in this case, head space). Or okay, maybe more like a suntan. You don’t realize it’s getting into your skin and then suddenly you are looking at a different color. Okay, I’ll stop with the metaphors…..
We were seeing/hearing so much music back in the day. Tickets were cheap, amazing music was aplenty. Not being overly impressed with the Dead at the time, I just went along for the party and the ride. I could take them or leave them. I didn’t get what all the fuss was about. I also couldn’t understand why I kept attracting the same type of relationship – serious Deadheads.
If you have read any of this blog before, you might know that I’m considered a Senior (at least outwardly. Age is so different inside your mind, though, right?). Given that, I was attending shows back when Pigpen was with the band. I was around for Owsley acid. I remember the vibration of Phil Lesh’s bass rattling my ribcage as I stood in front of The Wall of Sound. I’m that old.
Even though I had been seeing them (or being brought along to see them) before, it was actually a moment a couple of years later in 1973 (while experiencing what was a potentially unpleasant downturn of an LSD trip) when somebody suddenly put on a new album that had just come out – Live at the Keystone with Merle Saunders and Jerry Garcia. Rather remarkably, it calmed me right down. This recording seemed to open a different path to hearing where Garcia meandered. Suddenly everything turned around and became alright. Suddenly I was hearing through different ears. It changed my relationship with Garcia’s playing and the Dead’s music from “Eh…..” to “Aha!”
And from that point on, when I saw the Dead I was really listening – to the subtle nuances, to the musical conversations and interplay between them, to the inside jokes within the music, what it was doing to my head, what journey it was taking me on, and that it was different every time. That was the point when I suddenly realized I Get It. In addition, it wasn’t necessary (for me) to be in an altered state in order to pay attention to all those things, although it didn’t hurt. Once I saw it, I could see it.
Now what started me down (what will soon become) this circuitous road of reminiscence is the recent passing of Donna Jean Godchaux, the only woman to be part of the Grateful Dead. Yes, her husband was the keyboard player, but she had a significant history of being a studio recording artist with some pretty impressive musical cred independent of her relationship.
I briefly mentioned above that once upon a time I was connected to guys in a jam band. They played a lot of Dead songs in addition to originals, and then launched into their own jam space off those songs. More specifically, at a fairly young age I married one of those musicians. The band was actually really good. In addition to a circle of friends fanning out in concentric circles from their core bond, they had a small following of local fans. Some of us shared a house together. The band practiced constantly, had gigs, tripped together, enjoyed listening to music together, went to concerts together, and were heavily, heavily into the Dead. They would listen to tapes of different shows and dissect them. It was an interesting hive scene and a reflection of the times. Initially I started to write a whole piece on the dynamics of living and being a part of that tribe and some of the high points, pitfalls and parallels, but I’ve decided to back out of that road.
When we were at a Dead show, there was no lingering outside in the parking Lot scene, it was about finding the sweet spot inside the venue, discovering where the music would sound the best. The guys I hung out with did not like Donna in the band and made no secret about it. Okay, her pitch was off for some of those shows (as were all of the others in the Dead – they never could sing all that well – and as an ironic aside, my homey guys in the jam band didn’t have the greatest voices). But she seemed to catch so much more complaining than necessary from so many male fans. Although none of them would admit it, I truly believe there was often a misogynistic element to it, as if a lot of these men fans saw her presence as an invasion into some kind of Boy’s Club, no women allowed. I don’t think it would have mattered who the woman was.
Of note, this attitude was not coming from the Dead themselves. As I understand it, her bandmates loved, respected and welcomed her.
I looked at Donna’s seasons with the Dead as an asset in their history. I liked seeing her beautiful self up there performing with them in all their unpredictability and imperfectness and complexity. Sometimes she really did hit it. In an odd way, I sort of related to her and envied her from afar. I’m betting a lot of women fans did during that time. And not for nothing, I would have killed for her hair……
Okay – as usual, I am going to veer off track now for a few paragraphs. As is the way with the internet, once I clicked on an article about Donna Godchaux, my feed and social media became bombarded with all sorts of Grateful Dead/DJG backstories and historical facts. One of the ones that jumped out at me was someone who posted “Autzen Stadium 1978 – I was there!” and how much they liked it. As always with Dead shows, you could never be sure what you were going to get.
I was at that show.
Imagining I might be met with some disagreement, I stand by saying with certainty that it was the worst Grateful Dead show I’ve even been at – and it had nothing to do with Donna Jean Godchaux. She was fine.
So yes, I am going to go off on a bit of a tangent here and share how some mind-altering substances thrown into the mix might have helped to place different colored glasses on the event, although not entirely. It’s my blog, I can do that here. Stay if you want to.
In addition to the Dead, the people in my immediate sphere were all big-time into Santana, so this was going to be a double treat. Our neighbor, Iowa Boy, had never seen the Dead before and was looking forward to finding out what the big deal was about. We got our ten dollar tickets (ten dollars!!!) and it was me, Red, Howie, Emrose, Fonebone, and Iowa Boy heading off in Red’s huge, white International Harvester with a giant skull and lightening bolt painted on the back. She didn’t want to drive her truck (she actually hadn’t had her driver’s license for very long) so Emrose took the wheel. We got to Eugene the night before and all camped out in a field not far from the venue.
Once inside the stadium the following day, a few of the guys headed off into the crowd to score some psychedelics, or “craze” as Emrose liked to call it. A gray cloud cover blanketed the overhead sky, which lent striking juxtaposition to the huge painted rainbow mural arching over the stage. They returned with the goods, we all dropped and waited for the fun to begin.
In no time at all, Howie, Fonebone, Emrose and Iowa Boy got off on their “craze” and seemed to be enjoying themselves. But for some reason, Red and I did not get off at all. We sat there in our sober disappointment, wondering how we two women managed to end up with duds. After some discussion and a significant wait, we decided to take a second hit.
You might guess that not five minutes after ingesting our second dose, we suddenly got off on the first one. We both looked at each other and just said “Uh-Oh”.
Eddie Money came on first. Then The Outlaws. I recall Howie saying all of them were playing Gibson guitars and were a “Les Paul Army”. I don’t know if that was so or why that comment stuck with me. Then Santana was up. Carlos Santana was wearing an electric blue velvet suit and his playing smoked. They were AMAZING…it was so freakin’ good that we were totally psyched for what was to come next. Following that (I think they came after Santana) some of the Merry Pranksters got on stage and were rapping to the crowd.
Somewhere in all of this, Howie decided to get up and get something to drink, and while waiting on a vendor line, the guy in front of him suddenly fell to the ground in what appeared to be a seizure. Howie snapped into professional mode trying to tend to him, while a circle of people formed around them. Luckily, the guy snapped out of it and went on his way. Howie returned to the bleachers white-faced and kind of freaked. He was trying to light a joint and asked if anyone had matches, which was met with weird reactions from people, who repeated the word while looking as if he had asked for something outrageously and bizarrely unattainable.“Matches? Matches? Matches?”
And then the Dead came on.
From where we sat, something was very off from the get-go and I don’t think it was just us. Garcia appeared to be having an issue, maybe with the tuning or the guitar, and then there was something going on between Garcia and Weir. There was discussion and hesitation happening that read as friction from where we sat. Once they got going, it was disjointed and nothing seemed to really gel. It had nothing to do with any singing, it was more like a lapse in connection and absence of the usual magic. We all individually felt it. We kept waiting for it to get off the ground, but it never seemed to. After such a hopeful buildup, the disappointment was huge.
Afterward, joining the line of people filing out of the stadium, everyone seemed silent. Not just our group but everybody. Nobody was talking. It was a speechless, exiting crowd. Howie said “This feels like a funeral procession.” Iowa Boy just shook his head and asked “Is this what you people get all excited about?” Clearly he was not going to be on the bus as far as a fan in the future.
The guys began to get hungry as they started to slowly come down from their trip, so we got back into the truck and stopped at an International House of Pancakes.
As you recall, both Red and I had taken a second hit of acid, so things had not leveled off for us yet. Timing is everything and unfortunately, we peaked in the IHOP. This was not a good place to have that happen. Red watched in horror as the face of the woman in the next booth began to melt. I watched my pancakes breathe in and out for a while before suddenly declaring “I can’t do this.” We looked at each other – “Let’s get out of here” – and went to wait out in the parking lot while the guys ate their breakfast.
They finished their meal while Red and I tried to pull it together outside. Then we all packed back into the International with Emrose, still under the influence himself, resuming control at the wheel.
Of course we got lost. Somehow we ended up going up a mountainside, traversing a number of precarious switchbacks. “Is this the way?” ” Do you think this is REALLY the way?” “Are you SURE this is the way?” At some point the road turned to dirt, getting narrower and narrower until it was not much more than a cow path, barely the width of the truck. The left side of the truck was practically touching a wall of rock. The right wheels skirted the precarious edge of a sheer drop off. We could have easily plunged off the side of the mountain. Clearly this was not a road. Emrose stopped driving for a moment while we readjusted our heads to what was happening. There was no way to turn around, there was no way to back up. Channeling his best Neal Cassady, he resumed driving. We kept moving forward, Further.
Eventually the path opened up again and emptied out onto a paved road which then dumped out into a highway; relief washing over all of us, we headed home.
This was just one of many adventures during that time and probably not even one of the wildest. Normally I wouldn’t even touch on this subject at all, just another youthful story born of Poor Decisions. I’m certain we all have them. But I ended up going down my own mental cow path while thinking about Donna Jean Godchaux and her time with the Dead. So here we are.
Years later we did actually listen to a tape of that concert. In the scheme of Dead shows, it wasn’t great but it wasn’t all that bad either. Perception is an interesting thing. That we all had the same impression is even more intriguing.
Eventually I stopped going to see the Dead for compound reasons. I got tired of people like “Bandana Man” – you know, one of those guys in a long blonde ponytail and bandana, wearing overalls with no shirt – recklessly crashing into you, crushing your foot or other bodily part. I think I have encountered some variation of Bandana Man at almost every single show. Then there is the crowd thing in general. Don’t do crowds much anymore if I can help it. This old body no longer wanted to be down on the floor but prefers settling my butt into a comfortable seat. Or a bed. Or my own bed! Maybe I burned out a bit on the futile cries of that one guy who just can’t stop yelling “St. Stephen” over and over again throughout. For years! The price of tickets became too rich for my pockets. And Jerry was gone. Yeah, there was that, too.
Life took a different direction. Kids and a job with responsibilities, and no longer having any desire to imbibe in “craze” or any other recreational substance anymore. I’m grateful I’ve survived some Stupid Mistakes and Bad Choices. Over the years I’ve become very straight, but my eyes are wide open all the time now.
I still listen to GD on occasion though. Sometimes a song will creep into my head like an earworm and stay with me for days on end. Other times one of their tunes suddenly fits a situation or works well on a long drive. More than half a century has passed (omg!!!) since that earliest “exposure”, but strangely, the connection has not faded away.
As a small aside, any association or contact I have had with any people peripheral to the Dead family in times past has been the briefest of interactions, otherwise it’s pretty much at least a degree of separation. It is interesting though – over the years my old friend Red became acquainted with a few members of the Dead, including Donna Godchaux, and still maintains friendships with some of the extended crew. Yesterday I checked in with her to compare notes and see if what she recalled was the same. She confirms that’s pretty much exactly how it happened.
She tells me Donna Jean was a sweetheart with a beautiful voice. And so I circle back to that here.
A friend of mine stated that when the Dark-eyed Juncos show up at the bird feeder, Winter is surely on the way. They have arrived in all their rotund fluffiness, an announcement that Autumn is trucking right along.
Although it has been a less vibrant Fall, the young maple planted in the front yard has ended up putting on a nice show despite my reservations about getting any significant color. I mentioned to the S.O. that some day when it gets larger that tree will probably be one of the most attractive in the neighborhood during Autumn, to which he replied (in his usual cynical manner) that we will be dead long before we ever get to see that. I conceded he was most likely correct….
Halloween has come and gone. The Fence Dinosaur down the street (for those who follow) is in costume. I think there are little dots that light up in the bat wings but I’m not sure.
I donned my wolf hat and sat out on the porch in the chilly wind next to the skelly, with his glowing red eyes and skull switched on for good measure.
Little Rudi wore his pirate sweater all day to celebrate the occasion. Yo-Ho!
We got maybe fifteen trick-or-treaters – if that – in rather unoriginal costumes. There was a Halloween event going on uptown and also I think most of the kids gravitated to the ultra decorated houses. Friends from around the corner mentioned about one-hundred kids came to their door. Their place was done up rather spectacularly. By seven o’clock I had eaten a significant amount of the candy all by myself. Cold and tired, I gave it up, switched off the lights and came inside.
In the next town from here there is an annual parade that is always filled with some really creative costumes and characters. My neighbor V. was there and snapped a photo of the Halloween night sky. She calls this her $20 photo because it ended up costing her that much, as a twenty dollar bill fell out of her pocket and was lost when she pulled out her phone to take the picture. It’s a great photo. What do you think, worth it?
My sister sent me some west coat autumnal shots from where she was standing, so I am including one of my favorite ones in order to encompass a broader geographic view of the week.
This afternoon I took Rudi for a walk around the block and snapped a few photos of November’s fleeting palette.
The Crimsons
and The Golds.
Dusty, antique rose hues
and patterned foliage of an Oakleaf Hydrangea.
Pops of Nippon Daisies glow among their slowly rusting leaves.
Over the last number of weeks the air has been punctuated with the clarion call of Canada geese migrating in V-shaped silhouettes across chilly skies. Their announcements, along with the arrival of the Junco and the red-golds of November, are natures reminders to start preparing for winter.
So here we are, mid-October, and it’s rolling out in slo-mo. While other areas are getting color, this little corner of the world (at least my world) has been in a bit of a stall. The maple tree in front of the house that replaced my beloved linden has a few tinges of gold, but remains mostly still green. The Crow Tree on the corner which is usually in spectacular flamboyancy appears to be slowly browning, without much fanfare. It’s happening, but nothing like in years past.
Here is one of the trees from the neighborhood in a photo taken five years ago, just to give you an idea of the possibilities.
Here is the same tree on the exact same day this year. You never know what you are going to get….
To go hand-in-hand, I’ve had the most lackluster approach regarding fall cleanup. Honestly, I barely care about it. A small burst of energy here, another burst of trimming back there. Then I just want to go inside and take a nap.
What I thought were many tall sunflower stalks (having planted multiple varieties of sunflowers this past spring) ended up mostly being Jerusalem Artichokes (aka sunchokes). A friend had shared some bulbs with me years ago. I thought it would be fun to grow and eat them. They took off instantly and became a bit prolific (read Invasive). That would not really have been much of a problem, except given the layers of lead-based paint remaining on these old houses (this one is about 125 years old) that very well could be leaching into the soil, it didn’t seem like such a good idea to be ingesting them. I thought I had removed them all, but apparently little pieces of tubers left behind created new plants.
Initially thinking they must have been the sunflowers I planted, I let them go until it became all too obvious what they were. Their towering, hairy stalks reached towards the sky, finally flowering when Autumn was well underway (pretty much the last thing to bloom, aside from the ongoing Zinnias), producing tiny yellow blooms that looked like miniature heads stuck on giant bodies. They overshadowed and took over the entire area in front of The Urban Porch.
Luckily, they pull out very easily. I gathered some tubers to share with some local people who might have room to let them run.
The actual sunflowers are finished and died off. I’ve left most of them standing for now, letting the birds continue to feast on them. Their blackened eyes, empty husks and jagged, wilted leaves provide a tinge of spookiness to the season.
In their usual oddball weirdness, the squirrels (or one squirrel) repeatedly brings its lunch (entire sunflower heads) up onto the porch, possibly in order to dine in peace, leaving a mess behind. I’m wondering if this is the same one that insists on depositing peanut shells in front of the door.
The oak tree in the median by the next door neighbor’s house has been infested with Spotted Lanternflies. The tree appears damaged but I’m not sure if the insects are the cause. It is peculiar that only that one tree (as far as can be determined) has been affected, even though there are others close by. Perhaps someone had parked on the street beneath it and deposited a hitchhiker at some point earlier in the year. I don’t want them on my trees and have been rather vigilant in annihilating them whenever I seen them.
At first I thought my new tennis racquet bug zapper would do the job (see “Seriously???”, 9/6/25 for more on that), but it seemed to be useless against them and useless in general, although I did zap a really annoying fly in the house the other day. This item has pretty much been a fail since the beginning. So I grabbed the ever-trusty, good old-fashioned basic fly swatter from the closet. It’s been very effective. I’ve read that for each lanternfly you kill (before they lay eggs) it will prevent 60 to 100 more from hatching. If that is the case, I’ve rescued the street from thousands of invaders. The neighbors might very well be laughing when they see “that crazy lady with the hot pink fly swatter” out there smashing bugs on a tree multiple times a day, but they might appreciate it if it prevents them from showing up on their property. It might be a useless effort, but at least I’m trying. The yellow jackets feast on their carcasses. I thought I spied a woodpecker picking a dead one off the trunk the other day.
While the leaves have not been the most dramatic, color continues to come into focus in other areas. These eggs are gorgeous –
The single flower that my indoor Fuscia plant produced only last week opened slowly,
glowing beautifully in the front window, petals reaching out in a ballet dance.
The mini-Oxalis has been doing so well that I was able to root multiple cuttings and give them away.
Down the street, the Fence Dinosaur (for those who follow) finally got a new outfit for October. I think they may have skipped the month of September. Right now he’s wearing sort of a wind/rain parka, which will probably be useful this week. They are doing up their house in grand Halloween style this year, so I’m hoping they will give him a costume.
The farmer’s market never fails to present with vibrant bounty.
I was particularly taken with the stalks of brussels sprouts.
A view of the evening sky from The Urban Porch the other evening was fiery and rich, settling into moodiness as the sun dipped below the horizon.
More color zing! It’s time for paw-paws and pomegranates!
The annual local high school homecoming parade marched past The Urban Porch a couple of days ago. The band with those horns, drums, feathered helmets and cheering kids always brings on a smile and a tear at the same time – I’m not sure why. Perhaps because amidst a world full of chaos it is something that feels cohesive, joyful and healthy……..
The following day there was a massive No Kings protest march in town. There were thousands participating. It was loud, creative, colorful, peaceful, and also quite moving to see people standing together in solidarity and concern for the future of our democracy.
Back on the block during the evening walk with Rudi, we noticed a number of houses – the usual ones who really get into it – doing it up in style for Halloween again this year. My biggest effort was dragging the skelly out of the attic, putting it in a porch chair and arming it with a weapon. If you are a Spotted Lanternfly for Halloween and come up on this porch, you’ might be in trouble. Unless there is a sudden rush of last minute motivation, that’s going to be the extent of the decor.
A few perks of Autumn – the mosquitos are finally gone. It’s also been cool enough to break out my collection of way too many cowboy boots. I’ve been slowly off-loading a number of them throughout this year, but there are still quite a few in the closet.
It gets dark so early now! Little old Rudi and I have been soaking in as many sunny days as we can; just a couple of seniors enjoying the Autumn sun as the season slowly rolls out.
I’ve got an old friend who has a penchant for ordering things that look like “such a deal” from the ads on her internet and social media pages, and then receiving not quite what was pictured. No doubt there are plenty of us who probably have had similar experiences, especially in more recent times where both Quality Assurance and Customer Service are becoming less of an expectation and more of an archaic concept in so many areas.
These situations show up as frustratingly laughable stories and memes, as in “What I Ordered Versus What I Got”. For example, this “3 Ft Tall Chrome Doberman Statue as pictured that someone ordered, and what they actually received.
Or this Barney costume someone purchased and what arrived:
Along those lines, a while back my friend had ordered a lounge chair with sunshade and carry bag that looked like an incredible bargain, but received only the bag, and a bag not even big enough to hold what would have been the chair. She never bothered to follow up on her loss. Another time she ordered what she described as a “cute cat vase” that appeared about ten inches high in the photo, but received a teeny, tiny vase of a couple of inches, the diameter of the hole on top only large enough to fit a straw.
Going forward, you might think those experiences might have been enough to deter her from that great lure of internet advertisements lurking on the sidebar of the screen, but clearly sometimes they are just too good to resist.
Having undergone spinal surgery and ongoing recovery, she was in search of a lightweight, nylon cross-body purse that would not pull down on her neck and shoulders; something which would allow her to navigate hands-free so she could hold a cane and do whatever else. Being the night owl that she is, about 2 a.m. she was scrolling the internet and came across just the thing in one of those ads; shoulder strap, interior sections and zippered inside pocket, affordable, and in an array of colors. Looked pretty good.
The Red bag is the one that appealed to her most. She clicked on the Red option and put it in her “cart”, filled out the order form with all the information and moved on to the payment screen. Once there, she discovered that her choice of RED had all of a sudden been changed to BEIGE. Not wanting Beige, she backed out of the screen before hitting “pay” and tried making the order again.
This situation repeated itself a number of times. She would put the Red purse in her cart, move on to the payment screen, add her billing information and just before she was about to hit the payment button she would see her Red purse had once again been changed to BEIGE. Backing out, she tried a few times without resolution.
Now determined and very much wanting this shoulder bag, she decided to try another company, discovering what appeared to be the identical purse being sold by different vendors, with prices that were similar, maybe a dollar or so different than her initial choice. What was interesting is that all these separate companies happened to have the exact same photo of these shoulder bags in their advertisements.
Once on the website of company #2, she repeated the same process, only to once again discover at the last minute her choice was automatically changed to BEIGE! Despite the offer of a display of colors, in the final screen it always came down to no choice except Beige.
And here it gets a little bit cloudy, because she is not sure how many different companies selling the identical items she may have tried – possibly two but she thinks it might have been three (“Well, you know it was two o’clock in the morning and things get fuzzy”), but eventually her choice of a Red purse actually did appear to remain RED at checkout.
Her confirmation email arrived.
And then another one. And another one. And yet another one! Altogether she received sixteen (yes, 16) confirmation emails verifying she had submitted sixteen individual orders for sixteen individual purses. Next, all these charges immediately showed up on her credit card statement.
How was this possible? She had never hit “pay” at the end, but had backed out of each screen, only confirming the final purchase she had decided to keep. None of these companies provided any contact information on their site – some were written in Chinese. She is not fluent in Chinese.
So she called her credit card company, which was linked to her PayPal account (the method of payment) to explain the situation and cancel all the orders but one. The customer service person was amused, yet stated (perhaps with a sigh) that they would have to go in and cancel sixteen individual orders…. but assured her all would be taken care of.
Within a few days, a largish package arrived at her door. Opening it, she found it contained not one, but three Beige (or what appeared to be Beige) purses inside. Upon inspection, she discovered the interiors did not contain the zippered inner pocket as featured, that the strap was a bit more ribbon-like than expected, and that the lining of at least one of them was unfinished and not especially well made. She put them back in the wrapping and set the package aside.
Almost every day or so thereafter, another delivery was left at her door. She just left them all sitting on her table unopened. When she told me this I could not stop laughing. Showing my age here, I was flashing back to that old I Love Lucy episode where Lucy and Ethel had a job on a conveyor belt at a chocolate factory and the candies kept coming faster and faster.
I was also baffled. “Why aren’t you opening them? Aren’t you curious? Maybe a Red one is inside one of those packages!” Her response was sort of a lackluster “Meh”. Oddly, she seemed to have no immediate interest and said I was more thrilled about it than she was. It would have driven me nuts having all those parcels arriving and not knowing what they contained.
Eventually she had a pile of plastic-wrapped mailers just sitting there. When I saw the photo, the first thing I thought of was that it looked like a shipment of seized contraband. I guess you could call late-night obsessive retail therapy sort of a drug, if you will….
In the meantime and to her relief, her credit card company had reversed all the charges, which was her immediate concern. She asked PayPal (the intermediary payment method between her bank and the companies she purchased from) what she should do with all these wayward shipments. They told her she could either send them all back at her own expense (to China, no less), or she could just keep them. She figured she could probably donate them to a good cause somewhere, or (she joked – or maybe not a joke)“Guess what everyone is getting for Christmas?“
Yesterday I spoke with her and started bugging her a little bit. “So when are you going to open those packages?” She still didn’t seem to have any interest, but I persisted. I suggested we go on FaceTime and virtually open them together. So it began.
First – and most obvious – is that although there were three different companies, they are in fact all the same company. The source of the purses is the same, all are imported. They have the identical shape, colors, straps, little braided zipper pulls. Regardless of which vendor, they all arrived with the identical “Thank You” card inside.
She began by revisiting the first package containing three which she had initially opened. We discovered all three purses inside were actually more of a Gray color, not Beige. After that there was one purse in each package. Beige! Beige! Gray! Gray! Gray! As she opened each one and called out the colors, we found ourselves sinking into what soon became hysterical laughter. It got even better when it turned out one of the packages was an order of underwear she had been waiting for and wondered what had happened to it. She had thrown it aside, thinking it was another purse. Beige! Gray! Gray! Gray! UNDERWEAR! At that point I was laughing so hard that my eyes were streaming. When was the last time you laughed so hard that you cried? It was just too good! We were both almost howling and could not stop.
I kept a little scorecard during the reveal. The first twelve were all Gray or Beige. Wonder of wonders, purse #13 was a Red one. We cheered! RED! You finally got your Red purse! Well, it wasn’t exactly Red, rather more like a Maroon, but still……
Purse #14 also was Red! Purse #15 – another Red!
Finally it was down to the very last purse, #16. Drumroll…….. it was BLACK!
The final score: 8 Gray, 4 Beige, 3 Red and 1 Black. After all of that, she has decided she actually likes the Gray ones best.
I believe she put them all back in their packages and I’m guessing all those packages are still just sitting on the table. Knowing her, they will probably remain there for a while.
At last mention of this debacle, she shared that her credit card company had just billed her again for a few of the purses. I am not sure how that will play out, but the entertaining part of the fiasco has concluded for me with the big reveal. Honestly, it felt so good to just laugh.
I guess there might be a few takeaways from this. Avoiding the potential for misrepresentation can be challenging when engaging in the enticement of online shopping, even when you think you are being careful. I recently dodged one of those situations myself. Beware of those advertisements popping up in your social media pages. Maybe not shop in the middle of the night, especially if you are feeling a little bit “fuzzy”. And it never hurts to check the reviews and scores of the vendor to see if they are legit.
In the meantime, it seems as if (hopefully) one of these purses will provide what she was looking for regarding weight and accessibility. As compensation for the agita, I think she should keep a Gray, Beige, Red and Black for herself – one for every season!
This week I will share a few things that have provided a bit of joy, appreciation, awe, or curiosity during September. For the most part they are pretty simple things which have created a necessary and probably healthy bit of diversion.
I’ll start with a few autumn scenes from The Urban Porch and move on from there. Following an intense and sudden deluge, the gutters overflowed in a loud, dramatic, and rather exciting way.
The sunflowers have been a success this year, drawing comments of appreciation from the foot traffic going by, in addition to attracting the birds.
A praying mantis stopped for a few moments and then vanished into a tangle of weeds below. The first one I’ve seen this year, I’m guessing when the garden is put to bed a few of those foamy, empty egg cases might be discovered.
In my last post I mentioned the acquisition of a tennis racquet bug zapper to deter the onslaught of mosquitos and yellow jackets. Up until this point I have to say it’s been mostly a failure. My friend has an identical one that appears to have a bit more power to it. She’s excellent at wielding that thing too. I did manage to swat away a pesky hornet. It landed on her deck, only stunned, and probably would have gotten up again but for an interesting thing occurring.
An ant appeared and decided to haul the hornet away. A battle ensued! Disoriented from the zap, the hornet was at a disadvantage, but it resisted, twisting around in an attempt to sting the ant, while the ant doggedly avoided the stinger and tried to drag it off by its head. It was all very National Geographic. This went on for quite a while. We wondered if any other ants would come by to help out, but the struggle remained one-on-one. I’m assuming the ant won, as it finally disappeared with its prize down a space between the planks.
While walking Little Rudi up the street, we came upon this black cat lounging on the sidewalk. She is one of the Queens of the Neighborhood, patrolling her fiefdom with an air of ownership, often positioning herself under birdfeeders. She is in our yard almost every night. Large, about the same size as the dog, she is a formidable presence. As we got closer, it was clear she had absolutely no intention of moving. While she has never (yet) attempted to go after him, Rudi always gives her a very wide berth. We walked into the street in order to avoid any kind of confrontation. I enjoy her sassiness.
One of the last remaining floral scents of the season has been the Sweet Autumn Clematis (Clematis terniflora). It has a heavy, intoxicating, Jasmine-like scent to it.
While carefully sticking my face into the blossoms for a hit of perfume (avoiding the bees), I discovered a young Tree of Heaven had sprouted up within the Clematis, and upon the leaves was a Spotted Lanternfly. The lanternflies have finally made it to The Urban Porch. So far there have only been a few, but even a few are too many. They are quite beautiful. The patterns and colors on their open wings remind me a few articles of clothing I have! Lanternfly couture! It’s too bad they are both invasive and destructive.
Their food of preference is the Tree of Heaven (Hell), another invasive species from China, which grows quickly and spreads easily. I pull them out and cut them down whenever I see them, but some of the neighbors are not so diligent about it.
This one was observed busily chowing down on a small ailanthus that the next-door neighbor’s landlord had let grow. “Wait, let me go back to my house and grab my bug zapper tennis racquet!” So I did that, and I got the thing (you have to approach them from the front – their sensors appear to be on the back and they can quickly hop/fly/leap/boinnng away). It was oddly satisfying, but it was just the one, and it took a few attempts with the barely effective bug racquet. Maybe it needs fresh batteries. I flipped the defeated bug off the porch, where a group of house sparrows were hanging out. Hopefully one of them took it and will acquire a taste for more.
