May 27, 2004

• Suddenly GREEN

  I’ve been
  avoiding going out lately.  It was either raining or the
  mosquitoes were too thick to breathe.  Today the sun came out and
  the wind came up and made life hard for the skeeters.

  Yaay!  That makes it easier for me.

  A week of rainy days has turned the trees and undergrowth green, but it still has that light, yellowish spring tint to it.

  This first shot, on the left, is my backyard.

  On the right:
  The cup-shaped polypore on this old stump on the north side of the
  house has collected a load of twigs, leaves and assorted debris. 
  Sorta reminds me of the corner near the woodbox, inside the house.

  I did some housecleaning today.  My energy ran dry after picking
  up the litter of old newspapers off the floors, and gathering up a
  winter’s accumulation of empty cat food bags out of the hallway. 
  Then I got Doug to take them out… tomorrow is trash pickup day.

  Doug
  also changed a flat tire on Streak Subaru today.  He had never
  changed a flat before.   I was too short of breath even to
  try, but I thought I’d at least supervise.  I sent him out to get
  the spare out, find the jack, and loosen the lug nuts.  I caught
  my breath, used my asthma inhaler, got my shoes on, and went out to
  supervise.  He had the owner’s manual out, the nuts loose, the car
  jacked up, and was doing fine without me.

  He said, “What I don’t know about cars would fill a book.  That’s
  why they make those manuals.”   Great guy, good with techie
  stuff–when we got the computer, one of the first things he taught me
  was RTFM.

   I
  had cause to resort to the Subaru owner’s manual on a recent trip to
  town.  Going down the road, suddenly a red light on the intstument
  panel came on.  Not too informative, it just said, “EGR” (if I
  recall correctly).  I pulled over immediately and looked it up in
  the book. I found that it means “exhaust gas recirculation” or
  something like that.  It comes on when the odometer turns over a
  certain number of miles.  I made a mental note to call Morg, the
  Subaru specialist, after Greyfox’s car is fixed, to get the system
  checked and the light turned off. 

  Meanwhile, since that red light was distracting me, I dug a bandaid out
  of my purse and stuck it over the light.  That worked okay during
  the day, but after dark the red light shone through the translucent
  bandage.  Greyfox gave me a snippet of black electrical tape
  before I left for home that night, and I stuck that over my bandaid.

  Next time Doug rode in the car, of course he noticed the bandaid with
  the electrical tape over it and asked me about it.  I told him it
  was covering an annoyingly distracting idiot light.  He said it
  sounded like that story  one of the NA members told, about how,
  when he was in active addiction, if his car would start making a new
  noise, he’d turn up the radio to drown it out.  I think I might
  have gotten a tiny bit defensive, explaining that I couldn’t put my car
  in the shop until Greyfox had his back in running condition.

  The pic up there on the right is bunchberries in bloom.  All the
  recent rain followed by this sunshine has brought out a lot of them.

  
  The shot at left is of little rosebuds on the wild Sitka roses.

  I even got some “wildlife” to sit still for a picture (on the right).  It’s a ladybug.

  While I
  was out there, I heard songs and birdcalls from at least four different
  species of bird.  The only sound I recognized was a hawk.  I
  didn’t see it.  I did see one of the other songbirds, but it moved
  fast and all I can say about it is that it was about the size of a
  sparrow.

  After moseying around the yard taking those pics, I leaned on a fender
  and caught my breath, then started out toward the cul de sac.

  Pidney doesn’t think her primate can handle the out of doors all by
  herself.  When I go for a walk, she goes with me.  She
  “mrrraps,”  “meeps,” and goes “ack” at me the whole time we’re out
  there.  She’s the mouthy one, the only highly vocal cat out of
  these three who came with this housesitting gig.  We don’t really
  speak her language, but over the years we’ve figured out that she
  misses her Raoul and wants us to give her a map and a motor scooter so
  she can go to Krakow and look for him… or to Rio… that dirty dog
  moves around.

  Today,
  Pidney was focused on our walk and on the birds and bugs and the scents
  on the wind.  She stretched and slinked and rolled in the dirt.

  All the way out to the end of the cul de sac she kept complaining about
  something.  She simply seemed uneasy because I was out there, like
  a fussy old dueña trying to keep her charge in line and hurry her back
  to the safety of home.  As soon as I turned around and started
  back, she stopped complaining. 

  For a while she disappeared into the weeds and brush at the edge of the
  muskeg, after something.   Whatever it was, got away.  I
  guess it could have been a frog.  I haven’t heard any frogs out
  there for a week or more.  I suppose they all found their mates or
  met a different fate in the jaws of one predator or another.  It’s
  a food chain out there.

  
  This morning Doug packed a lunch and put the head harness on Koji (the
  Gentle Leader makes our husky easier to control on a leash.  With
  just a collar on, he pulls… and pulls–sled dog, y’know?) and they
  walked down to the Su River (the Susitna).  Straight-line, on the
  map, it’s a mile from the highway to the nearer bank of the river–and
  its braided channels make its course a mile wide in this part of the
  valley. 
  The trail along the bluff is probably between 3 and 4 miles, with all
  the ups, downs and cutbacks where erosion has taken chunks out of the
  bluff.

  I’ve not often seen Koji as relaxed as he has been all afternoon… nor
  as excited as he was this morning as Doug prepared for the hike. 
  The dog knew something was up and that it involved him.   He
  wore himself out, with all that excitement and then the walk. 
  He’s stretched on my bed, belly up, asleep now.

  The pic here on the right and the one below, left, are the muskeg
  across the road.  Y’seen one swamp, you’ve seen them all, no? 

  No is right.  You won’t see any mangroves, nor Spanish moss hanging in the trees
  here like you would in the Southeast U.S., nor any of the palos verdes,
  cattails, or mistletoe you’d see around a cienega in the Southwest.

  This
  shot shows how the swamp grass is coming up fresh and green.  It’s
  growing fast and will probably have hidden the water in a week or so.

  That threatening gray sky is to the north.  The vista in the other direction is completely different.

  The next shot here on the right was taken when the sun was behind a cloud.

  The last pic down there below is an angle on the margin of woods and
  muskeg that I photograph almost every time I’m out there.  The bit
  of muskeg up around the bend beyond those trees on the right is the
  place I walked last winter along the snowmobile trail, just to see what
  was around the bend.  What’s out there is more of the same and
  another bend in the trail.

  

  I don’t always do as I’m told, but sometimes I do.
  This was
  stolen from someone who stole it from somebody else.
  I wonder if
  anyone will steal it from me.

  “If there is one person you can’t stop thinking about,
   post this same exact sentence in your journal.”
  

  There is one man I’ve been thinking about since 1962.  His name is
  Larry Joe Turner.  I wonder what ever happened to him.

  

  • 2:39 am
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