Category: Environment

Categories
Plants

Haiku of gardens and pillows

I have a secret fetish for gardens and anytime I’m feeling stressed, I spend time out at the Botanical Gardens, Tower Grove, or Shaw. However, when I’m constrained to the house by weather or heat or the need to finish work, I make do with garden weblogs. I’m not sure why, but these weblogs almost invariably sooth and relax me; whether they’re showing photos of a new flower, or talking about pest control–human or insect, doesn’t matter.

It’s easy to find garden weblogs thanks to Sheila Lennon’s list of garden weblogs. But don’t stop there–Sheila also links the most unusual and interesting material weekly, such as this idea for what I can do with Zoë, my cute furball, when she goes on to her rewards.

Cute doesn’t always come furry, though; Bill from Prairie Point has been posting photos of flowers from his garden, including some lovely lantana but I’m more partial to his new armadillo. I don’t know why, but I adore armadillos. Probably make a lousy pillow.

Could make a good lunchbox. Great place to put my BLTs for hiking trips.

Of course BLTs (my favorite sandwich) require tomatoes. Don from Hands in the Dirt and I have been talking about tomatoes and the unfortunate fact that the only tomatoes I have access to here in St. Louis are those I buy in the supermarket. My budget did not allow for the necessary expenditure of pots to start my patio garden, so this year, tomatoes come in baggies.

There’s a haiku in that, I think:

Tomato ripen
framed in plastic sheet
Peel off small label

The Bookish Gardener writes about a Japanese garden in Illinois I hope to visit in the near future, since it’s only about 4 hours away. In the same post, she lists some sites that provide garden photos for people to annotate with haiku, providing several photos of her own for those who indulge in the muse.

I can’t do haiku to save my soul, but I liked the following from the photo/haiku site:

summery garden
there is no answer
sober up

There is something about a summer garden, especially at night that is intoxicating — sober up, indeed. I wouldn’t marry a man for his money, but I might for his garden.

Actually, I could be easily seduced in a garden at night, especially if plied with fresh tomatoes. No, better yet: fresh peaches. You bite into the fruit still warm from the day’s sun, and the juice drips delicately over your soft summer frock. You notice the spots, and pull it down from your shoulder to wash the sticky juice from the light, gauzy fabric; using the water at the fountain that plays oh so softly in the background. As you’re focused on the cool water, flowing like champagne across your fingers, arms slip up from behind and…

Whoa! Where did that come from! Think of tech, Shelley. Think of tech.

I don’t have any fresh garden photos, but I do have some of Zoë, the once and future pillow, helping me make the bed; I’m posting them in case you might be inspired to write some haiku. No prizes for best effort, though.

Well, okay: you’ll get a copy of one of my books, autographed by yours truly, with its own RDF-inspired haiku in the front. You’ll have to pay for shipping, though.

No, you can’t have a Zoë pillow.

Speaking of making your pet into a pillow, Christine at Big Pink Cookie points to a Target illustration of how to perfectly fold a fitted sheet. I was moved to demonstrate my own sheet folding technique as follows:

To better understand the complexity of this fold, you also need to see the reverse side:

If you are so moved in your quest for one of my books with genuine hand lettered, barely legible RDF haiku inside, you may also use the photos of the sheets as inspiration.

When placed into the linen closet in the hallway, said sheets are then shoved towards the back, using brute force, among the bunches of equally folded towels. Luckily, there is no photo of this arrangement, as there is a line drawn between what I will and will not put into a weblog entry–and pictures of my linen closet most assuredly fit into ‘not weblog’.

Speaking of which, Stephanie Klein wrote a post To Blog or Not that began with:

Reasons not to blog:

* Stalkers who love you
* Stalkers who hate you
* Bi-polar stalkers who can’t make up their minds but stalk you just the same

Loved it.

Though not a stalker, over at Feministe, Lauren opened her weblog to a new permanent co-blogger, Jill Filipovic. Even though Jill doesn’t like donuts–how can you not like donuts? I mean woman, Krispy Kremes!–I’m looking forward to reading her posts.