Onto the birds, yesterday in the driveway there was a flock of Mourning Doves in the spot where I park. Usually there is only a pair and they take off as soon as they see the car. This time there were five or six of them together, with no indication they were leaving.
So I sat in the car and watched them for a while. Perhaps some seeds had blown off a plant onto the blacktop were attracting them? Or maybe it was the impending rain storm that grounded all of them? On closer inspection, it appeared a few of the birds were molting.
Finally I needed to get out of the car, at which point the whole group rose up into the Japanese Maple tree with a noisy flutter of wings.
In other random areas, I opened up a bar of soap bought at a local craft fair last winter. Seeing that happy rainbow soap on the edge of the tub every morning has provided a small ping of enjoyment. It smells like lemon verbena and feels pretty nice too.
Okay, now we move on to the food portion (don’t I often gravitate there?) At a Tea House with a daughter ,we enjoyed a beautiful glass of iced Rose Milk Green Tea with foam, an iced caramel latte,
and a delicate slice of Purple Yam Mille Crepes Cake. Isn’t this gorgeous?
It was impossible to decide between that and the slice of Mixed Fruit Mille Crepes Cake, so…..both! They were so incredibly, light, fresh and not overly sweet.
In my own kitchen this month there has been a focus on figs, mostly because a large container of them was available at a reasonable price. My own lush-leafed fig tree continues to dominate The Urban Porch, but it has not produced even one fig this year. Not a one!!!! Last weekend the Sunday Dutch Baby was a combination of fig and peach, with a hint of vanilla.
On a more creative front, I messed around with ingredients I had on hand and ended up making a really good dinner the other night – Polenta con Fungi e Fiche. You have to say it in Italian because, well, the polenta. Polenta – a childhood comfort food – was baked and then smothered with a reduction of dried and fresh mushrooms (portobello, lions mane, porchini and some powdered morel). Added sliced figs, simmered all in Marsala wine, a little black pepper, a pinch of salt, and topped it off with a handful of pine nuts (pignoli). It was sooooo good. The photo does not do it justice, but just thinking about it now has awakened the taste buds. On the side was asparagus sautéed in olive oil with chopped Moroccan preserved lemons. I will say the asparagus was a little bit woody. But over all it was a killer meal, especially for a weeknight in front of the TV. French macrons for dessert…..
Having not done much with the sage plant that has been growing on the porch all summer, tonight I made Beer Battered Fried Sage Leaves as a little appetizer. They were crispy and interesting. I’m thinking basil leaves might also be good.
There were some big enjoyments this month too, surrounding seeing the kids and all of the grandkids. Just observing them going about their daily lives, watching the subtle nuances of their personalities and interactions actually brought secret tears to my eyes. Brothers on the couch next to each other, reading books. A hand draped over a dog curled up by a little girl’s side. Boys making dunk shots with their laundry. Feelings of appreciation, love, wonder, gratefulness, and some worry; more of a focus rather than a distraction or redirection. Probably a better subject for different post, but all so beautiful.
The Japanese Maple (aka “My Red Tree”) in the back yard is deepening into rose and amber hues, glowing beyond the back window. The days are darkening much earlier now – golden light of late afternoon washes across the room. Redirected gaze and focus to the small pleasures and beauty is a recommended sanity and soul saver.
I’m delicious. I can attest to that, as these freakin’ mosquitos confirm it. Doesn’t matter what foods I eat or avoid, if I am sweating or cool and dry, whether I am freshly out of the shower and scrubbed squeaky clean or not, am alcohol-free, not breathing out extra carbon dioxide from any physical exertion, using fragrance free products or am slathered with supposedly repellant essential oils and sprays. Even the commercial products don’t totally do the job. My enticing type-O blood and otherwise undetectable yummy aroma screams out to them and lures them in like a siren.
My sister gave me a repellant wrist band to try that she felt was helpful. I had been saving it for an occasion when I was out gardening or sitting on The Urban Porch.
To compliment the wrist band, a friend recommended a super inexpensive, battery operated swatter shaped like a tennis racquet. She told me she sits outside by her swimming pool and waves it around her, where it emits multiple (and rather satisfying) “zap zap zap” sounds as it clears the air of mosquitos and even yellow jackets that are harassing her. I just discovered my son-in-law carries one when he goes on his evening walks and finds it very effective for bothersome horseflies. How come I never heard of this thing? So I got one.
That afternoon I sat outside on The Urban Porch and awaited the usual onslaught of biting bloodsuckers. I waved it around my head and body as my friend described, anticipating the gratification of flying pest annihilation and mellow airspace.
But no action was occurring. It was as if they suspected something was afoot, even before the thing was on. Perhaps the mere presence of said device entered their tiny consciousnesses, prompting them to back off? I continued to sit there on the porch, waving it around my head like a hallucinating tennis-playing weirdo. While I was doing this, a large mosquito zipped right past the racquet, landed on my leg and began drilling into me. It felt like a personal affront! A few attempts have now been made to test this contraption out. So far there has been no success.
This afternoon I decided to do some weeding and yard cleanup before the predicted thunderstorms began. It seemed like a good opportunity to test out the pink mosquito-repelling wrist band, especially since it was hot and muggy and I was going to be sleeveless. It has a very strong odor, like citronella and probably a blend of other oils too. Not having total confidence in its effectiveness, I also added a layer of commercial repellent to my bare arms for an extra barrier.
And yet, they eventually drove me back inside. Notice the wrist band and the proximity of a mosquito bite just beginning to welt up. This is in addition to using the commercial spray.
And here is the front side of my opposite shoulder. There are more bites on the back side. This is before they really blew up to about the size of a quarter.
There’s also one on my face and probably a few more elsewhere. As I type this, all of the bites are continuing to expand even more than in these photos and getting increasingly itchy.
A guy I knew years ago once put forth his theory that they were not targeting any one person – that we were all being bit by the mosquitos but only some of us were having more extreme reactions to them. He pointed out that they were landing on him too, but he was not reactive. In a way that idea almost makes sense as sometimes the welts get huge – it is the body’s immune response. Even after they fade, they often seem to flare up again days later.
The most effective thing I have found besides covering up head to toe is DEET, and even that has not been totally fool proof. I hate the way it feels on my skin, although I have used it at a few outdoor evening gatherings and religiously when in areas of countries where malaria and dengue fever is a threat. As always, you have to pick your battles. It is also toxic to dogs, which is a big NO around here.
The greatest anticipation towards colder weather is that this flying army from hell will finally be dead…at least until next year.
Summer is closing out and the action surrounding The Urban Porch has very much slowed down. There is a tinge of color on the edges of some leaves. A slight shift in the quality of the light. Cooler nights, great for sleeping with the window open.
The Hostas have completed their blossoming, the leaves dying back to wilted, brown rags. I began mowing them down in small segments, a little each week. My mower is small and will keep stalling out if I try to do it all at once. After flushing out a small rabbit from beneath them (it scampered away to safety), I first make sure there are no creatures lurking beneath.
The black bears have been pretty active and seem to be everywhere lately. So many adolescent bears sightings happening around here – leaving their mother, starting to learn about the world on their own and trying to fatten up before it’s time to hibernate. Pretty much every day one is crossing the road, sauntering across a yard, or getting into someone’s garbage. While I was watching my granddaughter last weekend, my daughter texted me to say “Don’t let the dogs out, there’s a bear in the backyard.” It’s not a very clear photo off the back of the house camera, but you get the idea. It was still a good size, and no, I didn’t let the dogs out.
Speaking of dogs, there are three of them, including mine, and one that was just newly adopted (my new grand-dog). A quick diversion here to share about the acquisition of this one. I volunteered to drive out of state to pick up this little guy who was being delivered (along with so many others) off a transport. He was one of sixty-five small dogs coming from a hoarding situation in Kentucky. I don’t understand what is wrong with people that this kind of thing occurs and allowed to get to that kind of critical situation. Luckily, new homes were found for all of them.
I was expecting something like a box truck to be delivering these dogs, so you can imagine my surprise when a huge tractor trailer pulled into the parking lot. Inside, the cages were stacked three high and ran the entire length of the trailer. While they were stressed from their long travel, the dogs that came off at our stop appeared to be in good condition, and the driver transporting them was kind. This was one of multiple drop off points through multiple states.
Here he is when he first came off the truck and into my arms. He was trembling and so small.
And smelly. He needed a bath. He was good about it.
Afterward he immediately snuggled up close to me and fell into an exhausted sleep, as did I. When I woke up, the dog was tucked up against my collarbone, right under my chin. Sweetness overload!
The next day he went on to my daughter’s family and his forever home. He’s a great little pup and fit right in almost immediately. Lucky boy! ♥
So back to the bear; I was not going to take any of them out while a bear might be on the other side of the porch. There is always a lot of animal action in that yard. Fox often, racoon families, skunks and Barred Owls in the trees. This one was in front of the house. What a beauty!
Circling back now to The Urban Porch – as summer wanes, Zinnias and sunflowers are providing most of the showy hues, although the leaves on many of the Zinnias have developed a powdery mildew. It didn’t happen to the Zinnias growing next door at the neighbor’s place, so I don’t know what that is about.
Milkweed saw an abundant, successful summer – the seeds tossed around last fall apparently took. Monarch butterflies did eventually find them.
Once they emerged, they danced among the Zinnias.
The Milkweed pods are drying out and beginning to burst open, getting ready to send the next generation of seeds out on silky parachutes. I am gathering them to share with anyone who wants to encourage the Monarchs next year.
Masses of orange coneflowers throughout the neighborhood have contributed to some eye-popping admiration.
Speaking of “the neighborhood”, the Fence Dinosaur down the street (for those who follow updates on our local stuffed ‘saurus fashionista) was decked out in shades and a sombrero for August.
Inexplicably, a number of disappointments have occurred during this summer’s growing cycle. For the second year in a row, my fig tree did not produce any figs. I surmise it might be due to having been cut back the year before last, and even a tiny bit of a trim last year? Plenty of healthy leaves, not one fig.
Also the Hibiscus that had bloomed a few times inside the house over winter did not produce any flowers at all when out on the porch all summer. That’s a first. But weirdest has been the Heavenly Blue Morning Glory Fail. Tendrils snaked and vine-wrapped up and around the railings of The Urban Porch, in addition to climbing the lamp pole in the front yard. The soil in the porch pots was not even the same soil as in the yard, yet despite the differences, there was not even one blossom on any of them! I have no answers for that.
Elsewhere, scarlet seeds of summer’s end adorn the Dogwood tree in the front,
while English Yew is putting forth their cool-looking berries. If you have ever seen what an MRI image of an eyeball looks like, it’s kind of like these berries. Eyeball berries….
While these bits of late summer hues and pigments make an appearance, The Dulling of the trees has begun. The Dulling – that in-between time when the vibrancy of summer greens ceases any further action in the chlorophyll department and takes on a flat, appearance – the early commencement of dying, a dull pause until the vividness of autumnal glow truly begins.
A number of people I have spoken to lately have expressed their own pauses, lack of inertia, a suspended animation, a slowing down – in effect an emotional dullng running parallel to the seasonal changes. Everything is connected.
The Crow Tree across the road is experiencing a few radical changes. The two jutting pinnacles which have provided perches for crows, ravens and hawks appears to have finally broken off. I still can’t believe this tree has not fallen. The view from my chair on the porch indicates that The Dulling there has begun, with a hint of September gold beginning around the edges.
One by one the plants on The Urban Porch are experiencing their own version of The Dulling. The ones that will not be coming back inside are fading out and will be tossed. Tomatoes are finished and all eaten. Basil has been picked, the pesto has been made.
There was not as much basil planted and frozen this year, meaning less to revive August’s verdancy during winter’s dark. On the subject of food, The Dutch Baby of the weekend contained the late fruits and berries of the season – peaches, blackberries and raspberries.
I’ve still been making a few more watermelon/feta/mint salads, but the mint has flowered and bolted, leaving not much left to gather. It’s time to think about squashes and roasted vegetables for dinner in the coming days. Well, maybe not yet, but soon.
And then there are the night insects, the crickets and katydids; an ongoing chorus of jingling bells, interspersed with some chirping and what sounds like someone running their thumb along the teeth of a comb, over and over again. Last week there was an insistent, raspy man-voice rising above all the others calling “knee-deep, knee-deep.” This went on for days, but tonight Knee Deep is silent, perhaps having left the scene. By some time in October they will all be gone.
While The Dulling is occurring, in contrast there have been some stunning sunsets, vibrating blue skies and spectacular cloud formations, along with rumors of possible aurora borealis sightings in the near future.
As usual, where I start with these posts is not always where it ends up.
One of my kids sent me photos of outrageously massive, crashing and cresting waves on the ocean near where she resides, an effect produced by Hurricane Erin, which has been alternating between kissing and pummeling numerous states along the east coast this past week.
Simultaneously, one of my sisters let me know they were making preparations to evacuate their home if it became necessary – depending on which direction the wildfire ended up taking – as billows of smoke and glowing skies from a hungry blaze moved across the outskirts of their California town.
Throughout the last few decades, the whole climate change situation has slowly gained momentum from a dire warning to stark reality. Only now, over the most recent of years, has it become startling enough that any climate change denier would have to be pretty dense (or corporately greedy) not to acknowledge that something potentially disastrous is afoot.
It was in the 1970’s when I first experienced earth tremors in the northeast. Up until that time, tremors were something I only knew from the west coast. Were they always happening? Was it natural fault lines? Fracking? Undersea weapons testing? Subsequently, there is never any heavy decor or shelving hanging directly over my bed.
In 1989 I encountered the first (of a few) northeast tornados. Before then (at least for me) they were just stories shared by our midwestern relatives. The dog became restless as the sky turned pea soup green. Lawn chairs, kid’s toys, branches, leaves and and debris began to fly sideways past the house. I recalled my aunt telling me to open the windows (so the house would not pressurize and blow them out) and get down to the lowest or most interior spot inside. I did that, then grabbed the baby and the dog and crouched on the dirt basement floor. Mere seconds later it had passed through, uprooting trees as it skipped its way across a few counties and into the next state, leaving some areas totally unscathed beneath sparkling, sunny skies, while elsewhere lay a path of destruction and, tragically, a few deaths in its wake. And that was just an EF-1, debatably “only” a microburst. After that incident our local schools began installing NOAA weather radios and weather alert warning systems.
While (at this point) these experiences above have pretty much fallen way below the full wrath of nature, the degrees of separation are not that far off: A friend whose family lost their house in rapidly rising floodwaters from the Susquehanna river, another in Katrina, another stuck in her car as it began to submerge in a flash flood, at least two whose property and part of their houses were ripped up by a tornado, friends of friends and family who have lost their homes to racing wildfires…. an email from my cousin saying “I’m writing this from the basement because the tornado sirens are going off.” Were these things always happening, and happening as frequently? Or is it just a heightened awareness of such, an awareness made due to instant live media of these events?
So while these photos of waves and smoke were being shared and popping up on my phone in real time, it got me flashing back to memories of a few weather incidents from the past; memories like hanging on to the door handle of my car while the wind sucked my breath from my lungs, a basketball backboard, hoop, and a picnic table blowing by, trees bowed and bent till their tops grazed the ground, a huge tree lifted up and thrown through a (newly renovated) kitchen. Seeing the eerily surreal, pointing finger of a funnel expanding and contracting from a threateningly dark cloud on the horizon, as I raced to pick up one of my children from her friend’s house. Water rushing down the hillside, flooding the basement and rising to the level of the first floor, the oil burner, water heater and clothes dryer submerged, the washing machine actually floating. A physical earth tremor that was so loud we thought the furnace had exploded. Blizzards, with no power for days. Yet by comparison to other possibilities, these incidents are considered mild.
These geological and meteorological echoes from the past spun through my mind like a weather roulette wheel, until it landed on Hurricanes of Childhood. In my recollection there was always a hurricane, or the outer reaches and remnants of a hurricane, pretty much every year – sometimes more than one. There were so many that as a kid I used to hope one might eventually carry my name (that didn’t happen).
The pointer on the spinning wheel slows further and stops here: In first grade my mother sent me off walking alone to school in a hurricane – Hurricane Donna, to be exact.
The elementary school was normally only a ten minute walk from our house, which sat in a suburban neighborhood on the edge of still undeveloped land containing swamps, streams, fields and woods. I was six years old during the 1960’s era, a time when children of all ages walked and played everywhere and anywhere, unaccompanied. You went out into the neighborhood and beyond (sometimes far beyond) and didn’t come home until dinner time.
My mom used to stand outside on the front steps and ring a bell summoning us to return. When you heard the bell, you came home. This was so useful that eventually other mothers on the street started ringing bells to call in their children too. There was a deep-sounding ship bell on the east side of the street and a higher pitched school bell at the top of the hill. Ours was a distinctive Swiss cow bell with a tone that carried far.
Back then there were no mothers in cars waiting in school drop-off and pick-up lines. There were no “phone calling trees” of parents passing on information to the next one, or automated calling systems from the school district. You had to listen to a local radio station and wait for your school to be mentioned in the endlessly long list of school closings. And we walked, unless the school was too far, in which case you were bussed. My mother didn’t even drive at the time, had a couple of younger kids at home, and was pregnant with another. I’m guessing in her distraction and urgency to get me off to school that she didn’t even notice the dark skies, intense rain and billowing winds happening outside as she handed me an umbrella and shooed me out the door.
Immediately and disturbingly evident – there were no other kids walking up the street to school except me. I had only gone past a few houses before my umbrella was blown inside out, but I kept going, becoming ever more soaked as I trudged against gusting winds blowing water into my face and galoshes (yes, we called our rubber rain boots “galoshes” or “rubbers”), wind which left me gasping and almost knocked me over.
I just looked it up now to see how far the walk actually was to get to that school from home. As endless as it felt, it was just about the length of five football fields, which in the scheme of things is not very far (everything seemed so much bigger then). But given the conditions and the size of a skinny little six year old, it was formidable.
I did finally make it to school, water streaming down the back of my slicker….only to find upon arrival that the building was deserted. The door was was locked; banging on it elicited no response. I thought maybe they did not hear me knocking? Was I going to get in trouble? The school was not open. Turning around, the daunting trek alone was made back towards home.
I don’t recall my mother being especially upset at my return. It was just a fact; the school was closed, presumably due to the weather. I don’t think she even realized what I had just gone through. When this incident circulates through my cyclone of childhood recollections, I’m able to laugh about it (now), while having to wonder/marvel where my mother’s head was at during that time.
I’m assuming the school closing was announced on the radio back then, since nobody else showed up. Perhaps she didn’t realize the extent of the storm, therefore hadn’t turned on the radio. Maybe she was experiencing morning sickness that day, or she was busy changing the little one’s diaper. It’s highly likely (definitely likely!) she could not wait to get me out of the house and off to school that morning in order to have one less kid at home. She was a good, loving, caring mother in so many ways, and while born of a generation where kids were expected to do things independently like go off to play all day in the neighborhood or walk to school in the rain or snow, I still don’t think she would have sent me if she knew it was into a category 2 hurricane with wind gusts of up to 100mph. Can you imagine? During these current times, sending your six year old to walk off to school in a hurricane would no doubt be construed as neglect.
Delving further into this cache of recollections, I have to wonder what parenting faux pas my own children are going to dig up on me…..
It was a little over a week ago, time approximately 3:30 am, when I was awakened by the sounds of crashing and muffled yelling coming from somewhere downstairs. Actually, in my ever-increasing deafness, I felt, more than heard, what appeared to be (in a suddenly-jerked-from-sleep-hyper-alert state) the movements and thumps of a struggle. The dog was standing at the top of the stairs barking like crazy, as my hand fumbled around the nightstand in search of my hearing aids and the light.
Leaping out of bed, I peered over the bannister to discover all the downstairs lights were turned on and the front door was wide open into the night. I called out for the S.O. (Significant Other) and only heard what sounded like more unintelligible grunting and yelling. My brain was not able to comprehend exactly what was occurring and the only thought going through my head was “Well, it’s actually happened,” in respect to an actual home invasion, while I rapidly scanned the bedroom for something that could be used as a weapon. I remembered there was a baseball bat in the house, but it was downstairs. The only thing within reach happened to be the large, neon green stainless steel water bottle by my bed. It still was half full, which seemed to give it some heft, and it had a good handle at the top that might be useful for swinging at someone’s head, if it came to that.
Whatever was happening was taking place in the dining room. It had not yet crossed my mind that it might be prudent to grab my phone and call 911. I also didn’t remember that I had access to a large, sharp pair of sewing scissors in the next room. I just stood there inert at the top of the stairs, the water bottle dangling (uselessly) from my hand, little Rudi barking frantically, his head pressed against the spindles of the staircase, as we caught glimpses of shadows and movement happening in the dining room below. I saw a leg. An arm. I saw what looked like a broomstick being used as a weapon. I called downstairs, “Are you okay? Are you OKAY? ARE YOU OKAY???“ No response. Deaf as I am, I could clearly hear my heartbeat in my ears.
Finally, an answer. “There is a giant bat flying around the house!!!”
Aha…..and Nope. After taking a quick visual scan around the room to make sure it had not decided to join me upstairs, I took the dog, the water bottle and myself into the bedroom, quickly shut the door and shoved a couple of sweatshirts firmly under the space at the bottom. Then I went as far under the covers as I could and pulled them up over my head. Eventually I went back to sleep (not very soundly) with my hearing aids still left in my ears for the rest of the night.
Don’t get me wrong – I actually like bats, Outside Bats. I just have never done bats in the house very well (see Little Brown Bat -January 20, 2011 for a little history).
I left the S.O. to deal with that drama. He said he had been awakened by it flying through the upstairs rooms, swooping around the hallway and then making sweeping circles around the downstairs. He said it was HUGE. He also has no idea if the bat ever actually vacated the house, because he never saw if it made an exit through the open door.
This leaves me feeling rather uncomfortable. It has been over a week now, and I’m still not totally relaxed about the possibilities.
There are so many crevices, window shades, corners, and spaces where a bat could easily hide. Plus, where did it come in from? The house has been pretty much closed up with the air conditioning on during these sweltering hot days. The chimney to the fireplace (aka The Portal to Hell – May 5, 2012) is blocked off. All I can think is that perhaps when I briefly went into the attic to return a suitcase up there, a lurking bat might have taken the opportunity to slip downstairs? Or maybe it came in the front door when I returned from the last dog walk of the evening? The truth is, it might have come in from anywhere. Who knows, there could be a whole colony of bats living up there!
Did you know that bats can slip through a crevice the size of a dime? That’s 3/8ths of an inch!!! They can come in through a vent, or under a soffit, a space beneath a windowsill or door, or where a pipe or wire enters the building. This house is 125 years old – there must be dime-size openings everywhere! They are so flexible, they just fold up their wings and squeeze that body right on through. That’s an unnerving image.
The only consolations of the whole event:
1. it was only a bat and not an unwelcome human, and
2. I did not call 911. Could you imagine calling the police at 3:30-4am for a break-in and having a few squad cars full of officers arrive, guns drawn, to a bat flying around the house? I imagine they would not have been amused. Or maybe they would have been.
As an odd, rather synchronistic glitch in time……. exactly three years ago to the day there was a bat flying around inside this house (see Things That Land In Your Hair – July 30, 2022). July must be the month of the bat.
In retrospect, it might be prudent to consider some actual form of protection within easy reach, should anything of a more serious consequence than a bat happen to occur in the future. I’ll have to think about what exactly that might possibly be. I’m thinking a water bottle is probably not it. When I reflect on the ridiculous image of me potentially wielding around a neon green water bottle like a badass, I have to laugh. Of note, the rather ineffective broom seems to have made its way to the upstairs hallway and is leaning by the attic door – I guess in anticipation of further surprises.
This morning I decided to tackle some of the worst of the weeds in front of The Urban Porch. Although I’m not all that worried about neighborhood appearances (when you live across the street from a hoarder, everything looks better by comparison), there has been an explosion of somewhat unwelcome growth choking out everything I had worked hard to cultivate. So I was out there in the rapidly rising morning temps until reaching pre-heatstroke velocity, face a fiery tomato beacon, drippy with salty sweat. Finally heading into the coolness of the house, it was me into the shower, clothes into the wash.
I spaced out emptying my pockets and, while moving everything into the dryer, discovered my now very clean keys at the bottom of the washing machine. Luckily they were not the car keys.
Having cleaned up and currently relaxing with a glass of iced licorice-spice tea, the crimson blaze of exertion slowly fading from my face, I sit here unable to escape the incessant clang of overall buckles banging around in the dryer. I’ll take a minute to pause here, mid-typing, to do a Google search on how to remedy this. Suggestions:
Add towels to the dryer. This has been done (along with the rest of the laundry) and it made no difference.
Fasten the buckles to the button closures on the hips of the overalls. I just did that now. Ever so slightly better, but the noise continues………….hold on, I’m stopping here and moving on to another method.
Put them into a laundry bag. This is a vast improvement. I have also shut the door to the laundry area (which is in the bathroom). It remains to be seen if the overalls thoroughly dry while in a laundry bag. I suppose they could just be hung up to dry, but they are softer coming out of the dryer. I’ll report later if this was successful.
Lately it seems as if I am drifting through the days (and life) without purpose, idly floating through a sea, sans focus. While spending time with extended family last week, we took the grandkids to an aquarium. The jellies (one of my favorite things) are mesmerizing. I stood there for a while, transfixed and somewhat unmoored, gazing at those hypnotic blobs of gelatinous lace and gossamer.
Getting lost in jelly-land for an extended amount of time, I lost track of everyone else, drifting on to see the octopus. Right here I need to say I am a Great Fan of the octopus. They are intelligent, sentient beings. Seeing one in captivity, even in a large enclosure, feels uncomfortable. However, I don’t know the background of this one. There were a number of protected, recovering and rescued animals living there, as the focus has very much shifted to conservation, so I don’t want to jump to conclusions.
In any case, the octopus was not coming out of its hiding place, which resulted in a cluster of disappointed visitors moving on. So I stood there alone for a moment and decided to send some telepathic good wishes to the octopus. I silently commiserated with its situation (just in case it should it feel unhappy there) and thanked it for its understanding and patience, let it know how much people enjoyed seeing it, admired it for its exquisite grace. Slowly she (or he) came out and drifted over to check me out.
Most likely it was going to come out anyway, but it very much felt as if we were having a moment. And then it reached out an arm. Hello Beautiful!
Perhaps it’s just a case of anthropomorphism on my part, but it felt connective, the brief encounter leaving a curiously emotional glow. I finally pulled myself away, as it seemed prudent to locate the rest of the family which I had lost. The spacey grandmother gets separated from everyone else in the aquarium while talking to an octopus! Have to laugh at that one.
Further on during the week saw soaring gulls juxtaposed against billowing cloud formations, providing an ongoing distraction. As July closes out, the towering, dramatic, imagination-inducing cumulus clouds known to August are looked to with anticipation.
Leaving the ocean themes now, there’s just one more thing; a tiny sand crab exoskeleton. Childhood flashback – my older cousin using sand crabs for bait to catch what he called “sand sharks.” In retrospect, they were probably “dogfish sharks” – small, smooth and impressively shark-shaped. I would marvel at them and then he would throw them back into the waves.
Drifting off that and onward to just a few seasonal flora; Waterlilies afloat,
an eye-catching Hydrangea of spectacular hues,
a pop of Common Sneezeweed for texture,
and a Rose of Sharon by the Urban Porch that bloomed purple.
Days later, sitting high on a rock above a serene lake with my sister, we watched the clouds drift by while sharing sibling memories unique to us.
Below, two swimmers steadily approached from opposite directions…..when they cross paths, will they stop and drift long enough to greet each other? I fantasize they meet, become friends, become lovers. But they continue on by without pausing, no discernable acknowledgment, only concentric circles left in their wake.
Drifting back to weeding tales in the sweltering front yard this morning; while cutting back the spent floral spikes on the Hostas, I was thwarted by a hovering Cicada Wasp – just one (so far). Intense looking and tenacious, it lingered along the left side of the walkway, repeatedly circling, landing, bobbing about the wilting leaves. Perhaps it was looking for a place to nest – or actually on the hunt for cicadas? For some reason that one spot held dogged interest.
While supposedly non-aggressive (as long as you don’t mess with them), I gave it wide berth anyway, leaving the rest of the task at hand unfinished and allowing it do its thing as it drifted back and forth along the leaves. Having had some success in the past discouraging wasps by using a burst of water from the garden hose, I was able (from a distance) to chase it away with a steady stream – but it was persistent and kept returning. As of late afternoon it appears to have given up, but tomorrow may be another story.
An update: The clothes dryer cycle is completed, rendering the overalls mostly dry – only slightly damp inside the pockets. This experiment was a bit of a success then. To sum up – if you want to tumble dry your overalls without the buckles banging around, try fastening the buckles to the buttons on the hips and put them in a laundry bag to dry along with your other clothes.
It’s getting late so I’m going to drift off now….. see you in August, if not sooner….
It’s mid-summer, up to now quite thick with a sultry humidity, filled with iced tea and slow-moving. I’m too hot and lazy to delve into any subject too deeply. I just want to take a bit of a mental sabbatical and not think too intensely about anything for a little while. Don’t you?
Earworm of the Day – Edie Brickell & New Bohemians:
I’m not aware of too many things I know what I know, if you know what I mean
Both the dog and I have mostly been lolling around and napping. I’m just going to share small observations that have sent tiny pops of amusement or pleasure – buoyant balloons of fleeting, in-the-moment delight.
Shove me in the shallow water Before I get too deep
These Barn Swallows were just about to fledge. The mother was dive-bombing us as I took a few pictures so I didn’t hang out too long.
I love the little one waiting at the end of the line. Their wide, clown-like, juvenile beaks bring to mind mimes in white makeup.
