Just Breathe

I have been gone from home for two weeks and tomorrow will head off on another jaunt to visit my older daughter. While I was away, the snow melted, the daffodils pushed green spears up through the ground, and the snowdrops all around the cottage have bloomed at once. When I get back next weekend, I imagine there will be chives and parsley and oregano almost ready to eat. I saw their little shoots poking through the mulch in the herb garden. It won't take much more than a week of alternating rain and sun to coax them to edible height.

I have been lax with my blog visits; I'm sorry. Limited access to a computer and even less time to write or read here has made me a stranger. April is national poetry month and I've signed up to receive prompts from a local poet. Some may show up here if I can find time to scribble my responses. Meanwhile, thank you for all your kind comments on my sporadic posts. Someday I may be back on schedule!

Spring Forward

First catkins.

The wind is singing in the trees, the sun is high in the sky, the birds are serenading from the treetops. The very air beckons come out, come out! So, I go. Underfoot the ground is soggy, spongy with seeping moisture and melting frost. I look around to make sure no one is watching and then skip and hop down the meadow path, flinging my arms out to the wind. I twirl and dance all by myself among the field grasses, feeling five years old and happily unfettered.

All around me are signs of impending spring—rushing water in the creek, the faintest brush of yellow across the willow tops, a balminess to the late afternoon that speaks of April. A red-winged blackbird chortles to itself among the rushes at the creek’s edge. Two cardinals carry on a conversation in song, back and forth, whistle for whistle until their voices overlap and run into each other. Five fat crows digging for things in the flattened grass make raucous comments as I pass and disgruntled, lift themselves off on glossy wings to dig farther afield.

I stop to admire the catkins on a pussy will bush. Soft and silvery gray, they look like furry little dewdrops. Every tree and bush bears fat buds ready to burst in the lengthening daylight and burgeoning warmth. I leave the meadow, duck into the woods. Sunlight slants through the trees, burnishing last year’s discarded leaves, pinpointing abandoned bird nests and polishing the soft, punky sides of fallen logs. Here the wind, filtered by a thick stand of trees, does not push so hard. There is solace here among the great weathered trunks and strong branches, comfort and strength and such beauty that my heart lifts and soars.

High in the southeastern sky the moon is a pale thumbprint pasted on blue paper. The sun sinks lower, taking the west wind with it until the whole meadow lies quiet, gilded, and I am the only thing stirring as far as I can see. I too, stand still, unwilling to disturb such peace. But, the sun path at the edge of the meadow is too tempting. I flee the chill of the shadowed ground, skip and hop into the waning sunshine.

More snow is predicted for the middle of the week. Winter is not done with us yet but oh, these days of golden promise will keep me happy until the promise is fulfilled.

There's No Going Back Now

Tucked in a sheltered corner, the first snowdrops of the season!

February is gone. The lion winds of March are sweeping what’s left of winter toward the melting warmth of April. There are signs—daylight lingers in the sky until six in the evening and glows again softly at six in the morning. The zealous sun melts the snow in daytime, no matter how many times the temperature plunges after dark. My path and driveway are slick with ice from the tug of war between winter and spring.

There is a change in the air as well. There are cold days, to be sure. Today's sleet forced me to bundle up when just a few days ago I had to shed hat and mittens and loosen the top button of my coat. It is such days tucked between the cold ones—the teasers—that are the first indicators of seasonal change. The great shift will occur when the teasers are the norm and the cold days come as a surprise.

There is a freshness to the air that belies the staleness of the snow. I can almost smell spring, the sweetness that comes of freshly plowed ground and of green and growing things. When the afternoon sun shines down on the south-facing snow banks, Robert Frost’s silver lizards wiggle down the slopes, countless little rivulets of melted snow making their way into oblivion. My nose, all my senses, know what’s coming. 

So do the birds. The chickadees that come to the feeder slip into their two-note spring song now and then, as if practicing for April. High in the treetops the little finches that winter over sing to each other in the late afternoons. A few winter hardy robins venture out of the roadside brush to flit over the meadow, their orange undersides flashing brightly against the snow. The geese have just this week returned to fill the skies with their raucous vees and the red-winged blackbirds have come back to stake claims in the swamps. In just a few weeks the silent mornings will again give way to the joyful sounds of birdsong and evenings will be serenaded by spring peepers.