An interesting move of Lauren’s: to bring in a permanent co-blogger for what is, or was, a personal weblog. I couldn’t do it with Burningbird–this weblog is probably the most personal thing I still have in my life. It would be like sharing my toothbrush with another person. Or having a threesome.

On the other hand…

Think of tech, Shelley. Focus on tech.

Gardens on a summer night and hidden bowers scented with lavender and peach…and Zoë the once and future pillow, helping me make the bed with my perfectly folded, flower-accented sheets, as I tell her dirty jokes.

There’s this farmer’s daughter and a traveling weblogger who wants to show her his podcast…

Categories
Critters Writing

Companion to small things

The weather was so hot yesterday, I waited to just before sunset to go for a walk. There didn’t seem to be anyone around on the short trail I’ve been having to take lately (the longer ones being too hard on my knee and ankle). This suited me, as I wan’t in the mood for company, or having to respond to the tentative smiles walkers give out as we pass each other.

I had my head phones on listening to music when a sudden movement on the road ahead of me made me jerk in surprise. One of the young deer had been in the path and my coming around the corner startled it into flight.

It ran behind a tree and started to head towards the road when I called out to it, in my softest, “I swear I’m a vegetarian” voice. When she stopped, I knew she was my orphan — the little deer who lost her mother when she was still a tiny, spotted fawn. I’m not sure if her mother died because she was getting old or got hit by a car, or if the conservation area shot her in its effort to keep the deer from overgrazing the land. Probably the former, as the park people would never touch a mother if she still had young.

The yearling peered around the tree, big, beautiful brown eyes looking up at me, as if to seek reassurance that I wasn’t going to scare it again. I just kept talking to it, and carefully kept my movements to a minimum. Though I’ve chatted with this little girl since she was a baby, I was still amazed whe she turned around and came back into the path not far from me at all, and then into the greener parts of the park on the other side of the road.

In fact, she seemed to parallel my steps as I headed out again, as if she wanted company. Why not? There is a warmth beyond food and survival we get from companionship with others, so why should we assume humans are the only creatures that appreciate this? Frankly, the way we treat each other at times makes me wonder if we’re the only creatures that don’t appreciate this gift.

Looking at that sweet little head trotting along side, I had a wild moment contemplating opening the door at home with my arms full and calling out to my roommate, “It followed me home. Can I keep it?” The temptation, the need, was strong: after all, she wasn’t the only animal walking alone in the forest last night.

Categories
Critters Places

The snooty turtle

I almost missed the daffodils at Shaw this year. I even thought I might give them a pass, but the weather was good and I needed a walk, so there I was, in the field with the flowers.

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Yes, daffodils here, daffodils there, but not as many as last year, and not as many as the year before. It might be my imagination, but there aren’t as many flowers this year, same as there weren’t as many falling leaves last fall.

I suspect we should value the ones we have more, than. Instead we look at the fields in disappointment, muttering to ourselves, “That’s it, then, is it? A few scrawny blooms? Could have done better with the picture on a packet of seed. Where are all the bloody daffodils?”

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But that’s not what this is about. Enough with the brazen flowers, I don’t want to talk about flowers, I’ve talked about flowers. And yes, even done the daffodil poem–you know the one. Clouds and stuff. No, today I want to introduce you to my turtle.

You see, the great thing about visiting Shaw throughout the year is that each time a different animal has its time in the sun.

There are the frogs, of course; the famous frogs you can’t see but you can hear by the great noise they make. And mustn’t forget the bumblebee and the butterfly, as they contend for the prize: the last golden flower in the field.

You have to walk far, part with a tiny sacrifice of flesh and blood for the insect life on the way, but I should mention the beaver, as it slips quietly through the mud for a bit of twig and stem. There was also the time with the baby snake I thought was a rattler but was something tiny and harmless, and scared to death of the big, ugly things hovering over it.

Birds, always birds, of course, and this trip was no different–especially this happy fellow, a mockinbird in a tree. I have a fondness for mockingbirds; they are the ultimate copyright thieves and I’ve long been amazed at the fact they’ve not been adopted as mascot of the movement.