Here and there throughout the neighborhood I’ve encountered pockets of air laden with the sweet perfume of Privet blossoms. How powerful olfactory recollections can be! While walking the dog the other day, I caught a whiff of Privet and was unexpectedly transformed way, way back to a childhood memory long forgotten; watching my neighbor’s pretty teenage cousin who was visiting up north from Oklahoma, as she sat on the cool, grassy lawn abutting our back yard.
She encompassed everything I thought a high school girl was supposed to be, with her tanned arms, hair swept back in a headband, capri pants and a pair of white Keds sneakers. The cute teenage drummer in a band who lived a few blocks away and wore pointy Beatle boots was lying across her lap, smiling up at her as she flirtatiously dropped pieces of clover onto his hair. “She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah”…. I wondered how it would be when I someday became a teenager. Back then I wanted to be like that girl of summer.
Present flirtations – a male Red Milkweed Beetle (Tetraopes tetrophthalmus) finds his awaiting mate on a leaf.
The flowers have dropped, leaving milkweed pods burgeoning with seeds tethered to silken strands.
Drumstick Allium (Round-headed garlic) pops across a friend’s garden
Art mimics nature as holiday fireworks send Allium explosions into the sky
My granddaughter came running up to me, eager to share a found toad gently cradled in her hands. Both the toad and her enthusiasm put a smile on my heart.
After providing adequate admiration, she led me to “where it lives” and tucked it safely back into its grassy hide-away.
Philosophy is the talk on a cereal box Religion is the smile on a dog
Echinacea and Butterfly weed create a pleasant duet.
A bee alternates back and forth between colorful varieties of the cone flower.
My close observation seemed to slightly agitate it, so I left the bee to its business.
“Mema! Look what we found!” A poplar sphinx moth – aka modest sphinx moth (Pachysphinx Modesta). This one was as large as the palm of my hand.
Philosophy is a walk on the slippery rocks Religion is a light in the fog
Last weekend was spent not far from the Canadian border visiting a family member’s home. The Lupines in the yard there had finished blooming, leaving furry seed pods behind. For some reason I’ve always had limited success growing them. However, we gathered enough to bring back and attempt it again next year. They had not really aged enough to harvest, but I’m going to try letting them dry out and hope they will be viable. There are enough that (with some luck) at least a few may germinate.
I love Lupines. There is a wonderful story called “Miss Rumphius” that I used to read to my children about a woman in Maine and her legacy of Lupines. At some point, after growing past the age of hoping to be like that teenage summer neighbor from long ago, I decided I wanted to be Miss Rumphius. I think I still want to be Miss Rumphius!
Silhouettes of pine create images of daytime fireworks.
Pine needles of light fill the night sky with celebration.
Splashes of Goldfinch sunshine catch the eye.
A massive explosion of blooms consumes The Urban Porch. It is reaching critical mass….
In addition to too many plants (can you ever have too many plants?) there has been a steady supply of salad tomatoes.
I’m just looking around and soaking it all in as the sultry heat draws out the colors of summer, shimmering shards of beauty and things I love, catching the eye from every direction.
What I am is what I am Are you what you are or what?
~*~
*“What I Am” by Edie Brickell & New Bohemians – Shooting Rubberbands At The Stars, 1988
Those of us who can are spending as much time hiding in air conditioned spaces, parked in front of a fan, submerged in the water, or escaping the area altogether for cooler climes. Hitting 100°F with humidity is a condition that demands limited outdoor exertion. Schools which are still in session have been releasing the kids with half-days due to the temperatures, while by mid-morning the sidewalks have already become too hot for Rudi’s little paws.
Walking out into this morning’s air felt like getting hit in the face with a wet towel. The Urban Porch has become an afternoon blast furnace, the withering hanging plants requiring watering twice a day to revive them from wilted exhaustion. As I stand there quenching their thirst with a garden hose, the mosquitos relentlessly attack. These are the days of Muggy and Buggy.
This moisture-laden heatwave has produced a string of frustratingly Bad Hair Days, causing an unmanageable, hot, wooly mess that will not cooperate.
Since the grass was already getting high and we may (or may not) be in for another three or four days of rain upcoming, I decided to head out early today to mow the small area in front of the porch before the grass and weeds got too high and pushing the mower through it too difficult. It was only 85°F at 7:30am, but the air was already thick as I slathered on some rather ineffective homemade insect repellant and headed out.
I can’t help but think about people who have been working outdoors during this stretch of high temps alternated with rainstorms. The ones doing landscaping, construction, delivering mail and packages, farming – or really anything outside that requires movement and exertion. I am not taking for granted the privilege of relaxing in my retirement within a cooled house. Upon completion of the mowing and flourishing a bright, dripping wet “Tomato Face,” I made a beeline for the shower.
At this point, weeding and gardening around The Urban Porch has ceased and likely will not resume. Unless this weather seriously breaks, whatever grows will grow and whatever doesn’t make it is just how it’s going to be.
Overall I’m just not feeling it as far as any real cooking. Cooling summer foods this week have included cold spicy peanut Asian noodles, gazpacho, watermelon/feta/mint salad, tuna sandwiches, Caprese salad, guacamole and salty chips, accompanied by iced matcha tea most mornings and refreshing licorice spice tea (sun tea steeped on the blazing porch) poured over ice in the afternoon. And water. Lots of water.
Veering off track for just a second here to share a word on Japanese green matcha tea, which I was turned on to decades ago after partaking in conversation and a bowl of matcha with the percussionist Layne Redmond (1952-2013, frame drummer, recording artist, educator and author of When the Drummers Were Women). She shared her sources and recommended I buy it in bulk – back then it was actually affordable. It has become one of my go-to beverages and I often can’t help but think of her with gratitude while whisking the beautiful green powder. Over the years I have continued to purchase matcha a pound at a time. Stored in sealed containers in a dark cabinet, it tends to keep well without losing any of its taste or vibrancy.
My stash has neared depletion though, and it was finally time to replenish. Yikes, was I hit with some sticker shock (like that wet towel in the face) upon discovering the cost had more than tripled! The seller shared with me that the rising popularity of matcha – like all good things that have become trendy – has driven the demand (and thus the price) way up. On a smaller scale it feels similar to large numbers of people finding out where the secret swimming hole is, or the unique thrift shops, or moving to what were once idyllic and pristine rural and exurban localities. The word gets out, people start coming in throngs, overpopulating special places, depleting the resources and driving up the prices. At that point, like so many good things that often become popular, it becomes saturated, out of reach, even ruined. Muggy and buggy.
Despite the current furnace-like conditions, walking Rudi after dark has been rather comfortable. While the air has remained close and enveloping, after sunset the atmosphere has taken on the feel of a pleasant, sultry bath. The bluestone sidewalks have released the blistering heat of day. Last night hailed the June arrival of fireflies, fairy-dancing and flashing throughout the grass and perennial beds off The Urban Porch. My camera was unable to adequately capture this annual apparition, so I will share a similar photo I found, as we stood there, even amidst the most uncomfortable of days, enjoying the gift of twinkling lightning bug magic.
The story takes place on Venus, where it rains all the time, the sun only appearing every seven years and lasting for one precious hour before the endless rain begins once again. Just one child in a classroom of nine year old students had ever experienced seeing the sun, as she previously lived on Earth. With longing and wonder she spoke of the beauty of sun to her classmates, as she eagerly awaited its upcoming return. “All Summer in a Day” is a short story that was written by science fiction author Ray Bradbury in 1954. Impactful when read so many years ago, it still causes a bit of heartache to think of it even now. If you are not familiar with it, I recommend this short but powerful read. During times where there have been interminable stretches of rain (as we have had recently in the northeast), I cannot help but reflect on this story while yearning for sunlight.
At the moment, everything is wet. It has taken on a bit of a dance, packing those brief, dry spaces in-between with being outdoors. A few days of rain, then it stops; cram in as much gardening as possible, mow before the next week of precipitation, take advantage of umbrella-free walks, drive to places on roads you might not want to drive on when it’s pouring due to flooding, poor visibility, big trucks.
Then it is inside again for stretches of time, resignedly doing chores put off. Vacuuming. Laundry. Washing the floors. Paying bills. Eating an entire bag of chocolate chip sea salt shorbread cookies. With that also comes the urge to Order Things on line – a slippery slope…..like a pound of Japanese matcha tea, or another pair of sandals I don’t need at all (especially in the rain). So here I sit with yet another To-Do from the list; finally trying to catch up with this page, which has been sadly neglected for a few weeks. The gray days have been somewhat stagnating, making it too easy to doom-scroll social media or get lost in a movie or series instead of spending it productively.
All this water has modified the direction of growth in the garden beds around The Urban Porch. Dog Vomit Slime Mold (Fuligo septica) bloomed where I had planted Zinnia seeds. This commonly shows up on mulch. The yellow scrambled eggs appearance was rather impressive, vanishing after one brief sunny day, and has not returned (so far). I get a kick out of the nickname.
Although the leaves on my peonies flourished, there was only one small, fragrant flower. I kept going back to it in order to partake of the lovely scent while it lasted. It was quickly soaked and bowed over in one of the deluges and was finished.
There was only one yellow iris too. The other buds stalled and wilted on the stems.
And only one small flower on the Wild Indigo (Baptisia). This was a major disappointment, as it usually is prolific and impressive.
During a break in the weather I attempted some serious weeding, actually filling wheelbarrows full of weeds.
Little Rudi followed me around the yard and along the length of the driveway as I worked, stopping frequently to plop down in the shade. He looks about as exhausted as I feel.
The standing water gathering everywhere has launched an abundance of mosquitos, leaving arms, ankles, and even my face repeatedly bitten. After the maddening itch, the bites seem to settle down, only to suddenly flair up again.
Whenever a clear day breaks through there is an urge to seize the moment. Over the last few weeks there have been a few road trips to appreciate art. Roz Chast is one of my favorite cartoonists, whose work has been highlighted in The New Yorker magazine for years.
There was a show of her work at a gallery a little over an hour from here, which included some of her cartoons rendered in embroidery. After much stalling, I finally got out there to see it before it closed.
When it comes to Roz Chast, I feel seen.
Despite all the water, at least some of the things growing around The Urban Porch are gaining enjoyment from the deluge. Milkweed is rising all over the place. Hopefully some Monarch butterflies will arrive and take advantage of their chosen food.
Primrose and Rose Campion are providing a happy chroma duet.
Spirea has been lush and filled with bumble bees. They appear to dodge the raindrops.
The Lemon Balm (Melissa officinalis) also flourished. I was able to dig enough up to share with a number of people in the community. That always feels nice.
Back to another long stretch of rain and another show of art – this time a private collection of wonderful illustrations. Here is one from Aesop’s fables, The Wolf and the Crane, by Caldecott Medal recipient Jerry Pinkney.
And a page from Charlotte’s Web, illustrated by Garth Williams! Why is it that seeing the original artwork is a different experiential vibe as opposed to looking at reproductions? I did some quick research on this; as I understand it, there is a region of the brain called the precuneus, which processes self-related mental imagery and stimulates self-reflection, triggering an emotional response to seeing the fine details and vibration of an original work.
I was drawn to this Illuminated Monkey by Trisha McBain – the detail is lovely. A pretty recent piece, I haven’t yet found any background information about it or the artist.
Back out on the porch, the tomatoes seem to be doing very well, perhaps because I have some control over the amount of water they are getting.
For now there seems to be a steady supply for salads and sandwiches.
It is time for mulberries and all I can say about that is “Boo”. When I walked down the street to gather some, it was apparent the window for doing this had been missed. Taken down by gusts of wind and rain, it was mostly a water-logged mess on the ground. A few rather sad looking, bland, uninspiring ones were collected just because. I guess they could be added to a smoothie, but I will probably toss them. *Sigh*. Perhaps next year….
The towering Tulip Tree (Liriodendron) down the street had also dropped many of its gorgeous, prehistoric looking flowers before I was able to enjoy it, leaving crumpled, soggy brown blooms on the sidewalk below. There were still flowers intact high above though, peaking from within cat-faced leaves. As something to look forward to every year, it was good to catch their finale.
Aren’t these blooms fascinating in an alien sort of way?
The weather has not kept the fauna in their dens and nests. Bunnies in the garden abound.
Some time was spent lounging around on my daughter’s screened-in porch (safe from the mosquitos), listening to the intermittent rainfall and watching the birds come back to swoop around the feeder as the sky cleared. This Red-Bellied Woodpecker was so shy that if you so much as moved a muscle it would take off.
By far the most impressive animal sighting this past week took place in my friend’s backyard, where she managed to get a snapshot of it. What a beauty!
It has been many years since I have had the treat of seeing a Bobcat up close and in person. The last time was decades ago, when my friend Emrose and I spied one in his yard, peering at us from the weeds, unmoving, as we stood just inside his front door. “Wow, do you think that’s a Lynx?” “I don’t think we have Lynx around here, it must be a Bobcat! ” “A Bobcat!!! Wow…just wow!!!“
Actually, sitting out on The Urban Porch in the rain is rather pleasant as long as a west wind isn’t pummeling it into your face. I made some purple potatoes with butter and habanero salt and sat outside eating them, until the mosquitos drove me back inside.
Circling back now to the story “All Summer in a Day” – the girl waiting and aching to see the sun again was named Margot. There have been times where I have felt like Margot, or found myself in a sadly parallel position. On reading the story back then, I cried for Margot, and for myself, and for anyone who might have found themselves even momentarily forgotten. At times perhaps we have all been a little bit like Margot, waiting for the rain to stop.
Projecting the story a step beyond and out of context, every once in a while I struggle between the tendency of wanting to avoid social situations and being isolated, while up against a bit of FOMO (Fear of Missing Out). Of course sometimes it turns out you weren’t missing out on much anyway, but on occasion the FOMO can be a catalyst to overcoming the hesitation and having experiences that otherwise would not have occurred. While not all those experiences might end up being so great, they do often tend to be noteworthy.
Finalizing this rather long catch-up on the mundane doings of a life in a wet summer and being the Anti-Socialite that I am, it is so easy and comfortable to cocoon and just stay home, using the rain as an easy excuse. Thus, having a great aversion to crowds and there being a heavy gray sky, there was no intention of going to the most recent protest march (“No Kings”)
However, the rain had stopped, and seeing as it was happening mere blocks from my house, it seemed there was no harm in walking down there to check out (at a distance) what was happening….. only to find myself swept up into the vibrant – yet respectful – energy and running into so many people I knew from so many different segments of my life. One minute I was out of it and the next minute I was part of it, and it was good. Having been propelled into a collective situation and now out of my shell, I ended up afterward going to a party celebrating Gemini birthdays, which I had previously and firmly decided not to attend. And that turned out to be pretty okay too.
Out walking Little Rudi in a light drizzle, I encountered a neighbor rarely seen, mowing his small patch of lawn with a manual reel push mower. We stood there chatting for a while, despite the accumulating mist seeping into our clothing, when from over his shoulder the colors appeared. “Turn around and look” I said, “before you miss it.“
Right on schedule, it’s Purple Time on and around the Urban Porch again. It’s been raining, raining, raining, adorning the petals in watery gems.
Stopping by a friend’s house over the long holiday weekend past, I was met with the stunning sight of an impressive Clematis plant taking over her front steps. She seemed unimpressed with my gaga-ness over the massive blooms. I took a piece home and will attempt to root it.
Bearded Irises to the left of the porch wear tiger-print undies beneath their frilly lilac petticoats.
Lobelia hanging in a basket gets blown around by west winds.
Salvia planted haphazardly in the median fights the encroaching hostas and dayflowers for light.
If the mesmerizing scent of Wisteria hadn’t lured me toward the back fence, I might have forgotten it was hidden behind the parked truck and missed its show.
Even the Ground Ivy has little orchid faces peeking out from beneath it leaves.
Delicate, fragrant spikes of lavender rise from pots on the porch.
A search about the meaning of purple reveals a variety of choices as to what this color may represent. Depending on the culture, shades of purple can be an expression of spirituality, denote royalty, a symbol of luxury and wealth, of wisdom or intuition. Purple feels mature, antique, somewhat moody, at times a tad witchy. It can also be a reflection of sadness. The darkest of purples has been both attractive and yet leaves me with what can best be described as a bruised heart. A little bit melancholy, ever so slightly aching for something on the periphery, unnamed.
Green enhances the vibrations of purple, a colorway which tends to stimulate the senses (at least it does mine). Before this month closes out, I just wanted to share these beautiful Purples of May.
Over the years I’ve been increasingly tolerant of some insects in my environment – or sharing our environment, to be exact. An attempt will always be made to relocate a spider, a beetle or a bee from the house. Outdoors, I enjoy the Blue-winged Wasps bouncing around the hostas and the carpenter bees hovering too close with their phony bravado that makes me smile.
However, there are a few I will not abide and have no guilt about eliminating. Mosquitos, nope! Horseflies inside the window – if they don’t leave immediately when I open the screen, their time is numbered. Yellow Jackets are aggressive assholes and will always be discouraged. If they don’t get the message that it is time to go, they will be sprayed. Scutigera (those freaky, super-fast house centipedes) also are a no, partially because they are impossible to catch intact to move out of the room. If a Scutigera decides to leave the basement and come up onto any other floor, it’s dust. I’m just not going to share my spaces with them. We’ve never had a roach here, but if there was I think I would seriously consider moving out.
Then there are the ants, which always create a bit of moral dilemma for me. The social structure of the ant colony and their collective intelligence is fascinating. It is the females who go out foraging for food for the rest of the colony, arriving each spring to my kitchen – usually a few here and there, never having been much of a problem. They are such fastidious, hard workers! So when the first few (the large black variety) showed up a few weeks ago – one was found in the teapot, another couple on the countertop – I wasn’t too worried about it. As a matter of fact – this might seem kind of crazy to some – I attempted to scoop them onto a piece of paper and usher them out the back door. Having done this a few times, suddenly with greater and greater frequency, I will share that ants definitely do not enjoy being relocated. You upset their purpose when trying to pick them up, causing them to frantically wave their legs and antennae around, zig-zag and actually leap into the air. They pretty much flip out. I supposed it was some misguided benevolence on my part to try relocating them. As their numbers increased I conceded this was folly….as a matter of fact I even said aloud to myself, “Seriously??? What are you doing?”
Because soon they were everywhere. On my car, on the back porch. On the countertops, across the floors, in the cabinets, wedging their bodies into the crevice of the cap on a jar of honey, looking for crumbs of cereal. (As an aside, I want to mention they did not touch my stash of chocolate at all, which is both confusing and a relief. A little research revealed that despite the sugar content, some ant species just do not like chocolate, and also that the caffeine it contains can be harmful to them. These must be the anti-chocolate variety). I started putting anything sweet or crumbly into plastic bags and jars. But that was not enough, as their scouts began checking out the upstairs bathroom and marching across the hallway floor.
This invasion happened rather quickly; we had so much rain this past month that I’m guessing they had decided to find higher ground along with the free food source. The S.O. just started stepping on them and leaving them there on the floor. I assume he thought the dog might eat them (the dog did not) or that I would clean them up (I did), or I don’t know what he thought (most likely he did not think). It was rather disgusting (and disrespectful, really) but that’s another story.
For any natural save-the-ant types out there, I can tell you what I tried first and what doesn’t work. There was no kumbaya with the ants happening here. They remained unfazed by spraying deterrents like peppermint oil or vinegar around the perimeters of the room, the countertops, or along their ant trails. I finally broke down and bought some commercial ant traps, which did nothing – perhaps it was not the type of bait which attracts this specific ant variety. So finally I made my own.
THE RECIPE
4 parts Sugar
1 part Borax powder
Mix it up in a little bit of water to make a syrupy goop
Then I spread it on cotton balls and little squares of paper towel and placed them on the kitchen countertop, a windowsill, and by the back door along the base of the house where I had seen an ant trail. They were very attracted to it – sometimes there was a pile of them feasting on each of my little bait stations. It took a couple of days, but between day two and three, all the ants were gone. The Feelings: Quite Impressed, A Little Bit Elated, and Somewhat Guilty.
After another few days of rain, I spotted only one foolish scout who looked a bit confused as it waved its arms around. So far we have success.
Some blessed breaks in the weather afforded the opportunity to do some gardening. While elbows deep into the weeds, ants would occasionally run across my arms, but we didn’t really bother each other. However, yesterday as I was pulling weeds out from between the cracks in the bluestone by the front steps, the clumps of roots must have been the cover for a massive nest. Soon thousands (yes, thousands) of disturbed ants began pouring out of the spaces vacated by the vegetation. These were a different variety, as they were the little tiny ones.
This was not an ant-bait and wait situation, so I flushed out the nest with water. I have to say I felt both horrible and mesmerized watching those tiny ants doing an emergency evacuation, as they carried out and tried to save white pupae as large as themselves.
After the flood, the walkway was littered with specks of dead ants and pupae, scattered about like the remnants of a miniature tsunami. If you are of the theory that Everything is Connected, which to some degree I am, you can imagine this caused another pang of momentary guilt for me. But then something else happened.
The House Sparrows descended on the path, taking dust baths where the sandy soil had been disturbed from pulling the weeds.
Next they began to check out the open spaces in the walkway.
And then began to pick up and eat the dead ants. Suddenly I felt a whole lot better about it.
The backstory is that the only place to park my car behind the house is underneath a rather large Japanese Maple tree.
Over the last number of weeks it has been dropping clumps of red seeds, pollen and other combinations of organic detritus all over the backyard, into the driveway and on top of the car, which needs to be scooped off the door handles and windshield before driving off.
I was out shopping the other day, and upon pulling into the driveway saw my next door neighbor standing outside. We stopped to chat, when she suddenly paused, gave me that funny look I have gotten to know so well, said “You have some stuff….,” and with a little smile pulled a couple of tiny twigs off my head. Well, that part was not unusual (see Things That Land In Your Hair 7/30/22).
But when I walked into the house and checked the mirror to see if there were any more there, I discovered it was not just a couple of seeds stuck to my hair – my entire head was covered in tree droppings. I had been out in public sporting a head filled with tiny tadpoles of red pollen. Hopefully anyone who may have noticed (how could you not?) maybe thought it was some sort of fashion statement, as opposed to concluding this lady is an eccentric. Once upon a time I might have been mildly mortified. Now this ridiculous scenario just made me laugh.
Due to long stretches of rainy days occurring here, the continuing shower of tree debris (there is soooo much of it)) has become wet clumps packed into every crease, curve and vent of the car. The expectation was that the ongoing rain would eventually wash some of it off, but it hasn’t.
I had snapped a photo of an ant that had caught my attention as it aimlessly and inexplicably walked around on the surface of the trunk (okay, maybe that’s nerdy), but you can notice as an aside how this litter has gotten into every crevice.
Despite pulling handfuls of gunk off the the car each time I leave to go somewhere, it had become so densely packed on that a trip to the carwash was deemed necessary; the next sunny day I drove down there. Now I will preface the rest of this by mentioning that the carwash is kind of a Cheap Thrill for me (see Windshield Galactica 5/28/24). It doesn’t happen that often – the last time was maybe about a year ago. I will admit that when I am in the carwash, a bit of childlike regression occurs.
Bam! This happened first, like having a bottle of black ink thrown at you! It was so sudden I actually said “Whoa!” and then realized I was exclaiming aloud and nobody else was in the car with me. Well, okay…
Next came the “Car Wash Borealis.”
“Whap!!” Those persistent little seeds were fighting the waves, hanging on despite the deluge.
By the time we got to this point I was laughing loudly and exclaiming “Whoo-hooo!”…..all by myself. It was easy to imagine how cool it would have been to have one of my grandkids with me (or even one of my kids, although they might have started to worry about Mom’s sanity)….. or actually anybody who might have appreciated and enjoyed the wild, abstract nature of it…… fun, if only for a couple of minutes.
“Here comes The Edge of Night!”
Things swiftly moved toward the finale, a cloudy ceiling of rising birds. You can see some of those little tree buggers are still stubbornly holding on…
It ended with a giant blue tumbleweed swiftly coming into view. “Ha! It’s Cookie Monster!” (yeah, I really needed a kid with me), then a brief tunnel of fiercely blowing wind – and it was over.
Why bother? It rained for almost an entire week afterward, and despite it all, the car still has tree droppings stuck on it. I’m probably going to need to clean it by hand to remove all this stuff. Eventually.
Afterward I mused to myself…. and wondered. Yikes, am I crazy? Could this be what happens when you are spending a lot of time by yourself? Maybe it is a sign of some child-like regression. If so, is that so bad? Finding joy in the little things. Or maybe it’s a bit of “I Don’t Care What Anyone Thinks.”
Raucous laughter all alone in the carwash and hair covered with red pollen in the supermarket. Should I worry yet? Is it just me, or is this just a common stage of aging?
There was a dead ant floating inside the teapot yesterday morning, the arrival of such yet another sure-fire harbinger of Spring. This particular teapot has a very narrow spout, which makes it rather nice if you make pour-over coffee. It also ensures that something like a mouse will not be squeezing inside of it, which may sound rather far-fetched to some, but believe me, it is weirdly, unpleasantly possible (see Would You Like Some Mice With That? 5/18/2011). Apparently ants have no problem traveling down the long stem of a teapot. I can safely say that always looking inside your tea or coffee pot before refilling is sound advice.
There have been so many thoughts and musings provoked by recent events swirling around my brain that I have been wanting to put down to words, yet I am distracted by the blossoming, the scents and sounds of the season. While not intending to turn this into a gardening/blossom/insect photo dump, I can’t help but want to share the things that keep turning my head.
The Daffodils have completed their show, leaving little deflated sun-balloons behind.
Today is May Day, also known as Beltane; a celebration of fertility, as we have passed the spring equinox and move steadily towards the summer solstice. I have gravitated out to The Urban Porch, enjoying what has been a string of shimmering, gorgeous weather. The windows are open – fresh air circulates throughout the house, chasing away the last of winter’s thickness with sweet breezes. It is so good for mental health to be outside. Things are popping and then leafing out in such rapid succession that it is almost impossible to keep up with it all.
All this vibrancy is in sharp juxtaposition to the decaying condition of The Urban Porch, which has been steadily rotting away for years. I have no control over this situation – while this is my “home,” it is technically not my “house.” Wishful, magical thinking has not changed the circumstances, and I imagine it probably will remain the status quo – unless the porch collapses. Adorning the porch with seasonal flora and looking to the beauty beyond it is a way of emotionally coping with the sorry and somewhat depressing deterioration.
But oh, that view of the cherry tree!!! The majestic cherry across the street is hands down the nicest one in the neighborhood. Its size is so generous that it obscures the entire front of the cat-lady’s house. Large bubble-gum pom-poms dangle heavily above. Just about everyone walking by slows down to admire, brush their fingers along the the blooms, take a photo. It has reached the point today where the emerging leaves are competing with the blossoms. Petals should be falling soon, once again leaving a soft mauve blanket on the street (see West Wind 5/13/2015).
Ferns have unfurled around the Japanese Maple
Dicentra wears a string of hearts on its sleeve.
In celebration of the day, the dogwood to the left of The Urban Porch has fully flowered. As dusk falls, the glowing florets almost appear to hover untethered in the air.
The dogwood two doors down on the right dances in ballet pink.
Sauntering along the sidewalk with little Rudi on our walk today provided a blast of dreamy lilac perfume from over a neighbor’s fence.
They also have planted a swath of linen-white tulips in front of their house – so crisp and visually pleasing!
Redbud trees are flowering throughout the neighborhood, candy floss threads embroidered across the sky.
Over the last two days there has been a glorious scent wafting around the porch. Lily-of-the-Valley sends its sweet attar throughout the air, providing olfactory triggers prompting memories of times long ago.
For a few days I left food out for the pregnant/or nursing squirrel who had been “splooting.” I have not seen her lately – perhaps she is busy with young in her nest. The House Sparrows are back at it in their usual spot in the soffit above the corner post, darting back and forth with bits of fluff and gossamer. Songs from the Carolina Wren open the morning, the call and response of Northern Cardinals close the day.
While sitting on The Urban Porch typing this over the last hour or so, more than one pregnant young woman has walked by. Babies! Such a fertile time of year!
The carpenter bees arrived right on time, doing their dive-bombing mating dance and making an aggressive show by hovering (harmlessly) in your face. As I sit there observing them, it is of note that they are taking particular interest in the disintegrating porch railing. Perhaps they will hurry the demise along! Oh, and the first Yellow Jacket of the season made a few zippy passes by my chair. I chased it off with a spritz of peppermint oil and water from a spray bottle, which will remain at arm’s reach from now on.
As the afternoon winds down and the sun heats up the west-facing porch, Rudi begins to pace and pant, searching for a shady spot behind a flower pot, and so we have moved inside. An ant walks across the hallway floor carrying something larger than itself – perhaps dinner. Small observations. I will continue to share them with you.
There appeared to be a dead squirrel on the back deck yesterday afternoon. It was sprawled flat out, looking rather like a small, worn out old rug; on closer observation it resembled a flying superhero, sans cape. Upon approaching further to investigate, it was a relief to see the squirrel get up and headed toward the Japanese Maple tree, although it wasn’t in any great hurry. I was just climbing out of my car at the moment and didn’t think to grab a photo of it, but it looked pretty much like this:
The pose reminded me of something dogs sometimes do – splooting – which I looked up regarding squirrels, and indeed this one was engaged in exactly that. Apparently they lie down and spread out in order to cool off their body. It was one of the warmest of spring days (so far), and it’s been rather dry too. Once it saw me, “Splooty Squirrel” made its way up the tree, where it stopped again to rest, draping itself along a limb. This time I took a few photos and discovered she is either expecting or nursing.
With sympathy I recall those long-ago hell-hot dog days of summer when I was hugely pregnant and later nursing myself. I probably would have loved to sploot, had I been able! Eventually she took off to wherever she is nesting. Today I left water and some peanuts for her – she did return and took what was offered. I will leave more treats tomorrow. Ah, fecund Spring!
I’m back from my west coast Spring #1 and fallen into a delightful Spring #2 just in time to discover the lone Trillium that pops up every year and never quite opens all the way is back.
