Observations

Warm, balmy winds blew across the lake as we sat in our lawn chairs just off the shoreline.  When we got overly warm, we shoved off and swam for a bit, then came back to read some more.

It was this morning that I realized that yes, I had brought along plenty to read with library loans and e-books on the Nook, but none of them could go out on the water. I had to turn to the "beach books" library stored in the camper.  We bought them at library book sales last fall and this spring.  At fifty cents a book, they could tumble into the water, no worries.

Today, Gary was trying to read one of my favorite authors, Elizabeth Peters and having a tough go of it. With his urging, I was reading a Kinky Friedman novel.  I think we both came to the conclusion that dropping both books in Lost Lake would be a blessing.  Instead we will take them to the Florence library on Monday and peruse their book sale racks.

We spent some time discussing chipmunks.  The Laura Lake chipmunks are fat and sassy little beggars, willing to climb on laps if they are ignored in their pursuit of peanuts.  The Lost Lake chipmunks are thin little guys, who look like they had a bad winter.  They come for peanuts if they are offered, but keep their distance.

Gary has four hummingbird feeders up and we get regular visitors there.  Birdseed offerings are being ignored by all species, even though I saw a rose-breasted grosbeak on the trail and called to it to follow me back to the campsite.

I was just finishing my after dinner cookie when a bird almost hit my head, flew past and landed on a birch tree a few feet away.  It was a black backed woodpecker, rare almost everywhere else but Lost Lake which seems to be woodpecker heaven.  There are hairy woodpeckers everywhere and the occasional monster pileated version. One year we think we saw a three toed woodpecker.  Robins are one thing in the morning, but the racket of all those woodpeckers in the morning would wake the lately deceased.

So our days go here at Lost Lake.

One Thing After Another

With rain forecast at Lost Lake in the Nicolet National Forest, near the Michigan border, my plan was to relax with a good book or two. 

I had a few books on reserve through the Seymour Library dating back several months ago and suddenly, in the course of three days, five of them showed up, just in time for this camping trip.  In paper, I have My Two Moms,  by Zach Wahls and Michelle Obama's kitchen garden book.

Three e-books arrived,  Anne Rice's Interview with the Vampire, Brian Lamb's book on historical landmarks, and Coraline, by Neil Gaimon.  Then I have another book soon due at the library, though that's renewable, plus a Nevada Barr e-book I purchased some time ago.  I figured if I read a book every other day, I would be OK. After weeks of gardening, days of reading and relaxation sounded about right.

We began outside, sitting on lawn chairs as we read, occasionally feeding chipmunks at what Gary calls The Hard Rock Cafe. 

The rain drove us inside finally.  I continue reading until mid-afternoon when Gary decided we needed to pick up supplies.  He needed batteries and such at the Ace Hardware in Iron River, Michigan, and that led us to St. Vincent de Paul Thrift Store to buy a swimsuit.  I left my swimming bag hanging on a hook at home. I found an Eddie Bauer swimsuit for $2, like new and it fit perfectly. 

At Angeli's supermarket we found the produce we need.  The Family Dollar had the aspirin I take daily.  

Then it was off to the Lake Ottawa campground to visit our friend Anita Joy.  

But before that, we came over a hill to find Mama Raccoon trying to hustle her three kits across the road.  We pulled to a stop as she nosed one kit off the road, but the other two cheerfully scooted under our van and climbed on a rear tire. We made all the noise we could but they stayed right where they were, chattering away. What was our problem anyhow?  Mama had taught them to climb up something in an emergency, and here they were on a perfectly good tire. There was no way we could move without squishing the little guys and cars were coming down the road.  

Finally, Gary crawled under the van and using my jacket, picked up one, then the other and carried them across the road where Mama could find them. There are little paw prints all over the jacket. I didn't think to take a photo until it was all over. 

We had a brief chat with Anita Joy, who could talk for hours if given a chance, but begged off because we were off to an old fashioned Wisconsin fish fry at Fritz's in Long Lake.  Fritz is still there, though he's been trying to sell the place for years.  The fish was good, and off we went down Fay Lake Road toward the campground.  We took Fay Lake Road because several years ago, we saw a black bear there. 

Sure enough, there was a yearling several miles down the road, about 150 pounds Gary estimated.  I tried to take a photo, but it turned out blurry.  Still, a bear!

Next stop was Chipmunk Rapids where we get water from an artesian spring.  We came to the bridge over the rapids and there was our next critter.  It was a big mama snapping turtle busy laying eggs in the dirt at the side of the road.  It wasn't an auspicious spot because ATVs often drive off the road there, but there is no arguing with a big snapper who can bite fingers off humans if irritated.  

Gary tried taking photos but the camera malfunctioned. Usually, we try to herd turtles across roads to safety, but she was busy doing her matronly best to preserve the species.  We went on.

So here we are, back at Lost Lake after a day with Nature's children, and the only photo we have to show for it is of the chipmunk.  

