in the middle of planting grasses he flew in. i turned and he was perched on the fence, studying us. we looked at each other – eye to eye. and this hawk sat still, just watching. before i could get d’s attention and have him turn to see him, the hawk flew off, eventually landing in the higher branches of the east neighbor’s tree, where he stayed for quite some time. we could see him there and he could see us.
from his vantage point i ponder what else he could see. the horizon stretched out before him, his high flight giving him an edge for observation, clarity. his eagle eye taking in the flow around him, the circle of life ever-present.
now it makes me wonder if he knew what was coming, how grounded we would soon need to be. things change in a moment and moving forward requires determination and some acuity. perhaps it was there to let us borrow some of its vast abilities, its confidence, the sense of being in control.
i stared at the hawk. the hawk stared back at me. peacefully, focused. i was just a little astounded at how close it was. maybe it was a little astounded at how close i was. no matter, we both stayed put and the moments slowed down until he took flight.
right now – in this quiet early morning – i can hear the chippies at one of the birdfeeders. there’s a certain metallic sound as the seed, disbursed by scrambling tiny feet on the edge of the feeder, hits the metal chipmunk-squirrel-prevention plate below. i’m pretty certain the chippies giggle every time they jump from there to the edge of the feeding trough. there is an abundance of seed in this feeder and they know it, returning time and time again to fill their adorable cheeks, run off, run back, jump, giggle, gorge, run off, all on repeat.
that is what i wish for my children, the imperative: an abundance of seed. to know that there is always more out there for them: more possibility, more to learn, more adventure, more challenges, more successes, more love. to always know that they are rooted and capable. to always know acceptance and compassion and support and fairness. to know that they can be confident in the world, always. to know that, whether they need it or not, i will always be their biggest fan and will always hope for their biggest and littlest wishes to come true.
i knew, even as an adult, that my parents were cheering me on. i knew that they did the hard work of letting go as i moved away. i knew that they were ever-present – and still are. i knew they wished all good things for me and held steadfast during all hard things. their love was a perennial birdfeeder, infinity-abundance-filled and there whenever i needed it.
i used to text both of my grown children every night to say goodnight. somewhere along the way it was brought to my attention that this might be a tad bit annoying. though i, personally, would adore hearing from my sweet momma every single night – especially now – i realized that she would also have respected it had my desire been for her to not continue this practice.
i stopped my goodnighttext practice, but i didn’t stop my goodnights. they are now just simply silent kisses blown in their direction, like dandelion fluff on the wind. infinity-floating and always here.
we were supposed to have company. it has been a rarity these last couple years to share our space with anyone, so we were really, really looking forward to it. visits with people we haven’t seen in a year, two years. coffee-sitting or wine-chatting out on the deck, slow walks along the lakefront, catching up. long-awaited.
it wasn’t to be.
just before, we had attended a small gathering – outside. we were alerted a couple days later that we were exposed to covid. guidelines are such that it was then our responsibility – which we don’t take lightly – to isolate from others so as to avoid being contagious, whether or not we were also ill. we have respected this pandemic and its resulting health guidelines from the start, so we did the only responsible thing. we cancelled our guests, two sets of them.
to say we were disappointed is to underplay the isolation of these times. we were stunned. the ever-present facebook shows people off gallivanting on vacations and cruises, at disneyworldland, at parties. and we, abiding by what had been outlined as ways to protect others, were alone. in truth, we were a little ticked.
and so, we dedicated ourselves to crossing every appendage we’d stay healthy and working on the backyard. the new fence has created a blank canvas and we wanted to re-plant and re-organize our tiny sanctuary. i began studying plants and sun and shadow and height and breadth and movement and placement.
we moved the old hostas. they were along that back fence line. it hasn’t been a good year for hostas, dan told us, and we’d have to agree. these intrepid plants, we knew, would bounceback, so we transplanted them next to barney and under the white fir pine. i wanted a few hosta for under the blue spruce, but i wanted elegans hosta, rich green not variegated, huge heart-shaped leaves, gorgeous texture that will share that space with tufting blue sedge grasses.
we went to the nursery. it’s all outside so we felt confident we were not exposing anyone and we spent a few glorious hours wandering in and out among the plants, dreaming. that’s where we fell in love with that little stand of quaking aspen. (pause for a moment…)
i took a zillion photographs, not only of grasses and plants, but of the accompanying tags of information, so that we could go home and i could research and develop a plan for the new landscaping we would be planting. i had my work cut out.
i made several trips to the nursery, asking questions and moving slowly through, glancing at my camera at the pictures i had of our backyard space, pondering. after a week – sans people – we went and picked up the first of the grasses, three switchgrasses, tall with plumes just peeking out. they would join the hardy pampas we had already purchased, hoping they would grow tall against the fence.