Japanese Quince adorns a weathered fence.
A clump of Creeping Phlox at the bottom of the Urban Porch stairs has also made its return.
Grape Hyacinth is spreading all over the yard.
Many years ago I had planted Hellebore along the back fence. They used to be some of the earliest blooms, along with the Crocus, often making an appreciated appearance in March. Without any obvious explanation, they all died a number of years back. So that was that. But yesterday I discovered a small Hellebore had come up in a different area of the garden, nowhere near where the original ones were. Happy surprise! Go figure!
The Scilla continues to hold on.
Scilla fights for space with the Pachysandra, which has also flowered. A friend gave me a few cuttings many, many seasons ago and they have become invasive, although they are great for shaded ground cover. I have mixed feelings about them. When I was a kid my father planted them in our shady front yard and then expected a couple of us older ones to weed between them, which was a boring and unpleasant chore. Periodically they need to be thinned out. I may pull some up and give them away to someone else who needs to fill a bare patch under a tree.
Violets are everywhere, sweet, tiny bouquets waiting to grace a salad or two.
A different Annual Rando Tulip has emerged, this time from the depths of the Pachysandra, most likely planted by a squirrel – perhaps our splooting mama. I’ve never planted Tulips here and never know where they will turn up.
Poppy foliage is really beginning to lush out, hopefully to be providing another spectacular year of glowing, persimmon-hued joy for passers-by.
It was such a sunny, temperate day that I dragged the pillows for the wicker chairs down from the attic and began preparing The Urban Porch for another season of hanging out, observation and appreciation of the local world passing by.
On the topic of The Neighborhood, I am a little behind on updating The Fence Dinosaur attire. Last week it was rocking a bunny suit.
This morning it was sporting rainbow flower regalia.
While walking little Rudi last night, I happened to encounter the owner of the Fence Dino, who shared the actual story attached to it. At one point, somebody had taken it off the fence, ripped it apart and thrown it out into the street. I can’t imagine who or why a person would want to do something like that. The kids in the neighborhood (and grown-ups too) really enjoy the little bit of whimsy the Fence Dino provides. What possesses people to be so mean? She rescued it, patched it up and returned it to the fence. Fence Dino now is alarmed and under camera surveillance. What a world this has become….
Well, I’ll end with a few excerpts from Earworm of the Day, because how can I not?
Sugar Magnolia blossoms blooming
Head’s all empty and I don’t care
Sweet blossom come on under the willow
Sunshine daydream Walkin’ in the tall trees Goin’ where the wind goes
It’s been a gorgeous day, but also a long day, as I was at the audiologist this afternoon trying out a device that can sync to my hearing aids and help me decipher speech better one-on-one in noisy situations. All of this technology has a learning curve, is imperfect, and can often be finicky, unpredictable and frustrating. On top of all that, teaching your brain to learn/relearn how to hear and to parse out relevant conversation is often utterly exhausting. I’ve unexpectedly fallen into a nap three times this week.
I think I may need to go “sploot” for a while!
~*~
*”Sugar Magnolia” by the Grateful Dead, American Beauty 1970 (Robert Hunter & Bob Weir)
I’ve been away from this page, having had the good fortune once again to dwell amidst spring blooms in the west first, which will be followed a few weeks later with newly emerging blossoms of the east. This post will mostly just be a photo dump from images I took with my phone camera. Probably a little over-stimulated with it all, I’m gushing over the colors, scents and patterns. Bear with me…..
The Wisteria!!! Love love love that crazy sort of invasive vine that drapes a fence or trellis in splendor and at the same time can get its tentacles into your foundation. Once upon a time (many decades ago) I had transplanted a small cutting from someone’s yard and started it on the side of a cottage I rented. It took off and grew all the way up the side of that brick facade (both the wisteria and that cottage no longer exist – the plant was ripped out, the house torn down). Ah, history….
There is something magical about standing beneath fragrant cascading racemes in shifting shades of purple. They smell like Necco candy wafers to me (you might have to be old enough to remember that candy). I could not get my face away from them.
The twists and turns of the trunks and branches create a fairy-land shelter.
How can you not fall into the abyss of delicate, candy pink roses?
and wowza! Clivia Miniata about three feet high, growing profusely in a park!
Gorgeous Calla Lilies that evoke Georgia O’Keeffe
and Diego Rivera vibes
I’ll just leave these pops of color here. Glowing centers alive with energy.
Delightful mixed palettes
Lupine of a deep Gentian blue
with leaves creating gorgeous patterns, reaching up like “jazz hands”
Lacy Phacelia (Phacelia tanacetifolia) calling to the bees…
beautiful Borage
Arctotis (African Daisy)….
and more daisies!
Mediterranean spurge, a type of Euphorbia. Having had a few run-ins with various Euphorbia (I Can Make Poison Arrows Now – 7/29/2011) I try to not be a fan, but their structure really is so interesting.
Have you had enough yet? I’ll throw just a few more patterns at you then….Azalea
the prehistoric shadows of a Norfolk Pine
and some grasses, just because..
Rolling hills spring back with verdant life where wildfires had taken a toll. A lone charred oak in a fertile field stands testament.
Life
California Poppies, little drops of happiness, a blanket of Vitamin C.
Grapevines are beginning to bud.
Row upon row stretch across the valley
as if with arms outstretched, embracing the sunlight
carefully tended
while newly planted vines dot the hills like markers in a veteran cemetery.
Jasmine is in bloom. How unfortunate a photo cannot translate the insanely intoxicating scent of the Jasmine. Walking by hedges of them along a sidewalk was enough to stop you in your tracks. My sister and I sat at a table eating tacos while Jasmine petals loosened by a gentle wind floated down upon us. Can the aroma of flowers drive a person mad? Passion!
It’s so good to be out appreciating nature. Our souls need it badly. Now I get to do it again. More good things to come! Happiest Spring to you all!
Made it to April! Depending where you reside, so many experienced what felt like an endless stretch of cold and darkness. Around here you can almost hear sighs of relief echoing from all directions (regarding the weather, anyway).
I’m going to start here with a quick mention regarding a couple of unusual bird-related events. The first actually occurred a couple of weeks ago but I’m just getting to it now.
Spring brings along courtship rituals; the House Finches darting around my daughter’s home were in full swing. They kept flying in the garage while we were trying to pull the car out and leave to run some errands. Finally we were able to shoo them out and get on our way. But when we returned and walked into her house, there was one which had managed to get all the way inside the house and was frantically flapping around the hallway. I’m not sure how it actually managed to slip by us.
Her front hallway is the type which has a really high ceiling and a way up high window that is level with the second floor. It’s the kind of window where you wonder how anyone would normally get up to it to clean it (and also has the kind of light fixture in the ceiling that would be a challenge to change a lightbulb). That is how unreachable it is and where the lone House Finch was hanging out.
The poor thing kept fluttering and smashing itself against the glass. It was pretty upset and was impossible to get to. Despite opening the door wide to accommodate an exit, instead it would swoop away into the dining room into the window behind some houseplants, but it didn’t alight long enough to be caught before heading back to that high up window again.
From where I stood below I kept waving a towel to create some wind disturbance, which finally sent the bird off flapping into an upstairs bedroom. From there we were able to go into that room and close the door behind us, which had the bird a little bit more confined. In a stroke of luck, it then flew into the small bathroom off the bedroom, where I was able to shut myself into a tighter space with it, closing in. It finally alighted in the window, which I quickly opened and pushed out the bottom of the screen, allowing it to zoom away to freedom. Success!
Feeling a bit accomplished, I announced “The bird is gone!” and walked out of the room, only to find my young granddaughter standing there with an absolutely stricken look on her face. “Did you flush it?” she worriedly asked. Flush it??? I had to laugh. I didn’t ask her what her point of reference was to think that, but absolutely assured her that the bird safely flew out the window and back to its nest – and of course was not flushed down the toilet.
In other springtime related bird things, my brother happens to have a turkey decoy in his backyard that was inherited from his father-in-law. He doesn’t hunt for turkey himself, but they decided to stick it in the ground out back with all the other things they have out and about on their property. The other day he looked out the window to see a couple of turkeys curiously checking out the decoy. Unfortunately, the photo is a still taken from a video and not as clear as it could be. They were really funny.
Back home around the Urban Porch, the Chickadees have been singing (“Sweee-teeee”), the Northern Cardinals have been calling back and forth (“Wheet wheet wheet, pew pew pew“) and the Tufted Titmice have been “beeping”. (A friend once described the call of the Tufted Titmouse as being similar to the sound of a backup alarm on a truck, and now that is pretty much how I hear it…. “Peedeep, peedeep, peedeep”). Robins (the Official Ambassador of Spring, in my opinion) have been hanging out on the lawn, picking up whatever leftover seed the squirrels have spilled from our neighbor’s feeder.
The cycle has begun again, old friends returning to the yard. The fancy crocus in its stripey clown suit…..
the fancy crocus
the sunny daffodils……
so sunny!
and tulip with leaves like a pinstripe suit which comes up every year but never blooms.
The beginnings of the re-seeded hollyhocks are emerging. They will make stalks dotted with rows of washed out yellow flowers, which I’ve found to be underwhelming….. but I leave them to do their thing and grow every year.
Some of the sedum against the house has started, which actually will not bloom until the end of the summer. These will have small stalks of pale pink.
And one of my favorites, the Scilla. Because Blue!!!!
Each arrival is a series of tiny reunions. Some of these flowers are attached to old memories, creating an annual re-living, in a way.
While walking the dog down the street, it is exciting to see the variety of growth emerging in front of the neighbor’s homes. The people who have the Fence Dinosaur have clumps of pretty Hellebore coming up. All the Hellebore I planted years ago died; I think the invasive Trumpet Vine contributed to their demise.
Another home has installed one of those little library boxes, but this one is not just for books. People have been leaving toys and other items (some unusual) in there and also outside the box for anyone to have. The kids walking past seem to love it. I have left a few things in there before, but last week was the first time I ever partook of an item from the box. It was an ant farm. I was a bit excited to find this!
score!
Years ago in this blog I had mentioned one of the more “different ” gifts I had historically received (see The Eye of the Beholder 12/13/2011). It was something which has always held a nerdy kind of appeal to me. This one will not be for me (mine had turned out to be a failure) but I figured one of the grandkids might really enjoy trying to get it going. Gifts of Spring!
I’ll wind down this First Days of April post by mentioning that the Dutch Baby of the week was Strawberry Vanilla.
strawberry-vanilla Dutch Baby
And I’ve been cooking more asparagus, as it has been available, tender, and not very expensive at the moment. I’m ready for a few new seasonal recipes to try this year and add to the meal rotation.
Showers have been quenching the warming earth this afternoon. The greening is coming. April, please don’t fool us! It won’t be long before Little Rudi and I are back out on The Urban Porch again, sharing this small corner of the world with you……
A few days from now we will hit the official Spring Equinox. On and around The Urban Porch, things are happening. Rain has been softening the earth to quench and coax emerging growth. Sun-warmed, once again the crocus and the tiniest first daffodils have popped up in vibrant Easter basket colors.
hello!
a tiny sunburst
The first bee and first ant also made their spring debut together in the yard today.
The fig tree that was cut back and brought inside to winter over has begun to sprout leaves. It is still parked in a corner of the dining room. How does it know when to begin?
To mark St. Patrick’s Day, the fence dinosaur down the street has been dressed for the occasion.
Wrapped in a long coat and standing out on the porch between 2:00 – 3:00 am afforded the gift of watching a total lunar eclipse. Mesmerizing as always, it continually leaves one with a sense of wonder. My phone camera was unable to do the vision justice, yet I still attempted to capture it in the moment.
a view from The Urban Porch
In tandem with the slow greening of March, this week I came across and admired a beautiful piece of malachite that reminded me of clouds building on a horizon, or the shape of a Buddhist cloud in art, or perhaps a Turkey Tail mushroom. Nature mimics art mimics nature.
Buddhist cloud
Faced with a wall of different types of artisan chocolates (if chocolate happens to be your thing) was something difficult to resist…..
The Dutch Baby of the week was Pear/Blueberry/Cinnamon, drizzled with maple syrup once plated.
Little Rudi’s assortment of winter sweaters and tee shirts can soon be packed away. He takes pleasure basking in the warmth of porch sunlight.
I sit out there with him, enjoying how the late afternoon rays reflect off the stripes in my 1960’s Janis Joplin-style velvet pants, making them sparkle (cheap thrills!)
The faded earth/bird flag above the door waves on the breeze beneath a Crayola sky. Such a beautiful, hopeful day.
Tonight on our dog walk I was surprised to see a few moths fluttering beneath the street lights, even though the air began to cool down by evening. Moths! I guess it has really begun.
Tomorrow I am going for the annual haircut, a spring ritual. Not that it ever really is in control, but right now this hair is very much out of control. The thing about very curly hair is that when it is wet, or if you “un-boing” and stretch out a strand, you can see it becomes many inches longer than it appears, growing out instead of down. Suddenly there is a lot more than you thought there was – reaching a tipping point where it doesn’t behave. I would say that is one of the Banes of Having Curly Hair, the misbehaving.
a lot more than it appears
My parents used to call me “la strega” when I was a kid, partially (just partially!) because of the wild, uncontrollable hair. It was already enough back then. But when People My Age have very long crazy hair it can sometimes appear a bit “Agggghhhhh”! As always, I’m a little anxious about the once or twice a year cut. I’ve mentioned this often in the past – how disconcerting it is after all the snip-snipping is finished – when you glance down at the clippings by your feet and it looks like an opossum is playing dead on the floor.
after the haircut
Also, the last couple of times I had my hair cut I ended up with kind of a Cleopatra hair thing happening, except frizzy, and in gray. Every time I mention “Please don’t give me Cleopatra hair,” I still come out with that same blunt cut anyway. Then it takes a few painful, self-conscious weeks until it normalizes. After that it will look okay for a while, with even a few Good Hair Days (weather permitting), until it reaches critical mass again.
Elizabeth Taylor does Cleopatra
In any case, removing an excess of winter growth and starting anew with the spring should feel good.
Soon I will be making my way west to visit my family and partake of two springs again (see Two Springs, 5/02/24 from last year for a glimpse). Very much looking forward to it, but not thrilled about flying these days.
Renewed hope as we head into the Spring Equinox. We all could use a bit of hope right now.
OK, well this is going to be another one of those brain-salad riff type posts where I am all over the place, but if you follow or if your brain works like mine, you might find the connections somehow. Or not. It starts out one direction and then ends up in another.
To begin with generally safe topics like the weather, we are in that fake-out kind of almost-spring situation at the moment. There was snow, then there wasn’t. It warmed up to fifty for a little bit, so we all got some Spring in our step. The earth began to give off a few teaser whiffs of fertility to come. A few days of that had you looking out the window to see these sunny, intensely blue skies, walking outside in only a light sweatshirt with the expectation that would be more than adequate – only to be pierced by icicle cold mega-gusting winds that turned your hair into Albert Einstein-head and whipped the scarf right off your neck. A week of warmth is predicted – we are probably entering into that “Spring of Deception” phase, although the truth is that you never know what might occur. We could skip spring almost altogether and slip right into summer. It has happened before.
Since I last posted, the dinosaur draped on the fence down the street was changed out of its winter wear and had been dolled up for February. Like the other kids in the neighborhood, I wonder how they will be dressing it for March.
Speaking of kids, I just have to share a bit of a grandparent-y thing. No, it’s not photos of their cute faces in my phone (formerly in my wallet – showing my age here), but it’s just the stuff of moments that give you a tiny taste of Happy, and we sure could all use some Happy these days wherever we can grab it. So here is my slice of it; a little clay cat by a granddaughter. And one of the boys gifted his brothers Lego images of themselves. Sometimes it’s just those tiniest of fragments that can make you smile. File this one in the Senior Musings category.
“Look Mema, I made a cat!”
brothers ♥
Moving on into the house, a couple of my indoor plants decided to bloom after not doing much of anything and mostly being neglected, which has lent to anticipation of outdoor blooming to come.
the neglected Clivia
the Geranium brought in from outside
Meanwhile, around the Urban Porch there have been little pokes of hopefulness emerging.
The birds have become more vocal. The regular gang of House Sparrows are gearing up for their annual spring orgy. A few crows have returned to the area and are busy setting up housekeeping somewhere in the tall pines back beyond the yard. One or two have been visiting the Crow Tree again, which is nice to see. The other day there was one perched on the pinnacle while a flock of starlings adorned the branches below, as if subjects to crow royalty.
I continue making the weekly Sunday Dutch Baby. Last weekend it was Blackberry-Black Walnut, and it was extra delicious. I used black walnut extract instead of vanilla for a different experience, along with chopped walnuts and some super juicy blackberries. Light or golden whole wheat flour was substituted for white flour. Milk, butter, fresh local eggs, and I don’t add any sugar to it, as you can put whatever sweetener you want on it afterwards. Since I’ve never mastered the art of photographing food, all I can say is the photo doesn’t do it justice.
Blackberry-Black Walnut Dutch Baby
Since we are on the topic of food for the moment (this must be the Foodie section), my neighbor turned me on to this rye bread that is extremely addicting. It contains locally grown organic stone ground whole rye, organic sunflower seeds and flax seeds, maple syrup and sea salt. It’s the kind of thing where you keep going back for another small slice until you suddenly notice much of the loaf has disappeared. Great both toasted or not.
Speaking of eggs…….right now the price of eggs in this country has been a topic of dissatisfaction and dismay. So far I have been fortunate enough to have some connections to friends and neighbors to buy eggs from (or even have been gifted) for a while. Especially since there is rarely any meat in my diet, we have been blasting through eggs in this house. I think it is important to support local people. Even though the prices have gone up, they still have been selling them at a more reasonable cost than what is in the store right now, and I’ve been grateful for that.
beautiful organic eggs
There is a young mother I purchase from who loves her birds. In addition to raising her small flock for eggs, she makes all sorts of organic products and home remedies to sell. In a small way she reminds me a bit of what I used to be like in my late twenties and early thirties – a time of not being very economically advantaged but certainly more ambitious – growing a vegetable garden, canning, tapping maple trees for syrup, sewing, quilting, and making my children’s clothing – although I didn’t raise chickens. She is often interested in some of the odd things I give away through our local Buy Nothing group, and I tend to choose her name more often because I like her. Recently that included a number of socks from my famous Socks of the Day collection (see Socks of the Day 1/18/23). I am slowly starting to release some of my Socks of the Day, as they have become overwhelming. But that’s another story.
In a good way, there is a flow of goods circling about. She has asked me to clean and save the shells from the eggs so she can grind them up and use them as calcium to add back to the chicken feed, so I have been doing that for her.
Now here is where I swerve off the track for a little bit. The other day I was rinsing out some shells for her and suddenly had this very, very old, sort of weird memory pop into my head.
Back in the 1970’s, my Then-Boyfriend and I had been dropping in to visit people we knew as we made our way back and forth across the country and ended up spending a night in Palo Alto in a house that a friend of ours shared with a group of people. I remember one of them was a published author, the others I’m not sure what they did, but I recall they were a friendly and welcoming bunch. They kept chickens in a shed abutting the house that opened out to a small suburban backyard. There was one feisty, slightly aggressive rooster. They fed us dinner, which included some kind of chicken dish. After the meal they fed all their table scraps to the chickens, including the leftover chicken.
I could not get over the thought of chickens eating chicken. Did they know what they were eating? (Well, apparently not, or if they did, they clearly did not have the capacity to have any moral thoughts about it). There just seemed to be something rather disturbing about it (to me, anyway) and I had to do my nerd research on it. While I have friends and neighbors who keep hens and ducks that they feed grain, leftover vegetables, compost and meal worms, I have never actually asked them if they feed them meat scraps. Chickens are omnivores, so I suppose it is possible. Chickens will eat a dead bird and under stressful conditions will cannibalize another chicken. Somehow I don’t think that my homesteading young egg-selling friend is feeding her girls leftover chicken, but when I get more eggs next week, out of curiosity I am going to ask.
As far as asking the old friend whose house we stayed at what her memories were, she sadly passed away years ago – way too young and in a tragic way. Thus, I’m thinking about eggs, and chickens, and time passing and people you know passing on – the “why” of it all – and how all those experiential pieces accumulate and add up to how we perceive life (this I guess would qualify as a Senior Memories part of the post.)
On another totally unrelated note, multiple times this month (including just now) I have picked up my phone showing the time at exactly 11:11. I am not one of those people who has any investment in 11:11, although apparently that is A Thing. I knew a woman years ago who was a little (OK, actually a lot) paranoid crazy about the significance of 11:11. I think she might have written a chapter in a book about it, along with some other meanings of signs and a few conspiracy theories thrown in. One of my sisters, who has psychic tendencies and generally gives free reign to the universe for guidance, is also into 11:11. It has always seemed a little bit “woo-woo” to me, but for whatever reason, I keep catching the time at 11:11. When I see it I think “Oh, there it is again,” but I haven’t accorded any real thought into what is happening at that moment.
Perhaps I am a bit like the dog that knows it is exactly 5:00 pm and time for his dinner. It doesn’t matter if he ate something as late in the day as 4:00pm, at 5:00pm his internal clock goes off to let him know it’s meal time and he’s in your face. Back to chickens for a moment, they can become accustomed to being fed at the same time of day, and if you don’t appear at that time they will make a fuss. Seems like my internal clock right now is set to 11:11.
Okay, so I just paused writing for a few minutes here and looked up some information about 11:11, since I’m talking about it. Apparently 11:11 is supposed to signify enlightenment, insight and intuition. Or that the Universe is reading your thoughts, which it is about to manifest into reality; that it is time to align our thoughts with our intentions. New beginnings. Or that angels are near. I’m not feeling it that way, at least not at the moment.( I’m not sure if The Universe would necessarily want to be manifesting some of the thoughts I’ve had lately into reality). Maybe something will happen or is going to happen (although something is always happening or always going to happen). I’m all in for more insight and enlightenment, and an angel or two could not hurt right now either. I’ll have to pay more attention.
Daylight Savings Time starts tomorrow (we spring ahead). I wonder if the time change will affect the egg production these upcoming weeks. This will definitely throw the dog off his schedule – as it always does – taking days until he regulates into the new shift. I wonder if it will throw off my 11:11 clock experiences too, altering it to 12:11?
There is a bit of magic in waking up to trees glazed in icy wonder.
As the sun dodged in and out from wolf-gray clouds, I kept stepping outdoors into the frigid air for brief moments to admire the prisms of rime, the sky a ceiling of diamond-laden branches. Both the cold and the beauty took my breath away.
Finally I threw on an extra sweater and a pair of clogs and stepped back out into the wind and snow in order to appreciate a giant pine tree up close in all its frost-queen regalia.
Each fascicle was a delight of whorls and patterns in a crystalized, frozen world.
The wind was bitter cold, sending icy jabs sharper than the needles on the tree into my face and through my inadequate clothing, an invitation to run back inside. But mesmerized, I kept returning, as the sun would emerge for brief moments, creating radiant sparkles everywhere.
Such beautiful clusters, dewy droplets stopped mid-motion, suspended in time. Verglas.
Each a tiny gem reflecting the world.
The gutter above The Urban Porch has created its own unique ice-scape, sending cascading rivers and unicorn horns down the side of the house.
Stalactites form, effecting dark caves by the lattice at the base of the porch.
The Rose of Sharon wears a glacial crown,
waving sleeves of saber teeth,
and a gown of linen glass.
Slanting sun of late afternoon casts long shadows onto the glaze-covered snow in my neighbor’s yard. The dog and I gingerly shuffle our way down a salted but still slippery sidewalk. While he stops to sniff, I idly imagine it is the silhouette of the Eiffel Tower.
This week we will have a warming spell; with it will come the soot and mud. Most likely it will be a temporary situation, a February thaw, as March is known to bring another storm or two. While most of us are probably more than ready for winter to play itself out, these sparkling gems of seasonal beauty provide a break in the longing for spring.
Well, it was good to get that last one off my chest! The previous post was a Major Rant of frustrated feelings and opinions on a situation that had been brewing for a few years. After finally writing it down and dumping it here, I’ve been able to let it go and move on. My apologies to anyone who actually read the entire thing, didn’t relate and perhaps felt they suffered through it….. it was a long one. If you do sympathize, feel free to boycott the network along with me. Anyway…..
With the intention of veering off into another direction, I’ve taken a few steps to accommodate that. The first has been not watching the news on television at all. It has helped tremendously.
The next step was to just appreciate the small routine things. Here is the Dutch Baby (German pancake) from this past Sunday. I tend to make them on Sunday mornings and add whatever I have available. This one was pear and blueberry. When it came out of the oven it was all puffed up, fragrant and yummy.
I came across an entire bin of burn morel mushrooms in a grocery store last week. They have been shipped here from the west and are crazy expensive, but it was nice to see them and get a tiny zing of anticipation for the morel season arriving in the northeast in a few months. Hopefully it will be a good one. I had fantasies of filling up an entire shopping bag with these and running away!
The other day I picked up my keys off the table and suddenly began admiring the old enamel Moroccan hamsa on my keyring, gifted years ago from a friend who recently passed away.
The previous attachment to my keyring was a brass swivel spring snap that was given to me by a very dear friend-more-like-family about fifty years ago. My wonderful friend Everitt had picked it up in one of those old hardware stores that used to have lots of bins and sawdust on the floor. He is no longer earthside either, which has made it all the more precious. Holding it in my hands or seeing it daily as I opened the door or started my car has always provided a level of comfort, a talisman of the heart. I didn’t realize how much until recently removing it from the keyring, as the key fob for my latest car added a bit too much bulky weight. But I may just put it back on anyway, because something feels off not having it there.
On the subject of gifts, an interesting and generous assortment of medicinal mushroom powders and teas was sent to me. I’m slowly working my way through them, experimenting with their uses and best benefits. They should last a while. I am hoping to suddenly look and feel full of glowing vibrancy and energy. We shall see…..
The most exciting thing has been the Barred Owl that dwells in the woods behind my daughter’s house. She thinks there are a pair of them. It was just hanging out in the pine trees.
I am not sure if this was the same owl that swooped down and whooshed closely past me while taking out the dog in front of her house one night. It was pretty startling (I am always afraid Little Rudi will be picked up by a hawk or snatched by a coyote…..small dog worries). Here is this beauty from her yard the other day, sitting in the trees, then diving in to check something out, then zooming away.
There is something magical, mysterious and wonderful about seeing an owl…
Making the focus on small, random, sweet observances in life has been a mood elevator. However, I had to pause and wonder about something I saw today.
Glancing up at my rear view mirror while driving home this afternoon, a neon green light caught my attention. At first it appeared be perhaps a weird little indicator light for something in my own car that I had not known about before. But once stopped at a traffic light I was able to see that it was actually something in the windshield of the car behind me.
The car behind had “The Finger” lit up in neon LED lights in his windshield.
As I oft exclaim to myself and did again at that moment – “Seriously?” I admit to being a little confused. Since I didn’t do anything to this person, was driving the same speed along with traffic and hadn’t cut anyone off, it wasn’t really clear if “The Finger” was specifically meant for me or if it was just something he felt the need to proudly display all the time to the world. Questions ran though my mind while waiting for the stoplight to change; Is this person perennially pissed off? Might this be a visual alternative to acting out some road rage? Is this meant to be funny and I’m just missing the joke? Is this actually not a neon “flipping of the bird” but perhaps has some other urban cultural reference that I am not hip to?
Then there is the question that begs – who or what kind of person would want to drive around with that in their windshield? It was difficult to discern if it was someone younger, although road ragers come all varieties. What might have happened if I had suddenly stuck my finger up and given it back to him? Would that have incited some real road rage? Driving further down the road, I lost him at the next traffic light. The finger light continued to glow in the distance as I pulled away, so perhaps it had nothing to do with me.
Later on at home, I googled those lights and found some of them can also be adjusted to different gestures. I guess this was just not a very friendly person. The part I pulled out of this which could be considered slightly amusing is how totally bizarre a world it is that we live in.
Veering onto other tracks has taken a bit of mindfulness, but I’ve been practicing. The other day I had shown up for an appointment for the second time, only to find – once again – it had been cancelled (and I had not been informed). An exercise in office ineptness, but that’s another story. I was determined to continue veering away from that track as I headed back towards the parking lot, only shaking my head but not allowing annoyance to take over. A pickup truck had parked next to my car, with the likeness of Queen Elizabeth looking out the window from the back seat.
I’m not sure what that’s about either. Why The Queen of England? (on the other hand, why not)? But really, how can you not be amused by this? Trying to find the humor wherever I can. We all could use some of that.
Early on I had a gut feeling where this would be heading and how it would most likely end up, but decided to hold out in the (futile?) hope that there might be some righteousness in all of it.
Once upon a time I was a fan of CNN. Aside from their news, the network had been putting out some interesting and quality special programming for a number of years. Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman were presenting a documentary mini-series (The Sixties, The Seventies, The Eighties, The Nineties, etc.) that I was eager to see. But each time I sat down to watch with everyone else, I discovered I could not follow along due to the inadequate closed captions, which were not lining up with the dialog and scenes on the screen. It was starting to feel more than annoying, being unable to share with many others who were enjoying and commenting. Not only that, we were paying for this cable access. Since there seemed to be not much to be done about it in the moment, I had to let it go and turn my attention to other things, at least for a while.
I am sort of a foodie with a lust for faraway places. So it was sometime during 2022 when I attempted to try watching a program that supplied some of that fix (Anthony Bourdain:Parts Unknown on CNN) and found myself giving up in frustration because – as usual – the captions were so out of sync that by the time the words caught up, the visuals had moved on anywhere from one to three scenes past. It was impossible to watch.
If anyone is just coming on to this blog and doesn’t know it, I have a significant hearing loss and am totally dependent on captioning in order to watch television and movies. I have also spent a couple of decades in my former career serving people with disabilities, so you can imagine this situation touched a nerve or two on a few levels.