You have to take my word for all of this.

----
Wade Peterson's latest story about a last meal is at http://blackcoffeefiction.blogspot.com  This brings us to 38 short stories since last September.  I must write my next one here at the campground.

Hello forest, goodbye garden

I'm off to join Gary in the Nicolet National Forest today.  It will be a joy to hike some of the familiar trails and to reunite with the loons, osprey, and eagles at Lost Lake.

But in doing so, I must say good-bye to my beloved gardens for a week.

I live an itinerant life in the summers.  I camp and go off on storytelling tours.  This summer is no different.

Because I am gone so much, I miss some of the gaudier garden displays.  There is yellow rose bush in the back yard.  I know it is there because Gary has taken photos of it while I am gone.

I haven't seen my lilies in years.  This year, because of the unusual warm weather, the garden is ahead of schedule by up to three weeks, so this morning I could photograph the first of the oriental lilies.

There's a pink lily nearby, but whether I get to see it in person is anyone's guess.  The yellow day lilies are in full bud so probably will be over in a week.  

The peonies are wonderful this year.  The blooms aren't as huge as they were last year, but there are hundreds of them.  By the time I come back, the petals will have fallen and I can expect to spend some time clearing the mess and pruning. 

The sweet William is blooming nicely but a white variety is just starting elsewhere and will be done by the time I am home next week. 

What I do know is that my neighbors like to wander through to see what is going in my quiet garden.  Felicity and Dylan next door chase around the paths with their little friends.  Walkers come down the sidewalk and stop short to take a gander.  So someone is enjoying the show even when I am gone.   

Politics, Dirt and Philosophy

Yesterday, the recall of Governor Walker failed. I am disappointed but philosophical.

I've been voting since I was 21, which works out to 47 years of elections.  In all, I've only missed five, and those were school board elections when I was moving and felt I should have no say; town elections where everyone ran unopposed so what was the point; and minor elections held when I was out of the country. Back then absentee ballots weren't as easy as they are now.

More often (much more often) than not, I wound up voting for the loser. Since I am always an informed voter, it can be dismaying when the electorate votes for the worst candidate.

After a while, you get used to it.  The advantage then is that when someone complains about a politician I calmly say I didn't vote for him or her. I didn't vote for Nixon, didn't vote for either Bush, didn't vote for Carter either. Every so often I voted for a third party candidate when I couldn't abide either of the mainstream party offerings.

In this case, the governor wasn't recalled, but he is being investigated for election fraud and bid rigging, so it is likely he won't fill out a complete term anyhow.   As a headline in the Huffington Post asked before the election, would it be a pink slip or an orange jumpsuit?  It wasn't a pink slip, so now I look forward to the jumpsuit. Time will tell.

I didn't watch the news all day yesterday or last night.  Instead, I worked on the garden.  A year ago, the city forced me to remove the flowers I had tenderly planted on the terrace strip.  What was left after friends and neighbors helped me dig up the area was a terrible mess.  This spring, many of the plants came back to haunt me.

Three weeks ago, I set to work, spading, grading, and planting.  Today, I finished the job.

Along the edge of the curb, I put old bricks taken from the city dump.  Eventually, these will be replaced by the red tiles we used farther down, but for the moment, I just needed something to keep weeds down. The plastic fencing will come down once the plants are firmly established.  Most of them are vines that will grow thicker and thicker as the years pass.

Gary has gotten into the spirit of the thing.  He wants to get rid of all the grass on the other side of the sidewalk, replacing it with lilies, shrubs, and more red tiles.

Now that I've finished this section, the front of the house is complete.  The rest of my property needs so much work. Tomorrow, I join Gary at the campground at Lost Lake for a few days.  When I return, I figure on spending at least one week on the south side of the house, two weeks on the north side, and the rest of the summer on the back yard.

It is good to get my hands dirty.  It's cleaner than politics.

American Grown

I'm reading First Lady Michelle Obama's first book, American Grown: The Story of the White House Kitchen Garden and Gardens Across America.   


Even before President Obama won his election in 2008, Mrs. Obama was thinking about doing something about childhood obesity and she thought creating a garden on the White House lawn would be a beginning.  In April 2009, she planted the first garden with the help of experts and school children.  Now in its fourth year, the garden has been a great success, providing fresh produce for White House events and to a food bank.  Visiting dignitaries receive baskets with bounty from the garden.

I've been gardening for decades but still am learning a few tricks from this book.  I have a small vegetable garden, and it won't get much bigger because of the many shade trees we have here. I am happy with the trees, as are the flowers, so I make do with a small space.  I grow beans, peas, lettuce, asparagus, squash, tomatoes, and a few other things.  For the rest, we go to farmers' markets.

Mrs. Obama has the benefit of experts and many helpers.  The National Park Service (the White House is their responsibility) provided a horticulturist.  The many chefs in the White House include canning the produce in their responsibilities.  A local organic farmer provides advice on design, plants and soil.

