Sticking with the theme I’ve been on for the past couple of days, cosmos-wise, I want to remind you that tomorrow is the New Moon, and it is in Leo.
So I’m thinking it would be of benefit to hit your personal ‘refresh’ button, set new goals, step outside your old ways of thinking and being, and set some new, bold, creative intentions.
You might want to take a look at where Leo (which is not only where the sun is at the moment, but also exactly where the moon is – hence the moon being ‘new’ and therefore ‘dark’) falls in your own birthchart. Whatever ‘house’ Leo is in on your birthchart may be the area of your life where those new intentions might be most effectively planted.
Mercury Stations Direct, Too
At the same time that we’re planting the seeds of what we want to change or create new in our lives, Mercury is stationing and going direct again tomorrow too. So, yahoo for communications flowing more easily and technology not going on the fritz unexpectedly. Your efforts to plant and grow those newly planted intentions should flow more easily.
Jupiter Also Stations Direct
One other astrological phenomenon that’s happening tomorrow is that Jupiter, too, is stationing direct. I’ll see what I can find out there to help us understand and isolate the specific areas of our lives that are being activated by these aspects, and share what I find tomorrow night – if I locate something particularly fascinating or enlightening.
I have to admit, my Sky Guide app assisted me in recognizing Jupiter’s presence in the sky over the past couple of nights. It sure is a big, bold, bright spot in the sky.
Cassiopeia
For some reason, my eyes kept being drawn to the constellation Cassiopeia. It’s from the direction of that constellation that the Perseids appear to originate. I’m not at all sure why, but the geometric precision of the triangular placement of the stars just kept calling to me.
I’m still being called to look upward, both physically and metaphorically. Maybe you are, too?
…but I’m heading out the door to check out those meteor showers again tonight.
I’m such a sucker for celestial events. Which also reminds me: recently we celebrated the 50thanniversary of the moon landing. I’ve been meaning to watch the footage of that again, maybe even watch it with our kids (who are not ‘kids,’ I hasten to add). In fact, there are quite a variety of programs being offered this month to celebrate the technological innovation and tremendous bravery we witnessed all those years ago.
NASA and the Apollo Program were such huge parts of my childhood. It’s shocking, really, to consider how much promise there was when we landed on the moon in 1969 and how few dramatic accomplishments we’ve actually made since then.
I guess we got distracted.
A Lack of Will
I don’t think I’m alone in feeling a deep sense of disappointment at the lack of will our country has shown to continuing our efforts in space exploration. When I think about what we accomplished in 42 years, I am stunned at the apparent lack of comparative progress.
What 42 years, you might ask? The 42 years between when Charles Lindbergh made the first transatlantic flight and when we landed men on the moon. The reason why I speak of this span in terms of 42 years is because my mother was very fond of recalling how she was ten years old when ‘Lindy’ made that incredible, groundbreaking flight. As you can probably guess, since I was ten years old when Neil Armstrong took his famous first step onto the surface of the moon, she was 42 when she had me.
Quite honestly, I always expected at least one of my children to be witness, when they were ten years old, to some scientific achievement that rivaled that enormous leap in technological capability and vision. But it didn’t happen. Again, it seems we got distracted.
We Got Distracted
Probably the greatest disappointment to humanity resulting from this failure to keep the technological research and momentum going is the grievous situation we find ourselves in right now: the climate crisis. So many incredible breakthroughs and inventions were discovered in the process of meeting the challenge posed by President Kennedy all those years ago. We can only wonder what could have been discovered had we continued the quest.
All of which makes me yearn for an about face to the head-in-the-sand, intelligence and education-bashing, and steadfast aggrandizing of ignorance over scientific inquiry that we’re witnessing in our country. The ‘dumbing down’ of America has been tremendously successful – to our great peril.
We Need a Grand Challenge
We need brilliance, innovation, and creativity to be valued and funded. This starts with us collectively making education a priority for all our children, from pre-school on up. And for sure it demands respect for science and the cessation of the bald-faced censorship of scientific inquiry and the result of it.
We need to be challenged; we need our scientists to be believed; we need to want to save our Earth for the good of all – not just for those who hold all the power (and all the money).
