Invasions

At first I took it for the wet roof of a house, but one flash following another showed it to be in swift rolling movement. It was an elusive vision—a moment of bewildering darkness, and then, in a flash like daylight, the red masses of the Orphanage near the crest of the hill, the green tops of the pine trees, and this problematical object came out clear and sharp and bright.

And this Thing I saw! How can I describe it? A monstrous tripod, higher than many houses, striding over the young pine trees, and smashing them aside in its career; a walking engine of glittering metal, striding now across the heather; articulate ropes of steel dangling from it, and the clattering tumult of its passage mingling with the riot of the thunder. A flash, and it came out vividly, heeling over one way with two feet in the air, to vanish and reappear almost instantly as it seemed, with the next flash, a hundred yards nearer.

Well, no. Actually, that's just the water tower here in Harwich, and those words are worshipfully lifted from Chapter 10 of H.G. Wells' sci-fi classic, The War of the Worlds, always good summertime reading. But with July 4th coming this Friday, we on the Cape are dealing with an invasion of another sort.

It's true that ever-rising gas prices have had their impact on the sheer numbers of people visiting Cape Cod, but things are still busier here than a few weeks ago. There's longer lines in stores and more cars on the highway. Wailing sirens fill the air, both day and night.

We haven't lived this far up-Cape before, so it's a little hard to judge just how much the economy has impacted things, but you can see the difference at the restaurant. We've not yet seen those crazy nights where there's a waiting line for hours. Surely that will come soon, though...probably as soon as the weekend.

Still, the other day, as I waited at the end of the on-ramp to the highway while a long line of cars passed by, a red car came dashing up beside me, doing close to 50, slipped around me and inserted itself into the flow of traffic, expertly fitting between two cars there was barely enough room to fit. It seemed carefully choreographed, but it was clear to me: the idiots always find the money to go away on vacation. If only they could leave their fast-paced lives behind them, instead of treating a day at the beach like another business appointment.

Here's some of those lychnis flowers I keep talking about. I've got a few of these plants now and I see plenty in the neighborhood. They are one of those plants that likes to sow itself around with impunity and so once you've got one, you seemingly always have it.

I wanted to show off this pair of toymaker gnomes /elves, who are nestled into a bed of holly along the walk into our backyard. Granny painted and fired these at her ceramics class in Florida not too many years ago, shipping first one and then the other to us. They've stood sentinel in several of our gardens now.

My most sincere thanks to all of you, who have expressed your concern, offered your comforting words, good wishes, thoughts and prayers to us and for Granny. We wouldn't be at all surprised to see her make a good recovery from this--that's just the kind of person she's always shown herself to be--but it's become clear this week that it will be perhaps a bigger challenge than she's faced previously.

Dad's flying down there tomorrow and I have no doubt that the sight of her Number One Son's smiling face and the warmth of his hand in hers will go a long way toward bolstering her spirits.

Here's one of those spectacular shasta daisies, about as tall as the top rail of the fence. Others are even taller. More of them open each day and some of them are showing lots of side shoots, so we should see a nice, long-ish show from them this year.

Also notable here is the fly who's doing some pollinator work on the daisy. Notable because these are the pollinators I'm seeing most in the garden this year. There have been some of those round black and yellow bumblebees, though none I've yet managed to photograph...and honestly, they were mostly brought to the yard by the sweet smell of honeysuckle and took little interest in the rest of the border.

I haven't seen a single honeybee this year.


The zucchini seedlings are now almost all sprouted and doing pretty nicely, completing the trio of plants which comprise the Three Sisters garden. I look forward to watching them trail and ramble around, covering the ground and trying to take over.

A warning to you all: now's the time to arrange to rent a guard dog for your front yard, to fortify the locks on your doors, or boost your virus protection: one way or the other, I suspect I'll be trying to sneak great sacks of the slender green vegetables into your life come August.

Here's that yellow rose, now fully in bloom. I still can't quite fathom that the Victorians designated this flower to represent jealousy (did they forget the whole "green with envy" thing? Or did we come to that notion later, when money became so very important?), although I suppose, if you have it growing so delightfully in your yard, there's a possibility your lesser gardening neighbors could hate you for it.

Em and I saw a hawk (I'm pretty sure it was a hawk, anyway, but considering the speed with which everything was happening, I suppose I ought not rule out an osprey) down at the end of Not Wisteria Lane last night, stirring up trouble with a host of smaller birds, who were all ganging up to drive him away from their homes and young ones. Troubling for all those other birds, but still, hawks are so darned cool to see close up, and this one was not far overhead. Of course, the camera was far behind me, back at the house.