The disappointments with CNN continued. Friends would ask “Did you watch that special on Linda Ronstadt (Linda Ronstadt: The Sound of My Voice)?” No, I could not, because the captioning was so off. With hope, I kept thinking it was just a glitch, that if I turned off the TV and then turned it on again, rebooted the cable box, waited for another day, it would change. I repeated that scenario over and over again.
It didn’t change.
Despite recommendations from my sister-in-law, I could not watch Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy. I could not watch the documentary on RBG. My disappointment began to turn to indignation. We were paying for this service in order to watch programming on CNN, which included the news of course, but not just the news. Live news is almost always out of sync, it is the nature of live transcription (although one can hope with the advent of AI that this will become more perfected). Pre-recorded shows should not have this issue.
I thought for sure there must be something wrong with our local television provider, which at the time was Spectrum (formerly Time Warner). I contacted them to ask what was going on and they informed me the issue was not with them but directly with CNN. Just to make sure, I reached out to family, friends, and friends of friends across the entire country who used different cable providers (Spectrum, Frontier, Verizon Fios, Dish, Direct TV, RCN/Astounding, Xfinity, etc). From California, Texas, Florida, North Dakota, Georgia, Colorado, Arizona, Connecticut, Illinois, Ohio, Missouri, Massachusetts, Oregon and New York – you can see I was pretty thorough in my inquiries – they all tuned in to the CNN documentaries and found the same thing. There was no doubt that CNN was the problem. Their responses ranged from “That’s horrible!” to “How can anybody manage to watch anything like that?” to “That’s discrimination.”
While I understand that live broadcasts like the news are always on a bit of a lag, these were pre-recorded shows that were either aired (usually on a Sunday evening) or could be brought up On Demand. There seemed to be no good reason why CNN could not provide adequate, on point captioning for those who depended on it, especially with all the technological advancements happening with AI. Every other major network seemed to be able to do this with their pre-recorded material.
Towards the end of 2022 I reached out to the CNN contact that dealt with captioning issues (at the time it was IPClosedCaptioning@Turner, based in Atlanta) via phone and email, addressed directly to the person listed in charge. I received no response at all. It was beyond comprehension why the CNN desk actually responsible for captioning could not be bothered to answer my inquiries.
Not knowing where to turn, the next step was to contact a Hearing Health Advocate, who suggested I should bring my complaint to the FCC Disability Rights Office. Not really wanting to go down that rabbit hole if it wasn’t necessary, I attempted to contact CNN once again by email. No response. Given that brush-off, at the end of December 2022 I filed an informal complaint with the FCC, providing both explanations and videos of the issue. In January 2023 the FCC opened a ticket addressing the situation.
Much to my surprise, a few short weeks later I received an actual phone call from the FCC following up on my complaint. I was pretty impressed with their personal – and what appeared to be concerned – response to this dilemma. They let me know they were working on it.
It is interesting that while CNN could not be bothered to respond to me after a number of attempts, once contacted by the FCC they managed a pretty quick response to both of us. Essentially what they did was throw around references to Section-this and Section-that of the commissions rules, full of numbers, letters and sub-clauses, which supported their argument that since they are a network which “airs a high proportion of live or topical time-sensitive programming” this therefore allowed them the flexibility to continue to use the 24/7 real-time captioning like you see on live news (which of course would be out of sync) – just in case some “breaking news” happens….. and that their delay of 3-5 seconds falls within the parameters of what are acceptable lags per all those sections and sub-clauses. The letter was from CNN/Warner/Discovery. Apparently there have been some acquisitions and changes going on there along the way.
Despite this response, their pre-recorded programs air at specific times, they are repeated, and they are also available to be pulled up “on demand” well after the fact. Why any “news break” could not be inserted if necessary, just like on any other network, without it affecting pre-existing accurate captions appears to be just an excuse. As a friend who is a documentary maker said to me after I shared the situation, “Of course they can accommodate it. That’s bullshit.”
For all the hearing people out there who might not get it – try turning the sound off or extremely low on your TV, turn on the CC, and attempt to follow a show through its entirety with a 3-5 second (or more) delay. Then see how long it takes before finding it so much work (and sometimes even brain-frying) that you give up watching, since the dialog does not match the video. Not only that, some of the captioning lags on CNN pre-recorded programs have ranged anywhere from 5-14 seconds. (Yes, one of the Stanley Tucci segments swung erratically and wildly back and forth with the captions, the extreme clocked with as much as a fourteen second lag). Count out fourteen seconds (or ten, or five, or even three) while watching a program and notice how often the scene, picture and dialog changes. In captioning time that is an eternity. By as little as five seconds or less, you can already be on to an entirely different subject.
In their closing comments, with respect to their collection of Originals series, CNN said the network “hopes to continue to minimize any attendant latency issues”. They “hope” to. Not “will.”
They didn’t.
Actually, in the year following this letter sometimes it was even worse than before.
It came to a point where it all began to feel rather quixotic – fighting windmills, foolishly pursuing an idea that is not going to come to fruition. I was aware this was discrimination. It is discriminating against people who cannot hear well, but also age discrimination, as many who are older depend on captioning. Every time a show was broadcast on CNN that I wanted to partake in and couldn’t, I felt what eventually became anger rising all over again. So I soldiered on.
Next, I wondered who might be sponsoring this. Approaching some sponsors of CNN to let them know about the issue was met without response. Clearly they don’t give a damn either. I won’t even bother to list them here; you can look them up if you are interested. I will say a number of car insurance companies are among them. Running through the list, there are sponsors of CNN that I will never, ever give my business to, given they are subsidizing a company that discriminates against people with disabilities (which they now know about because I told them so, if they didn’t already know before). Concerning a few of the sponsors, it is almost impossible to untangle from them, as their big business tentacles are in everything. No point in making a segue into that whole subject here. I think we all pretty much know how this runs.
Onward with the saga; the FCC continued to be in touch a few more times, which I thought was rather earnest. While they didn’t want to push too much by stepping on CNN toes and irritating them (while they were standing behind all those sections and clauses), there was an expectation that the network was eventually going to remedy the problem as they had indicated. “When?” I asked. Within the next few months there should probably be some movement on this, I was assured. I waited. Every once in a while I would check in again. “When?”
No change.
We moved on through 2023 and with it, more new documentaries, series and special programs from CNN were aired. Guliani: What Happened to America’s Mayor? – out of sync.
The Whole Story with Anderson Cooper – unwatchable and unsynchronized. Periodically I would follow up again with the FCC to find out where things were at. WHEN????? When exactly will they be fixing this?
Eventually, in the spring of 2024, the concerned and engaging person I had been in contact with from the FCC stopped responding to me about an issue that clearly is not going to be resolved. In the meantime, CNN began to wind down on their docu-series anyway.
In these few years of frustration and periodic rage at this media giant that used to tout themselves as “The Most Trusted Name in News,” I had fantasies of contacting the hosts of those presentations, who would surely speak out, since they are all righteous guys, right? How do you all feel about people who don’t hear well not being able to watch your shows? Where are you Tom Hanks? Will you help me, Stanley Tucci? Will you stand up for us, Anderson Cooper? Of course I didn’t really try contacting any of them, but it rolled around in my mind for a while. Realistically, the way things were playing out, they probably would not have responded either.
Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman
Still unwilling to throw in the towel just yet, in 2024 I tried watching The United States of Scandal with Jake Tepper. The CC was insanely impossible to follow.
Given my dismay and outrage at CNN and their lack of care, as a matter of principle I pretty much stopped watching CNN; not just their special programs but their news too. However, a few months into 2024 I was curious to see the four part series The Many Lives of Martha Stewart (Why can’t I just give this up?). Of course it was a wild fantasy, but perhaps (just maybe?) CNN might have actually stepped up and ended up doing the right thing after all? I tuned in a bit early; one of Anderson Cooper:The Whole Story segments was on, which was pre-recorded and airing again. Of course the captions were thoroughly useless. I was just about to turn the channel off in disgust when it ended and the Martha Stewart story came on.
Unbelievably, Martha’s captions were lined up. Totally, beautifully synchronized, throughout the entire four segments. Of course Martha Stewart was perfect. I have no idea how that happened, why or who managed to pull that feat off, but there it was, clearly possible. Oddly and unfortunately, it was just on her story and no place else. Eagerly I brought up other CNN specials again, only to find all the other captioned shows were unsynchronized trash. Only Martha Stewart had it right. I actually had to laugh, albeit wryly.
Eventually some of the documentary series mentioned above found their way to streaming services like YouTube, Max, Prime and Hulu. I was finally able to watch Anthony Bourdain elsewhere, which is what had set this whole thing in motion to begin with. Once off of CNN, all were exactly the way there are supposed to be, just like all the other shows on those venues. It just meant having to watch them in a different place instead of enjoying them with everyone else at the original time of airing. Left behind and after the fact.
Concurrently, in 2023 and early 2024 I was connected to a member of the Division of Human Rights Disability Advisory Council for my state, who was very much onboard with continuing to address this whole issue. I posed the idea to him that maybe someone at The New York Times might be interested in pursuing a story on the subject. He told me flat out that they wouldn’t give a crap about something like this, and I think he’s probably correct. On further discovery it seems – quite ironically – that the former chief executive of The New York Times was hired by CNN in 2023 as their new CEO. So I guess that’s not happening. The member of the advisory council said he was willing to refer the CNN issue to a few attorneys that might possibly be interested in taking us on as plaintiffs.
And this is where I stopped.
Perhaps if I was younger and up for a good fight, I might have taken him up on the idea. But I am not younger. I’m exhausted from the effort and energy expended, disheartened from the dismissive we-really-don’t-give-a-shit-about-you stance. Sadly, it’s not just CNN. It’s an attitude that has permeated just about every aspect of our daily lives these days, coming from all directions. You don’t matter to them. They try and wear you down until you finally give up and just go away.
Don Quixote by Pablo Picasso 1955
During my unpleasant foray into CNN and their out-of-sync hell, there were a few other unexpected revelations. Of the people I questioned who were getting their news and watching these specials and documentaries on CNN via cable, most of them were older. The younger people tended to stream their information, many telling me they did not (and would not) even watch CNN. It appears it’s not “The Trusted Name in News” for many. On the technical side, I also found there were many (mostly older people) who did not even know how to access the closed captioning on their television, finding it confusing or convoluted, too much effort to turn them on and off, with too many steps. There were complaints that the typed words of the captions covered up things they wanted to see and could not be moved out of the way – blocking things like baseball scores or faces. A whole other subject, but worth mentioning.
As I write this in 2025, I have not bothered to go back to check and see if CNN finally did something about their captioning, but given their lack of action over the last number of years, I highly doubt it. Even if they did, at this point it doesn’t matter anymore. They lost me.
There are a few things I would like to say to the FCC, who appears to have decided not to pursue this corporate behemoth further and eventually dropped the ball. Such high hopes ending in such a disappointment. How about updating the Commission’s Rules and Captioning Requirements and tightening those loopholes in order to truly address this discriminatory problem?
What I would like to say in response to those who could have remedied this at CNN, and to the SVP/Head of Global Ethics & Compliance at Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc., who threw the sections, clauses, quotes, parenthesis and italics back at us instead of taking responsibility and actually fixing the problem. Does that make you feel great? Are you proud of yourself?
Perhaps some day it will be your child, your mother, your spouse, your loved one who finds themselves in a situation where they are not accommodated and essentially iced out because nobody cared enough to do the right thing. Maybe someone you care about will be sitting in a classroom, a lecture hall, a play, concert, or movie theater and find they cannot enjoy or participate like everybody else because a loop system or caption was not provided. Maybe they will have actually paid for that service or show and are presented with the insult of having no way to access it. Perhaps they will be sitting in your very own living room, ready to enjoy a television program together with their family, friends, or with you, and find themselves isolated and essentially socially removed from participating – all because they were not deemed important enough by someone up the corporate ladder willing to make the effort.
Perhaps someday that person being discriminated against and left out might very well be you.
It has been too easy to hunker down, gazing at winter skies, finding excuses to ride out the coldest moments indoors (unless you are one of those winter outdoor types – me, not very much).
this is enough “Brrrr” for me
a misty winter view across the street
Despite a predisposition to remain in Cozy Mode during the most bitter of days, I will admit to very much enjoying the magic of a late night dog walk down the street during a snowfall (in seriously insulation, bundled up from head to toe) when nobody else is about.
Flakes falling gently, creating halos around the street lights, sparkles everywhere, leaving tracks coming and going. The hush.
It has been a good time for roasting colorful vegetables to add to a quinoa bowl, making salads with greens, pomegranate, mandarin oranges, goat cheese and pistachios in a honey vinaigrette, or having cups of hot horchata while curled up in a blanket on the couch.
January continues to bring transitions. Aside from a number of influential musicians, artists and activists who have left earthside for another realm, this month has brought sad news with the loss of a worldly, intelligent and generous friend.
For the past week I’ve been wearing the amber beads she unexpectedly handed me one afternoon, “Take these! You need to take these!” They feel like a little piece of sun, imbued with the memory of that day.
Given that, and the state of the world in general, it has been too easy to want to spend a lot of time in the comfort of bed.
cozy
It has probably been more unhealthy than not to habitually slip into the sinkhole of the internet, or to get lost in endless streaming of movies and series. I tell myself that’s OK…. it’s winter. In the spring it will change. I will consciously make that change. No sense beating yourself up now. Winter is the time we are meant to lay low and recharge. Right?
On the night table resides a small tower of books in various stages of immersion or reference, somewhat diverse and nothing particularly heavy. I begin one, then start something else, often having a few going simultaneously, only to put them down, distracted, to return to it later. The pile keeps growing. The internet gets in the way. The movies get in the way.
I’m on a waitlist for a few reads from the library. Often there is a very long wait, so when they become available, the ones borrowed supersede the others in order to complete and return within the allotted time limit. In a way this is good because it throws me back in reading mode. This one was just finished and given back today:
In addition, on my Kindle reader there are probably more books stored than I might ever get to. While there is something positive about holding a physical book in your hands when reading, with the physical books you have to stay propped up with a good reading light. The thing I like about the e-reader might be that it is a throwback to childhood; turning out the lights, pulling the blankets up over your head and creating a cozy cave, secretly reading under the covers with a flashlight when it was past bedtime and you were supposed to be asleep.
Boomer Bonus Throwback: Who used to do that with a transistor radio and an earplug too, so as not to be caught listening when you were supposed to be asleep on a school nigh – the amazing music being aired on a few particular stations, in early youth on AM, later on FM? I’m betting many of us did the same thing. And thus, my Earworm of the Day:
“The flutter of wings, the shadow across the moon, the sounds of the night, as the Nightbird spreads her wings and soars, above the earth, into another level of comprehension, where we only exist to feel. Come, fly with me, Alison Steele, the Nightbird, at WNEW-FM, until dawn.”
A winter goal over the next few weeks will be to consciously whittle down the existing nightstand pile.
Gustavo Bauman – Winter Corral, 1940
How are you balancing the season? What is going on in your winter head? What’s on your nightstand?
It is beyond explanation why I often awake in the dead of the night with odd memories or curious questions about random subjects, some which can send me scrolling through the internet for verification and answers before being able to settle back to sleep. A few weeks ago, at that surreal point between three and four A.M., my mind started spinning out flashbacks, finally landing on a visual image of Uncle Moustache.
Around the mid-1970’s I found myself temporarily living an unsettled existence with my then-boyfriend and three dogs, dwelling in a rather seedy hostel down a road outside Damascus Gate, which is on the north wall of the Old City of Jerusalem.
This setting hosted some subterraneous, occasionally scary and potentially dangerous goings-ons, which provided a spin-off for a number of bizarre situations, the finer details of which I will not be sharing here. Breaking glass and loud yelling in the middle of the night, someone giving or receiving a beating, a few police raids. Fingers of hashish furtively being sold outside in the street. At night you would lock your door and not come out until morning, not even to use the toilet down the hallway.
Although some of the particulars were written down in an old notebook where those wild experiences might be rediscovered someday, most likely those stories will be lost to the ages (like the time I opted not to sell my blood to the blood-buyer who popped out from an alley, and ended up getting paid to be an extra in a supernatural horror film instead).
scenes from “The Omen”
But again, all that stuff is not for this post.
If you are interested in knowing a little bit about then-boyfriend (aka “Hikey the Lover”) and how ending up in this inconvenient situation makes sense given the parties involved, there is a vignette on “Hikey” that can be found here (Would You Like Some Mice With That? 5/18/2011). If you are interested in reading about one of the dogs (a sweet yellow desert-bred Saluki that was mine) there is more about her here (The Saluki in the Floor 1/30/2012).
This photo I found online was pretty much what the daily action looked like just outside the walls during that time.
Damascus Gate 1970’s – APO Documentaries
vendor 1970’s – APO Documentaries
at Damascus Gate 1970’s – APO Documentaries
And here is a photo from 1912, just to appreciate this historical, awesome gate.
THE DAMASCUS GATE IN THE OLD CITY OF JERUSALEM. (COURTESY OF AMERICAN COLONY)
Since we did not have cooking facilities where we were during that period, it was necessary to subsist on street food. Breakfasts consisted of hummus bi tahini, pita sprinkled with za’atar or sumac, chai and nana (mint tea), muddy Turkish coffee, and hot glasses of sahleb/salep – a milky drink made of orchid tubers, which was carried on the backs of vendors in big brass teapots. On a chilly winter morning you could wrap your hands around the steaming glass for heat. The sahleb was warm, sweet, and good – inside and out.
hummus bi tahini
hot sahleb for a winter morning
Later on in the day, street meals might consist of falafel, shawarma (spicy sliced lamb) shashlik (kabobs) fresh bread or bagels, along with lemonade, tamarind or carob juice from a juice vendor. For a special treat there was always a piece of baklava.
bread vendor 1970’s – APO Documentaries
drink vendor 1970’s – APO Documentaries
Memories of these foods bring up olfactory, visual, and auditory images as well. Men sitting on low stools playing shesh besh (like backgammon). The music of Oum Kalthoum blaring out of staticky radios everywhere.
playing shesh besh 1970’s – APO Documentaries
Just inside Damascus Gate, on a road that goes into the residential part of the Muslim Quarter, was the shop of Joseph the baker. You had to go down two or three steps to get into the dark stone room where his oven was. There he baked bread for sale and for people who brought in their own prepared dough or food to cook in their own pots. You could sprinkle extra salt or cumin on the bread he made if you wanted to. It was also one of the only places open very late at night.
Women would arrive laden with large trays of unbaked pita, which would go into the oven and come out in fragrant, puffy pillows, then fall flat again. I could have watched this for hours; after all these years I still retain a beautiful mind-painting in my head of Palestinian women in black dresses, juxtaposed against his glowing oven in that warm, dark, stone room as they waited for their breads to bake. One time in the after-hours, we supplied Joseph with the ingredients to make a pizza, which he did – and then as it finished, he unexpectedly broke an egg on top of it with a final flourish.
I’m taking the long road here, but will be getting to the point shortly.
This rambling stroll through the memories of 1970’s old city street food continued on, heading maybe a five or six minute walk slightly east of Damascus Gate to Herod’s Gate (Bāb az-Zāhra). This neighborhood was a lot less commercial and more residential. This is pretty much what it looked like back then,
Herod’s Gate 1960’s-70’s – APO Documentaries
and here are some views to share that were taken more than half a century earlier, just because I love the timelessness.
Herod’s Gate (Bāb az-Zāhra) 1914
Herod’s Gate (Bāb az-Zāhra)
Just a short way inside Herod’s Gate was (and still is at the time of this writing) a restaurant where the main meal of the day would be had – a meal which was both affordable and could really (and necessarily) fill you up. The shop was called “Uncle Moustache.” Inexplicably awakening to this odd memory is where my mind went down a labyrinth of rabbit holes, recalling Uncle Moustache (and then all the rest above). So there I sat, awake in bed in the dark during those surreal hours, time where I should have been deep in REM sleep; instead the light from my cell phone casting shadows across the room as I scrolled, looking for the past. I did manage to locate a few pictures and comments – thankful for others who also remembered that place frozen in time and shared on the internet – that, in addition to a wonderful archival collection of the Old City, some of which I cropped here for the sake of space and detail.
To greatly summarize, three brothers from the Badr family of Jerusalem (Yassin, Ahmed, and Mohammed) opened a falafel shop in the early 1960’s, which they named after Ahmed’s huge, unmistakable, impressive moustache.
Uncle Moustache
Their shop became somewhat renowned by word of mouth in the 1960’s and 70’s as sort of a hippie gathering place among backpackers, people stopping en route to and from India, young travelers staying in hostels, or kibbutz volunteers on sojourns and holiday to Jerusalem. That – and I guess in this case – a couple of displaced souls with three dogs and very little money. The big draw to this shop was about many things; the delicious food, the affordable prices, the atmosphere, the scene – but also about the congeniality and kindness of Uncle Moustache himself.
Aside from the wonderful falafel and hummus, they used to serve ample, affordable and delicious full chicken dinners, which could really fill you up and become the main meal of the day. There were a few tables and chairs placed outside the door, where we could sit with the dogs and catch the social scene.
As I said, Uncle Moustache was friendly and generous, a distinctive character with a significant belly and a serious moustache – a convivial presence. If people didn’t have much money, he might add a little extra hummus to your plate, and had been known on occasion to accept a story or a song to cover the cost of the meal. He would save his leftover meat scraps for our dogs, which we could collect at the end of the day. This was a big deal, as buying dogfood was not an option at the time and they lived on Uncle Moustache’s “doggy bag” remnants. That, and a large, daily fresh bread which cost one lira on the street.
When I came across some of these photos, my immediate thought was to reach out to those who were there – “Hey, do remember that guy?” But Hikey the Lover, the dogs, and a few other people I knew from that time and place who would have recalled those days and said “Wow! Yeah!” have passed on long ago. One of the things about aging is eventually there are fewer and fewer people left who can bear witness to our experiences. It appears the place is still in existence, although they don’t serve those chicken dinners anymore. While not certain, I believe at this writing his nephew is running the falafel shop, which has gotten some enthusiastic reviews.
the modern version
So concludes a small segment of the circuitous road which led to Uncle Moustache – or perhaps it was the brief memory of Uncle Moustache that sent me down some avenues of recollection – as I sat in the dark, in the middle of a cold winter night, reliving those strange and interesting times.
Scrolling back over the past posts of 2024 puts it right in my face that there was plenty about nature, food, weather, and just mindless, ambling summations. That, and a couple of Rants here and there.
At the beginning of the year the WordPress platform was giving me trouble – subscribers were not getting alerted to posts, those that tried to comment found it difficult, frustrating and not worth it. Over the fourteen years of writing this blog (January 16, 2011 was the first post – somehow I can barely grasp that fact), it has been an up and down issue with feedback, readership, and some of the helpful tools that were once available on this platform no longer seem to exist. But I’m still here, along with a handful of loyal followers, a number of new ones, and some random people dropping in from throughout the entire world, which is kind of cool. So maybe it’s fixed. For now. And for those that continue to bear with me, I appreciate it.
Of the more mundane, the weather. Temps bouncing all over the place, perhaps our new normal, climate change, all that. And yet when I look back at old posts here and memories from social media, it appears even back then we were commenting about how weird the weather was behaving. It seems it is our tendency to forget.
We had great, fluffy snows, ice storms, and even teeny tiny snowballs everywhere. Any significant snow was an excuse to have a bowl of fresh snow drizzled with maple syrup, which gets mentioned just about every year. I wonder if anybody reading about it here has ever felt the urge to try it out…..?
Phenomena provided by the cold began immediately in 2024, with gorgeous art displays of bathroom window ice. The year also ended with a new collection framed on the same glass.
At times there were skies so blue that they looked like a square on a Pantone paint strip.
actual sky blue sky
There were glimpses of rainbows peeking through trees and arching over houses, luring people out of their homes and into the streets to appreciate those fleeting treats. Sunrises and sunsets lent moments of hope and led one into silent contemplation.
I found myself often lost in billowing cumulous clouds, or great thunderheads building on the horizon. You could imagine angels behind beaming rays of heavenly light emanating from icy edges of afternoon formations. There were lenticular clouds that mimicked dolphins leaping through a sea made of sky, or flying saucers surveying the Earth. We had a few dark, moody, emotional gray ceilings, along with mackerel designs blanketing the above.
Clouds and clouds and more clouds.
Right here I could probably add an Earworm. Songs just kept popping up in my head all year while writing. As I type this, I’m hearing Judy Collin’s version of Joni Mitchell’s song, “Both Sides Now” in my mind.
Rows and floes of angel hair And ice cream castles in the air And feather canyons everywhere I’ve looked at clouds that way
There were plenty of earworms shared this year, usually just a line or two. Sometimes they would not vacate and stuck around for days at a time.
2024 brought us a total eclipse of the sun that became a social event, bringing so many gathering together to share the experience.
Okay, so here we go again – “You’re So Vain” by Carly Simon. I bet I’m not the only one who had this earworm when it was happening, was I?
Well I hear you went up to Saratoga And your horse naturally won Then you flew your lear jet up to Nova Scotia To see the total eclipse of the sun
In more celestial phenomena, we experienced four full Super moons during the year, and a showing of the Northern Lights a number of times, including once viewed right from the front porch.
As if spinning through a color wheel, every few weeks a fresh wave of blooms took stage – Roy G. Biv through the seasons! If flora is your thing, scrolling back you will find there are photographic bouquets of beauty scattered throughout this 2024 edition.
While “Views From the Urban Porch” provided outdoor observations, whimsical, mind-spinning examinations were shared from within the house and within my head – anything from thoughts and opinions on at what point the hole in your socks rendered them no longer Sock Worthy, to Object Attachment, horses I have known, crickets, human-animal connection, Hawkmoths, radiated bliss, the attack of the lily pollen, the odd abundance of houses that are painted black, feelings of restlessness, political fissures between family and friends, and the perceptible feeling of being on the edge of an abyss while waiting for Something to Happen. There were expressed urges both to flee and to hibernate. Childhood reminiscing. A year of No Figs. My first experience with an internet troll. The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms. A study in the abundant patterns and colors both man-made and in nature, which provided tremendous distraction from other things that needed to be completed – like taxes. Perhaps a reader or two found recognition in a few of these meanderings.
And oh boy, there were a few Rants; a recalled expression of frustration and rage during a transatlantic flight years ago, where simple disability accommodations were not considered. A diatribe about Respect (or disrespect), set off by the theft of a single poppy, and dog owners who allow their dogs to crap everywhere and don’t pick it up. Or the guy taking up four parking spaces…. because, seriously???
Crows made appearances on the Crow Tree. Turkeys and cardinals and blue jays graced back yards together. Blue-winged Wasps bounced around the front lawn while various larvae and beetles arrived, along with the invasive Spotted Lanternfly. We saw a ghost cat. A Suspicious Squirrel provided some laughs. Chickens were laying in abundance – neighbors shared their egg bounty. Birds nested, a doe admonished me for disturbing her repast, the annual spectacle of the fireflies made their appearance, and there was the excitement of being in the middle of an incoming dragonfly swarm.
I shared often about my little dog Rudi, who had a few concerning health issues over the year but is still by my side at what might be about age twelve. Here he is today, looking out the front room window with his little ears poking up from under a blanket my mother crocheted so many decades ago. The view of his ears from the back always reminds me of artichoke leaves.
As always, talk of food. Different variations of Dutch Baby – an oven-baked pancake (sort of) – were made almost weekly, filled with whatever fruit or berry was on hand. Significant amounts of chocolate were consumed. Many wild mushrooms were foraged (or purchased) and eaten while standing at the stove, never even making it onto a plate. Stir-fried Asian style Chicken of the Woods was a nice summer treat. Lots of Caprese salads over the warmer months. Shakshuka was made a couple of times, satisfying an inexplicable and unusual craving. Paw-paws, pomegranates and persimmons (I call them “the three P’s”) were greatly enjoyed. Baked pears with feta cheese, cranberries and walnuts….. I could go on and on. Mulberries, blueberries…. and the discovery that you can easily regrow a second batch of scallions.
It was nice to have the annual enchiladas on Christmas Eve, a tweaked recipe I used to make with my wonderful old friend, sidekick and former roommate Emrose for many years. Emrose is gone, but making them and eating them always brings back extremely wistful memories, and now my daughters have taken up the tradition. This year I was not with the entire family, where we historically have the family Swiss Fondue. That will have to happen in another month or two when we get together. One of my sisters has the original fondue pot from our childhood, and has continued to celebrate and preserve our custom on the other side of the country.
I shared a few Oddball thoughts, like the incident with the dashboard symbol, or space travel through the car wash. Lost keys. The angst of needing to get another car and the reluctance at embracing some newer technology. There was a bit of ruminating about senior-hood and the forgetfulness just about all of us in that phase of life are experiencing on some level. I reflected on the personalities of the women in my family as depicted in art. Wondered about Mercury in retrograde. And finally there was the Panettone Dilemma.
As the year wraps up, and most recently this very month, there have been a number of losses of people in my orbit. A distant friend, an old lover, a former coworker, a relative. They succumbed to ongoing diseases, sudden illnesses, the afflictions of age, and accident. As each has made their exit, the sudden holes they left have been flooded with an onrush of reflections and memories. While most of us have just been dealing with the natural nuisances of aging, a few of my friends have some pretty serious conditions going on at present. Of course this is to be expected, as we have reached the decades where we now dwell in “The Zone,” as one friend very much in The Zone has dubbed it. Being in The Zone has sent some thoughts spinning off in different directions.