We need a Grand Challenge, an audacious goal that flies in the face of what the naysayers would have us believe. We need to turn the Climate Catastrophe into a rallying cry for discovering the best, brightest, more brilliant among us who can turn everything around exponentially faster than ‘they’ say is possible.
Worth Saving: Tohickon Creek in July – Photo: L. Weikel
A Strong Dose of Idealism
Everywhere we look right now, there’s misery and unbelievable cruelty, there’s slavery and corruption, there’s deliberate exploitation of the Earth’s resources to make a few already obscenely rich people even richer – and damn the impact upon the rest of us, not to mention the Earth herself.
It’s no wonder so many are so miserable.
Yet we can turn this around immediately. We need to believe in ourselves; we need to believe we can do it. We need a person at the helm who has vision, who gives us hope in the future and in ourselves. We need some leaders to step up who are not solely out for themselves, but who truly know that as the least among us are made better, we’re all lifted.
I know, I sound naïve. But I tell you this: we cannot lose our hope. We cannot give up on ourselves, on humanity’s ability to bring brilliance to the fore. We cannot give in to the distraction any longer.
We have to take a stand, and we have to do it now.
Excuse me while I go outside to stare at the cosmos and dream.
I love learning about stuff. And until yesterday or the day before, I don’t think I’d ever heard of the Delta Aquariid Meteor Shower before.
I’ve been a devotee of the Perseids for decades and decades – pretty much all my life, to be honest.
Perseids or Aquariids?
I remember going down the cliff to the beach at the Cape, where the expansiveness of the sky was the greatest (notwithstanding Nauset’s “I-Love-You” light sweeping across the ocean and then across the scrub pines near the cottage). Yes, I remember the odd sensation of the sand of both the cliff and the beach feeling cool between my toes, even as I could dig them deeper to reach some residual warmth that had baked in a little below the surface.
But the Perseids usually peak in August (right around both Karls’ birthdays). It’s been a family ritual to jump into the car and drive about a mile from our house so we could lay out in a field to get the widest possible view of the entire sky. All my guys have indulged me in my delight at witnessing meteor showers and other astronomical events. They’re among my most treasured memories.
forbes.com
A Little More on the Aquariids
So I find it a little weird that I’ve never heard of the Delta Aquariids. They’ve been falling (meaning we’ve been passing through the debris of the MachHolz Comet) since approximately July 13thand will last until August 28th. The best opportunity to see the greatest number of ‘shooting stars’ (although obviously, technically, they are neither shooting nor stars – discuss), though, is tonight and probably tomorrow night, when there will be the most particles entering our atmosphere and the sky will be darker longer because it is a “new moon.”
And…Capricornids?!?
Apparently we’re in for ‘dueling’ meteor showers this year. If you follow the tail of each meteor you see, you can use your Sky Guide app to figure out where it originated. That’s one way to identify if it was one of the Aquariids, Capricornids, or Perseids.
I’m happy to report that I’ve already seen two gorgeous, surprisingly slow-moving arcs of light travel across the sky tonight. And there’s been an added lightning show taking place in the northern sky as well, which is a little off-putting, since there are no clouds in the sky.
My sightings this evening were actually quite a surprise. Everything I’ve read recently has recommended that you go outside and look up around midnight, so I was definitely looking up simply because I was outside!
One More Immersion Into the Night Sky
As soon as I publish this post, I’m going to go outside one more time to see what I can see.
As I’ve mentioned before in my various posts about eclipses and things, I adore witnessing natural phenomena. And as I lay on my back staring up at the sky tonight, I felt that sense of being such a teeny, tiny part of a vast and virtually limitless Universe.
I am in awe.
So I strongly urge you to turn out all your outdoor lights right now and venture outside. Unless, of course, you’re reading this Monday morning, in which case set your alarm and go out this evening at around midnight. You’ll be glad you did!
Every once in a while I have a peculiar experience that is both strange and inexplicable. It’s simple, really. Simple, yet profoundly odd.
The best way I can describe it is as follows: I’ll be standing in the little nook of our kitchen, to the left of our sink, where I keep our espresso machine. I’m most often either grinding the beans or waiting for the brew to drip into my cup, when I’m suddenly reliving a ‘snapshot moment’ in which I’m transported back to a town in Vermont in the early afternoon, in a small bookshop.