It is the season of bursting catkins, of the yellowing of willows and the reddening of dogwood withes. I know my garden perennials are beginning to stir deep down at their roots and I've just spotted the first snowdrops pushing up through the leaf mold. The maple trees give no visible sign that soon their sweet sap is rising but some are already decorated with collecting buckets. Seed and flower catalogs outnumber any other in my mailbox and those that sell clothing are introducing their summer lines. 

The pastel season is approaching. The glaring white snow, the dull gray clouds, and the washed out blue of the sky will give way slowly to petal pink, to daffodil yellow, to that lovely, ineffable shade of new leaf green. The months of waiting for spring have turned to weeks and will turn to days soon now - soon.

What it was like on Sunday

Snow that crunched underfoot just last week makes a sighing sound under my boots. Icicles that clutched the roofline have cried themselves to death. Dawn came with a mere lightening of the sky, but birds sang as though they knew the sun was somewhere rising; the cardinal and its mate dropped liquid notes into the morning, the jay sang its squeaky wheel song.

Rain and then snow and then rain fall, a curtain of moisture linking earth and air, making the snow and sky one color against which the stark branches of elm and oak and maple are lightly penciled. The light is cottony and soft, holding the day in suspension between brittle cold and increasing warmth. Despite its lack of color and definition, it is a hopeful day, easing the way between the end of winter and the beginning of spring, teasing with its relaxation of winter’s cold grip on the land and our souls.

Unexpected in Winter

For my friend J who likes neither poetry in general nor an extended winter...

When skies turn the color

of an old metal bucket

and cold rains fall without mercy

on the sodden pines,

it serves us well to seek solace

in the hidden colors -

the scarlet of the wintergreen berry

tucked under emerald leaves,

the sudden flash of a blue wing

or a red feather,

the fading orange of the oak leaf,

the last flame of the sumac.

Purple smoke pipes a line

of indecipherable writing across the horizon

and the washing,

left on the line in hopes of sun,

waves pale hands in your direction.

Lately

Some of the "guys" playing croquet

My current schedule - three and half days with my granddaughters and three and a half days home - has put me somewhat out of the blogging loop. There is no time between peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and bottles of formula, playtime on the floor and fiercely resisted nap time, laundry and dishes and general tidying up, to sit and read, to contemplate and compose. Weekends home seem to fill up of their own accord. There's always grocery shopping and house cleaning to do, laundry to wash and errands to run. I remember being told that I'd be busier in retirement than I ever was in my working life but I didn't see how. Now I do.

Days with my daughter and her family are full of noise and bustle. The Bean is a very active toddler who starts the day slowly (like her grandmother) but once she's fully awake it's run, run, run until bedtime. We color, play with clay, take care of her dollies, and play elaborate games with her "guys," a collection of small plastic action figures and wooden dollhouse family members. They all have names and personalities. There's Guy Guy who's always, always crying and needs lots of attention. (I suspect that's an outgrowth of Baby Lily's entrance into the Bean's life as an infant in constant need of Mama's attention). There's Mama Teddy who, as the matriarch of the clan, takes care of everyone. She spends a lot of time in the dollhouse kitchen. Tito, New Guy, Dude and Nana hang out together and have adventures. There's also Caco, Mama Teddy's sidekick, Eday (Bean's pronunciation of her own name), and even a Baby Lily wrapped in a bright red bunting. In addition, there's a school bus full of little, squatty people collectively called the Mee-mos and a group of alien looking plastic fellows known as the Odgie Codgies. It took me weeks to remember everyone's name!

A model baby and cooperative one year old, Bean has entered the terrible twos with gusto. Cross her and she folds her little arms across her chest and glowers from under lowered brows. Her words are very distinct. "Okay Nini," has been replaced with, "I don't want to do dat," stated firmly and without compromise.

Her sister, Baby Lily is a chunky, happy little girl who thrives on bottles supplemented with cereal, bananas, and applesauce. At four and a half months she can sit up with a minimum of added support, rolls over if left on a blanket on the floor, and grins toothlessly more than she cries. Sleep is her nemesis. She catnaps for twenty minutes at a time, making caring for her a constant process. By the end of three and a half days, I'm pretty worn out and ready for some cottage downtime.

