TIME! TIME!

WHERE DOES IT GO?

I have been trying to find time to get on here… even having trouble finding time to read other blogs that I so do enjoy – well, and look at some I don’t, but that is a post for another time. But life has become a big Tempest Fugit. Yes, I know the Latin is Tempus fugit, but a dear departed friend of mine always called it that, and somehow it seems to fit so many occasions if you think about it… Anyway, long story short, life has taken a sad turn here, I have lost my beloved uncle Jesse, among other chaotic events since I last posted on here. So,sorry about that.

I will share a moment from my garden, and get back to work.

St “Fwankie” and the ground level birdbath, coleus and strobilanthus.

BLUEBIRDS

Here on the Eastern Shore they have a saying that if snow hangs around,

it is waiting for more. And with the temps in the 20s, I was preparing for the next snow today when I happened to glance out the kitchen window and thought I saw a bit of blue where I seldom see any blue…

Forgetting my chores, I looked around the back yard and could not believe my eyes. Scattered around the yard were well over a dozen bluebirds (and spouses) sitting in the bushes,

on various perches,

and even on St Fwankie’s head!

 

Try as I might, I could not get more than 5 or 6 bluebirds in any one picture frame.

So, I gave up since I had to go to work, but imagine my excitement when I came home and saw 11 of them and a few other little visitors gathered at the birdbath. For those of you who are new to my blog, that is a birdbath deicer in the water.

It is the most popular watering spot in town as it is the only unfrozen water out there. It is usually empty in the morning as the deer come to visit at night along with raccoons, possums, and the gray fox family.

Winter Storm Janus 1-22-14

Well, Winter Storm Janus blew in last night in a bad temper. Snow is one thing we all enjoy every once in a while, the high winds are another thing. Then, too, temperatures in the teens are a shock to our sensibilities around here. My camellias are frozen. Not nice, Mr. Weather! In truth, we had only 4 inches more or less – with the blowing it is hard to measure how much actually came down – but here on the Shore, 4 inches might as well be 4 feet. The phones started ringing at 6 AM with cancellations. The radio had been broadcasting nothing but cancellations since 5 AM, foregoing all other broadcasting except ABC News and Mike Huckabee and a couple funeral announcements. I mean, who needs to listen to advertising when you can’t get out of your driveway anyway, right?

One interesting comment by our announcer (and owner of the station) was to tell the Good Old Boys to stay off the road. “Yeah, I know,” he said, dropping his voice and adding the drawl of the uneducated, “I got 4 wheel drive, man, I can go anywhere. I am out here to help people who get stuck!” Then he paused for dramatic effect, “And you end up in the ditch with the rest of them causing more problems than you can ever could fix, blocking road clearing crews and even emergency vehicles. So stay the heck home and off the roads!” Of course, the bulk of the sales on days like this are – guess… go ahead… milk? No. Bread? No… Baby formula? Nope, not that either… beer. Well, if you can’t get to work what else is there to do? So, half of the 4 WD pick-ups in the ditch are drunk drivers anyway. Whoopee.

OK, I digress… so what else is new? Anyway, here is the scene out my back door onto the carport which is protected on one side by the house, a little by the furnace room, and, of course, has a roof over it. Look at that snow, will ya? It was all the way up on the top step. See how it has drifted by the bottom step? I had to sweep off the steps to get to the snow shovels. I have 2 – one is an old aluminum shovel, one is plastic. This was an aluminum shovel type of snow because that is ice under there on the ground and on the concrete. My van was covered with almost as much snow as my truck that was sitting out in the yard.

   

The greenhouses were struggling to stay above freezing with ice crystals on the doors. My little incandescent bulbs were working overtime keeping my bucket of bricks warm. I hoped none of them burn out during this below 20 weather. I would hate to open the doors to change a bulb!

It was not a ‘pretty’ snow. The high winds blew most of the snow off the branches. On the other hand, that kept things from snapping and coming down on power lines… unless the wind did it. The prayer flags got a good workout blowing so hard you couldn’t even tell if it was Sanskrit or Hebrew on them. But the early morning sun was pretty and a promise that things would thaw. Eventually. The daffodils have been up, some as much as 6 inches, but they were invisible this morning. In a good year, they bloom the end of February. I have a feeling they will wait until March this year. But, who knows?

The Buddha was wrapped in a nice blanket of white while St Fwankie kept an eye on the birdbath deicer. The little critters were very thankful for that tiny pool of not quite freezing water. However, I have a couple wrens and sparrows that have discovered the cat’s heated water dish and take an occasional drink out of that. I tried to get a shot of one of the little fellows last week when it was so cold hunkered down at the bottom of the door to the furnace room. When I opened the back door, he hopped out a ways, but went right back to the door after I shut the kitchen door once again. I think he is smarter than Spook who has abandoned his heated box now that Punkin is no longer there to defend him. Bless his heart. A friend renamed Spook last week calling him a kittidiot. I have to agree. He is such a scaredy-cat that it often applies.

The new generator is here… but the inspector has not been here and I am on a long waiting list for the gas tank. I can only hope I don’t need it.

And these last 2 shots are of my CoCoRaHS official precip cylinder – minus the inner core that stays in the house during freezing weather where it will measure the melted snow for water content.