It’s the weirdest thing. And it’s happened to me many times over the years. The exact same trigger taking me to the exact same moment in time that I actually experienced.
Snapshot Moment
The five of us were on a mini-vacation, having taken a jaunt up to Vermont after attending a travel soccer tournament probably somewhere in Massachusetts, although it may have been upstate New York.
That’s part of the weirdness of this ‘snapshot moment.’ I have little recollection of any of the details surrounding the rest of the trip. I just know we were in Vermont. I’m reasonably sure I could even pinpoint the exact village if I had to come up with it – which is the benefit of my journaling.
But that’s not actually the point.
It’s this absolutely vivid ‘transport’ I experience. I assume it must have something to do with the smell of the coffee or something, although the moment in time to which I’m transported does not, as far as I can tell, involve coffee.
Why Does This Happen?
I think that’s part of the reason I find this experience so odd. Inevitably, when I get ‘flipped back’ in that way – momentarily – I always find myself wondering what triggered it. And then my second thought inevitably is, “Why does this happen?”
This experience always serves to remind me that I never know, from one day to the next – one moment to the next – when an experience is going to be so indelibly seared into my brain that I will recall it, perhaps randomly, for the rest of my life.”
Another moment I remember and which is indelibly imprinted in my brain is driving with my mom in our car on Route 22 in Easton, after having just dropped my sister off at her high school. My sister was probably 15 or 16, so I was six or seven years old. I was in the front seat, and I remember my mother and I having a conversation about words.
I Remember Thinking “How ‘Silly’ a Word…”
Specifically, I remember telling my mom that I’d heard kids at school talking about that part of a boy’s anatomy that makes them different from girls. I don’t actually remember how the topic came up or how I phrased my question – I think I wanted to know if those words were ‘real.’ But what I remember is my mother, in that moment, telling me the proper word to be used. And I distinctly remember stifling my laughter (or perhaps I didn’t actually succeed at stifling it, come to think of it) because I thought that word was absolutely hilarious, as it so closely resembled ‘peanuts.’
I randomly remember that conversation (again, never knowing what might trigger that specific memory) and yet I remember exactly where the car was on that stretch of road and viscerally remember that sense of internally giggling to myself and thinking how silly a word it was.
Random Moments – Persistent Memories
If I tried, I could probably think of at least another half dozen or more ‘random snapshot memory moments’ like these. And I just have to wonder about the nature of memory.
What makes certain moments imprint themselves so deeply that we recall them throughout our lives? I would understand if these instances were profound in some way – traumatic, for instance. And I do have some memories like that. But the ones I just recounted are certainly not traumatic. (Don’t even go there with the associations…ha ha.)
I’m not sure why I wrote about this tonight, beyond the fact that I probably <<blinked>> back to that afternoon in Vermont while making my coffee this morning, and it made me think.
A random moment in my life. A random – if persistent – memory.
Who’d have thought such a thing could be possible?
I’ll admit, it’s not something I’ve thought much about. However, a couple experiences I’ve had over the past two days have proved to me that it is indeed possible to discover – often unexpectedly – that as grateful as you may be with the many delights in your life, a change in perspective can lead to the experience of even more joy.
As you know if you’ve been reading my latest posts, I’ve become smitten with my Fish Crows. I’ve been trying to get closer to them (to take a couple photos) as the parents mentor their fledges, mostly in the branches of our maple tree and sometimes in the middle of our crushed stone driveway, where they teach them how to crack open peanuts. In spite of the fact that I’m the one that keeps the peanut coil filled, they still get spooked when I try to edge closer. This was the best I could get today:
Fish Crow snagging peanuts – Photo: L. Weikel
Magic!
I happened to be out and about this morning and got the urge to pay a visit to the hostel where I’ve held many Listening Retreats, as well as the retreats for the entire two year Merkabah Medicine Program. There are a lot of wonderful memories associated with that place and the Spirits of that Land.