Obviously, I did no posting last evening--jeez, I gotta take a break sometime. I did manage to get a little weeding done and edged the beds in advance of Kelly and Carol's visit later today, but I was also on the phone with Mom and Dad for a while and the day's heat lingered into the evening. It took only a minor camera battery SNAFU to encourage me to check email, surf some blogs and then to YouTube (we can make anything a verb, eh?)for a little while instead, before heading off to bed.

Here's another look at the ever-lovely verbena bonariensis, soaring over the rest of the garden bed. Woo hoo...is that a pretty color or what?

Some Days Are Fine, Some A Little Bit Harder

Last night, we were having some steady breezes, easily little gusts without the power to do more than stir the treetops, the leaves' whispers rising and falling in the dark. It's the sort of sound that tells you that there's probably some rain coming...though it continued to not arrive for the longest time. Still the sound of the trees is a soothing one, and the breezes stirred the air and seemed to push away some of the day's humidity, though it was still a warm enough night to sleep atop covers.

Very early this morning, I woke up long enough to realize that soft wooshing sound had changed a little...the difference between leaves rustling and rain washing the leaves of everything in the garden, soaking into the earth, bringing strength to seedlings recently transplanted. It too, was a good sound, and with the cat snuggled against my legs, I settled back against my pillows to sleep a little longer.

When I went out into the garden a little later with my coffee, there was plenty to celebrate. This first snapdragon, which I'd thought to be pink in bud stage, has turned out to be something a little more fiery and exciting.

There are more shasta daisies in bloom each day, and now that the hot magenta lychnis has begun, that's true of them as well. Birds sing, bunnies hop, chipmunks scamper and all seems right with the world.

Of course, that's rarely true, that bit about the world. It's too hot, or there's too much traffic. Loved ones don't necessarily value us the way we hope and probably the same is true of us about them. The almighty dollar turns out to be not nearly as mighty as we'd like. There's too much time to be spent in offices, and well, a thousand other things that just aren't worth going on about.

The garden is my refuge and also my strength, usually giving me smiles enough to get through the day and it teaches me plenty, too.

In the garden, you learn Life isn't always fair. Adorable bunnies have a taste for valuable plants. A plant that is perfect and full of promise one day can be mown down the next by some anonymous insect or accidentally trod upon by some eager pup. Wind can snap lilies or hail pelt your tomato plants. All you can do is clean up the mess, figure out what you can learn from the experience and move on, hoping that next time things might go a little differently.

This weekend I found this pretty eggshell in the vegetable end of the garden, near the bushes where catbirds and house sparrows make their homes. It is, I'm pretty sure, the shell of a catbird egg, and it seems to be empty, so my hope is it was just tossed out during post-fledgling nest cleaning.

While researching to confirm the egg type, though, I did learn that sometimes cowbirds will lay their eggs in catbird nests, and if they manage to replace the catbird's first egg at the same time, the catbird will occasionally be fooled into thinking that its own subsequent eggs are imposters and toss them out of the nest, incubating instead the egg of the cowbird.

You see: Life's just not always fair.

This morning saw the usual examination of things, admiring a strong seedling here, whispering encouragement to others over there, taking another noseful of that heliotrope, yanking out a few tufts of grass, and realizing that once again, it was time to trim the edges of the bed to make it look tidier.

When I was through, I decided to give Granny a call. She's been on my mind always lately, as you can imagine, and I hadn't been able to talk to her in a while. I thought perhaps I could encourage her in her recovery efforts with talk of a thriving garden. And at first, we did just that.

But then something changed, and all of a sudden she was very confused, repeating herself almost endlessly, her words getting mixed up in her sentences, seeming to think for a minute or two that she was talking to someone else. This evening finds her back in the hospital once again, as she may have suffered a worse injury than we'd originally believed. Everything else seems to leave my mind and she is, quite naturally, all I can think about.

One of the many things that she and I talked about the morning before her accident were a set of solar lights shaped like tulips, which she'd recently seen in a catalog. She wanted to know what I thought of them, and of course, I thought they sounded pretty neat. She asked if I'd like them and I said sure, but suggested that perhaps there were other things she ought to be spending her money on (like, in hindsight, rides to the grocery store)instead.