One of the White House carpenters raises bees as a hobby and brought hives to the garden.  There were some interesting problems.  The hives had to be strapped down because the winds from the presidential helicopter would knock them over. Parents of school children working in the garden worried they might be stung. (They weren't)  In 2011, the hive produced 225 pounds of honey.

In reading this, I realized I wasn't seeing any honeybees in my garden this spring.  In May, we had the little Mason bees that swarm around the tulips and daffodils and disappear around the time the honeybees show up.  But this year, I am only seeing bumblebees and hornets.  Was it the early spring followed by frosts?  I do know that there are only a few apples forming and I am not seeing pears at all.

I am thinking about getting a bale of straw to use to cut down on weeds.  There is also an idea about using paper cups with the bottoms cut out to start plants in the ground.  I wonder if that would work for carrots.

I like trying new things.  This year, I decided to put starter tomato pots on the bottom of one of Gary's bird feeders with impatiens pots at the top where they are shaded. Gary thinks the squirrels will knock everything over, but so far, so good. Once the tomatoes are planted elsewhere, I'll fill those pots with flowers, too.

We're still suffering from drought, so I must water the gardens nightly to keep things growing. But then in 2011, Washington, D.C. suffered from drought, a hurricane, and an earthquake, so Mrs. Obama has her gardening problems as well.

Escape

Tomorrow is election day in Wisconsin.  I've been anxious about the recall because this governor has changed my state, a state I've been so proud of.  It wasn't only about unions, though Wisconsin has always led the nation in workers' rights.  

It wasn't that he was incapable of working with the opposition party, creating a civil war in a friendly state.

It wasn't even that he seemed to be in the pocket of the Koch Brothers, a pair of billionaire uber conservatives.  

It was all the rest:

-- hiring a jumped up expert from Texas whose recommendation is to put state land into private hands.  

Sportsmen would have to pay to hunt. 

-- changing gun rules to allow people to pack anywhere, even in the state legislature.  

-- demanding voter IDs to solve a problem of voter fraud that never existed.  (The courts put an injunction on this for the time being.)

-- he tried to let a mining company with a record of environmental disasters come into Wisconsin to the edge of Lake Superior, one of the last pristine water sources in the world.  Worse, the company wrote the legislation which would have made them unaccountable for problems, leaving the state to pick up any costs.  One Republican state senator balked at that but the assault on our natural resources is not dead.  

-- he put realtors in charge of the state Department of Natural Resources.  The idea was to make it easier to build on wetlands, which have been protected in this state for decades.  

In a state that produced Fighting Bob LaFollette, John Muir, Gaylord Nelson, Warren G. Knowles and Aldo Leopold, we have no business having a governor like Scott Walker.  He deserves to be recalled. 

Of course, if he isn't recalled, he still has to face an investigation into illegal election practices while he was running for governor.  It looks more and more like there's an indictment in his future. 

In addition, four GOP state senators are facing recall elections.  If only one is defeated, the control of the state senate goes to the Democrats and Walker will effectively be neutralized.   

Gary and I voted absentee ballot over a week ago because we were going to be camping to avoid the television and radio coverage of the day, but I had to stay here to write, work on the garden, and go to a meeting.  I thought about camping somewhere overnight, but I think I will stay here and garden.  The TV and radio will stay off.  When it rains, I'll read. In other words, I will be camping here. 

The race will be close, so I'll go to bed before the results are in. On Wednesday morning, I'll see how the election came out. Until then, I won't think about it.  

June Flowers

Gary went camping this morning, but I stayed home to continue to work on the gardens.   As I pull weeds and transplant flowers, I enjoy the flowers blooming around me.

The peonies blooms aren't as big as they would be in wet years, but they're still a source of sweet smelling joy.

Gary suggested planting a row of hostas in front of them to cut down on weeds.  That way, he doesn't have to mow in front of them.  It's working beautifully already and by next year, they'll be so full we won't see the ground.

I gleaned the hostas from the hosta bed behind them.  Dividing and transplanting saves so much money.

Last week, Wade brought his family to dig up some plants for his home in Darboy.  We looked at one plant which we both thought looked like a weed, but I told him I always waited to see what it looked like in flower.  Good thing I did because it was a balloon flower that I'd paid good money for. 

It's spread to other flower beds, so if he comes back, he can dig that one up, too. 

While digging around for transplants, I ran across a bleeding heart I'd forgotten about.  I know it has to be moved, but where should I put it?  

There's so much yet to be done. The path on the north side of the house is buried by ferns and roses. I'll be tackling that soon.  The gazebo needs clearing.  Gary has taken to storing machinery in there, which is not what it was meant for.  

Still there are spots I've tamed.  The front of the house is the way it should be. 

It's on lovely days like this, that I don't resent staying home and gardening.  I'll get to the campground soon enough.