Just being at this energetically rich place, I encountered magic. Butterflies of many colors languidly feasting on the nectar of a massive butterfly bush. Six, seven, eight hummingbird moths hovering over the Monarda and drinking deeply from its many blossoms.
Hummingbird moth – Photo: L. Weikel
I had to wonder if some of the creatures were gathering so abundantly precisely because there’s far fewer humans hanging around on a regular basis. They feel safer now to drink from the blossoms slowly and deeply.
This brief visit helped me appreciate the current situation involving that land with a shifted attitude.
Photo: L. Weikel
An even greater example of ‘appreciation rut’ and how it impacts my life was brought home when Karl let me know he was going to be home much later than he expected last night.
In a dual bid to both outrun the impending rise in temperatures that’s going to visit our area starting tomorrow, as well as just give Karl a pleasant surprise after a long week, I decided to mow all the lawn while he was away. Normally, he does ‘the back’ (behind our small barn) and I do the ‘front’ – which is what you often see in the photos I share, especially of our birds.
A Land of Faerie
Well, I always seem to forget the utter faerie-like quality of nature’s expression back behind our barn. There are so many places for all sorts of animals and other creatures to flitter, roam, play, nest, and nestle. It is an exquisite oasis of sacred nature: An Lar Naofa, as our dear friends from Sli an Crois, Karen Ward and John Cantwell, dubbed our land.
As I looked up from my path and eased up my intensity (born from a desire to complete the task before Karl returned, weary, from a road trip), I saw our property from almost the exact opposite perspective, literally, from what I see when I sit on our porch. At that moment, I peered through willow leaves and brilliant purple wildflowers to see our barn basking in the deep golden orange of the setting sun.
It was in that moment that I realized that, as much as I love, appreciate, and celebrate the abundance of beauty that I enjoy from the perspective of my porch – an entirely different flavor of natural beauty had been patiently awaiting my awareness and celebration.
I’ve waxed rhapsodic over my porch in other posts. I’ve also shared (ad nauseum?) my love of my birdfeeders and the many avian visitors I’m lucky enough to have a front row seat to enjoy as I sit writing on my porch.
Truth be told, especially now that Spartacus is not as nimble as he used to be, and Sheila’s practically blind, other creatures find themselves emboldened to partake of the bird seed (and peanuts!) without fear of being molested. That’s not to say that every once in a while Spartacus doesn’t still give the chasethe ol’ college try. But he’s just not the threat he used to be.
Every year it seems there’s a different type of bird that has a starring role in performances at our feeders. It’s been fascinating to notice over time what ‘energy’ predominates at the feeders any given year.
All Things Blue Jay
One year we had blue jays make a nest in one of the hanging planters directly outside our kitchen door (on our porch, of course). That was a very cool experience. All three of our sons were still living at home when the blue jays roosted. We all had a chance to witness the entire process, from nest building to laying the eggs, to how they would take turns sitting on the nest, to the hatching and growth of the chicks. Things got hairy when the chicks started to fledge. The parents got a bit testy with us then and would whack us with their wings if we walked out the kitchen door too abruptly, thus spooking them.
One day, one of the fledges got ahead of himself and fell out of the nest. We were pretty sure he hit his head because he seemed a bit groggy. I picked him up and put him back in the nest. The parental units didn’t mind. But we always swore we could tell which one was the fledge who fell out. He was the one who always looked a bit cockeyed. He was the jay whose crown feathers seemed to be puffed up and a bit askew, and he’d look at us and tilt his head questioningly.
We affectionately called him “Franken-Jay.” He would show up at our feeders occasionally – and we could always tell it was him by the way he would look at us in that particular way, with his feathers all in disarray.
Beyond Just Jays
We’ve had years when there were entire flocks of cardinals. I have some great photos from ten or so years ago when there would be 15-16 or more fledgling cardinals all hanging out together on the grass and dirt underneath the feeders. I called them my Teenage Mutant Ninja Cardinals because their feathers were so patchy and mottled. They really looked unkempt and discombobulated and, well, teenaged.
Another year we had a bazillion goldfinches. Yet another year there were more house finches than anyone should be permitted to feed at the same time in the wild.