busying ourselves with greenery helped the sting of losing the opportunity to see loved ones, but not entirely. though grateful each day to not take ill, we felt gypped.
a few days ago we added a couple dwarf fountain grasses. their flouncy-ness is charming. we brought home a little zebra dwarf silvergrass and a purple fountain grass for contrast. after a few days of studying placement, we’ll actually dig holes, take them out of their pots and plant them. and there’s space for a small rock garden too, perfect for this thready heart.
it’s the end of the week and now more days have passed since our exposure. though we went through ten home tests – to make sure we were moving through a ridiculously long incubation period – we have mixed feelings.
we know that in cancelling our company we did the right thing, for we would not want to inadvertently infect them or anyone they would, in turn, see.
but we remain just as hungry – we are just as longing – for a bit more normal as we had been. we’ve all sacrificed much in these two plus years to protect each other. we – the two of us – have limited our restaurant-visits to less than two hands, have stayed back from concerts or festivals we wanted to attend, have masked in shops and stores, risking the dirty-look ire of others who have simply moved on. and we have not had the chance to really see many others – to laugh in our pjs together, to get in each other’s way in the kitchen, to spill out stories, interrupting and laughing.
doing the right thing is sometimes painful. especially when opportunity is few and far-between.
this weekend we’ll sit out on the deck and gaze out toward our new fence. in the early morning of the days i’ll water all the new plants, greeting them each time. and maybe, later in the day, the new grasses will catch an early evening breeze and tilt toward us, billowing. i imagine they will be thanking us for bringing them home. birds and more birds will attend to the feeders. squirrels and chipmunks will scamper, chasing each other looking for fallen seed, high-tight-roping across the yard. dogdog, a little older and more tolerant of little friends in his yard, will lay on the deck watching with us.
should it get to the point that the vine is obscuring the metal sunflower, we will cut it back. right now the vine is in its glory, billowing on top of the wooden fence, weaving in and out of the decorative wrought iron, and tumbling down our side. it has reached out and is starting to creep over this sunflower, ever so slowly and then, suddenly, the sunflower is wrapped in vine.
we keep a watchful eye.
for the vines of the neighbors, though lovely, are somewhat aggressive and we wish to protect the plants we have beneath their spilling. they are quietly growing, growing beneath these explosive vines and it has taken us years to cultivate even this small garden.
it used to be that the snow-on-the-mountain took over…it was everywhere. it choked out the lavendar garden and its long-branching rhizomes were spreading, spreading, giving our newly planted grasses a run for their life. it was overrunning everything else and its root system sent out feelers all over the yard, even under the driveway, looking for vulnerable plants it could overtake.
now the ground elder, on the other side of the potting bench, is rampant. because it is on-the-other-side and we mostly keep it from the stone patio in our potting garden, we are not as worried. but we watch it anyway.
we’ve discovered that vigilance is key. not so shockingly, we see the vines will win.
so we keep a watchful eye. and we protect the more fragile plants. we are sure to water them and check for the invasives trying to squeeze them out.
because they are beautiful, diligent silent growers, not insistently loud snowballing vegetation, and they each deserve their own space in the sun, their own dirt, air to breathe and our appreciation.
just like when i take a photograph of a person i try to avoid having extraneous people in the picture, when i take photographs outside i try to avoid any messy unnecessities.
this time i did it on purpose.
on july 29th i will have lived in this house for 33 years. i have sat out back watching the sky turn orange over the garage for 33 years. i have watched the trees grow up over the rooftops in my view. i have watched squirrels on their highways-of-highwire for 33 years.
it suddenly occurred to me that there might come a day when i can’t simply walk out the old screen door onto the deck, stepping onto the patio to watch the sky in the west. there might come a day when i live somewhere else and i won’t have access to this view.
and so the messiness of wires sectioning off the sky became important. important enough to photograph. important enough to remember.
we’re surrounded by things – and views – we have taken for granted. we see them every day – though we don’t really see them.
they seem unimportant.
yet, these familiar sights are the very things that help ground us. in a world that is politically volatile, climate that is destroying mother earth, bombastic leaders itching to reduce freedoms, disrespect and aggression out of control, it would seem that we need grab onto that which grounds us, centers us, slows down our breathing.
because i’m thready, i notice – and try to memorize – things like how the old wood floor creaks in the hallway, what it sounds like when the glass doorknob falls off, the feel of the small chain on the basement door and the decades-rubbed indent it has made, the sound of a double-hung window with ropes and weights opening, the deck cracking in cold weather, the cool painted-cement floor under bare feet in the basement, the places where the plaster has cracked. they all spell home.
and, with a world in turmoil, everything in flux, so much anxiety and grief and worry, things that are solidly familiar help.