One of those things is Getting Rid of Stuff so that my children will not have to deal with it. Kids don’t seem to want our stuff, they don’t want to be burdened down with our Stuff, they don’t share the same taste as us concerning our Stuff. I think someday they are going to wish they had some of our Stuff, especially if it was Quality Stuff, and might regret getting rid of it. Or maybe not. In any case, I worry about all the Stuff, but have only made the slightest dent in it. I keep thinking I should label photographs in order to avoid my kids asking each other the “Who is that person?” question that I have about many of my grandmother’s and mother’s unlabeled old photos. But then again, the kids just might not even care.
To add to all this mind-spinning, I started thinking about whether or not I have been a Good Person in life. I think sometimes yes, sometimes maybe not so much. If you could become a bird or a dragonfly discreetly hovering above while listening in to a eulogy for yourself (provided there even was such a thing happening), what nice things might be said about you? What not-so-nice things might be thought about you? What would I have changed or done differently if I could go back and change them or re-do them? What would I want to fix? What regrets do I have? And what part of the path am I satisfied or happy about? What were the successes? What have I accomplished in this life? How have I touched others?
Of course, this is mostly useless ruminating (which was happening in the shower, no less) and there is no going back, there is only The Now and The Going Forward. But I still think it is important to make amends in some cases, when possible – a cleansing, a repairing, and a settling.
Remarkably, I have a few friends who have told me they see me as even-keeled, steady, serene, possessing wisdom and kindness. Those are wonderful things to be told, but they surely must be in the eye of the beholder. When I hear those words attributed to me, it is difficult to suppress laughing and shaking my head, wondering what makes them assume that, as I feel like an imposter. Others in my sphere (the ones who admit it) consider me high-strung, sometimes difficult, scattered and kind of nutty. In my insecure self-image, this is closer to the truth. I guess at times it could encompass both, depending on the situation and what the relationship to the observer is.
Hopefully in older age there has been a “mellowing.” What I do know is that I waffle between periods of content and dysphoria regarding who I am. Probably many (or most?) of us exist on that spectrum. Which gets back to….
(while still in the shower) I suddenly started thinking about The Serenity Prayer. The original, lengthy version was actually written in the 1930’s by a Protestant theologian and shared in many publications, where part of it was discovered, adopted and later adapted in the 1940’s by Alcoholics Anonymous, where it has become synonymous with Twelve-step programs, although not exclusively. While I do not have any addictions that necessitate a program (unless there is one for the ongoing acquiring of too many cowboy boots and other collections), for many years I had these lines taped to my computer monitor at work. It was given to me on a little card by a coworker in regards to dealing with some of the more outrageous, problematic and stressful issues both on the job and in my personal life.
God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, Courage to change the things I can, and Wisdom to know the difference
It is thoughtful and inspiring advice, except I have always found myself balking at the first line. it’s not about the “God” word. Even if you change the “God” to “Higher Power” or “The power within myself” (I like that), I know that I will not ever (necessarily) accept “all the things I cannot change.” In our government, in keeping silent at being disrespected or lied to, or treated poorly – some of this remains and will always remain unacceptable. You might accept part of it, but not always all of it. Okay, there is the issue of loss, like sickness or death. That is different. Maybe it needs another line, like “The courage to continue to speak your truth about the things that aren’t going to change, instead of stuffing it inside.”
So much for “letting it go”. Clearly there can be a number of personal interpretations. I’m guessing some people might think I am missing the point. I can’t change it, I don’t like it, and it’s probably never going to be okay with me! With this attitude, perhaps I’m not as serene as some of those people think I am. And to segue into a whole other subject – to hell with Toxic Spirituality! Funny I should wind this post down with what sound like a Rant, although it’s not really a rant; it’s just what was going through my mind during what was actually a very pleasant shower this morning.
There are a few things I am hoping to address in the upcoming year. One of them is a funny one – an attempt to try and refrain from the overuse of the word “snippets” in this blog. When I was going back over it to sum up, I could not help to notice the redundancy of “snippets.” And it’s not even one of my favorite words. I don’t think I even use it in speaking, so I have no idea what that is all about. Note to self – there will be a conscious effort to reduce “snippets”.
The other things is to try and “go with the flow” a little bit more, while managing to maintain personal integrity. Which, ironically, could possibly be associated with accepting (just a few!) of those unchangeable things.
To those who already think I’m a nice person, I’ll will continue being that, and for those who think I am not so nice, I’m going to make an effort to figure out why and address those reasons.
To end on an upward note; a couple of posts back I shared about giving away a Thunbergia plant that had been prolific during the summer, but had pathetically withered away due to my lack of attention over the last few months. I had put it up on our local community free site hoping a plant lover might want to give it a last chance before I tossed it. Today the person who took it sent me this photo of the little plant beginning to thrive under her care, hopefully to eventually bloom once again.
making a comeback!
I hope some of you might go back and revisit the posts made throughout this last year in order to enjoy the views, photographic and otherwise.
Little Rudi began and has ended the year perched on the arm of the living room couch, attention turned towards an unclean window, barking at everybody that walks by. Some things remain consistent. The window also remains unwashed. Goals for ’25?
Here’s to repairing the damages, looking for the beauty, finding serenity, enjoying friendship, sharing love, the courage to change what you want to, seeing through fresh eyes, and Thriving in Twenty-five. Rudi and I hope to see you on The Urban Porch next year!
~*~
“Both Sides Now” by Joni Mitchell, 1966 – recorded by Judy Collins, 1967
She’s been gone many years now, but every December I can still hear my mother’s voice in my head talking about the panettone. “Would you like this nice panettone?” “Here, take this lovely panettone home!” She would offer, urge, somewhat cajole, and practically push the overly large package of “nice panettone” into your hands. I’m not sure if this is an Italian thing or just a mother thing, the Hand-off of the Panettone, but it has become a bit of a family joke, one that causes us to smile inwardly, or sometimes laugh outwardly in remembrance.
For those who might not be familiar with panettone, it is cylindrical-shaped, dome-topped sweet Italian cake-like bread filled with raisins and candied citrus, that is traditionally enjoyed around the Christmas holidays. I have to say right up front that I do not like raisins in my cakes, cookies or breads and am also not fond of fruitcake. I feel panettone might fall ever so slightly under the umbrella of being a fruit-cake, of sorts.
Despite letting my mother know year after year that I seriously dislike panettone, a great big one would usually arrive in the mail anyway. If I saw her around the holidays, the push to take the panettone home was inevitable. On reflection, it was similar to her insistent (and in retrospect, deeply touching) offer of Aunt Rose’s “lovely boots” (see These Lovely Boots 1/24/2011 for reference.) I think she honestly could not believe, nor accept, that I did not like and would actually reject the panettone. The premise seemed almost impossible to her.
A few weeks ago while out shopping, I found myself face to face with an entire shelf of assorted panettone. There were not just the usual raisin ones, but some that were filled with flavored creams, and a few personal-sized panettone that had chocolate chips instead of raisins. Although none of them appealed to me – as a matter of fact I could feel a distaste that was slightly physical – I purchased one of the small ones anyway, in order to give it another chance. I guess on some level I still wanted to please my mom, even if she wasn’t around to know it. What I discovered, even sans-raisins, is that I remain Not a Fan. Even without raisins, all panettone tastes like a stale sponge to me.
The thing about being gifted a panettone when you don’t like panettone, is trying to get rid of it. It is the hot-potato of gifts. Aside from the fact that there are very few people I’ve known who admit to liking panettone, the packaging itself even before you open it is unwieldy. They come in these giant boxes that do not fit in a cabinet, so they are out there taking up counter space. If you have ever attempted to regift a panettone to someone else, you will discover is not an easy thing to do – nobody wants them. Which has me wondering…. who is actually buying all these holiday panettone displayed on the shelves?
A few days ago my brother teasingly asked me “Are you going to have the panettone?” and we both cracked up. Actually, the very word “panettone” has the capacity to send me into hysterical laughing under the right circumstances. Only one sister enjoys panettone, but she has to buy a small one meant only for one person, as her family will not eat it either (and they make fun of her). This sister has a theory that our mother appreciated the panettone almost like an art form – the festive printed box topped with a ribbon and the beautiful domed shape of the large pastry within as a symbol of the holiday. I’m thinking she is probably correct about that. I can’t help but remember our mother’s holiday efforts fondly. But still…..
It has been many years since I’ve had to deal with a gifted panettone…… until now.
A couple of days ago my neighbor received one. Perhaps it’s speculation, but I’m guessing the person who gave it to her might have also been the recipient of it as a gift as well. My neighbor is on a strict no-sugar diet, so she asked me if I would like to take the panettone. I groaned inwardly. I told her I really hate raisins in my baked goods. She said she didn’t think there were any raisins in it, and that maybe it would be good toasted. Perhaps I was the default person to ask about taking the panettone, as her family probably had no interest in it either. I could see my mother’s eager, loving face in my mind talking about the panettone. I reluctantly took it home.
The label on the bottom listing the ingredients had such small writing that I didn’t notice (or maybe I didn’t want to notice) that the second ingredient is indeed raisins. I suddenly feel weighted down by the panettone, in possession of this holiday albatross.
Christmas is only a few days away and the tremendous urge to hand it off to the next person presses upon me – not that panettone only can be eaten at Christmas, although the timing seems to go hand in hand. It seems wrong to throw it out. Perhaps it could be donated to a soup kitchen or community holiday meal – but would anybody there even like it? I texted my daughter and asked if she would like me to bring it. She replied with a quick “No thanks!” to my offer.
I have a few days to figure this out. Anybody want a panettone?
Once again, the bathroom window has provided. The first ice pictures of this winter have arrived. It is a seasonal event, an arrangement of ice particles that develop on the (okay, not too clean) east-facing bathroom window on the coldest of mornings. They can be viewed best as the early sun is just rising off to the right of the horizon. After a few hours the images usually vanish, with a new configuration appearing the following day. Last winter bestowed a few imagination-provoking showings, a gallery of fleeting, natural offerings of gorgeousness, a group of which I had posted this past January ( Gifts From a Bathroom Window 1/22/24)
Over the years there have been some beautiful dawn formations, and I admit I look forward to discovering them. This is a slow start to to the bathroom window art season, but as the temps were briefly in the teens this morning, I expect we will continue to be experiencing similar conditions, which will produce more abstract daybreak displays to admire.
Earlier in the week it snowed these little tiny snowballs.
Not hail, but actual little snowballs.
little tiny snowballs
I thought it was pretty cool. Of course as soon as I tried to scoop some up, they immediately began melting in my hands.
A few days later we had more significant snow.
Being distracted with other things, I forgot to have a bowl of maple-syrup drizzled snow, as I always do after the first noteworthy storm. By the time I realized it, the window of fresh snowfall was missed and what was left was kind of yucky. But a neighbor just informed me we are supposed to get some Big Snow this weekend, so there will be other opportunities. I’m poised and ready this time.
Speaking of syrup, over the past couple of weeks I made some Apple Cider Syrup and have been pouring it over the usual Sunday morning Dutch Baby breakfast. It came out pretty good and is about halfway gone now. Basically, take a half-gallon of apple cider in a large, low pan and simmer it down until it evaporates enough to become syrupy. I will say it is times like these where the old woodstove is wistfully missed, where you could just let it do its simmering thing while the house was being heated.
You can throw a little bundle of spices wrapped in cheesecloth in with the simmering cider, but I just added a cinnamon stick to it and felt that was sufficient. It boils down to a small jar, but it has a tang to it, and a little goes a long way. Apparently you can do this with regular apple juice or pear juice too. Perhaps other juices would also work, but I haven’t experimented. It came out pretty good – I think I might break with tradition and try pouring some over the next fresh snow and see how that goes over.
In other kitchen discoveries, I was going to make a recipe using some scallions that had been sitting in the refrigerator, but found they were past their prime. Somewhere in the back of my mind I recalled recently reading where you can snip off the tops down to the bulbs, put the root bulbs in a glass of water, and a new crop of scallions will grow. So I did that. Well, all I can say is “yowza!” Within the first day they were already making significant tops, and within three or four days I had a new bunch of scallions! It happened so fast it was almost freaky. I’m wondering if it is a one-time deal or if you can do this over and over again. Kind of reminds me of those little projects we used to do as kids, growing a carrot plant from a cut top. Except this is way better.
On the subject of things that grow (or not), The Urban Porch is adorned with pots of dead plants. I probably should remove them.
I had a Thunbergia plant that was gorgeous over the summer and was doing okay even after I brought it inside…for a while. Now its condition is pathetic. I don’t have the space, or the light, and am getting into my Planticide Mode (see Planticide 11/30/22 or Black Thumb 2/11/11 for more of this phenomenon). Before tossing it, I decided to put it on our local Buy Nothing group in hope that someone might want to perform a rescue. A kind plant-loving soul has actually offered to try and save it.
Thunbergia in its summer glory
sad little neglected Thunbergia
We continue to close in on the holiday season, and all the emotions, highs and lows that accompany it for so many of us. Indeed, sometimes it feels like we are all doing a balancing act through this life.
“From There to Here” by Lucy Campbell
Rifts and reconciliations. Joys and sorrows. Gain and loss. Upholding or letting go of traditions. Changes from the usual plans. Hellos and goodbyes.
welcome ♥
farewell ♥
And a glimpse of good things to come….
coming soon! ♥
Speaking of good things to come, a fantastic gift of chocolate arrived in the mail!
I think I’m set for a little bit!
The neighbors have dressed their fence dinosaur in holiday garb.
Rudi is back in his best winter sweater that was knitted just for him.
I have a recipe sitting here for Cranberry Pistachio Shortbread Cookies. This particular version also contains chunks of white chocolate. It’s a ridiculous fact that I dislike baking (as opposed to cooking) and am especially frustrated and unskilled when it comes to making cookies, and yet I can’t resist saving these recipes and occasionally trying them, with mixed results. My cookie-making friends are not local, so I guess it’s up to me.
The holiday season is usually filled with all sorts of emotions and memories, some traumas and dramas, and also cheerful and wonderful traditions. Only into the second week of December, the earliest sunset has occurred, the Winter Solstice is soon to come, and the days will begin to get longer, which always feels hopeful. We are closing into the end of the year, the old passing, the new coming in. It seems the wheel keeps turning faster and faster.
I think tomorrow I might remove the dead plants from The Urban Porch, maybe hang something festive on the front door. And perhaps try my hand at those cookies.
I’ve stopped watching and reading most of the news these days. Never one to hide my head in the sand, at this point I’m saturated and have had enough. All this angst in the media can’t be healthy. My gaze has turned to random details. November provided many.
Small observations, snippets of color, contrast, movement and taste have drawn attention over the last month. The full super moon of November – the Beaver Moon – lit up the eastern horizon, a beacon rising through the trees.
There is an image stuck in my head from an old black and white movie I saw as a young child one rainy Saturday at the house of some kids who lived down the street. “The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms” was the first of this genre, making its debut a year before Godzilla came out. A dinosaur they called the Rhedosaurus (there is actually no such thing as a Rhedosaurus), awakened by a nuclear blast, wreaks havoc as it makes its way from the Arctic to Manhattan. Sitting on Stephen and Betty-Anne’s living room floor, we ate pretzels and watched – enthralled and slightly terrified.
Was the scene showing the full moon hanging in the sky a portent of things to come, a visual metaphor for the eye of the monster? Or was it not the moon at all, but actually the dinosaur’s eye? Did I imagine that? Funny what can trigger a memory. As my family moved away, I don’t know what ever became of those neighborhood kids, but I still sometimes experience a quick flash of that cinematic image when the moon is full.
the awoken beast from 20,000 fathoms
Most of the weather during this past November was warm, dry and sunny enough for some pleasant walks, or to sit outside and eat ice cream on those last days before the ice cream place closed for the winter.
Halvah Honeycomb ice cream ♥
The ice cream was actually a wee bit of consolation after tearing a tendon in my foot while going for a stroll through the woods and along the river. I wouldn’t even call it a hike, it was pretty much just an easy walk, so I don’t really understand how it happened. It seems everything is just a little bit more fragile and takes just a bit longer to heal lately. Senior-hood strikes again. So now I am supposed to be off my foot. This is easier said than done.
boo! 🙁
Right now I can’t get this foot into anything besides an old pair of rubber gardening clogs. This has prompted a reality check, which is driving the seriously practical consideration to downsize the significant collection of cowboy boots in my closet. I really love my cowboy boots, so this decision has encompassed both Maturity and Acceptance on my part. Before this happened, two pairs had already found new homes with a daughter and a neighbor anyway. Up next to go will be these beauties. Hopefully some cowboy boot lover will be interested in carrying the boot-a-holic torch forward.
these were great boots
This month I suddenly had the urge to make Shakshuka, a North African dish which is also popular in the Middle East. It is made of peppers and onions cooked into in a tomato sauce flavored with cumin, paprika, cayenne, or maybe some harissa, which then has eggs poached into it. I add feta cheese to my shakshuka and finish it off in the oven. The word shakshouka is a Maghrebi dialect Arabic word for “mixed up.” Just thinking about shakshuka has me considering the need to make it again this week.
shakshuka شكشوكة
Although I’m suppposed to be resting this foot, the dog still needs to be walked. A couple of days ago, Rudi suddenly stopped short and froze, glaring into the front yard next door, where a cat sat like a motionless apparition.
As we moved closer, it did not seem at all concerned that we were standing in front of it and staring at it. The cat was larger than Rudi, who insisted on pulling back to keep his distance. I haven’t seen this one around here before. Appearing fairly well-fed, most likely it is not feral. We continued to make our way (or limp, in my case) down the street slowly. By the time we headed back towards the house, Ghost Cat had vanished.
ghost cat
In these days of internet scrolling, emails and electronic advertisements, it was a rather lovely surprise to receive a seed catalog in the mail last week. So many long winters in the past had been enhanced by the pleasure of perusing Burpee, White Flower Farm, and other gorgeous seed catalogs; page upon page of fantastic fruit trees, bushels of vegetable goodness, a riot of floral jewels promising to burst forth with blooms to fill every nook, corner and border. A dream-book to carry you through until spring. This one is called Baker Creek Rare Seed Catalog. One can anticipate spending a cold, snowy afternoon curled up on the couch beneath a cozy throw, with a cup of hot tea, catalog in lap during the upcoming months.
A quick glance has revealed all sorts of great choices. And there are ten whole pages just of different tomato varieties!
Since the foot injury, I have accompanied other people on their errands and excursions. Whenever someone says “Want to take a ride? I need to do (whatever it is they have to do)”, I’ve said “Sure!” and gotten out of the house. I went with one friend who needed to get her shoes repaired and ended up having a delicious Indian lunch and scoring an almost new pair of muck boots exactly in my size from the shoe maker, for a fraction of the price (hopefully the foot will heal enough and fit in them come winter). Another friend needed to look at a piece of furniture for her bathroom that was in a building filled with gorgeous deities.
On the way home, it was pretty windy. A bank of lenticular clouds spread across the horizon above the mountains. I get very excited by clouds. These were so cool that I have to share a few shots here. Some looked like a pod of whales or dolphins.
leaping dolphins in the sky
sky whales!
This one in the center has a shark face.
sharks
As we headed further down the road, they became more like UFOs.
Since I was riding in a car, these photos were taken through a dirty windshield, so they are not as clear as they deserved to be. These gave an alien invasion kind of vibe.
the aliens have arrived
This was the last glimpse of them before the direction we were headed veered away. What a treat!
The stuffed toy dinosaur has returned to its perch on the neighbor’s fence a few houses down. This year it looks like someone has knit a new hat for it, preparing for winter. In keeping with the theme, maybe I should start calling it The Rhedosaurus.
A sad situation mid-month occurred with the tragic and unexpected loss of a former coworker. She was only fifty-three. I had not seen her in ten years, but the news was upsetting and sobering. In attendance at the funeral, I could not hear much that was being said, so I tried to focus on the glow of the stained glass church windows and reflect on the fragility of life.
I recognized (and didn’t recognize) a few people in attendance who I used to work with. You don’t notice it happening during the day-to-day, but it is always a surprise to see what time passing looks like on any of us when apart for a period of time.
Almost anywhere and any time I have found myself in a place of worship – of any denomination – be it across the country or in other countries throughout the world, if the opportunity arises I have lit a candle or contributed a devotion in memory of my mother. Over the years as other family members have departed, I’ve added their names to my silent prayers. I wish there was a way to psychically send some kind of healing towards the family of my coworker as they approach these hard holidays.
the candle on the left
On Thanksgiving Day, snow fell in large, lazy, mesmerizing flakes.
drifting mega-flakes
Rudi and I left a pattern of little paws and rubber clogs walking (and limping) across light snow.
I admired the shape and dusty lavender color of this left-handed guitar that was generously gifted to my son-in-law from his friends. So much surrounds us to catch the eye.
There is a settled type of comfort in having holiday meals on the same dinnerware that belonged to my mother.
my mom’s platter
The waning moon faded into the blue of an early morning sky before setting in the west. The dinosaur sleeps and the calendar turns to the next page, as we move on into December.
Some people reminisce about the number of lovers in their life. Some people count the number of cars they have had. Sometimes the two overlap.
My first car, bought as a teenager with help from my dad, was a white second hand Ford Pinto with a manual transmission. The deal was that I had to pay for part of it and he would help. It was a lesson in responsibility.
Since that time I have owned six white cars. Only once was the choice deliberate (high-visibility for safety while driving kids around) but the other times it was just what happened to be available. This year there seems to be so many white cars on the road and in car lots. Most of the ones I saw had been prior leases, so I’m assuming the cars that dealerships tend to put up for lease are primarily white.
There are pros and cons to having a white car. You can see them at night better, and reports state they have a lower rate of accidents due to the contrast of color (how does that play out in a snowstorm?). Supposedly white exteriors don’t get as hot in the summer as they deflect heat. While some people feel they show dirt, others say that actually it is the opposite. Some people think they look classy, some feel they are a bit boring. For me, I always thought a couple of my past white cars looked like ambulances.
On reflection, I’ve owned an awful lot of cars, perhaps more than should be normal for a woman my age.
Of the ones I can recall (and I think I’ve remembered all of them), as of today they add up to sixteen cars. Most of them were not bought new. Like old lovers, a number of these used cars had issues and didn’t last as long as hoped. A few of them were run right into the ground. Some were driven on long daily commutes or did cross-country trips.
Each one provided a ride through different chapters of life. A few were testaments to various levels of poverty, while the later ones reflected periods more prosperous. One was totaled by a boyfriend. Another seized up on a road trip and sold for parts in central California. A couple of those cars chauffeured my beautiful new babies home in them, shuttled them back and forth to school, drove them off to college, were driven in the middle of the night to be present for the births of their own children. When I think about it, while each car was tied to a story, the purchases of most of the white cars had an element of caring or happiness attached to them.
While lying in bed at night trying to fall asleep and thinking of useless distractions, I sorted them out. Of the sixteen, they fell into a number of categories:
The Models – Ford Pinto – 3 (the cars known to explode); Volkswagen Beetle – 3; Chevy (Nova and Impala) – 2; Oldsmobile (Omega) – 1; AMC (Gremlin) -1; Toyota (Tercel and Corolla) – 2; Subaru (Brighton, Crosstrek, Impreza, Outback) – 4.
The Colors – Silver – 1, Orange – 1, Brown/copper – 1, Blue – 3, Green – 4, White – 6.
The Transmissions – Manual – 9, Automatic – 7
What started this weird rumination was the fact that my car was reaching the end of its affordably serviceable life – unfortunately a bit sooner than I had anticipated. I had purchased a silver Subaru brand new a little over ten years ago – actually ordered it – where I could choose the color and features.
At the time I declared this would be “The Last Car I Will Ever Own.” It was a peppy little thing that handled nicely, although small, very noisy, and not the most comfortable on a long haul; but I was very fond of it. I did not anticipate outliving this car. Yet – perhaps surprisingly – I’m still here, suddenly needing to find a replacement sooner rather than later. I had hoped to pass it on to a grandson, but that is not going to happen now. I am rather sad to say good-bye to it.
farewell little silver car!
Under the current life situation, buying a brand new vehicle wasn’t really in the cards, so the hunt was on for a good used one. It has been a bit of a shock to discover that in today’s market, a decent used car costs almost as much as a new one. Perhaps it is rather shallow, but one issue I was stuck on after dealing with all the practical requirements was the color. I wanted something different, something that was a reflection of my inner self. Something I would be happy to see sitting out in the driveway every morning. Something I could find in a parking lot amid the glut of sameness. And yet every vehicle I found that checked the other boxes and happened to be available was White.
So I held off, and waited, and resisted, and kept looking, while anxiety grew and grew. Until all of a sudden I found myself in the situation where I had to get a car immediately. I found one that was a few years old. White Car Number Six.
And here is where my Senior Stuff kicks in. All the technology makes me a little bit anxious. The only things I really wanted on this car (besides Not White) were a back-up camera and heated seats. I wanted to clearly see what was behind me so I wouldn’t hit anything, and I wanted a warm butt in the winter. That was it. I don’t want and will never use things like a sunroof or cruise control, yet most of these recent cars don’t even give you a choice. I didn’t want leather seats or leather anything.
What I discovered is the more recent cars don’t even have a key for the ignition, you have a “fob” you keep on you and push a button on the dashboard to start the car. You don’t use a key to open your door either, instead you touch the door handle with your finger to unlock and lock your door. I seriously dislike this. I don’t like that when you stop at a stoplight, your engine turns off and then kicks on when you begin to move again. I want to permanently disable this feature. I would love to have a regular key instead of this fob thing. But that’s not the case. Embracing state-of-the-art seems to be a bit of a necessity. I am dragging my heels while going forth.
I know, this really sounds like First World Problems. And it is. But here we are….
All these modern changes remind me of my own mother’s resistance to technology years ago. She had a simple microwave oven in her kitchen that had dials on it. You adjusted the dial to the minutes you wanted and another dial to turn it on. After many years of happy use, eventually it stopped working. By that time, microwave ovens all had panels with push-button keypads on them. She was adamant that she did not want a keypad on her microwave. We laughed at her, but she insisted that was the only type she wanted.
There was no internet back then to do a search for a microwave. After scouring every store to accommodate her, I think we probably found the last microwave with dials ever made in some dusty carton, forgotten at the bottom of some big box store shelf. She was delighted with it. After she passed, nobody wanted such a dinosaur; we couldn’t even give it away. I just looked up dial microwaves to see if I could find a photo of an old one, only to discover they actually still do make them and can be ordered online. She would have been very happy to know that she still had this simple option.
I fear I have inherited some of my own mother’s traits in that department. I only use the most basic of functions on my keypad microwave. And honestly, a washer and dryer with dials instead of computerized keypads is much more preferable. In my mind, the fancier these devices and machines become, the more apt they are to break – and the more expensive they are to fix, if they can even be fixed at all.
There are some nice safety features in the newer car though – the blind spot indicators are my personal favorite. There has been a learning curve, but my friends and family assure me I will get used to it all and eventually come to love it. As I write this, I am not at that place yet.
In the meantime, I drove three blocks the other day and passed six identical white cars to mine. Not just white-color cars, but the same exact white car as mine. Went into a store, came out, and could not find my white car among all the other white cars in the parking lot.
Maybe I should have settled for the neon yellow/green one that I waffled over a few weeks ago, but I just could not get my head (or my stomach) past that color. Someone referred to it as a “snot-rocket,” which pretty much summed it up. I don’t think I would have felt good about seeing that somewhat vomitous color parked in the yard each day. Maybe I would have felt differently about it thirty or forty years ago, but not now. The salesman told me that people will actually approach me at the gas station to admire such a great color, and that I would be noticed in that car. I told him I really didn’t need any more people noticing me, as I’m already noticed too much.
Out of the sixteen past cars, only a few of them have been referred to with nicknames. There was Skylab, Omega, The Gremlin, Big Blue and The Silver Bullet. “Skylab” had been badly damaged in a hit and run. Over time, pieces of it began to periodically drop off, much like the space station that fell to earth. “Omega” was an Olds Omega; it was a no-frills, unassuming, do your own thing kind of car – “the new Olds is old news.”
“The Gremlin” was actually an AMC Gremlin, light green in color. It lived up to it’s name – that car was possessed. Inexplicably, a rim on it once shattered while I was driving, sending the entire wheel – both rim and tire – careening down a hill where it just missed hitting someone, leaving me skidding along the road on an angle, the axel sending a shower of sparks in its wake. The driver’s side door of The Gremlin also decided to no longer work, so you had to climb over the center console and through the passenger side to get in and out of it. Evil car.
Big Blue was just big and blue. It was a very comfortable car, but it did not have a “friendly face.” I will share that I often see faces and other images in random objects, which is a phenomenon called Pareidolia. Big Blue had headlights that tended to make the car look slightly annoyed, if that makes sense. When I moved on to my next car, having an affable face was a consideration.
My last car was the Silver Bullet, because it was silver and darn fast for such a little thing. Over time though, I had begun to refer to more often as “Skylab II” as it had taken on the appearance of a dented tin can. Getting the first dent is always the most painful. After that, it’s just more dents.
Sky Lab II
The front bumper shattered one sub-zero winter’s day, when I stopped at a neighbor’s house to feed their pet turtle while they were away and drove over a ridge of ice at the end of their driveway. It seemed every time went shopping, I would come home to a new scratch or dent on that car. It came to a point that when my son-in-law backed into the rear corner of it, I told him not to worry as long as the tail lights still worked. When my daughter backed into the front end of it, I just stood in the driveway laughing like some crazy person. I told her the same thing – as long as the headlights still work, it’s okay. My five year old granddaughter added a few blobs of silver paint to the scratches. That car had character, and yes, I will miss it.
“Mema! I painted your car!”
I’ve decided to name this new car to help ease into it. It has a nice pearly finish to it, and came into my possession on the full moon. So I’ll call it “Pearl Moon”. Pearl Moon is going to need a number of stickers and other identifying objects stuck on to it in order for me to find it in a parking lot, so I’ve begun to do that. By the time I am done with it, it’s going to be a rolling advertisement for “Old Lady Who Can’t Find Her Car.”