Last year it was wrens. Oh my goodness, the voice and song of the wrens is incredibly distinct and they would just chatter and sing relentlessly. They were a delight.
Photo: Sciencenordic.com
Fish Crow Extravaganza
This year, it’s the fish crows. (And yes, fish crows are distinct from regular crows, which I only discovered this spring.) They are SO AWESOME. We have a family that nested right across the road from our house. (I need to see – I may have written about them previously.)
Sitting out on the porch today for the first time in several days, I was privy to some absolutely delightful fish crow family dynamics. The babies are definitely fledges. Mom and Dad are teaching them all sorts of flight tricks and how to try to navigate the peanut coil that is a big addition to our creature offerings this year.
Oh, do those babies squawk. My photos do not do my guys justice. I’m trying to be as unobtrusive as I can, so I’ve been trying to take photos of them without getting any closer than I am normally. I just sit on the glider where I usually reside and try to capture their raucous behavior.
I’m going to have to try harder tomorrow. I really want to share them with you!
No, I don’t have a good deed to report for this day, but I do have a teeny tiny story to tell from a couple weeks ago.
I’d almost forgotten about it, as a matter of fact. But since I’ve been sort of training myself to take photos whenever I see something odd or beautiful or breathtaking or troubling – because I might be inspired to share it with all of you – I was just reminded of the incident when I came upon the photo I took. (Score one for the 1111 Devotion!)
Fawn Meets the 202 Bypass
As you can see from the photo above, earlier this month I encountered this little baby in the middle of a major intersection – Route 202 and something else (I can’t remember offhand the name of it). As luck would have it, I was the first car approaching the intersection to get into the left hand turn lane on the 202 bypass.
I could not believe my eyes, though, as I pulled up to the light. I saw that sweet little fawn out there in the middle of the intersection, its legs splayed in a way that only babies’ legs go, and I immediately felt a whoosh of protective Mommy energy rise up within me.
My eyes swept from left to right, assessing the traffic situation. The cars and that massive cement truck facing both the fawn and me were of particular concern. I couldn’t imagine the terror the fawn would feel if the cement truck started shifting through its 16 or 22 gears, jerkily lumbering toward it.
I was also petrified that someone – somebody not paying attention, or lost in a swirl of thoughts about where they were headed or the phone call they just had (or were having), or simply hell-bent on getting to their next destination as quickly as possible – would just plow through the intersection blindly and not even realize there was a fawn there.
As I say, massive protective instincts kicked in.
A Moment Frozen in Time
In that moment that I first saw the fawn and realized its predicament, it seemed as though everyone was frozen. As I said above, my eyes swept the scene. Convinced that no one was going to ram through imminently, but not sure if everyone was paying attention or saw the little one, I moved my car slowly toward the baby, giving it wide enough birth that it would not assume I was headed toward it, but close enough to sort of corral it toward me and away from the direction of the cement truck.
I’d put my window down and, as I am wont to do whenever I see an animal, I started speaking to it, calling to it and trying to assuage its fear even the tiniest bit by exuding a sense of kindness and care in my voice.
Have You Ever Heard a Fawn Bleat?
Much to my astonishment, it looked at me, wide-eyed, and it bleated. Over and over, this little baby kept vocalizing for its mommy (I guess) as its tiny hooves slipped on the pavement as it tried to run but couldn’t quite get all four of its legs to act in concert. I turned my car more toward the baby, herding it toward the grass and small grove of trees that lay catty-corner to my left.
I cooed to it. It kept bleating. It stopped trying to run and seemed to shake itself calm.
My instinct was to stop my car and physically get out and herd it to safety, defying anyone to hit me with their vehicle. I resisted acting upon that, though. I thought, “Only if I have to.”
In the meantime, I continued talking to it, and at one point I got within four or five feet. I could almost reach out my window and touch it. All the while, it kept bleating and bleating. Its cries were just so…young.
I Felt the Collective (Good) Will of Everyone Watching
I’m glad to say it didn’t mess around. It didn’t fight moving in the direction I was guiding it, and it did manage to stumble up the curb and onto the grass. I immediately returned my attention to where my car had ended up and got myself out from in front of the cars facing me immediately to my left, and proceeded on my way.