But it turns out that she had her own ideas, as always, and she had either already ordered them for me, or did so when we finished talking that day.

For as I sat by the window this morning, thinking about our confused and unsettling phone call, worrying about her and wishing I could be at her side, even knowing there's nothing much I could do for her, a package arrived with the morning mail, containing a set of those silly solar lights.

I wasted little time in assembling them and then finding them homes within the garden bed, so they could soak up all the sun the day had to offer. They were glowing brightly out there in the garden when I got home from work and I've lit my wee lanterns to add to their light.

Tonight I don't hope to attract the fairy folk, nor am I much in the mood for leaping and dancing. But I hope they add some positive energy to the world, all of which I send in my Granny's direction.

Tonight, the garden is my comfort and I hope, hers, too.

Clouds Across the Moon

Last night we hosted a barbecue. Not a huge affair, nothing to trouble the neighbors with, just a chance to spend some time with some friends outside the workplace, celebrate the arrival of the warmer months and have some laughs.

There was good food, good drink, good company, good tunes, hammock swinging, bird poo and hot tubbing. Pretty much everything a proper party requires.


There was even a garden tour or two, with guest appear ances by the nibblers, who were in stealth mode with all the parked cars for cover.


My morning watering routine always includes emptying the cruddy water out of the bird bath, then rinsing and refilling it so it's always fresh for the birdies. So I always take the cap off, and so I was surprised this morning to discover this elaborate network of spiderwebs inside the flower pot-base of the birdbath, where none existed yesterday.

I thought the pattern was pretty cool, especially the way it turns invisible close to the edges and seems to just hang in midair like some anti-gravity science project. I wonder what sort of bugs you catch in a dark, dank space like that.

It turned cool last evening as the party was winding down. In fact, we even caught the scent of skunk drifting on the air. Fan of classic cartoons that I am, I'd love to be able to say that the distinctive scent drifted through the gathered guests and the cry of "Le Pew!" went up, causing a cloud-raising stampede for the cars. But really, the party was just about put to bed by the time the skunk seemed to pass by.

A nice surprise this weekend. You may recall that way back on April 1st, when I planted those first sunflower seeds, I also potted up a ginger root that my Granny sent me. After two long months, it has finally burst through the surface of the potting soil in this big pointy nub.

Before long, there'll be several stalks, each one about two feet high and as the summer goes on, there'll be purple flowers. I look forward to sharing them with you.

Always one to take a cue from the Universe, I poured myself another cup of coffee after the watering was through and called Granny in Florida for a nice phone visit. She sounded great and we had a terrific chat, mostly about gardens but also about life in general. She turned 89 a few weeks ago and this spring also decided to give up driving...which she hadn't been doing for all that long.

With the price of gas being what it is, she doesn't really miss the expense of driving, but definitely some of the convenience. I counseled caution when she talked about crossing four lanes of traffic to go grocery shopping. We've encouraged her to take cabs with the money she saves not having a car, but she's always been an independent thinker and does what she likes.


This afternoon at work, I heard a lot of bird activity outside and discovered this red tailed hawk perched up on the power pole. He was taking a break from deviling a few crows' nests in the area, causing the black birds to start mobbing this bigger bird when it resumed soaring through the air.

I was able to hear that distinctive cry a few times...what a sound! You can hear it here, if you like.

The rose bush which was here on the property before I built a garden around it is now covered with buds, many of them about to unfurl. I wonder if it will be scented.


Did you know that June 14th is commemorated as Flag Day here in the U.S.? It's the anniversary of the date that the Stars and Stripes was adopted as the flag of the country in 1777.

The holiday was established nationally by Woodrow Wilson in 1916, but made official by Harry Truman through an Act of Congress in 1949.

I'm sure you know that seamstress Betsy Ross designed the first version of the stars and bars in 1776, inspired by the misadventures of Bugs Bunny and a garden rake.

Our temperatures remained on the cool side today, in the sixties and clouds are drifting across the moon this evening. In fact, the forecast suggests that the week ahead may be a rainy one. It'll be a busy week at work, so this is not bad news to me.

However, some troubling news did come this evening, in a phone call from Mom.

After our conver sation this morning, Granny was heading over to the Publix, and while crossing the afore-mentioned four lanes of traffic, was hit by a car.

She's in the hospital this evening in Gainesville, and we're all feeling a bit helpless here in the north and awaiting word on how she's doing.