I’m hoping with time I will get over my aversion to all the fancy stuff and come to love it. I hope I will handle the first dent with grace. Today, after weeks of drought, we have had rain. I walked outside to see my car covered with wet Japanese maple leaves that have been artfully plastered throughout. The contrast is rather decorative. I drove all over town with those leaves stuck all over the car, and was able to find it in a parking lot, since it made such a loud, autumnal statement.
I hope Pearl Moon will eventually have some nice stories attached to it. Coming full circle, this will probably be my Last Car. Odd how both the first and the last are second-hand white cars, although miles apart in technology.
Disease: “Any harmful deviation from the normal structural or functional state of an organism. A diseased organism commonly exhibits signs or symptoms indicative of its abnormal state.”
Dis-ease: “A particular quality, habit, or disposition regarded as adversely affecting a person or group of people.” “A situation of un-ease.” ” Uncomfortable.”
I think we are pretty much at both places right now. A harmful deviation…..adversely affecting a group of people. And it sure is uncomfortable.
current mood
While walking the dog a few days prior to the election, I came upon this reproduction of a famous Renoir called “Bal du moulin de la Galette” (Dance at Le moulin de la Galette) propped up against a building next to a row of garbage pails. It was rather dismal to see. Leaning against the rotting facade of the building next to a dirty refuse container – in a way felt both disrespectful and metaphorical – it struck a chord of sadness in me. I was hoping someone would come along and take it home. Perhaps it was just projection on my part, but in that moment I was overcome with the uneasy foreboding that there was not going to be any celebrating in my camp after the votes came in.
This past week on social media, I encountered my first ever “troll”. Usually I don’t go out for politics much on my personal pages nor here in this blog. There are people more learned and articulate who can do that, and honestly, I am not up for the debates and discord this kind of thing generates. So if any of you are reading this and do not agree with me, let’s be civil and not get into any discussion after the fact. This time I sort of broke my own rule though. I was feeling pretty nauseous about the possibilities ahead and expressed sadness and worry over the future of democracy with a temporary profile picture on my page.
Some rando guy that I did not personally know dropped a nasty comment beneath this picture. Considering he did not even live in this country, and that the person he favored to win actually won, it seemed to just be a hateful, senseless thing to do. This being my first “troll” experience, I was more fascinated than upset at this person’s need to lash out with venom at someone who was a total stranger to him. After a number of people responded to him with a few choice words, I asked him to please take his hate elsewhere, and then I removed the picture. My point was made and his hostility and spitefulness was showcased. It was easy to delete and block this intruder and his “disease.” It’s a lot harder to do that when it’s someone you know.
One of the most disturbing aspects of this political division between people in our nation has been the fissures between families and friends. This has been felt and expressed by people on both sides of the fence. It is rather mind-blowing when people you care about or love – that you have been related to or had lifelong friendships with – have such an alternate (or in some extreme cases, distorted) view of reality that you have to wonder, “Who ARE you????”Or in some cases, “Who have you become???” In the past I have pretty much been able to put on my Swiss Face and maintain some sort of neutrality or acknowledgement regarding the opinions of people who matter to me, knowing that our core values were pretty much the same. I am not so sure of that anymore and find myself struggling to accept some upsetting viewpoints that I would find intolerable (and even deplorable) were it from anybody else. Dis-ease.
Following the election, a friend and I headed for a diner and stuffed our faces with Belgian waffles and crispy bacon. I don’t know if I would call it “comfort food” in as much as “drown your sorrows” food, but it temporarily took the edge off.
comfort food?
So here we are. For a few days I wallowed in anxious grief and disbelief, but there is nothing healthy about continuing on with that. Well, okay, I did throw in a couple more sarcastic memes, just because….
But then it was time to move off from that place and focus on the small, healing things. I made Thai Spring Rolls with Peanut Sauce for dinner, accompanied by a salad of mixed lettuce, oranges, ginger, pomegranate and pistachios in a ginger vinaigrette.
I made baked pears stuffed with feta cheese and chopped dried black cherries, drizzled with honey, fresh thyme and walnuts. Recipes for Sanity.
I admired some of the last gold of November against a vibrating sky.
Enjoyment was taken watching the squirrels stuffing their faces under the birdfeeder, burying their winter stores and frenetically running up and down the sidewalks.
I marveled at the roses still blooming on the porch of a house a few doors down. For some reason this photo came out looking almost like a painting.
The last of my porch flowers are still hanging on.
Produce at the farmer’s market lent beauty to appreciate.
Early last evening while out walking the dog, I glanced up to see a perfect half moon hovering above the treetops. It was a lovely night.
Even though the sky appeared clear, when I got back inside the house, I noticed my hair had absorbed the smell of smoke. It has been incredibly dry here in the northeast. Wildfires have been cropping up all over the area.
from the south west
from the north west
Climate change is real, folks. This is scary stuff. I was reading about The Gaia Hypothesis, how Earth is a complex, living system where components work together to form a self-regulating organism. By now it is pretty obvious that this organism has a disease and the disease is us.
To refocus, this morning broke to a rosy, beautiful, hopeful dawn.
hopeful dawn
something good to wake up to
When all else goes awry, being outside in nature always helps. In an attempt to blow off a little energy and be Useful, I went outside to do some yard work, raking up leaves. Almost everybody on the street was out there doing the same thing.
At first it appeared someone was illegally burning leaves (there is a burn ban here) as there was heavy gray smoke that seemed to be sitting at the end of our street. But soon you could see it spread throughout the sky, as it became apparent that the smoke from the wildfires had arrived on the wind. It was bad enough to irritate your throat. Eventually I gave it up and came inside.
smoke on my street
I’m not sure how I will feel the next time I interact with friends or family who have aligned with choices that threaten the future and rights of so many. It will be a slow, cautious process. At this point there is not much to do but try to take the “dis” out of the dis-ease. Hope for the best, find beauty in the small things, try to love one another, be a good person, look for the light – and if you can, Be the Light.
And hope for rain.
And one more thing I have to say….thank God for dogs.
Whenever a string of mishaps and unfortunate events of daily living transpire, inevitably someone I know will say “Mercury must be in retrograde.” Considering the backward-moving appearance of Mercury that occurs a few times a year is merely an optical illusion, the science-nerd part of me tends to repeat that phrase more as a joke than anything else.
Earworm of the Day – “Everything is Broken” by Bob Dylan.
Broken lines, broken strings Broken threads, broken springs Broken idols, broken heads People sleeping in broken beds
There’s no doubt these are stressful times. It feels like the entire world is on the edge of one big psychic meltdown. With all the Big Stuff to worry about, when the little stuff happens it sometimes feels as if it’s enough to just push you over.
Broken hands on broken ploughs Broken treaties, broken vows Broken pipes, broken tools People bending broken rules
The little things for me began when we kept losing the WiFi network connection in the house – at first just brief and random, then suddenly it went out for days. Not having it be reliable has been a sobering realization as to how dependent (and also addicted) one can be to the internet.
My computer is also needing to be replaced. And the screen is cracked. I guess first you need the internet to be working. Then the computer. Perhaps one can notice a trend building here.
Ain’t no use jiving, ain’t no use joking Everything is broken
Then the car decided to have big problems and has suddenly crossed the financial tipping point of repairing. So I’ve been searching for another car. Trying to find the right car has been a bit stressful. Every time I’ve been on the verge of committing to a certain car, an internal panic ensues and I don’t go through with it. Meanwhile, not having reliable wheels has been restrictive.
Broken bottles, broken plates Broken switches, broken gates Broken dishes, broken parts Streets are filled with broken hearts
The annual hearing test revealed that I’ve lost some more hearing.
Broken words never meant to be spoken Everything is broken
Up to this point, while those things have been annoying and stressful and potentially expensive, none of this is earth-shattering. These have been more a series of “WTF is Going On?” type events. I have friends and family going through life situations which can truly be described as awful and even devastating. Acknowledging that keeps things in perspective.
However, in the middle of all this, the dog picked up a bacterial infection and has been miserably, painfully, scarily sick. He lost a lot of weight, and is on four different medications. His recovery has been slow and his care suddenly labor-intensive. I have been worrying about him constantly. All the other stuff doesn’t matter, but to me, this matters a lot. Little Rudi. So little.
not feeling very well
Broken bodies, broken bones Broken voices on broken phones Take a deep breath, feel like you’re choking Everything is broken
For the grand finale of the week, I tripped going down the last four stairs and landed hard on my knees at the bottom. There was a surreal perception of falling in slow motion, while successfully managing not to spill my coffee or drop my phone or any of the other crap I was juggling in my arms. Some bruises and a scraped shin; thankfully, nothing worse than that. It was a seriously stupid move. You hear stories about this happening to Old People all the time, The Falling. During the next routine doctor appointment where they ask “Have you fallen in the last few…..?” I think I might lie, while realizing I have officially arrived into that senior classification.
Seem like every time you stop and turn around Something else just hit the ground
Following some unceremonious curse words or two, I suddenly asked nobody (since I was alone), “Is Mercury in retrograde?” So there it is.
Actually, Mercury is not in retrograde – at least not for another three weeks. So it’s just stuff, and in the scheme of stuff it’s not so bad (except for the dog being sick). And as a matter of fact, while Mercury is still in the process of appearing to be moving forward, these small, wonderous, snippets of life happened:
A tree down the street has made feathers of crimson.
While foliage in autumn glory adorns the beauty of weathered wood.
Golden fans of Gingko leaves adorn the bluestone sidewalks.
On the way to the farmer’s market, I noticed the rubber snake that had been placed at the base of some bushes by the sidewalk last week (see Gems of October 10/25/24) has moved upward, now dangling from a tree overhead. I had to laugh…
On the walk back, a bagpiper was playing a moving tune in front of the church for a funeral. I stopped to respectfully listen.
While many trees have dropped their leaves, the Japanese Maples have ignited and are holding on.
Halloween evening from The Urban Porch was uncharacteristically filled with gentle, balmy breezes and a gorgeous sky palette.
Some neighbors chose not to participate this year.
While the usual suspects went all out. As in the past, this house will most likely continue to wear some of this adornment throughout the upcoming year. I admit I rather enjoy it.
This time around the only decoration I had was the skelly brought down from the attic. It has a switch that makes the eyes light up, so that was turned on, letting kids know there was candy available.
Sitting out there with my next door neighbor and our dogs, eating packets of M&M’s as the sunset provided a show, one could not help but feel serene in the moment.
The following day was also deliciously warm. Back out on The Urban Porch, soaking up the golden light of late afternoon, the sudden sound of brass and drumbeats filled the air, providing a front row seat to an unexpected high school homecoming parade.
The color guard was dancing in unison, convertible cars filled with teenagers cruised by, pickup trucks pulled floats of happy kids sitting on hay bales, waving and tossing candy.
I don’t know what it is about a parade, but as they marched by, the plumes on their headwear backlit and glowing in the slanting sun, I could not stop smiling and got a little choked up – even as far as feeling some tears well up.
percussion
and horns
There was something both nostalgic and innocent about it, allowing a brief respite where all the other heavy stuff in the world could be put on hold, if only for the moment. A gift. The afterglow lasted for hours.
Concurrently, it was also Diwali, the Festival of Lights, a celebration of light over darkness, which somehow feels fitting, and hopefully auspicious. So that night my neighbor and I went out to enjoy some Chana jalfrezi and a sweet dessert of cardamom spiced Gulab jamun in rose syrup.
Image Source: Pixabay
While navigating the crap of this Not Retrograde (and any other retrograde that will be coming along), it seems like the best way to get through it is to try and maintain a sense of humor (even if it’s dark humor) and to find the light in the things around you.
Oh, and I took one of my grandkid’s squishy fidget toys and use it as a little stress ball. Every bit helps.
~*~
“Everything is Broken” – Bob Dylan, from the album Oh Mercy, 1989
Small gems of October have provided entertainment and distraction throughout the month, acknowledged with appreciation, wonder, and some amusement.
I’ve been admiring the treasures afforded, observing wildlife in their environment over the past few weeks. While walking by the ocean, a seal repeatedly dived and resurfaced, keeping abreast with my steps. We watched each other with mutual curiosity.
A turkey, with feathers of beautiful burnished bronze, steps out into the road in front of the car.
With great hesitation it pauses, remaining motionless with indecision, stopping traffic in both directions before ever so slowly making its way across. Come on buddy, you can do it!
On the way to the farmer’s market, I spy what appears to be a snake dangling from the bushes.
Both dogs and people passing by are giving it a wide berth. Of course I need to check this out. On closer inspection it is revealed the snake is a rubber one, and there are two of them! Clever way to keep dogs away from your plants!
I pause in front of a neighbor’s house to watch a squirrel busily carrying black walnuts and burying them strategically throughout the lawn. It seems to be having a difficult time deciding exactly where the best location should be. Finally he chooses a place, digs a hole, drops his prize inside and quickly covers it up. He begins to leave, but suddenly Squirrel notices me and realizes I have seen where his deposit has been made. He freezes, sits up tall and stares at me with suspicion and alarm. I can almost imagine him saying “Uh-oh!”
Worried that this observer might steal his prize, he quickly runs back to the the spot and frantically digs the walnut back up.
With his treasure once again safely in his possession, he shoots a pointed look in my direction before taking off with it, over a fence, on to a safer hideaway.
It has been dry. The house sparrows enjoy water accumulated in the saucer of a porch plant.
Following the first frost, we experience an Indian Summer. My brother’s bees emerge to take advantage of the warmth as they prepare their stores for the winter.
A flotilla of Canada geese, all facing in the same direction, adorn sapphire waters on a breezy day.
A napping dog blissfully soaks up the sun inside an uptown storefront window.
Rich colors and textures abound during this Autumn month. The bright green, custard-tasting paw-paws have ripened.
Pomegranates, with their lovely renaissance hues, are available and plentiful.
Acorns and oak leaves blanket the woodland floor.
I indulge in a handful of Matsutake mushrooms, a cherished favorite, which I clean, slice, sauté in butter, and eat right out of the pan while standing over the stove.
Mums and asters of gemstone hues grace The Urban Porch – and just about everyone’s porches up and down the street.
Resinous buds in my neighbor’s back yard catch the afternoon rays.
The gingko nuts have ripened on the trees
and fallen to the sidewalk, where they have been crushed underfoot, emitting a vomit-like aroma.
Grasses wave in the wind coming off the river,
delicate in their detail.
The firebush by the driveway does its annual flame.
October has brought the gift of beautiful skies. Dream-inspiring clouds decorate above.
October gave us rainbows arching across horizons and peaking through a canopy of trees.
Denim waters reflect the azure atmosphere.
There was a wonderous glimpse – even from the Urban Porch – of the aurora borealis one night.
October brought us a great big melon ball of a full super-moon too.
Hunter’s super moon rising
And if we are lucky, we might be able to see one of the two comets anticipated this month. I haven’t been able to locate it from where I sit, at least not so far, but that would be a celestial treat.
hope to see it – image via Wikimedia
The neighbors decorate their homes with haunting displays in anticipation of Halloween. Unable to restrain myself, I have already begun to sample the candy meant for trick-or-treaters.
Sections of the Crow Tree that still bear leaves bedazzle with a stunning glow against electric blue.
The fig tree and other plants which had summered on the porch have been brought inside. The annual planting of daffodil bulbs in honor of my mother has been completed. Little old Rudi supervises as he basks in the afternoon sun.
These are the mood-inducing, wistful, seasonal observations – and a few sighs – as the month of October moves swiftly past us.
I was driving around looking for a good space in a rather large parking lot that serves a number of chain stores. The plan was to meet and accompany a friend who had a few errands to run in those stores and needed a little help, then leave my car and ride with her so we could grab some lunch. Since it was a bright, sunny day, I was hoping to find a spot near one of the many islands in the lot that had trees planted in them which provided a spot of shade. This way, when I got back in the car later it would not be burning hot.
There are a number of these “tree islands” scattered around the lot that are surrounded by from two to four spaces each, but unfortunately there weren’t any available, so I ended up just parking in a regular spot in the sun and got out of my car to wait for her. While casually leaning against the hood and idly observing the parking lot action, I noticed someone had arranged their vehicle in one of the shady spots in such a way that they had taken up FOUR spaces.
My immediate thought – one laced with disgust – was “Seriously? What an entitled asshole.” It was a large, black pickup truck; although full-sized, it was actually no larger than any of the other pickups and SUVs that seemed to dominate this parking lot, all of which appeared able to fit nicely in the spaces without parking like a jerk. As a matter of fact, there were so many pickups parked there that if all those stores had not been lining the perimeter of this lot, one might almost think this was a used pickup truck dealership. We have a lot of trucks and SUVs around here, that is a fact. It was the kind of scenario where you wish you had one of those snarky, pre-printed notes handy to leave on the windshield of selfish people who park like that.
Two spaces to accommodate length, had it even been necessary (it wasn’t) would be understandable. But four? Clearly the person just wanted to make sure nobody was going to ding his shiny truck.
I am sensitive to the part about not wanting to have your car scratched or dented, especially if it is perfect or brand new. My car has been hit so often in parking lots that it is starting to look like the remnants of Skylab. For those of you unfamiliar or too young to know about Skylab, it was the first United States space station, sent up in the early 1970’s. In 1979 Skylab – no longer functioning – was brought down into the atmosphere, disintegrating and leaving pieces strewn across the Indian Ocean and the outback of Australia – about a 2,500 miles long trail worth of debris.
So yes, I understand not wanting anyone to dent your vehicle, but if they were so worried, they could have parked further out towards the edges of the lot. But no, this person had to take four spaces in the coveted shady area.
So there I am; leaning on my car, still waiting for my friend, meanwhile letting my mind wander, imagining what this space-hogging owner might look like. In the past, a number of unfortunate encounters I have had with big, black pickup trucks has been accompanied by an air of aggression – extreme tail-gaiting, billowing exhaust, running stop signs, being cut off, and even an incident or two of road rage. Sometimes great big stickers, signs and flags stating a preference for a certain political persuasion can be seen adorning these vehicles. Based on those unpleasant former encounters, I visualized a very large, scowling, disrespectful guy (or woman) with a very unpleasant vibe. Although there were no identifying objects stuck to this shiny four-space bogart, I still imagined some macho dude ready to flip the bird to anyone in his way.
Suddenly, a man strides quickly towards the truck carrying a number of bags in his arms. He’s tall and thin, wearing jeans and sneakers….. and he’s a white-haired old man. He’s an old guy! He places his parcels in the passenger side, shuts the door and then walks back into the bookstore. Then he comes out again, futzes around for quite a while with whatever it is he’s got going on in the passenger side, opens a bottle of something to drink (tosses part of the zip cap opener on the ground), then smiles at me before getting behind the wheel and driving away.
Well.
Although I didn’t speak to him, there was nothing visually about him or his manner that indicated any hostility, aggressiveness or anything else. He was just an old man who parked his truck so that nobody else would put a ding in it. And okay, littered a bit. But at that point, I felt like maybe I should extend him some mental grace (because this entire movie was playing out in my own head). Who knows, maybe he is having more trouble parking as he has aged. Maybe he was a nice guy, regardless of whatever politics or anything else he might believe in. Maybe he just came out of that bookstore with some really interesting books (I love a bookstore) or gifts for someone special. Or maybe although he looked benign, he might really be not nice at all. Perhaps he does go around tail-gaiting and giving everyone “the finger.” There’s no way of knowing. The only thing I know for sure is that at that moment, he was Still An Asshole for taking up four parking spots.
After he left, I got back in the car and pulled my little compact piece of space junk up into one of the parking spots he had vacated, taking up only one space and leaving the other three for somebody else. Later on when I returned to my car, three other people had parked around me, also partaking of the shade provided by the tree island.
It was only a number of hours later that some irony surrounding the entire scene occurred to me. Although I try not to think about it too much, technically I am a “senior.” This “old guy” in the parking lot was most likely not much older than me. Old Guy!!!! Gahhhhh! So much for assumptions, perceptions and perspective. It was a good reminder and lesson for the day.
But, still, four spaces…. it was really an asshole move.
The awareness of a particular image continually showing up began about a year ago, when I was repeatedly borrowing my daughter’s hoodie. Whenever I was at her house I found myself reaching for it, as it was roomy and cozy and I was drawn to what I thought (at the time) was a butterfly pictured on the back of it. I don’t know how many times I had worn it before I actually took a good look at the graphic and realized it was a Death’s-head Hawkmoth on the back.
Since that time, these depictions seem to be popping up into my awareness rather regularly, a visual type of Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon, or “frequency illusion.”
I had stumbled upon an attractive vintage 1901 image, which took me down a rabbit hole of lovely antique renderings.
from the NYPL digital collection
A little bit about these moths – the condensed version anyway; we won’t be seeing any of these in the United States. The African Death’s-head Hawkmoth (Acherontia atropos) is native to Africa and found in the Mediterranean region, Middle East, Southern Europe, Asia, and the British Isles. They will migrate to northern areas during the warmer months.
cigarette card from the NYPL digital collection
It has a wingspan that can be as large as five inches and a distinctive pattern on its thorax that resembles a human skull – thus the name. The larvae (I think they are rather wild-looking in a vivid, swizzle-stick sort of way) favor tomato and potato plants, deadly nightshade, lilac, jasmine and privet, and supposedly even cannabis. The moths are fond of nectar and honey and will raid beehives for it. They can mask their own odor and mimic the scent of the bees, thus disguised in order to enter the hive. Pretty tricky!
Oh – and when they are stressed out or feel threatened, they make a squeaking noise by inhaling and expelling air from their pharynx through their mouth and reedy proboscis, creating a vibration, sort of like a tiny accordion. I went in search of some recordings to hear them squeaking, and indeed they do! If you are interested, I urge you to look that up yourself – it’s sort of freaky. I had no idea….
The females are larger than the males, the males have fancier wing coloring. They have a lifespan of about six weeks.
So these moth visuals have been coming on strong and in unexpected places. Recently I stopped by a neighbor’s place to attend an open house art show. While there, I met her interesting daughter, whose throat was adorned with a striking Death’s-head Hawkmoth tattoo-in-progress.
And just recently, a friend created and sold this beautifully intricate moth necklace made up of the tiniest glass Delica beads.
With such a mysterious vibe, it feels as if the Death’s-head Hawkmoth should be adorning oracle cards, doesn’t it? So I went looking for that and found this Five of Cups tarot card. Oddly enough (or not), it turns out it was created by a woman I have corresponded with in the past concerning her beautiful crow-related art. More connections….
The Guardian of the Night Tarot – MJ Cullinane
This one is from an attractive nature oracle deck I could not help but purchase.
Woodland Wardens Oracle by Jessica Roux
I guess if one wanted to read more into all of it, you could wax suspicious and say that this ongoing visual leitmotif of hawkmoths might be a harbinger of something not-so-great to come, a bad omen. Because of the mystical-looking skull image, they have historically been highlighted in supernatural and horror movies, giving an air of the otherworldly and a portent of misfortune. I don’t see them that way, instead finding the Death’s-head Hawkmoth both fascinating and beautiful, and maybe even a tiny bit magical in its striking strangeness. Perhaps the frequent appearance or awareness of such is actually a good sign, one of transition or transformation. I prefer to run with that premise!
by August Johann Rösel von Rosenhof – 1744
I finally bought my own moth hoodie and wore it this past week while on a brief jaunt away. Meandering through a row of tourist shops, I wandered into a rather eclectic store that was selling smoking paraphernalia, some goth-style jewelry, and an incongruous assortment of dayglo plastic items. The walls and shelves were covered with glass cases that contained framed specimens of beetles, bats, moths and butterflies from throughout the world – including an actual African Death’s-head Hawkmoth. There it was again!
in person – Acherontia atropos
Somehow, seeing the real moth felt like a possible culmination. I don’t know if this recurrent theme will continue, or if that might have been the finale of Death’s-head moth appearances for a while. In any case, it’s been an interesting run of observances.
A day or so away from the Autumn Equinox, here we are again. It’s been cool nights and still very warm, ever-shortening days. All signs are barreling towards Fall at full speed, pops of orange here and there, gardens calling out for tidying, soon to be put to bed.
I’ve pulled out clothing from the drawers and closets – some to be donated and others to be making their way into storage tubs and back up into the attic, where they will be swapped with some winter wear. The ongoing cycle. Unfortunately, it’s mostly keepers because I still Cannot Let Go of Things I Like, but some slight progress is being made. Before packing it all away, I’ve decided to wear some of it one more time – this has resulted in a pile on the chair of “Goodbye Summer” outfits and my own private little fashion show that nobody will see unless they notice me walking the dog in something new every day this week.
it has begun
There has been the heady, sweet scent of Clematis wafting past The Urban Porch this month, emanating from an explosion of it in the yard of a house two doors away. A blanket of it, laden with bees, took over the fence, jumped into the next yard and grew up on top of the hydrangeas there. I was hoping the neighbor might share a couple of the many roots, but despite my shamelessly blatant hints, she has not been forthcoming.
over the fence
A golden grasshopper erratically flips around the porch, prompting me to carefully slip inside the door before it can enter the house. After the previous evasive and relentlessly loud cricket visitor (see Soaking in the Last of Summer 9/7/2024 for that one) I would like to avoid more hopping house guests.
Just south of here, a stroll across the walkway spanning the river reveals hundreds of planthoppers known as the Spotted Lantern Fly (Lycorma delicatula). They are a brilliant black, white and crimson, with eyes that glow sort of scarlet in the sunlight.
Spotted Lantern Flies
This invasive species comes from Vietnam and China, where it hitched a ride on ships bringing in products from overseas. They are not a good thing for our valley, destructive to hardwood trees, orchards of stone fruits and grapes in the vineyards. They have the potential to economically devastate the area between decimating crops, damaging trees and impacting tourism. It is no surprise to me that their tree of preference is the Tree of Heaven (Ailanthus altissima), an invasive scourge originating in Asia itself (see Hydra 1/17/2011) for the experience with the “tree from hell”, which is still an ongoing issue)
I thought it curious that masses of them seemed to be on the bridge that arches over the wide river instead of all over the shore leading up to the bridge. A conservation officer I encountered there explained that in addition to these invasive insects hitching rides up on cars with visitors to our area coming up from the city, via southern counties and states, they also are cruising up attached to barges traveling upriver for commerce. So they are managing to travel by many different modes. I saw just today someone on social media mentioned they noticed their first one in our town.
I wonder if the wave can be stopped. I’m not big on killing most kinds of insects, but this seems rather important. It has been recommended by the Department of Environmental Conservation to check for the eggs, nymphs or adults and destroy any you come across. As they flitted from the railings to the pavement, people walking or riding across the bridge were doing their best to stomp on them with their feet, run over them with their bicycles, or even roll over them with rollator walkers! They are incredibly fast as they spring out of the way. There was a trail of stepped on ones, but so many more were bouncing on the fencing and across the pavement in the sun.
Reflecting upon how something so beautiful could simultaneously be so destructive; I suppose that is the way of the world – with insects, weather, and people, actually……..
Out in the woods in a stand of oaks, the forest floor has been littered with papery, golden wasp galls.
This tiny little bug was waving its antennae around as it clung to a sprig of rosemary growing in a pot on the porch. I don’t know what kind of insect it is, but I observed it for a while. Perhaps this is just a bit of anthropomorphism on my part, but I imagined it was a little confused and filled with much indecision.
I had a funny encounter with a deer the other day. Stopping at friend’s house to water their plants, a doe and her growing fawn browsing some hydrangeas by the driveway suddenly paused as I stepped out of my car.
She stopped eating for a second to stare at me, poised for flight, before deciding I was probably not a threat. Junior, however, was a bit more cautious and relocated behind a shed.
assessing the situation
Clearly her lunch was a strong enticement to stay. I was standing pretty close to her and could not help but notice the swirling white markings on her nose.
As I stood there taking a few pictures of her, she became visibly annoyed by the interruption. She didn’t want to give up her hydrangea feast, instead showing her displeasure at my invasion of her repast while she stood her ground.
Eventually she decided to put a little space between us, flipped up her tail and moved away – but she didn’t go very far.
At that point, Junior emerged from behind the shed and the two of them stood there staring at me, hopefully and perhaps impatiently waiting until I left so they could continue their lunch in peace.
You can’t see it that well in the photo, but Junior has similar, interesting white designs on the nose too.
has mama’s nose markings
I just can’t help but anthropomorphize this moment too, as she gave me what I imagined to be one more imploring, exasperated, disappointed look before they gave up and both moved on.
The full harvest moon was lovely, bathing the warm night in a bright glow. No matter how I try to adjust it, my phone camera has never facilitated the capture of any impressive lunar shots.
This was the best I could do, and it’s pretty inferior.
But a few of my friends were able to get some nice shots of the partial lunar eclipse happening with their phone cameras. I guess I have the wrong phone for this kind of thing. Big difference! Here is one of theirs as it was happening .
Since the crows have vacated the Crow Tree, the starlings feel comfortable gathering there.
Starlings take over the Crow Tree
They are very flighty and certainly not as brave as the crows. They even let the house sparrows push them around. Today they swooped down from the top of the dying maple in a group and landed in the dogwood tree next to The Urban Porch, where they picked off the red berries, perched on the wires to devour them and then nervously took off again.
I always expect them to have a lot more temerity than they do, especially since they travel in groups.
Large clouds of House Sparrows have been covering the lawns and filling the trees of the houses on this street. Since they do not migrate, perhaps the congregations have to either do with some sort of social endeavor? Here is a small sampling of the crowd that decided to hang out on my neighbor’s front steps. The entire yard was filled with them, but their brown color blended in so well that I could not take a detailed enough photo to show how impressive it looked.
Touching on birds, I stopped by a friends house and hung out with their backyard fowl for a while. Interesting chicken faces…
and Muscovy ducks, boldly inquiring if I had something for them.