we wake up early anyway. there’s no alarm clock on saturday morning. yet, before the sun is barely above the horizon we are awake. we both lay and listen quietly to the quiet. birds, chipmunks, the pond out back, maybe the waves on the lakeshore if it’s windy. for just a little while, before the lawnmowers start or cars drive by or people empty their recyclables into the new big blue waste containers, if we close our eyes we can picture being wherever we want to be.
my big brother has now been on a different plane of existence for thirty years. 30. as of yesterday. it is shocking that so much time has passed by. for the longest time i had a hard time understanding how the world could go on, when he could no longer feel it. and yet, it did. those of us left behind had broken hearts and missed the sound of his laughter, the details of his stories, his giant bowls of coffee ice cream. we are left wondering how he is present with us, what he can see, what, if anything, he feels. it was a friday.
“this life is not a dress rehearsal.”
the magic of friday night seems ubiquitous. for those in a traditional workweek, the weekend stretches out in front of you, friday night’s yawns delicious and lingered in. there are two glorious days to follow, days of errands or adventures or catch-up or sleep or just simply nothing. two of them. days to declutter your brain a little and sink into a little less routine.
and then, suddenly, sunday.
and, too fast, monday.
and we find ourselves wishing for friday.
yet, there is something about mondays that we should probably lean into. another day. here.
i stand here, in the kitchen in the world in all its complexities and all its flaws, and the dog gives me a kiss before he starts his breakfast and i bring david freshly-brewed coffee in a favorite mug. he smiles as i approach his pillow and the dog pounces on the bed. the sounds of early-early monday morning are like the sounds of saturday, like the sounds of friday. the certainty of monday is no less or more certain than the certainty of saturday or friday.
i imagine my brother took with him the sounds of morning, the sounds of his beloveds, the sweet taste of first java and ice cream in a late-night bowl. i don’t imagine he reached out to grab things as he floated; there were certainly no trappings as dear as the party he had on thursday-the-day-before just being near those he loved. his hologram remains with each of us, his humor and brilliant mind within our grasp as we speak of him. he made – and makes – a difference in this world for us.
we can choose to shut down the party on sunday. last call before midnight, enough time to sleep for the new week. or i guess we can recognize it can keep going. to be standing here, now, in this spot – with all its chaos and all its bounty – is party enough.
the day starts in quiet. the sun is barely over the horizon. the birds are singing, chipmunks chirp. i can smell the coffee brewing. i am here. i don’t know how the world goes on once i can’t feel it anymore. but for now, i can.
described as “too vigorous”, creeping bellflower, gorgeous purple flowers and all, is considered noxious and invasive. i know people like that.
as a matter of fact, the other day while we were strolling along the lakefront, we passed someone i know who is quite bellflowerish. without hesitation, i immediately began an animated conversation with david, complete with hand gestures and enthusiastic arm movements, my face intent on his as i told him the non-story and he stared at me, knowingly.
there are just some people who are best avoided.
had we stopped, even to exchange pleasantries, the conversation would have shifted to mining. this person mines for details, details, details, for gossip, for information. too vigorous, noxious and invasive, masked by curiosity and feigned intense interest, this person has always been a miner. avoidance is best, just like creeping bellflower. it looks lovely and inviting, beautiful purple flowers standing tall, but it will reseed – your newsy news – and spread it all out in gardens near and far, your personal story strewn all over, regardless of soil, aggressively spread like a weed.
the most robust plant can produce up to 15,000 seeds annually and self-sow in the wind. bellflower can overwhelm other, less aggressive, plants as they strive to co-exist. they are tough to eradicate in a gentle garden.
beware. creeping bellflowers will run over you and your garden.
it’s easy to recognize that we have germinated, that we have early growth with initial leaves. we send down a taproot, stabilizing just a bit. we are nurtured and we learn self-care, both. changes during the vegetative stage are a little easier to see as we grow upward and outward, green and healthy.
flowering and early fruiting…these are easy to discern in the striding of early decades of life. rushing to accomplish, to get up the mountain and down, to run without ceasing, to move without pause.
the presence of ethylene – a gaseous hormone – triggers the fruit to ripen. i suppose i would like to think this is much like the graying of my hair, the wrinkles on my brow, laughlines evident, jowls mysteriously appearing. coming to maturity. ripening.
early season varieties require 50-60 days to mature. mid-season require 60-80. late season varieties require more than 80 days to reach full maturity. and later, senescence, a natural progression.
i wonder how that all translates to human years.
the fruit of determinate tomatoes ripens all at once. indeterminate tomatoes ripen fruit throughout the growing season, extending the crop harvest…longer and longer.
we can all wager our own guess; i’m thinking late season variety. this still-learning thing makes that abundantly clear.
