A springtime walk

Azalea in bloom.

Flowers open every night
across the sky, a breathing peace,
and sudden flame catching.

~ Rumi

A little bit closer.

Spring is here, busting out all over the place.  To be honest, it’s more like summer lately than spring although we are still getting a few cool days and nights here and there.  The warm weather has brought a plethora of insects that fly in clouds before me when I mow the lawn.  I think they are craneflies.  The cranefly’s common name is “mosquito hawk” although they have nothing to do with mosquitoes.  In their adult stage, it’s all about love.  They’re here to mate and lay eggs for next year.  They don’t bite, and in fact might even be helpful as pollinators since some types of cranefly like to sip and sample some of the flowers that are in bloom.

Snowball bush heavy with blooms.

It has been a stellar year for the flowering trees and shrubs.  The cherry and Asian pear trees were so laden with blossoms that the branches bowed down toward the ground.  I’m not sure if it’s just a particularly good year for flowers or if all the pruning and clearing we’ve been doing is finally paying off.  Either way, the wildlife will eat well when the fruit of the cherry and pear trees ripen.

Pin oak by the garden leafing out.

The petals from the cherry trees were creating small blizzards a few days ago as the wind blew them from the trees.  The loblolly pines continue to produce copious amounts of yellow pollen that coats everything.  When I go out for a walk, I come back with yellow shoes.  They are not yellow when I leave the house.  They are dark green (Muck shoes).  The pine pollen coats them and turns them a bright yellow.  It’s difficult to keep the camera lens clean, too.  The pollen loves sticking to glass surfaces.

The doe and the turkey by the pond.

My gardening adventures have been limited.  The ticks have been really bad this year, and I am sadly considering deconstructing the scrounger’s garden and mowing it over.  If this past winter was an indication of things to come, the insects are going to get worse.  We need a prolonged period of below freezing temperatures, and that seems to be harder and harder to come by since we moved here.  During my last attempt to weed under the lavender and sage, I found my arms and legs covered with tiny ticks.  There were too many to count.  The insect repellent (and I’ve tried several) doesn’t seem to be repelling them.

An Eastern Bluebird enjoying the new perch.

If you were to come for a visit, you might notice some odd metal objects in the front yard.  One is simply a long piece of metal tubing that comes straight up out of the ground and curves out about a foot or two at the top.  The other is an old rooftop television antenna.  We put them out there so the birds can perch on them.  The Eastern Bluebirds like to use them during the spring months.  The simple one (the metal tubing) was used as a platform to teach their babies to fly last spring.  We just installed the antenna in the front yard this year.  The bluebirds found it this week, and don’t seem to mind that this one is a bit closer to the house.

Pretty bird.

The antenna, in case you’re wondering, is one of the many things we’ve repurposed around here.

A male cardinal surveying the area.

The birds have been quite active, building nests and laying eggs.  Yesterday I watched as two Blue-gray Gnatcatchers worked on building a nest in the mulberry tree.  They are lovely little birds.  You can find a photo I took of one here, and another photo of a nest here.  They use lichens in their nests and the result is quite beautiful.  Apparently they are good mimics and will imitate bits of songs from jays, warblers, vireos, and other birds.

Sitting on a garden fence post.

They say you shouldn’t blog about blogging or apologize for your blogging schedule whether you are blogging too much or not enough.  They say people find that sort of thing boring.  If the subject of blogging is not at all interesting to you, feel free to skip over this paragraph and the next, and make your way past the next image.

Now that the disclaimer (of sorts) is out of the way…  Perhaps you’ve noticed I have not been blogging on a regular basis.  Perhaps you’ve noticed that I have been bringing up this subject every now and then since last November.  The good news is that this is not related to politics anymore.  The better news is that it is related to the fact that I have been doing a lot of writing of a personal nature lately, learning a lot, releasing a lot, and somewhere in the process, finding myself and my voice.  This takes time, the time usually spent on blogging.  The best news of all is that it leaves me little time for whatever is being reported as news these days.    I try to maintain a good balance between staying informed and avoiding overload.  So much of the news lately is geared towards acts of violence (whether it be towards people, the earth, or other inhabitants of this planet).  It’s not the type of energy I wish to absorb or put out.  Limiting my view of the news helps with that.

One of the guardian bees near the dock. (I call them guardian bees because they hover around in a small area — usually along a walkway –and greet me whenever I come walking up to them.)  I have been trying to get a good picture of one of them for almost four years now.  I finally did it.

That’s out of the way so let’s wander around a bit, shall we?

• I love this:  The Pyramid and the Pool.  There is a little ad at the end, a mention of the Write Into Light course which, oh my goodness, I wish I could afford to join!  The price is way too high for me.
• Here is a really good look at the blue-gray gnatcatcher and nest building:  Catching Gnats and Plucking Lichens.
• The Importance of Female Friendships with another good link to follow.
• The Beach, a Memory, a delightful read that put a smile on my face this morning.
• Something beautiful and heartbreaking:  On loss and spring.

In fact, I got more than one photo. My next goal is to get one of them facing me. That will be more difficult since they come up so close to check me out.

In other news… Today is Little Wookie’s first birthday.  Although he’s as smart as can be, he can’t read yet.  Nonetheless, Happy Birthday, Little Wookie from Momo and Gramps!  Sending you lots of love and magical birthday wishes.

Little Wookie having a good laugh.  Sometimes he just throws himself forward when he laughs.  (We saw him when we went to Cleveland for the film festival at the beginning of the month.)

I reckon that’s about it from the Wabi-Sabi Ranch on this cloudy and somewhat cool Wednesday.  Thank you so much for visiting and wandering around with me for a little while.  I don’t expect we’ll see much of a sunset this evening, but you never know.  If it looks good, let’s head to the Point for a little stroll around the beach while we wait to see what the sun and clouds will do.  Sunset is scheduled for 7:43 PM.

Buttercups are scattered across the landscape now. I think the fairies must have come for a visit one night and left them as a gift.

Be good, be kind, be loving.  Just Be.  🙂

Wild cherry in the woods.

A few of the 10,000 reasons to be happy:  181)  Buttercups and butterflies.  Even the Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterflies are out and about now.  182)  Love in the air.  183)  Little Wookie, for at least ten thousand and one reasons.  184)  The spring green of the new leaves on the trees.  185)  The guardian bees who are always friendly spirits.