I hope the storm was not a bad event for you and yours. Stay in, stay warm, stay safe!

A SUMMER SUNDAY MORNING

I find mornings exciting – well, I do now that I don’t have to get in the van and drive 20 miles to spend the day working at a job that mostly goes unappreciated these days. Heck, I can stay home and not get appreciated and have a much better time doing it! But mornings excite me with the cliché of seeing what the new day will bring and the gratitude of being able to see and hear it. I do lots of posts about Gratitude… note the capital letter, for Gratitude is what gets me thru life. I seldom actually post them… writing them, thinking about all i have to be grateful for is all I really need to do at the time. I spent many, many years being bitter, sitting on the pity pot with Poor me, Poor me, and the occasional Pour me… but the bitterness brought me only more bitterness. It did not make the pain go away. It did not help me to walk (or walk without pain). It sure did not bring me any peace. Once I accepted life on life’s terms and figured I’d better “get over it” in some sense of the word, well… it got better. OK, there are those who would argue that it really DIDN’T get better – maybe just some part of me got better. I had to stop looking at the weeds in my garden and notice the flowers.

I have always loved the play of light on and thru objects… especially as the light shines thru leaves and flowers or lights up some distant corner of the garden while the background is still in a bit of darkness. Years ago I had a little girl living with me who thought we should whisper outside in the morning because parts of the garden and woods were still asleep. So, whisper we did. It was fun, actually, as she would tap my side to point out little things she saw from her childhood perspective. She was not afraid of bugs or other critters and they seemed to know this often allowing her to hold them and whisper to them.

She loved my St Fwankie, as she called him, “cuz he wuved all critters and knew they wuz his cousins.” She said the Buddhas were there to tell her to get quiet, calm down, pick a flower, study it. Brilliant child.

 

The sun in the morning hits this Buddha first thing. His whiteness just glows with the shadows behind him. I see him out the kitchen window as I take my first sip of coffee or tea every morning. He reminds me to go sit and get my morning meditation in… but the day often does not cooperate. The phone starts to ring, people arrive, the cat yowls for something different for breakfast or to let me know his dish is empty – how could I not notice such an important thing? I look back out the window, take another sip, swallow my blood pressure medicine (sigh) check the clock, feed the cat, give him his pill, go outside to feed Spook… try not to look around for Punkin – tho I still do.

I notice the phlox around the ground level birdbath are especially beautiful this morning. The hanging planter has come back into bloom. The colors seem to blend in with the mood of the phlox. St Fwankie seems quiet this morning, still in shadow. Perhaps he is still napping! I’d better not wake him. The bench sits alone and empty,  bags of mulch still on the ground. It has just been too hot to work out there, or the mosquitoes too hungry. And any cool moment is spent on the mower or swinging the weed whacker around keeping a clear path to the bean patch.

The yellow wax beans have been picked almost to extinction… when they are finished, I will pull these plants and replant for a fall crop. The Italian flats have been ready and enjoyed by many of us this week. I discover with  great excitement that I have 2 pickles and one almost cucumber but lots of flowers on the only 2 cuke plants to survive the coonie bear rampage of a couple weeks ago. The onions have been harvested, and the potatoes are looking sad and tired. I discovered that means they will soon be ready to harvest. Dumb me, the first year I thought I had lost all my potatoes. LOL! Stupid me, I almost dumped out 5 lbs of redskins from the potato bag that first year.

As I wander around the yard, I notice my favorite day lilies are in bloom. I now have quite a few, but these never bore me. My aunt called them funny faces.

This is one of my first day lilies… the morning sun makes the center glow as it shines thru it.

Thanks for taking a little walk around the garden with me… look at the pictures, be calm, wuv all critters, be kind, and let the beauty that is out there shine thru and into your heart.

IT ALWAYS SNOWS ON THE DAFFODILS

I HAVE PROBABLY POSTED THIS TITLE BEFORE – because it always snows on the daffodils, and  that makes for some fun pictures. In PA where I went to college, this is called the Onion snow, because onions sets are usually in the ground by now. These are my onions, I put them in last week. 

But, here in VA, when it snows in the end of March, it snows on much more than the onions, or daffodils, but the good thing is, the snow does not hang around. Often it barely covers the ground. So, I have learned to grab the camera early because sometimes the snow is gone by the time I hit ‘publish.’ So, I will share a bit of last snow beauty.  

It is the time when many of the camellias are in bloom. Pink Perfection is probably my absolute favorite and I don’t remember seeing it in the snow before.

Red Emperor… Pink Precious… One of my own hybrids…     

White on white (this is a 12 footer)… Snow on the forsythia… See the peonies coming up? Pansies…

Know what this is? Snow on the PussyWillow, up about 15 feet. The Redbud is starting to bloom, these will be flowers next week. And I love the pattern of snow on these branches.

When we flew our first flights over Libya, I bought a new Peace Rose bush as my prayer for Peace. I hope it does not fall on deaf ears.

The snow filled Buddha’s lap as he sat out back and reminded me to think thoughts of love and compassion, and it fell on St Francis as he watched over Spook taking a drink from the slightly slushy birdbath.

May thoughts of Peace and Compassion fill your heart this spring day. (Guess what? It is all melted – just that fast.)