By contrast, the cottage is elaborately quiet. Everything is in its place. I waken naturally without baby soundtracks. I putter, I sit down often, I doze in my rocking chair. I take walks after lunch and read whole book chapters at a gulp. My tea is always hot. The hours not taken up by household chores or trips to the store are open and I'm free to fill them as I wish.

Some of my favorite hours are spent reading your posts. I may not visit as often as before but you all give me something to think about on the days I hold a bottle or hum a lullaby or stand at the sink washing endless dishes. Thanks for that.

A quiet moment with Baby Lily

Hellfire, Damnation, and Spit

My left leg has been on fire for three days running, a result of a pinched sciatic nerve, making the slightest movement painful and walking nearly impossible. I move -slowly- from one point to another hunched like an old woman, dragging that leg along like a sack of coals. There is something about intense and constant pain that alters the personal landscape. Inconsequential moments loom large: how many steps from the bed to the bath, how many minutes to prepare a meal, how far from sofa to sink and back while trying to carry a plate. The things I do without thought, with no more than passing attention suddenly have all my attention.

I sit on the sofa and survey my domain in a new light. I watch the morning sun shimmer through hanging window decorations. Two red glass birds and a prism of dried flowers cast the sun across the floor in a rainbow of colors. Dust motes dance in the beams and settle on the furniture. Dusting, however, will have to wait, as will washing up and vacuuming and polishing. For a rather active woman, this forced halt of things needing doing is both a curse and a blessing. It's hard to let work wait and freeing to sit idle, dreaming in the sunshine. The afternoon sun pours through the west window and lays itself across the end of my bed. I lie myself down in its warmth and try not to think about how hard it will to get up again.

There are other things I am reluctant to put off but must. There will be no babysitting for a few days, no playing on the floor with the Bean, no carrying her upstairs to bed, or outside to play in the snow. There will be no snuggling Baby Lily as she drinks her milk or tries out her voice at every point of eye contact. There will be no scurrying about trying to tidy the house or make dinner before my work-weary daughter and son-in-law get home at night.

I've had acupuncture and physical therapy, TENS treatments and massage. I've used ice and heat and Arnica gel. I've tried gentle Yoga stretches and bed rest. Finally I've resorted to some heavy medication to give me surcease. In a few days I hope to come back with far less time on my hands to write a poor-me post!

Inside the Mind Is An Interesting Place

My Sunday writing friend found a wonderfully written story about a child who tasted a bug and we used that as our prompt. Here's what resulted:

Often, while minding our own business

we are swallowed by a child

curious about how the world tastes

on a neophyte tongue,

only to be spit out when we wiggle,

impatient to be about adulthood,

too abrupt with our answers

to be taste-tested.

A pity. We might

learn a lot from a short sojourn

in the maw of an innocent,

might realize that, like a bug tasted,

we are spit out into a new world,

lucky to be wakened

from our self-important dreams.

A Different Point of View

You’d think, looking out across the vast expanse of snowy meadow that snow would be the great concealer, covering every sin of autumn. You would be wrong. Snow is, instead the great revealer, carrying on its surface the calligraphy of bird feet, the black dot trail of infinitesimal seed dispersal, the tracks of leaf travel refrozen in small puddles of melt. On its surface are scrawled the death stories of bloom and blossom, the life stories of mole and mouse, the travel journals of fox and coyote.

Snow reveals man’s impatience with weather where it is heaped, gravel-stained, along the roadsides and pushed impatiently back against the banks of pond ice. It recounts, in rounded belly and stony eyes, the story of a child at play and bears traces of snowshoe and ski with grace.

Nothing under the snow is unknown, only seen in another form. Boulders sleep under blankets, bushes huddle in imitation of sheet-draped parlor furniture, fence posts and tree branches become confections, frosted and glittering. You could speak of snow as the great concealer but you would be wrong. It merely puts the familiar in an unfamiliar light and reveals the minutiae of the normally unobserved.

 Thanks, Hilary!

Let Me Count the Ways

Love is like wind - you don't see it but you see its effects. I am reading to the Bean at nap time when she suddenly leans over the railing of her bed and hugs my head. I look up at her from my seat on the floor and her eyes are warm and sparkling and so moved by the winds of love that I nearly weep.