But this trip was for the turtles. I’d seen turtles before, but from a distance and only one or two. Yesterday, however, the turtles were out on the cypress logs and stumps and roots in the water — big fellows, a foot or more across. Unfortunately, though, I could only catch brief glimpses, as they would dive into the water when I approached.

Except for one, my turtle. I found it sunning itself out on the remains of a cypress in the lake itself. I crept closer, closer, closer, and still it stayed. I even wondered if it had eggs and that’s why it wouldn’t leave, but I think the reason is, it just didn’t want to. I pulled out my long lens and took several pictures, not really able to see the turtle’s face through the lens. In fact I didn’t see the turtle’s face until I got home and loaded the photo into Photoshop.

Did you ever see a snootier turtle in your life? I have seen many photos of turtles, and they are a smug creature indeed, but none filled with such obvious disdain of the antics of lesser creatures. Now I know where the flowers are gone — I’m sure it ate them. Probably sat there and thought to itself with each crunchy bite, “HaHa stupid humans coming out for flowers. HaHa! *mumph* This is good! Tasty! HaHa, dumb humans. Now all they see is my poop.”

[image lost]

I took as many photos from as many angles as I could of the turtle before finishing my walk around the lake. At the end, amidst a group of trees was a great splashing and ripple of movement as what must have been hundreds of young turtles swimming for deeper water.

Well, I’m sure there were dozens of young turtles.

Five or six, I’m positive.

One, at least. Oh, yes, I am confident of one.

Or, maybe it was a fish?

Categories
Critters

Girl Doves are from Venus Boy Doves are from Brooklyn

The weather has warmed enormously and all of the birds are out busy making new birds, including the mourning doves. In fact, my window is open and I hear one right next to my window, with that sad, soft, mournful cry.

This afternoon I opened the curtain out on to the deck, just in time to see two doves finishing their reproductive duties. The male dove flew down next to the female on the deck guardrail, and they both started preening their feathers.

Then an odd thing happened. The female started gently pecking at the male’s neck, rubbing her head underneath his beak. The male started to rub back, but then stopped and fluffed it’s feathers out and moved away from the female a step.

The female started again in a rather touching, intimate display of postcoital grooming. The male just looked at her, and again moved away.

The female moved towards the male and again started grooming him. This time the male ruffled its feathers a last time and took off, leaving the female alone on the guard rail.

I am not going to anthropomorphize this behavior. I am not going to anthropomorphize this behavior. I am biting my tongue, hard, with what I’m not going to say. I am not going to anthropomorphize this behavior.

Categories
Critters Plants

Baby greens

I haven’t been in much of a mood for cooking lately, usually making do with soup, eggs or rice and vegetables, and cottage cheese and fruit. Inspired by Joe’s recent writing, though, I decided that the roommate and I needed a really decent meal tonight.

At the store, sirloin steak and sour cream were on sale, so that set the main dish: beef stroganoff, with lots of sweet Vidalia onion, and mushrooms. The baby greens also looked good, and I picked up a radicchio, as well as a curly endive and Belgium endive. To complete the salad fixings, I added vine ripened tomatoes and snow peas.

I can’t do a good vinaigrette to save my life, so I also added a bottle of Newman’s Own Balsamic Vinaigrette.

At home I made a lemon cake, which seemed a nice desert on a rainy day. While it was cooling, I browned the steak and then sautéd the onions and mushrooms before adding water, dry sherry, and tomato juice. While these simmered for two hours, I crisped the greens, and frosted the cake with cream cheese frosting.

Just before dinner, I sautéed the snowpeas in olive oil and a small bit of garlic, until they were bright green and still slightly crisp. I tore the small lettuces into pieces, added the snowpeas and sliced tomatoes, some small, crusty pieces of french bread, and then tossed it with the vinaigrette.

I served the stroganoff over egg noodles, with the salad on the side, cake for desert. I think my roommate liked it, if him going back for thirds is any indication. I had more restraint–I only went back for thirds on the salad. Zoë, however, was a real pig and had four helpings of the baby greens.