FIELD NOTES: In pure New England style, there has been a reprieve…

Sunday: Before & After

…from the predicted rainy weekend and now I can take a swipe or two at those leaves that last weekend were doomed to overwinter on the lawn. At the stroke of 9:30, the first leaf blower has sounded in the neighborhood giving me the go-ahead to put on my work clothes and head out, although I will be quietly hand raking and then mulching the piles with the lawn mower. Never buy a house before you research its trees; dangerously old oaks with leaves as leathery and large as baseball mitts and the spindly locusts with confetti for leaves that will hang on nearly until new buds evict them do not respond very well to mulching. Oh for a stand of compliant primary colored maples! Mercifully, the entry on Lawns in Wikipedia has given me a place to lay blame for my love-hate relationship with lawn and leaf:

“In the United States, it was not until after the Civil War that lawns began to appear outside middle-class residences. Most people did not have the hired labor needed to cut a field of grass with scythes; average home owners either raised vegetables in their yards or left them alone. If weeds sprouted that was fine. Toward the end of the 19th century, suburbs appeared on the American scene, along with the sprinkler, greatly improved lawn mowers, new ideas about landscaping and a shorter workweek.”

...and towards the bottom of the entry, further explanation (and a long list) of the meaning of ‘maintenance’ in the ‘burbs:

“There is often heavy social pressure to mow one's lawn regularly and to keep up with the Joneses. Maintaining higher quality lawns may require special maintenance procedures:”

But I feel more like Pooh today, so perhaps I’ll rake a pile…and just jump right in!

FIELD NOTES: It’s the morning after Halloween, yet I hear…

Through the window

…the clatter of little bicycle wheels in the circle…and sweetened giggles. Last night, even though it was oddly seventy degrees, the trick-or-treaters came early to beat the pouring rain and swelling wind. The lights went out prematurely. The weather forecast for the coming week classically mirrors my daughter’s in Seattle: partly cloudy, fifty…and then more rain for the weekend, so…it’s official: the leaves will prevail and overwinter on my lawn. So be it. Some gentle folks are beginning to mourn the season’s passing but, by my (Polish) nature, I gravitate toward the bittersweet, towards its mysteries and challenges. Even when I set out to be gloomy - because like Eeyore it is pleasantly self-indulgent to be so - inevitable sleep, or…a mug of coffee, or…a cup of tea, or…antics out the window, or…something…rallies me…which can be annoying if you’ve just gotten yourself into a good funk…and there is plenty to be funky about! As I write, a new wind - like a sharp-nailed witch’s hand - has just yanked the jack-o-lantern flag hanging out by the front door…and then…disappeared, as if to snidely remind me that it is not all honey in The Hundred Acre Wood, there are Heffalumps…and Woozles…and it is time to walk the plank…to bravely find deeply hidden beauty…

“In the midst of winter, I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer.” – Albert Camus, 1913-1960, French novelist, author and philosopher, 1957 Nobel Prize Winner for Literature

Optimism and Pessimism Quotes and Quotations

FIELD NOTES: To be of few words...

Harrybrooke Haiku

...is sometimes to be wished for…

October Walking

Leaves tattle: "Feet! Feet!"
Soft brown needle shower, I
seal lips, hold breath…fall…

My Seattle Bento Box

Title inspired by a New York Times article

FIELD NOTES: My head cold has been replaced with a new malady….