Tiny baby Lili stares at me as she drinks from her bottle and when I smile at her, she smiles back, her eyes lighting up as though someone has flipped a switch. Milk dribbles down both sides of her mouth but she doesn't care. We're in love with each other and that's better than milk.

I pull into their drive each week for my stint as Nini-in-charge and my son-in-law drops what he's doing to hurry out and help lug in my bags and boxes. My daughter waits at the door for a hug and a kiss. They make breakfast for me, fetch my special tea mug, make me feel as though I am the most special guest they've ever entertained.

The phone rings and it's my grandson wanting to Skype or my granddaughter wanting to tell me about her swim team or my son wanting to say he loves me or my daughter-in-law catching me up on family news. When I'm at their house I'm the center of attention. It's like being Queen For a Week and love sweeps through the rooms like a zephyr.

Every week there's the phone call from my distant daughter. Her laughter and mine get tangled in the phone lines until I'm sure everyone talking at the same time we are can hear it. She and her husband are professionals at picking out just the right cards for any occasion - I've saved them and whenever I feel blue I haul the box out and read through them. It's like opening a window so that love can blow through.

My oldest son in Oregon leaves "love you, Mom" messages in my email, on FaceBook, on the answering machine. He often tells me how he sends messages to me on the wind, knowing the jet stream will carry them eastward. When I feel a breeze on my cheek, I know it's him, thinking of me.

The mail arrives and there's a card or a letter with a "little something" tucked inside. My sisters never fail to anticipate my running short at the end of each month. I never do, of course, because of their thoughtfulness.

The winds of love are mighty, and they are always blowing.



photo borrowed from http://stock-clip.com/

Why I Don't Make New Year Resolutions Anymore

Out with the old, in with the new! It’s the January cry of merchants everywhere. Year-end clearance extravaganzas are being announced with manufactured jollity in newspapers, on television commercials, on the radio. So why not apply the same philosophy to people? Clear out a few old habits and issue in some new ones.

With resolve in hand I take a look around, deciding to start with my refrigerator where a couple of bad habits—ice cream and bacon—lay waiting for me to indulge (though not simultaneously). I take the ice cream out of the freezer. It’s coffee flavored, rich and creamy and slightly softened around the edges, just the way I like it. I carry the carton to the sink and lift the lid. I figure I’ll take one last taste, just one, before I throw the rest out. Waste, after all, is sin and sinning is a poor way to start out a new year. I grab the first spoon at hand (a serving spoon, as it turns out) and scoop some of the luscious stuff to my mouth. How can something so bad for you taste so good? One spoonful leads to another, of course, and in the end I don’t have to throw out any of the ice cream.

I go back to the fridge for the bacon. There are only a few strips left and I am gazing at them longingly when I spy the last two slices of bread sitting forlornly in their bag. Looking away quickly, my eye lands on a half-cut tomato and a leaf of lettuce poking invitingly out of the crisper. Waste not, want not, I chant, and moments later wash the ice cream down with a BLT.

Because this is the way I often cleaned out the refrigerator in my regretful past, I turn next to the closet where several garments that no longer fit hang in reproachful silence. One by one I take them off their hangers and stuff them into a bag destined for the Good Will bin. Halfway to the door, I have second thoughts. Now that I’ve given up fattening foods, these clothes just might fit again some day. I stash the bag in the back of the closet.

With that “Wow! What a good day!” feeling, I drag on my boots, pull on my mittens and set out for a brisk walk. From now on, I resolve, I will walk two miles every single day. I get as far as the driveway when the first sprinkle falls. Our predicted snow is obviously going to begin with rain. By the time I make it back to the house and pour myself a cup of hot chocolate decorated with a mound of freshly whipped cream, a mixture of sleet and snow is coming down in wind-driven gusts.

Isn’t that always the way? You make a few good resolutions and the weather or your conscience or some other thing you think you have control over leads you down the road of best intentions. It’s a good thing we’re given a whole year to practice our well-founded resolve.

A little gift to you all: For a splendid post on resolute wishes, see Friko's writing on the subject.

Winter Storm

Silver white

and feather soft,

falling from the heaven's loft,

ice cream cold,

and turtle slow-

snow.