You can’t help but laugh when they follow you, waddling and muttering. For some reason I feel a little bit differently about ducks than I do chickens. Maybe it’s about their cute webbed feet? When I was a kid my friend had a couple of ducks, which were kept in a pool in her backyard – until they made such a mess that her parents gave them away. I named the one with the crooked foot “PRNDL,” pronounced “Pernandle”. In case it didn’t immediately jump out at you, PRNDL is the automatic transmission on a car (Park, Reverse, Neutral, Drive, Low). Pernandle is actually an excellent name for a duck, isn’t it? What is it that is so endearing about ducks?
being followed by PRNDL’s
And so we move into Autumn. Colorful pots of mums, purple asters and festive pumpkins adorn front steps and porches. Squashes and corn fill bins at the farmer’s market. Soon the scent of apples and leaves will be filling the air. As the daylight hours yield to early evenings, it becomes a time of hearty soups, cinnamon and ginger cookies, cozy blankets, hibernation and a comforting dog. Hopefully this year’s leaf show will be a splendid one. As always, this season is a moody, emotional time of year. Despite the hope and renewal of spring, I think autumn remains very much my favorite. I wish we could hold on to it for a while.
In NYC, wearing all black appears to be de rigueur. It has been an observation over the last number of years that the sudden appearance of so many people dressed primarily in black has often been one of the markers highlighting the steady influx of urban transplants to our area. This proclivity apparently extends beyond clothing.
As the newcomers continue to buy and upgrade property around here, houses painted in the color black have been popping up all over the place like dead flowers in a Halloween bouquet.
I think this one might be my favorite
a recent upgrade down the street
Although I’m not sure, I’m guessing even some of the old time local homeowners might be gravitating to this trend.
The first time I noticed one of the Victorian houses around the corner painted black, I thought it was seriously unique and kind of cool, in a witchy sort of way. Eventually another one appeared a couple of blocks over, also lending a slightly spooky air; the color definitely highlights arched windows, a decorative trim or a mansard roof. But then there was another. And another. And another.
As the flow of new residents has increased, with a great wave that happened at the start of the pandemic, houses have been and continue to be quickly snatched up – with buyers often engaging in bidding wars and paying cash – at which point they sink a crap-ton of money into renovation with intention to either flip or keep – and then (go figure!) paint it black.
There are now so many black houses right around here that you would almost think this place was trying to compete with Salem for “Most Witchy Town”….. it’s so very Goth. Pictured are some of the ones I pass by while walking the dog.
Because my camera is picking up the subtle nuances of light and shadow, taken at different hours of the day, different weather conditions, and seen on a variety of monitors or screens, the photos might not look as intense as they are, but these houses are pretty much all serious shades of black.
a pretty one
It has become such a trend now that even in the span of one short block there are quite a few with charcoal exterior paint. Depending on the house, they can range from stately to imposing, gloomy to a little bit spooky, urban chic to depressingly unappealing.
Of course, I can’t help it – Earworm of the Day: Rolling Stones “Paint It Black.”
I see a red door And I want it painted black
There are actually three of them not too many steps from my front door –
No colors anymore I want them to turn black
and about twenty just in the immediate neighborhood!
I can imagine that taking a short ride or a rambling walk farther out would probably reveal scores of them, all tucked into the side streets within the radius of a mile or two. In the meantime, these are right here. It’s amazing!
Some are appealing to me, while others give off a sort of funereal vibe.
black on black on black
sporting matching black porch furniture
another a few streets away
black on brick
Even the old eyebrow colonials are getting the treatment…
Different trim colors lend variation – some are rather striking. But still…. So. Much. Black. And it’s not just black-black…….”almost black” has become a thing too.
I like this one
I think of them as “house shadows”.
There are also a number of homes that lean toward extremely dark-smoke-gray, or the deepest of forest greens, or the most midnight of blues, all that read pretty much as black. Depending on the trim color and landscaping, the values tend to shift.
this trim gives it a lift
Although the homes in my neighborhood tend to be over one hundred years old, apparently it isn’t just the older houses dressed in this color choice. I have an acquaintance that has a painting business, where it seems one after another, contemporary houses they are hired to paint are getting the same treatment. I’m reading that painting a house very dark colors might help disguise stains and dirt, but I don’t know if that’s true.
I wanna see it painted Painted black Black as night Black as coal
The black exterior really tends to absorb light, and definitely heat. In the northeast winters this might be useful for helping to keep the house warmer and heating bills down. But in the summer I would imagine it must contribute to some hellishly high interior temps, with very expensive cooling costs.
bought, gutted, renovated, painted black and flipped
Since I’m on the subject, I will add one personal irksome situation here as an aside. Slightly off-topic, yet related. The people who bought the house behind us on the next street over decided to build what they have designated as a “barn/studio” in their backyard. This was put up where a shed once stood, before it was knocked over by a fallen tree. While it’s not a terrible looking structure, I don’t understand how they were allowed to get away with plopping down what is essentially a two and half story house on such a tiny lot as a replacement – right behind our back fence. Painted black, it sits there like a dark, imposing, way-too-close monolith, blocking an area that once had space and light. With the trees in leaf it’s not so bad, but once they fall, it is going to be right in your face. Or actually, my bedroom. Not happy. Actually, it was quite a rude thing to do. I admit I have had fantasies of painting a great big neon face with giant googly eyes on the entire back side of our barn facing their “barn.” Assuming – according to their permit – it’s not designated as a house, nobody should mind, right?
incredibly disrespectful urban encroachment
It’s a tempting thought to drive around and take photos of all the local black-painted houses just to see how many different and interesting ones can be found, but I probably won’t. I wonder…. how long this trend will last, or what the next one will be?
I wanna see it painted, painted, painted Painted black, yeah
September in the Northeast. While it is probably a temporary thing, we did get a break in the heat and have had some deliciously bright, temperate days. Actually there were a couple of weeks of those days, with one or two big bursts of intense weather in between. I’m waiting for a little rain now to perk up the parched yard.
I opted to get the most recent Covid vaccine yesterday and am sitting here now with a sore arm, feeling ever so slightly nauseous, drinking some ginger tea. Hopefully the feeling will pass by the end of the day. Don’t need any judgement or opinion as to why or why not one should or shouldn’t get one – I’m one of those people that absolutely should, and so I did. So here we are.
Of mention is that during one of those massive cloudburst storms that wreaked havoc in certain localities this month, a friend of mine found herself caught up in a swift and unexpected flash flood. Here is a picture of her car as seen on the local (and possibly national) news:
flash flood
She shared that she was “rescued by three hunky fireman.” Her fairly new car, which only had about seven thousand miles on it, is totaled. Like many of us at any given time, my friend can sometimes get upset about certain things, so when she was telling me what happened, I could not help but note how absolutely calm she was about the whole ordeal. I actually asked her what drugs she was on, because I might like some of those. Joking/not joking! She has (so far) handled the whole thing really well. It’s a good example of “going with the flow” – figuratively and literally – and also a great lesson in perspective.
Since that day we have not seen more than a sprinkling of rain. For some reason I’ve not been as eager to be foraging much. Occasional forays have been made into the forest, but very few compared to previous years. However, recently I did have a delightful encounter with a massive blanket of enticing, beautiful woodland moss.
gorgeous, magical moss blankets the hillside
There were cool little plants popping out from a bed of tiny leaves like trees on a miniature planet.
And mushrooms –
black trumpets
I couldn’t help it – I had to take off my shoes and walk around barefoot in this mossy bliss, which was such a childishly delightful feeling, that it required also lying down in it in order to experience the full effect.
becoming one with the moss
With the slightly cooled off weather, the occasional cricket or two has found its way into the house. There was one that continued chirping night after night with the intensity of a dying smoke detector. One would think, since I’ve lost so much hearing, that a cricket would not bother me. But this one happened to strike a note right in my range. As a matter of fact, it was the predominant sound being picked up by my hearing aids. But despite searching with a flashlight under furniture where I thought it might be, it could not be located.
My cat-owner peeps all assured me if I had a cat, that cricket would have been dispatched immediately. Having a dog, and one that seems to be losing a bit of his own hearing (although he’s supposed to be helping me here – there’s a conundrum), there clearly wasn’t going to be any serious hunting going on. But finally, on the third night, I saw it on the living room floor. See that little blurry guy taken in the dark?
the noisy night offender
Rudi the non-hunting dog sniffed at it a few times, causing it to take a few hops. He followed it for a bit, but had no interest in pouncing on it. I decided to use the “humane bug catcher” that I had very much wanted and had received for a Christmas present a number of years ago, planning to scoop it up and set it free. Even though I quickly retrieved it, when I turned around to catch it, the cricket was gone. As an aside, my “humane bug catcher” has been kind of a fail when trying to humanely catch bugs, but that’s a story for another time.
A couple of nights later the cricket was discovered in the SO’s office at the back end of the house. Perhaps it was not the same cricket – if so, it did a bit of traveling. This cricket was definitely worse for wear. I suspect the SO might have been a bit rough with it before I came to its rescue. I took it outside, don’t know if it made it. Quiet nights, once again.
There was also another discovery inside the house. I have a very small Fuchsia plant that was gifted to me over a year ago. Every Fuchsia ever owned has gotten aphids and died, so this one is sort of an enigma. Perhaps it has lasted because it has never been outdoors. It has only produced one or two blooms at a time, so small and insignificant that I’ve never even bothered to transfer it out of the 6″ plastic pot it came in. It sits in the front dining room window. Last week I noticed there was some sort of berry or fruit dangling from it.
what is that thing?
Fuchsia berry
After a little research it seems Fuchsias can make berries, which are not toxic, and indeed, people do eat them – even making jam out of them (I guess if you have enough). So I ate it to see what it tasted like. Maybe if there had been a few, there might have been a more significant taste impact. I can say it was just ever-so-slightly sweet, pretty mild actually, and a tad juicy. Learn something new every day!
mild, slightly sweet and juicy
A less welcome discovery in the house are these tiny little flying gnat things. At first I thought the little dark dots floating past my face were just “floaters” (those vitreous dark spots in your vision that all us “old people” tend to get at one time or another). But it’s not that. My daughter gifted me a pack of brightly colored gnat traps for placement in the affected plants in order to catch the little buggers. While it has been impressive as to the volume of captures, this has not eliminated them. Research says they are “fungus gnats”. Even through there are not any plants with new soil in the house, they somehow have made their way here. I’m going to let the plants dry out a little, douse the soil with hydrogen peroxide and see how that works. Martha Stewart suggests that. Martha should know, right? Learned yet another new thing this season.
fungus gnat trap doing its job
Outside on The Urban Porch, things are playing out and winding down. The cherry tomatoes have mostly finished producing, save for a couple still hanging on. I’ve already tossed one hanging Petunia that has now become so leggy and bedraggled that it was depressing to look at. The trees around the house and in the neighborhood are beginning to flush with the beginnings of autumnal color.
the Dogwood begins to blush
pops of Autumn
The other morning at 7:30 am I stepped out on the porch to find this mess by the front door. It wasn’t there at 6am.
At first it looked like some sort of dog vomit, but on closer inspection it became apparent that it was pieces of Black Walnut husk, most likely left by a squirrel. I looked back on the video doorbell to search for the culprit.
the culprit
And there it is. Historically, every single spring and summer the squirrels have dug up my porch plants and left peanut shells all over the place. But this year, not one. It’s been the same oddity as few mosquitos and yellow jackets this summer too. No squirrel activity. So this is was an event. I had to wonder why it actually brought the black walnut up onto the porch and in front of the door. In the past they have left peanuts by the front door too. Why the front door? Not sure. Also, it made quick work of the whole procedure. Squirrel arrived with the prize, broke it down to shreds and then left in just over four minutes. That’s pretty impressive.
The oils from the shells immediately stained the porch floor with moldy-looking black spots. Since the porch is in a rather pathetic state anyway, it was not such a big deal, except seeing how it was right in front of the door I figured I would clean it. It required a little bleach to lift the stain out. But I was amused……..
So that’s what’s going on inside, outside and all around in Daeja’s View – trying to soak in and enjoy the last two weeks of summer until the Autumn Equinox arrives.
There has been a dark cloud around my heart lately. It happens sometimes. I think pretty much everyone knows the feeling.
Late afternoon, heading out the door with the dog, leash in hand, pausing for a moment on the porch – my gaze, as always, moves to the sky. It’s an hour or two before a riot of sunset hues will begin to flood the horizon – the atmosphere still a palette of blues and grays.
Glowing, cold white edges trim the tops of crouching, wolf-gray clouds. Rays of light – the kind you see in paintings of angels – fan out above. I call it God-light, lending grace.
God-light
The clouds shift ever so slightly, causing the beams to become more pronounced. Not unexpectedly, an Earworm of the Day immediately begins playing its track in my mind. While this heavenly display should probably be calling up the music of a celestial choir and images of Seraphim, it is “Touch of Gray” by the Grateful Dead that cues up in my head.
The ABC’s We all must face And try to keep a little grace
The glowing margins are actually so bright it almost hurts to look at them, yet I can’t look away. Light emerging from darkness – this is what a vision of hope might resemble, the silver lining in every cloud. A visual message right in your face – the reminder to Look for the Silver Lining.
The ABC’s We all think of And try to keep a little love
hope
The dog tugs on his leash, sending his clear dog-message; “Let’s get going, time to move on”. Taking one more glance of appreciation and acknowledgement toward the sky, we head down the stairs and out to the street. Time to move on.
I will get by I will get by I will get by I will survive
We will get by We will get by We will get by We will survive
~*~
“Touch of Gray” – by Jerry Garcia & Robert Hunter – Grateful Dead, “In the Dark” 1987
The waxing moon has suddenly taken on an orange glow this week, due to drifting smoke from the fires up in Canada that tinge the atmosphere.
It hangs in the sky much like a leftover hunk of yellow cheddar, perhaps one that was nibbled on. My inadequate camera does not catch all the details, but you get the idea.
Tomorrow will be a Full Blue Super Moon. Weather permitting, moonrise should present as a massive tangerine ball of wonder on the horizon.
I missed the Northern Lights for the second time this summer. Will this now be more of a regular event in our area? Not long ago I would have been out there watching the Perseid meteor showers and maybe caught the Aurora like so many people did, but by 2:30 am this tired lady was in bed. Supposedly you have to look through your phone camera lens to actually see all the bright colors. I feel fortunate to have seen them with the naked eye many, many years ago.
local photo by Marcus M. Harun
Life on The Urban Porch has been punctuated throughout the last couple of months with ongoing construction by our local utility company. The streets have been opened up from one end to the other, pavement cut, trenches dug, blacktop rolled, old bluestone sidewalks lifted and replaced. During intervals amidst the cacophony, I turn down my hearing aids and sit outside to observe, wishing the grandkids were all here to watch the massive shovels, backhoes, dump trucks, vacuums and giant road saws do their thing. Our little section is finally coming to completion. Rudi supervises from the window.
supervising the job
As was mentioned in a prior post, despite ample rain and humidity, we continue to experience a mostly mosquito-free summer, and the yellow jackets have not been haunting the porch either. There seem to be less butterflies this year too, although they are still around. In contrast, the yard is a-buzz with bumble and honeybees, laden with their pollen payloads.
honeybee payload
zinnia bumble
Once again, the Blue-Winged Wasps have returned to the front lawn, searching for grubs. They cruise low to the ground and hover above the hostas in a swirling, ever-moving mass, never alighting long enough to allow a decent picture of them. When I walk across the yard with the dog, they part before us and reconvene after we have passed through, as if there is some invisible shield surrounding our presence, a reverse magnetic field repelling them from our path. Clearly they are aware, so perhaps there is. Non-aggressive – I’ve yet to be stung by one – we coexist. I’ve never been thrilled about a wasp before, but have enjoyed their arrival.
Here’s a fast blur of one cruising at low altitude:
Blue-winged wasp on the wing
Because I can’t manage to catch a good phot0, I’ll share one from the web so you can admire the color and markings of the Blue Winged Wasp (Scolia Dubia).
Scolia dubia on goldenrod / David Hill / platycryptus on flickr.com/CC BY 4.0
The “shabby-chic” floral wildness of the porch and front yard has begun to tip over into just “shabby” at this point. Late summer tumbles of blue Asiatic Dayflower (Commelina Communis) have encroached throughout the flowerbeds closest to the road. They pull out easily, so while a bit invasive, the tiny pops of cornflower blue are so pleasing that I always end up leaving a few, ensuring they will proliferate again. Dayflower is actually edible, both cooked and raw. A handful of leaves and flowers have graced a few past salads. Unfortunately this is not an option now, as the close proximity of both the Dayflower and Purslane to the sidewalk and street leaves them exposed to dog pee and car exhaust.
a jumble of Asiatic Dayflower
It is a time of sunflowers, Black-eyed Susans and compass plants –
Daylilies arrive
and the tiny orchid-like faces of the Obedient Plants have opened.
The hummingbirds are still here though
female hummer alights on a branch for a second
and the butterflies continue to enjoy the floral bounty.
Spicebush Swallowtail at brief rest
A garter pauses on a hosta leaf
while bright colors of August abound.
Meanwhile, the mint has gone to flower.
Mesmerizing Zinnias adorn the neighborhood, inviting deep glances into their Fibonacci mandalas.
Summer sends her signals of upcoming closure when the dusty mauve/lilac of Joe Pye Weed bloom along the roadways.
A few things of note from the porch – my fig tree did not make one fig this year! I had cut it back a bit before last winter so it would easily fit back in the house, figuring the pruning would actually stimulate more prolific growth. Not one fig!!! I keep waiting hopefully but it’s a little to late to start now…isn’t it? I’ll have to do a little research on that….
Boo! No figs for you!!!
While the fig tree was non-productive, the Trumpet Vine and wild grape vines have been working overtime. Despite having pulled them off the fence and ripped up or cut back as much as I could earlier in the summer, they have returned with a vengeance that has proved to be overwhelming; taking over two entire fences on both sides, wrapping tendrils around trees and bushes, snaking vines across the yard, spreading out with deep, almost impossible-to-remove roots that have infiltrated large swaths of earth behind the house. No doubt they have crept into our Very Nice Neighbor’s yard, and no doubt she has been trying to remove them from her side, while being too polite to say anything. I decided over the weekend to try and tackle some of this invasion.
invasion of the Trumpet Vine
When you pull the runners off the fence, the small gripping rootlets leave behind alien shapes on the wood. They remind me of Trilobite fossils.
aliens
I pulled off a massive amount of wild grapevine too. These grapevines have never produced any grapes at all – a little research seems to indicate that unlike cultivated grape vines which can self-pollinate, wild grapes are dioecious – which means they have separate male and female plants. Assuming this monster that has taken over my yard and reached up into the trees is a single male grapevine, it will always remain fruitless. There is now a pile of Trumpet Vine and grapevine so large that it will need to be hauled away in a dump truck, and I’m not even finished yet. It is so exhausting and frustrating that images of digging up the entire area with a backhoe and starting all over has been a recurring fantasy. As a matter of fact, when the utility company was digging a trench through the yard, I mentioned that “I don’t really mind if you dig the whole thing up”. They just laughed at me, but I was kind of serious…..
I don’t mine if you keep digging
Meanwhile, the front of the house has been overtaken by ivy. At first I was very much enjoying the look of the ivy growing upward, especially where it is framing one of the front windows that faces west and gets very hot direct sun all afternoon. It has provided both shade and a bit of privacy. Unfortunately, the ivy has steadily crept onto the porch, across the steps, and encircled the front door, in addition to climbing up the front of the house, where it is now towering above the second floor windows and reaching toward the soffits. Aside that it’s not good for the siding, a Grey Gardens vibe might not be such a welcome style for the neighborhood, and things are definitely heading in that direction. So I have started pulling some of the ivy down too. It comes off a lot easier than the Trumpet Vine, but leaves quite the mess behind. and removing it from the higher elevations might be a bit challenging.
After devoting a number of hours spread out over three days to creeper wrestling – with only marginal accomplishment – I returned to the house in various stages of sweat-dripping, back-spasming condition. I’m tired and this does not feel that great. I don’t mind a few hours of weeding on a breezy morning, but tangling with vines in high humidity has been an exercise in frustration and exhaustion.
A striped flying “something” with a stinger attached itself to my bare shoulder, which I knocked off and reflexively stomped on, in the event it had any notion of using that stinger – then immediately felt guilty about my knee-jerk reaction. Various pieces of plant and animal matter are discovered clinging to my head,
while my damp, dirty skin is tattooed all over by stuck-on leaves. After a long, cool shower and a huge glass of iced coconut water, I lie on the bed in front of a fan, eyes closed, with Visions of Condominiums dancing in my head. I’m feeling I can’t keep up with this, no longer have the energy for it. I feel overwhelmed. Maybe I don’t want to be doing this anymore. I don’t know…..
tiny leaf tat
August moves forward. The Milkweed pods have burst open, sending their seeds adrift on silky white wisps of gossamer.
As they take to the air, I reflect on cheddar cheese moons, flower mandalas, honey bees, summer clouds and seeds on the wind – and the practice of letting go……
While not wealthy in property or finances, I am certainly rich in siblings, children and grandchildren. Repeatedly over the years, certain works of art seem to convey their personalities and vibrations to me. I see this mostly in the women of the family….although I can probably come up with parallels and traits in the men as well. Of course, these are my own personal interpretations of how I visualize and perceive them.
Back when we were children, our mother purchased a charming little volume of The Flower Fairy Alphabet by Cicely Mary Barker (1934), which she read to the little ones before bedtime. Through these magical and delightful illustrations and poems, we identified with the fairy whose flower began with the same letter as our name, or sometimes with the drawing of a flower fairy we resembled. I think that was the beginning of connecting my family with different works of art.
good-natured Nasturtium
a kind and steadfast brother
the baby
“Charlotte”
My mother was enamored of the artist Mary Cassatt. I associate her with the figures in Cassatt paintings due to the care, love and connection between mother and child, which is the embodiment of who my mother was.
“A Goodnight Hug” – Mary Cassatt 1880
One of my sisters as an adult brings images of Edward Hopper to mind –
“Automat” – Edward Hopper 1927
And for some reason, another one evokes a bit of Maxfield Parrish –
“The Canyon”- Maxfield Parrish 1923
A third sibling is a Renoir in so many ways.
“Woman Reading” – by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, 1900
It’s not that any of the individuals in the paintings bear physical resemblance, as much as the mood or spirit they impart.
I wasn’t sure where I fit into all this, until I stumbled upon a number of photos and memes on social media and discovered a contemporary artist that calls my name.
“Flame” – Andrea Kowch 2017
“Flame” by Andrea Kowch (2017). Seated before a hearty breakfast, in the company of dog, her expression can be interpreted many ways and does not reveal the thoughts going on within. A peculiar sense of calamity, which does not appear to be necessarily alarming or unusual but just existing, occurs just beyond the door. Her hair mimics the out-of-control flame burning outside. The weirdness of it, the strange light, is something I find simultaneously exciting and oddly, comfortably familiar.
I feel seen.
The appeal of her work no doubt reflects and draws different emotions unique to each viewer. Decades ago, as a final exam for a college art course, I wrote a paper which compared Johannes Vermeer to Andrew Wyeth – two of my favorite artists. It was all about the light and the mood they communicated, the very same pull of déjà vu that appears in Andrea Kowch’s contemporary and surrealistic work. So it was reaffirming and exciting to recently discover that very assessment and more (a twist of Alfred Hitchcock!) so well described by Pam Coffman, Education Consultant at the Museum of Art – Deland, as a forward in the catalog Mysterious Realms – Andrea Kowch (2023).
I am moved by strange skies. And then, there are the crows. If you know me, you know about the crows. Her work is resplendent with images of crows.
The deeper I delved into her wonderful paintings, the more my family of sisters and daughters emerged.
“Without Measure” – Andrea Kowch 2022
When my organized, patient and well-adjusted sister came to visit and became involved in the clutter and disarray of a kitchen project in my weathered and dog-hair embellished house, we became “Without Measure” – (Andrea Kowch 2022). While we work together to prepare food, I bring up dark and heavy subjects nobody wants to talk about. Our discussions repeatedly return to the topic of our sister “Charlotte”, who has throughout her lifetime often been referred to as “A Squirrel” (see A Golden Squirrel 12/23/2012 for some context). I can’t express how much this resonates for me.
In gatherings where all the sisters have converged in the past, the chaotic dynamics and sibling frictions had sometimes emotionally devolved into this:
“An Invitation” – Andrea Kowch 2019
And finally, there are my adult daughters. When we have had the opportunity to spend a length of time together, I always have fantasies and hopeful expectations that things will happen a certain way. While occasionally they do, the reality is that visits often do not go as planned.
“Mom.” “Mom!” “Mom!!!!” They give each other silent, knowing looks. Later on in private, they will discuss the idiosyncrasies of their mother between themselves.
“The Visitors” – Andrea Kowch 2010
When that happens, I sometimes wish I they could become the little Apple Blossom Flower Fairies they once were.
Apple Blossom Fairy – Cicely Mary Barker (1934)
My mother, perhaps wishfully, used to imagine our family in the idyllic oil paintings and watercolors of Carl Laarson or Beatrix Potter. Loving, domestic, cozy scenes of kitchens and gardens…..a mother feeding her little bunnies…. which brings us back to the Flower Fairies again.
Do you see yourselves or your family in art? What images move you?
Perhaps I’m taking a risk by speaking too soon, but it is of note that this summer (so far) there has been a marked absence of mosquitos here. Of course there have been a few around The Urban Porch, and I’ve not totally escaped the attention of one or two, but being a Mosquito Magnet, the lack of encounters has been rather remarkable and seriously enjoyable. The last few months have provided us with plenty of steamy, wet days, ample rain and standing water that usually facilitates their presence, which has everyone wondering what’s going on. Last summer you could not even stop on the sidewalk to speak to a neighbor in the evening without being bombarded, as we waved them away and slapped ourselves between sentences, finally needing to cut our conversations short and retreat to our homes.
little evil visitor from hell
I admit it has been rather delightful to be able to sit outside, but also raises questions about what is occurring in the environment. Perhaps it is just a natural cycle – if so, a welcome one. Someone mentioned to me that a lot more birds have been around lately – maybe getting their protein from the mosquitos? If so, eat heartily my feathered friends! Speaking of Jerks of the Insect World, the aggressive and nasty yellow jackets also have not made their incessant appearance on the porch. I qualify that with a “yet”. It’s only the beginning of August. But one can hope….
Other local observations in the universe of phylum Arthropoda – the fireflies have completed their sparkling dances and are no longer twinkling by the front steps. They have been replaced by a varying nighttime chorus of katydids and crickets, loudly announcing that the days of summer are slipping by.
Here we segue further into feathered friends and moving on; the few crows who stood daily watch from The Crow Tree and flew back and forth tending their nests have vacated the area. We would observe each other daily – I from my porch and they from their perches. I was not feeding them, yet there seemed to be some sort of acknowledgement of each other. The day after they departed, I found a feather and one shiny quarter placed together on the front lawn. It might just be a coincidence, a dropped coin from the pocket of a passerby, a fallen feather….but it’s nice to imagine it could be a gift. Farewell! Hope to see you again next year!
In a rare and spectacular experience, a few days ago I happened to be on a beach in Rhode Island with my family and encountered a delightful swarm/migration of dragonflies. At first there were a few gray and iridescent blue ones alighting and quickly taking off from the backs of the chairs as we were eating lunch. “Oh, look how cool!” Soon there seemed to be enough to really take notice as they zoomed around in no discernable direction. “Wonder what’s going on?” The playground scene of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds flashed in my mind, not of horror, but just in the way they slowly accumulated from few to more. As my sister and I took a walk south along the shoreline, their numbers increased, until we came to a jetty where they were everywhere – little incoming helicopters in the sky.
incoming
It was impressive how they did not crash into each other (or us) at all, but milled about in a crazy dance.
wow! just wow!
“Are you going to video this?” my sister asked. But I declined, just wanting to be in it for the moment. They didn’t stay for very long, quickly moving on to wherever they were headed, only a few stragglers remaining. It felt rather magical, another gift of nature.
moving on, heading out
Off the Insecta observations and onto Flora tales…..it started when small dog Rudi rolled in something awful. He’s like that, will find the tiniest nothing in the grass, a dead worm, some old animal scat, a greasy, visibly undetectable but putrid spot, and in pure wriggling delight will quickly drop and roll in it. It was so bad that everything he came in contact with became contaminated with that stench, including the car and my clothing. So before coming back inside he needed to be washed outdoors using the garden hose stowed behind a border of lilies on the side of the house we were staying at.
I had forgotten how much the pollen smudges when you brush against them.
pollen looking for a ride
After finishing the dog bath, I discovered my clothing and skin were covered with a deep saffron stain that did not easily wipe off. At first I thought it was just me typically dropping lunch on myself, as I’m known for that. But it turned out to be lily pollen.
beautiful saffron stain
There was also a lily patch next to the driveway that was very near to where you tightly parked. At first nobody noticed that upon opening the door and entering your vehicle, they seemed to almost reach out as you squeezed by, anointing you with their bright kesari glory. No matter how carefully you tried to give them some berth, there was no avoiding Close Encounters of the Lily Kind.
waiting to pounce on the unsuspecting
We tried inching sideways to be able to get in the car door, but no matter how careful we were, there was no escaping The Attack of the Lilies. I will share that with treatment, the stain did come out in the wash.
brushed by a hip
Gah! Boo!
Onward to the Fauna of late July and early August – looking through the screen door, a doe vacuums down multiple pom-poms of hydrangea flowers with gusto.
She brings her fawns with her. There are actually three, frolicking in and out from the depths of the bushes while mom browses.
one out, two hidden
Cardinal lends pops of color and song on a branch above –
and alert bunnies pause in frozen stillness on the lawn. Say it with me – “Bunny, bunny, bunny!”
daeja's view 