I was so grateful that not one horn was beeped at me (this all took place in the midst of that busy intersection) throughout this process. No cars even crept forward or acted impatiently (that I noticed, anyway). In fact, I swear I felt the collective will of all of us who were aware of this little fawn’s plight working together to get it to safety.
After reaching my destination, I decided to return home the same way I’d come. Obviously, I hoped against hope I wouldn’t find its little body lifeless at the side of the road, having made a bad choice to turn back into the intersection.
I’m happy to report – there was no sign of the baby anywhere.
I originally titled this post “I’m a Dinosaur.” You might wonder just what age-related encounter happened to me today that might have provoked that title.
Well, it was nothing momentous. Just this odd, mustard-yellow slash emblazoned across the top of my Word document as I attempt to eke out a post this evening.
I’ve seen it before, although I could swear it was worded a bit differently. Not quite so ominously. Indeed so benign that I blew it off. Although…I could swear it wasn’t this color before tonight.
A Benign Message? Or a Ticking…
I’m thinking any further blowing off will be at my peril.
It’s a simple enough set of statements: “GET THE NEW OFFICE. Office for Mac 2011 will no longer be updated. Learn more about upgrading Office.”
Ordinarily, I would not even consider mentioning that I need to upgrade my laptop’s software. Mostly, I suppose, as I said above, because I’ve almost certainly not even registered the admonition in my brain for at least a couple years. I think the warnings up until now have consisted of only a vague reference to the software entering some no-man’s land of no further updates ‘soon’ or ‘sometime in the future.’
It’s Been Quite a While
But alas, now we’ve hit do-or-die. And there’s something striking and unsettling about that mustard yellow banner. It blasted into my awareness and made me calculate just how darn old my software is – and I can state unequivocally: I’m a little bit freaked.
I bought this laptop in 2011, and purchased the suite of software ‘Office for Mac’ at the same time. Which means…it’s eight years old?!?! I must’ve purchased it sometime earlier in 2011 – a year, of course, that will always be associated with losing Karl. And that, in all honesty, is the real nub here.
It’s not the age of the software. Nor is it the age of the laptop. It’s the realization that this November it will be eight years since Karl died, and it’s already been eight and a half years since I last put my arms around him, hugged him, and waved goodbye as he pulled out of the driveway to make his way back across the country.
Strange Connections
It’s weird; times like this. How a random mustard yellow banner across the top of my Word document could lead to the sad realization of just how long it’s been since I last put my arms around my boy. My young man. My eldest.
Sometimes the oddest things act as catalysts to stop our mindless wanderings, our sometimes zombie-like lumbering from one day to the next, to stop us in our tracks and demand that we pay attention.
He was on my mind a lot today. I miss him. And since he’s the whole reason I’m writing these posts every night, maybe he’s getting my attention so I won’t get caught one night soon with software that won’t do what it’s supposed to anymore.
Or maybe it’s just Microsoft demanding that I upgrade.
I prefer the former, even if the latter is definitely more plausible. But as I close this up for the night I’m realizing: perhaps there’s an even deeper message here. Hmm.
Blue Heron Hanging at a Pond Beside the Road – Photo: L. Weikel
Not Another Weather Post
I will admit, I am as loathe to write another post focusing primarily on the weather as you are to read one.
But I have to tell you: for a person who mostly listens to others and usually doesn’t do much of the talking, it’s hard to come up with something to ‘talk about’ every day. That’s especially true when you consider that there are many days when I don’t leave my home. And even some days when I barely leave my porch.
Today, for instance, I reveled in getting lots of emails written, forms completed and submitted, and appointments scheduled. Yet I barely left my porch. And while I managed to cross a lot of tasks off my ‘to do’ list, having a productive day does not necessarily translate into having much to write about. At least, not anything that might hold interest to many, if any, of you.
Lost Opportunity
One thing that happened today was a moment of excitement, rapidly whisked away by a flood of disappointment. Last week I received an invitation from my law school to secure tickets to attend a “conversation” with The Honorable Ruth Bader Ginsburg. The notice indicated that tickets would become available online at 10:00 a.m. this morning.
You can guess how successful I was in scoring tickets. Not at all.