I wrote that as a child while staring out my bedroom window. I can still picture my small self huddled against the cold sill, watching the flakes drift lazily down, listening to the small splats as they hit the window and trying to capture just what I was seeing.

I've always loved snow, though as I grew older and had to drive in it, I looked less forward to hard snowfalls. When we lived in northern Vermont, land of continuous hills, driving took a treacherous turn.

This morning I am snug in my cottage. Snow has been falling fairly steadily since yesterday morning. There's about a foot on the ground. Every branch and limb is frosted, every rooftop piled high, every fence rail outlined against the white. I've shopping to do and some other errands but perhaps I will put them off until tomorrow. My showshoes are waiting in the garage and the woods beckon.

Motherhood Revisited

Known collectively as "the guys," four of the Bean's toys go for a horseback ride.

My days as Super-Nini continue. Taking care of two very small children three days a week is challenging and immensely gratifying. I'm able to get down on the floor and immerse myself in miniature worlds that are as real as my full-sized one and I've lost ten pounds running up and down stairs while the girls are asleep, trying to fit in the washing and cleaning and cooking before their tired Mama gets home.

I watch the Bean play the games of a two year old. She postures and talks to herself— no, not merely to herself but to her toys as if they are alive and participating actively in the game. She questions them and answers in their voices; it is not own her voice that answers. Most times she is so intent on her doings that I can go about mine undetected. While her dolls take train rides or go off to pick apples and make pies, I can get the breakfast dishes washed and dried and put away. While she colors pictures and comments aloud on the names of the colors, I can tidy the living room and heat a bottle for the baby whose cries often work their way into the Bean's play. “Baby’s crying,” she’ll murmur, making a small, helpless, crying sound. Then Momma Teddy, a tiny wooden mother doll, will stop what’s she’s doing to hold the crying paper baby in her arms and rock her.

Sometimes the Bean looks up quickly from her play, fixing my whereabouts in her mind. I can see the flicker of recognition but there doesn’t seem to be a separation of her real and imaginary worlds and when I am on the floor with her amid the scattered dolls and clay apples and the small playhouse, the miniature cars and train engines and miniscule plates and cups, I follow her into the world of altogetherness, of play that is not play as much as it is just being.

Where Light Comes From

in memory of all those slain in the CT school shooting

Sleep gives you no choice,

it closes your eyes to all that is precious,

leaving you resting in the hope

that it will still be there

when you wake.

Grief will not be held accountable

it lives where it will;

like sleep, once you have tasted it,

you never lose the memory.

Joy, too, comes over you

but in its wake there is no yearning.

It gathers you and your grief in its arms,

makes it safe to close your eyes,

and leaves a small flame

for the next time darkness falls.

Today

This morning the sky is a pale blue parchment against which the bones of winter trees are etched in ink. The early light makes silhouettes of the chimney tops, and the silent wings of a crow cut through the air like feathered scythes. It is still and cold and quiet. The horizon is one long pink streak and the clouds go from rose to orchid to paler pink as the sun climbs into the sky. I love this reverent hush before sunrise, when nothing is yet stirring, and the light grows gradually brighter until the everyday world is revealed.

I like to rise in the dark and watch the day begin. I sit curled in a chair with a mug of steaming tea at my elbow, my sketching journal in my lap, and let my thoughts wander. Later, I will be so busy I won’t have time to think and so will have this peaceful interlude from which to recreate serenity.

Through the window I watch the sun inch over the horizon, spreading gold in its wake. The frosted bushes glisten and beams of golden light alternate between the tree shadows falling across the lawn. The mat of fallen leaves at woods’ edge glows with every shade of brown in the bright light with here and there a scarlet berry to break the monochrome.

I wrap my robe tight and slip out the door into the chilly air. Overhead a flock of geese flies into the sun. It is so still that I can hear the whisper of their wings. I pick a few seeds from the feeder and hold them in my flat palm. In a few minutes, a chickadee flits across the open yard and lights on my fingers. It snaps up a seed and hops onto a branch of the lilac to eat it. Moments later, two birds and then three, sit on my fingers. Back in the house I sketch my hand and the birds and note that when one is quiet and unhurried, small miracles happen.