Sunday morning musings

…fall festival overload. Unlike summer, fall does not unfurl like a satin runner down a long aisle, affording the opportunity to smile and wave as you step, lightly-clothed, down its path. Autumn, especially in New England, bursts overhead like a comet; you catch its full beauty only if your timing is right. There are so many ‘festivals’ available this weekend, that yesterday I woke up with a headache and, after managing to tutor a student for several hours in the morning, took a 3 hour nap on a sunny bed. As if to prove there was nothing wrong with me, I got up and mowed the front lawn, stopped to rake the pine cones and needles covering half of it, then roasted a chicken for supper, listened to Prairie Home Companion and Thistle & Shamrock before hunkering down under the covers with The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, my latest book club selection. There…that’s about as ‘twittery’ as I’ll get…and only to emphasize the point that I have ‘festival overload’. My town has been going through an identity crisis for the past decade or so as it tries to transition from agrarian to touristy and also to meld the two. Every group and organization wants a piece of the apple pie which usually includes fund-raising and/or merchandising. When I was growing up a few towns over, there was no need for farm festivals; if you wanted to see farm animals or needed to buy some corn or squash or pumpkins or apples or cider, you stopped at one. Fall wasn’t advertised, it just happened. Just about every other house in my neighborhood has a version of a scarecrow on a stick purchased at the store for $4.99…including yours truly! To revive creativity, we had our preschool class stuff some extra kid’s clothes in our classroom with paper leaves, tape a ball on for the head, prop him in a little rocking chair and they named our ‘new student’ Macy. It was refreshing to see them excitedly take ownership of this half-planned activity. I love fall…I guess it’s just too brief…it’s time again to clean the patio & garden and put away all their charming accessories. There is urgency unlike summer because, ready or not, winter can now strike at any time putting an abrupt end to autumnal tasks…and pleasures. Not a good year for tomatoes, the prettiest things in my vegetable garden are the pinwheels I weaved into the wire fencing so, in the afternoon that promises to be a gorgeous fall day, I will break it down and take a trip to the local farm shop to decorate it with some mums, ornamental cabbage, straw bale and maybe a pumpkin or two. In the end, it is not the fall festivals that I am actually critical of; it is not having enough time to enjoy all the nooks and crannies of the season. If the workday talk after this long Columbus Day weekend begs the question “How come you didn’t go the _____ festival?” I will say I did…at home…

6pm Postscript: 'round about 3 p.m., I had lots of company outdoors...the rev and lurch of tractors and mowers, the rhythm of rakes, the whoops of little boys filled the air...it seems everyone was done with the festivals...and it turns out we all have similiar needs...especially in New England...

FIELD NOTES: A day for stones...

Sunday rest

…home doing nothing, (a rare occurrence only because I have a head cold) I am eating breakfast on the couch with the CBS Sunday Morning show. Bill Geist brings out a gentle segment about stone skipping and a competition in Franklin, PA. It looks so simple, so pleasantly old-fashioned and countrified, I wish I was there! I am fascinated not by the stone skipping as much as I am fascinated about how it relaxes me, takes me to the summery memory of my father showing off one of his ’dad skills’ by demonstrating how to skip stones across our favorite swimming hole, a pastime he perfected during his Depression-era childhood. It may seem like a waste of time, to go around collecting potential skipping rocks like world record setter Russ Byars does, but what a refreshing step back from the world of business…&…it must be no coincidence that I chose river stones for wallpaper on my laptop because I find them soothing to look at…&...it must also be no coincidence that a card slipped out of the medicine cabinet today for Magic River Stones™, the ones I had purchased to arrange around the lucky bamboo plant in the green-glazed pot. I stopped to read the card: “These beautiful stones are jasper, quartz and agate. They were naturally shaped by an ancient river in China, which for more than 2,000 years has been a pilgrimage site for people collecting lucky stones. Beautiful stones have always held a fascination for people from every culture. They are wonderful to carry as personal talismans or for use in fountains or to put around plants to slow moisture evaporation and to add a bit of beauty, luck and magic to your life.”…&…another non-coincidence must be the trail I followed from a blog comment that led me to wildramblings.com and an article about a stone wall in the woods adventure…&…might it be another coincidence that I created a “Zen rock bottle” for myself. On Labor Day, I quelled my impatience waiting for a family member by sitting on the front steps and counting the tiny pea gravel from the walkway as I dropped them one by one into a Soave Italia wine bottle. The wine was not particularly memorable – I had been persuaded by the bottle’s balletic bend of the neck and its green tint with spare silvery gray graphics – but it was a calming, meditative physical action to wait by dropping stones into a bottle. I got up to 400 and when I picked up the bottle to put it back inside, the glass with the rocks was warm against by body. And I would remember that. Today, I needed some vitamin D for my cold, so I put 200 more stones into the bottle. It was a good day for stones….and all because I have a cold….


(Yes, this is what 600 tiny stones amount to!)