and i’m hoping for indeterminate. never quite done.
a good self-actualizing refrigerator and freezer will keep things cold and frozen, respectively, and have no further issues. the job is simple.
now, there are fancy fridges and run-of-the-mill fridges…side-by-sides, french-door-bottom-freezer models, freezer-on-top standards, retro fridges, beverage center fridges, deep built-in fridges…but the one thing they have in common is keeping things cold, keeping things frozen. so, leaking water onto the floor is not in the list-of-things-to-do for a fridge/freezer combo that has any self-respect.
which brings me to the last two years of our kitchenaid.
back in 2013 i spent a literal fortune on a stainless steel french-door-bottom freezer refrigerator because suddenly, after merely 24 years, my fridge had failed. there is limited space in our old kitchen where the fridge goes so i had to choose carefully, measuring tape and measurements in hand.
they installed the new shiny fridge and, i have to tell you, i felt fancy. gleaming stainless steel, sunlight reflecting off its french doors, bottom freezer the coolest-invention-ever, i was pretty darn excited, despite the monthly payment to the temporary credit card issued by the local appliance store. classy fridge and all, i moved on in life.
seven years later, this fridge, that i have babied with stainless steel cleaner and soft cloths, began to weep onto the wood floor.
there was no reason for it to weep. on the contrary, i should have been weeping as i watched rust spots accumulate on its no-longer-gleaming doors. stainless steel that is not stainless. when i asked kitchenaid about the rust spots and streaks, they said, “we’re sorry you’re experiencing rust on your stainless steel fridge. we recommend using stainless steel cleaner.” well, hello. that’s the only thing i have used, frequently enough to have to purchase and re-purchase. somehow i am not feeling their remorse or sympathy.
but, back to the water-on-the-floor. the opening credits of the pandemic on the screen of life, we were not anxious to bring in a service rep, so i googled. there was a gigantic sheet of ice under the drawer of the freezer – and this was leaking onto the floor. apparently, this is a common problem. (which begs the question why this is not addressed.) i defrosted the freezer and fridge, cookie sheet catching the icebergs as i rubber-spatula-ed them off of the freezer floor. cleaned everything, dried it all off, stainless-steel cleaned the doors and body for good measure and turned it back on.
and now? i am doing this every four to six weeks. but i have it down to a science. i use this tiny fan that my sweet poppo made, a rube-goldberg special the rpms i could not guess but the pitch of the whir tells me it’s mighty fast. i only thaw the freezer floor – so i only need one larger cooler for the freezer food and i don’t open the fridge. i wipe it all down (there’s no chance for it to get icky these days) and turn it all back on.
yesterday morning…merely nine days since the last great-thaw…we woke to puddles under the fridge, clearly having a meltdown (no pun intended). we are increasing the defrost-the-freezer-frequency and looking up appliance repairmen.
my conversation with kitchenaid was…interesting and very, very long. they promised to send me a part on the 22nd. a couple days ago i checked on this. they told me the information i provided does not match their records. so i am at ground zero again. no irony there. zero. the degrees the freezer is set at.
i just don’t know. it goes without saying they just don’t make things the way they used to.
in the sweetest of moments – that i will hold oh-so-close and not entirely share – my beloved daughter guided me into a skincare regimen. she generously shared wisdoms and gifted me with new knowledge, exquisite time together i will forever cherish, and products with detailed instructions on how to use them. her gesture of thoughtfulness…i felt like a girl. so deeply appreciated.
i haven’t spent a lot of time at makeup counters or in stores dedicated to makeup or skincare. you can buy covergirl and maybelline and oil of olay at target or even the grocery store or online and the one mac product i have repeated for years is actually because of my girl as well. every now and then a few new products have found their way into my world – marykay when my sister was a rep, clinique when i wanted to be in solidarity with crunch or when my sis got free samples. mostly, budget and a lack of mentors or social informants on the topic have kept me in the simplest of products. i’m guessing that is obvious, for i do not have the glowing skin or flawless makeup of those who have paid attention; i look in the mirror every day and realize i am, indeed, growing older.
i must have complained a little about that the other day when our daughter was here. her response was to do something about it. every day i count my lucky stars for that time together, for all time together.
the wall of brushes caught my attention at sephora. it looks like a kickline – paused and ready for the downbeat. they were all labeled, so it’s clear you could have quite a plethora of brushes for your face. i just loved the art of it, the black and white and grey with a touch of blue. it looked clean and crisp, things i look for when picking out airbnb cottages in faraway places. at ulta, as i followed my beautiful and knowledgeable girl around, i took photographs of marketing taglines, interesting teasers, product promises. it was absolutely and entirely fun.
the day will shine on in my heart for a long time to come.
reverse threading 