Joy, Illimited...

Dear Maria,

Decided to dash off a letter to you in between a list of chores. I know, of course I could spread them out over a few days, but sometimes I get to leaning forward and gather enough momentum to seem busy.

Did set the bluebird house on a pole that I told you about last week. Gave the obligatory speech on how great odds were against any kind of action this season and that even next spring was a longshot for a couple-in-residence.

So? Two mornings later I was waiting for a delivery of three crape myrtles, and while I mostly stared off into the sky, out the corner of my eye I saw a bird streak up into the neighbor’s tree. Yep, a young male bluebird. Then a finch came in, followed closely by a young female bluebird. Those two bluebirds were the first I have seen at that location all season. In my mind, of course, I was convinced the bluebird pair were eyeing the new bird condo.

Late that afternoon, as I took a break after getting the Dynamite crape settled into the ground, the male went to the roof of the house and made a quick survey of the terrain, and then the female flew over and took a quick peek inside. This moment for me capped an hour of digging, and watching an infant on her blanket find her way to a game of peek-a-boo, and laughing as a two-year-old dragged over a level nearly as long as he is tall.

The sky was a high, clear expanse of blue, the sun was warm, and for a stretch, life was a joy to experience. You know I am stingy with words like joy and happiness, but even I succumbed to a feeling “of joy illimited”. The moment was more skylark than thrush, but Hardy’s phrase wins out.

Okay, I am enthusing about birds and kids and trees. Good stuff. There’s my more typical restraint. Better? Colder weather on the way this weekend apparently and before long, less and less to do in the yard as the days get shorter.

Maybe I’ll wax on about scotch and books and boats next time. Until then, may some joy come your way.

Just, for now, srk

 

Say It With Me, Timing...

Dear Maria,

A little melancholy this morning, but even that phrasing is too strong. Absurd, too, having spent a quiet half-hour on the patio. The lantana and roses have bloomed with great vigor, and even the mums I stomped into high grass last year have flowered. Too beautiful to feel anything less than delighted to be alive.

Caught up yesterday with a great friend after a year’s absence—impossible to be that long, and yet so quick in its passing. Remains a matter that perplexes me, how time’s arrow speeds on its course while I am only barely getting around to stringing the bow.

While I got after a sausage and peppers sub at the neighborhood Italian place, her good-natured grilling about how my life was going kept me reassessing the past two years. She, too, shared the twists and turns of her year, and I think we both agreed that a stretch of calm was very welcomed. That letting the universe come to me thing.

Hard to see the rapids for the rapids sometimes. A look back from a flat stretch, a needed vantage to understand how much has been withstood and to provide a respite. Of course, a little rest and back into the rapids. There will always be rapids.

So much of life strikes me as timing—yes yes, timing is everything, or so I have heard, too—but at any given moment with others, catching them where they are and where you are is the X factor. Even as simple as one person having a good day when you are not, or the other way around.

Or changing your mind about sharing what’s on your mind or in your heart. To speak or not to speak. To plunge forward or restrain yourself for a day, a week—forever. We are all in our moments that lead us forward into this future or that future. Blindly. There’s a rub.

Today, I am setting up a bluebird house for a friend. Coincidentally, yesterday afternoon as I stood out on the patio, taking in the scene, a young male bluebird came from over my left shoulder, dipped down to eye level, and then did a power climb nearly straight up 20’, all the while his back to the sun.

The color of his feathers does not exist in the world except for the sky when it is perfect. And then he was joined by another whose coloring matched his. Impossible. While they swooped and circled about the trees, an older male settled on the bluebird condo. A good scene.

Melancholy? Absurd.

May all be well for you and yours,

Always, srk

 

 

Pacing Guides...

Dear Maria,

Thanks for lunch the other day. I know the demands on your schedule—hope my recently buoyed mood was a bit of an antidote for the stress you have been battling. This morning I’m sitting at my desk, watching the elms shimmy in the wind. Storms forecast for later today, and the warm humid air earlier pretty much gave that likelihood away.

Most of us around here had a chance to experience a Saturday a week ago that was so sublime that there simply could not have been any violence in the world that day. Yes, I know better, but hope flings itself eternally forward.

The great hawk—the one of big-shoulders, larger than any hawk I’ve seen before—made another visit the other morning. His seasonal rotation through my little section of the urban forest means that nothing moves while he is in flight and squirrels will be killed. But he is especially attuned to the weather and was about only while we had that cool spell. The smaller hawk that has been announcing sunrise all summer returned a few days ago after being knocked off its perch by the master of these skies.

The first flowers on a loropetalum have appeared this weekend. Not on one of the 4-footers out back that have been in the ground four summers. Instead, out front on one of the six added this May. The runt of that litter that has suffered all summer and that I had most doubts about. Made my morning as I tugged up weeds and Johnson grass. The elms are heavy with flowers as they were last year—another harbinger of a tough winter of cold and ice?

The tether that links me to the calendar remains, but knotted more by the agenda of other’s than my daily or even weekly rhythms. I know it is Homecoming Week at Ashley Ridge, and I can laugh about it being time for me to be finishing up with Macbeth and touting the witches’ brew as a recipe for Halloween. Yesterday, I went out to the mailbox and checked even as I knew since it was my kid brother’s birthday that it was Columbus Day.

I continue to tell my mother that I am letting the universe come to me. I tell my former colleagues that I never feel the need to catch my breath. Life meanders along, the sunrises and sunsets to float me downstream.

Maybe you are drinking a cup of coffee, feet up, sitting on the porch as you read this letter. I like to think so.

As it goes, and yours,

srk

 

 

Billions and Billions of Ones...

Dear Maria,

Finally—Saturday was a hit-the-jackpot kind of day that makes short work of memories of rain and humidity and the heat index. Bluebirds fluttered about their condo, and Max galloped around the backyard nearly all day. As usual, as you know, I will temper my delight with the knowledge of the roller-coaster ride weather-wise that is coming this season. But, for that one day….

You know I have kept my nose out of the daily news mostly since my retirement save for science stories and some sports. The headlines are dosing enough, and without a television, the noise is my life is mostly music, birds, dogs, and some traffic. Oh, and the occasional jet coming in from the west.

Right on cue: A small plane is buzzing overhead. So, those too as well.

The ongoing violence in the Middle East fills columns and propels the yap-fests, of course, but the radical Buddhists in Myanmar determined to crush Islam in their nation is the story that to me screams volumes about the horribly mistaken notion of exclusivity.

Make others’ othernesses a monolithic monster and the hatred begins. All Muslims are…, all Democrats are…, all billionaires are…, all Russians are….  Seven billion individuals on the planet and folks are hunting for oneness?

I did see that a fatwa condemning ISIS came out of Saudi Arabia—yes, I read it. My hope, which is also so very far-fetched, is that every young person in the world between 18 and 30 will decide that enough with violence already. Naïve, I know.

Hold on for a moment. Pulse good, bp holding steady. I have good books to read, good friends to visit, and a supportive family. Scotch is on the shopping list, along with some potting soil.

Life is good.

Hope the turn into October feels like some forward progress for you. Holiday madness looms soon enough.

Yours, srk