If prayers are in your kitbag, I ask you to share one for her good health and speedy recovery. If not prayers, then any good thoughts you can spare in her direction would be most welcomed and appreciated.

Although I'm worried as hell, I expect she will be just fine--after all, this morning she told me she was planning to beat her elder sister's lifespan of 90, making her the longest-lived on that side of the family.

Spring Storms but Good Times

Today was a stormy day, as it turns out, with a whole series of thunderstorms sliding rumbling by overhead. You can kind of tell that, from the size of the puddle out behind the restaurant. Fortunately, the hail was just a momentary thing and didn't repeat throughout the day.


As you can see, I got a couple of great cloud photos, though I wasn't lucky (or unlucky?) enough to capture any lightning strikes. I was inside for most of those.

As you can see, the weather isn't stopping us from having a good time. Mom and Dad are in town for the week, and Sue and Joe on Cape for the weekend. Tonight we all got together for a fun dinner out.

Although I'm still experimenting with the settings on the camera, you can still see we were having a great time together!

Happy Family

Sharing a household with a dog and a cat is not exactly peaceful. Although they seem to like one another well enough, it seems they are always vying for attention and rarely comfortable sharing it.

All that makes this evening's photo of what appears to be domestic bliss something just short of miraculous.

Maybe someday we'll be able to get a shot of all four of us. : )

Wild Center

Today, in an effort to get out of the house and work off some of yesterday's Great Feasting, we made a roadtrip to Tupper Lake, to visit the newly-opened Wild Center, a natural history museum of the Adirondacks. It's an amazing place...and a terrific spot to pass an afternoon.

The focal point of the Wild Center is a series of water tanks, linked one to another, showcasing a series of wildlife habitats and hosting an assortment of aquatic wildlife, including a heritage strain of native brook trout. There were turtles, too, though they were much too active for my photo-taking skills.


In addition to these large tanks, there's a great assortment of smaller terrariums and other exhibits featuring frogs, toads, more turtles, snakes, salamanders and a host of other creatures.

The highlight of the visit, perhaps, are the river otters. They have several "on staff" at the Wild Center, and they come out to the exhibition tank alternately (as they are not all well-acclaimated to one another yet.). Great fun to watch, but even more difficult to photograph, since they dash through the water so very quickly.

Finally I got this halfway decent shot when this one paused on the play rock. Amusing to note that the otters have a Kong toy not unlike Emily's!

One of the larger exhibits features a faux glacier. These giant ice sheets were largely responsible for making the Adirondack region what it was today. They also make a great backdrop for potential Christmas card photos!

One of the extra surprises of our visit came in the Panoramic theatre, when we came across some old friends of mine who were also in town visiting family! We had a pretty quick visit, but it was great to see them.



All in all, it was one more great day in a series of them, and a good one to make my last in the Adirondacks for a while. Tomorrow I'll pack up and head East again for the Cape. It's always nice to get back home...


"Nature is one connected whole. At any given moment every part must be precisely what it is, because all the other parts are what they are." - Johann Gottlieb Fichte, 1762-1814

A Gardening Heritage

Morning in Long Lake: 28 degrees. Here's the view from Mom and Dad's front deck.


It's true, in November, there isn't too much to see outside, not from a gardener's perspective, anyway. Even these late season asters have called it quits. But while Mom was at work, Dad and I had a few projects to keep us occupied.

We had a number of boxes of old photos and other family memorabilia to look through. This is a shot of my great-grandma Berns (that's her in the middle of the back row...before she was anyone's grandma, or even a Berns, for that matter!) with her brothers Townsend and Clarence and their mother in front.

I just love this picture. It's 1933, and that's Great Grandma B.'s lower half on the ladder, and her dog Tippy, who's apparently decided to help pick fruit or prune...or at the very least, mug for the camera.

Here's a pair of shots of my Granny, who was just Josephine back then. In the first photo, she's age six (that's likely my aunt Florence up in the tree to the left). The second shows her laden with rhubarb at age 7.

Here's another photo of Grandma Berns, taken in her garden at 305 Wood Ridge Avenue (actually, I believe that's where all but the first of these photos were taken) in the early 1960s. I do actually have some vague memories of her garden myself. And I can only assume that she grew allyssum, among many other things, as the scent of it always takes me back there.

And then there's this photograph, from a Halloween party in 1962. The butterfly is my Aunt Florence, the butterfly hunter is my Uncle Charlie...and yes, that's Great Grandma Berns in the background as a French maid!!