The day ends as it begins, with trees inked against pale blue. Overhead the color deepens as the western horizon melts in a blaze of gold. The birds have found a warm place to sleep; the shadows swallow what light is left.

Borrowed Thoughts

Often on a Sunday morning, a friend and I get together to write. She is always ready with a prompt and though we don't designate either poetry or prose, she usually writes the latter and I the former. This morning one of the prompts was the opening line from Sara Teasdale's poem, Places— "Places I love come back to me like music..."

Here's my own construction:

There is music in nature—

the sigh of needled boughs,

the staccato of pouring rain,

the bellow of an icy wind,

the bell ring of water over stones­,

arias sung by summer birds

and dirges played by storms,

but no music is as sweet

as the symphonies of places loved—

the violins of longing,

the persistent drumbeat of the heart

underlying every blade of grass,

gracing every memory

of wall and walk.

Spilled Secret

Look at all those unsuspecting faces...

Several years ago my children and ex and I were living in the cellar while we built a log cabin over our heads. My sister and mother had joined us for Thanksgiving dinner and things were cramped in the basement. Two adults, four children and thirteen dogs (eleven of them puppies) were crowded into whatever space was left around the furniture and packing boxes. Add two guests and a twenty-pound turkey and something was bound to happen.

Dinner was nearly ready. Northern Vermont is cold by November so the kids and their dad were out gathering wood to keep the cookstove fire burning. The table was set, the potatoes mashed, the cranberry sauce chilled. I lifted the heavy roasting pan out of the oven and as I did, the bird took flight. It landed at my feet in a great splash of grease and slid with astonishing speed directly toward the mouths of eleven startled pups.

Mama dove for the bird, dumped it in the sink and furiously pumped water over it. Out of the corner of her mouth she said, “Don’t say a word and no one will know.”

Until today, no one has.

%$#@

Even bad days come to an end...

This has been a day of damns. I woke, stretched and watched in disbelief as my toes curled one way, my heel twisted the other, and the muscle in my calf turned to a pillar of stone before my very eyes. I sprang out of bed shouting, "Damn! Ow! Ow! Ow! Damn!" The day went downhill from there.

The first pancake, not quite cooked through, tore as I flipped it. (Damn.) The container of raspberries stubbornly refused to open and then when it did it flipped over, spilling berries all over the floor. (Damn!) I had some data entry work to do at the home of a former boss and when I finished and got into my car to return home, I realized I'd forgotten my special chair cushion. I went back in the house and up the stairs to fetch it, apologizing on the way only to get back to the car and realize I'd left my tea mug in the office. I went back in, apologized once more, went up the stairs and fetched the mug. Half way down I remembered the calendars she'd given me that were still sitting on the edge of the desk. I trudged back up and back down again, feeling very disorganized and foolish. (Not exactly the way one wants to appear before an employer. Damn!)

Back home I collected my book and my outdoor swing cushions, thinking to enjoy an hour's worth of reading in the bright sunshine before lunch when I found the note I'd scribbled to myself about getting my flu shot and a pertussis booster. I called the doctor's office. "Come now if you can," said the nurse (damn) so I got back in the car and drove into town. The nurse was waiting for me with two hypodermics but the new receptionist could not figure out how to enter my Medicare information into the computer. She whisked my card out of my hand, told me to go on through and she'd have it figured out by the time I was done. "I'll have to give one shot in each arm," chirped the nurse. (Damn!) Back at the reception window the new woman was still struggling with my information. She searched for my card and couldn't find it. "Oh dear," she sighed, pawing through a slew of papers strewn across her desk. (Damn!) Finally another woman behind the counter located it in the copy machine. I took it and fled.

I opened the cottage door to the drool-inducing scent of pork cooking slowly in pomegranate juice and orange slices. Every week I try to take a ready cooked meal to my daughter's, saving her a day of thinking about, preparing and cooking dinner. I lifted the lid and inhaled. I took a fork and poked one of the sweet potato chunks swimming in the delectable juice. It fell apart before I could lift it to my mouth. (Damn.) The crockpot had been on low for a mere three hours. The recipe called for 6 hours of cooking. Nothing should have been fork tender yet. (Damn!) I took a slotted spoon and scooped the potato chunks out, mashing a few in the process. (Damn!)