But it was fun to imagine, even if only for a millisecond, having the opportunity to listen to and experience this icon in person.
A Vow for Tomorrow
Surprisingly, the wild storm last night did not usher in a new wave of pleasant weather. It cooled things off a little bit, but not significantly. In fact, I was surprised by how miserable the weather turned out to be again by late this afternoon.
Ooops – I just realized I’ve begun talking about the weather again. Gah.
Well, it was really just a segue into what I wanted to say about walking. It’s official: I just allowed an entire week, a vast seven days, to go by without walking as much as one pathetic mile. Appalling!
The last mileage of any consequence that I walked was last Monday, when I walked three miles. The day before that I walked 6.5 miles.
Re-Committing
I guess that’s something I could write more about tomorrow. I was really on a roll there for quite a while. And I’ll tell you: I miss my walks.
So my Vow for Tomorrow is to renew my walking. I’m beyond eager to do so. I yearn to be walking again. I don’t care how long my session lasts tomorrow, I know the weather should be exquisite for a walk by the time I get home – and I intend to take one.
Let’s hope I can snag a photo or two that can inspire me to write about something fascinating or intriguing.
In the meantime, I’m going to leave you with this little critter, who kept insisting upon marching across the top edge of my computer earlier today.
Hummingbird at our porch feeder – Photo: L. Weikel
Porch-Vacating Heat
Even though they called for it, I’m still trying to wrap my head around just how hot and muggy it was today. By the late afternoon and early evening, the atmosphere was unbearable and I had to go inside. Reluctantly. Dripping with sweat, but nevertheless dragging my feet.
I’m probably a bit weird. (As if you hadn’t figured that out yet; amiright? My façade is so well-maintained.) As I was saying, I’m probably a bit weird, but I adore sitting, writing, talking, reading, working, musing, Medicine Card picking, bird-watching, and all around being on our porch.
It’s a bit odd, too, since the porch isn’t exactly roomy. And our house is sort of close to the road. I guess I’m saying it’s not a perfect porch. Not even close.
Our Porch
But it’s our porch. And so many good times have been had on that porch, so many beautiful sunsets have been viewed, so many games of hearts played, so many hummingbirds, crows, chickadees, downy woodpeckers, cardinals, fish crows, indigo buntings, mourning doves, pileated woodpeckers, wrens, blue jays, catbirds, house finches, red breasted woodpeckers, goldfinches, red winged blackbirds, sparrows, and both red tailed and sharp-shinned hawks (keeping the populations of the aforementioned in check) have been celebrated and excitedly welcomed from our porch.
We’ve also enjoyed squirrels (OK, maybe ‘enjoy’ is overstating it a bit when it comes to squirrels), chipmunks, deer, foxes, turkeys, opossums, raccoons, groundhogs, garter snakes, bunnies, bullfrogs, skunks, tree frogs, snapper turtles, and box turtles from the vantage point of our porch. I’m sure I’m leaving some critters out. I’d include weasels but the weasel that ran up to me so many years ago was actually out back behind our barn. Since I didn’t view it technically from our porch, I’m not including it in that list.
So Much Life – Just Off the Porch
Now do you get a sense of why our porch is simply the best? It’s better than a zoo. (Doesn’t even compare. I really don’t like zoos. But that’s another conversation.)
And beyond all those creatures mentioned above, we’re also surrounded by grass, trees, moss, hostas (also known as deer food), wild flowers, and bushes. All viewable from our porch.
I tend to gravitate to the porch, and spend a considerable amount of my time at home on it, from roughly mid-March through early December. So for me to abdicate my domain – you know it was hot, humid, and unequivocally miserable.
The Reprieve Arrives
And now, as I sit here on the couch writing this post, the close and exceedingly bright flashes of lightning and deep rumbles of thunder that began about half an hour ago have paved the way for a downpour, the promised reprieve. Ah – great. All the electricity just went out and I’m sitting here in the pitch black of the night. Except for the lightning.
Which of course, it now dawns on me…means no internet connection. Great.
I’m thinking it may be time for me to go to bed. I will post this as soon as I am able.
Here’s hoping this storm marks the end of this heat wave.