I toasted English muffins with cheese and tomato for lunch. One tomato slice slid off the toast and spattered on my clean shirt. (Damn.) And my clean jeans. (Damn!) I'd already done two loads of laundry which were flapping on the line so I hand washed and wrung out the shirt and jeans and hung them on the line. No way were they going to dry before sundown. (Damn!)

The sewing project I'd put off for days sat waiting for me. I am making slipcovers for cushions that will make seating out of a long, low bench in my daughter's dining room. All that was left was to put a long zipper on one end of each cushion cover. To save money I'd cut two zippers from some old cushions. I set my sewing machine up on the kitchen table. I needed a magnifying glass to help me see the infinitesimally small hole in the needle. It took several minutes to thread the machine. More time was spent ironing seam allowances and pinning the edges to the zipper. A special presser foot had to be installed. Finally I was ready to sew. The fabric was thick and refused to be moved along by the ridges on the feeder plate. The thread gathered and bunched and broke. (Damn.) It took several tries to re-thread the machine. (Damn!) Half an hour later the first zipper was finally stitched in. I pulled the zipper closed and whoosh! The pull flew up the teeth and right off them, flung itself from my hand and came to a clanking stop under the refrigerator. (Damn!)

I did what any country girl does when things go wrong inside. I grabbed my sweater and went outside, stood in my fading summer-green-turning-to-autumn-brown yard and looked up into the huge blue sky. Great, gray-white, puffy clouds drifted before a high wind. The sun was setting in a welter of pinky gold. One wispy cloud looked like a small witch on a tattered broom. Chasing behind her was a dragon-shaped behemoth, gray-black along the edges where ten foot incisors loomed. I wondered if that poor witch was saying, "Damn!"

Of Storms and Silence

There's a tiny goldfinch in the center of fallen leaves. See it?

It was a calm day, this day before the next storm making its way up the eastern seaboard. The sun smiled down from a cloudless blue sky. A small breeze danced with falling leaves. Frost made the grass underfoot crunch as I set out to see what the geese on the pond were hollering about. As I crossed the road a bright yellow leaf fluttered over my shoulder. But wait... leaves don't chirp! I looked down. There at my feet, half disguised by a thick pile of oak leaves hunched a tiny yellow finch. Hardly daring to move, I lifted my camera and snapped a shot before the little bird fluttered its wings and lifted off. Though they seldom frequent my feeder in the winter, I read that they stay here year round, braving the cold and snow and bitter winter winds.

Leathery oak leaves brought down by hurricane winds.

Leathery oak leaves have been blown from trees earlier than usual and litter the roadsides. We've had some very strong winds lately and more are due tomorrow night. Just two weeks ago the maples and beeches, the birch trees, walnuts, poplars, and hickories held their colors high. Then came Hurricane Sandy; wind and rain tore the leaves down and flung them far and wide.

Cold weather has bitten the heads off the last of the season's flowers. I spent the day cutting dead stalks, mulching the rosebush roots, filling the bird feeders, turning the mulch that's been collected over the summer. It was so fine a day that I sat on the patio with my afternoon tea, basking in the sunshine that bathed that sheltered nook. Warmer weather will follow the Nor'easter and by Monday the temperature will climb toward the 60s. It will be a welcome treat before cold settles in for the duration.

Garden beds readied for winter.

I love this time of year. I like the gunmetal smell of cold air, the constant conversation of the geese on the pond, the stark pen and ink sketches of leafless branches against a pale sky. I love snow and snowshoeing, hot chocolate and holiday meals, sledding down slippery hills, standing under the Wolf and Snow moons of January and February while stars sparkle like white Christmas lights against a darkened sky. Most of all I like the quiet, the gentle hush of winter mornings, the deep stillness of long nights, the soft whisper of falling snow. To love winter, one simply needs to listen to the peace.

Branches inked onto a sky canvas.

Gift

 

 

The day is wrapped in clouds and cold

and so am I,

determined in my unhappiness,

marching up a mountain,

anger in every step.

And there, nestled in the shelter of a fallen log,

pierced by an errant ray of sun,

shines a violet,

a single lavender blossom,

an April treasure in November.

Growing by serendipity or design

what does it matter,

when an entire mood can be altered

by the sight of small purple petals?