Rainy Day Gardening Frustration

It's another cold, wet day in Wisconsin, frustration time for a gardener ready to attack her flower beds.

Until Memorial Day here in the north, there's always a chance of a frost, so I am never able to do much more than clear the gardens. When the angst builds up, I start plants in trays indoors.  Right now I have forty five assorted tomato plants, each five inches tall. That may be excessive so I'll give some away to friends.  There are ninety-nine flowers coming up in the trays, almost ready to be planted, everything from alyssum to zinnias.  But not today.

Outside, there are geraniums in pots, but only in small containers that I can move when the forecast is for frost.  Then they will be plopped in the wheelbarrow and moved into the warmth of the garage for the night. (That may happen tomorrow night.) The biggest planters will wait until that magic day, June 1.

Over the last week, I've planted some seeds in the gardens, but those were packed in 2008. I ran across them this winter. They are old seeds that may or may not sprout.  If the frost gets any shoots that do come up, nothing will be lost except for my time.

Today, with drizzle, I did the ultimate.  I bought fake ivy at a rummage sale and stuck it into the window boxes, so that at least there, I can see greenery.  

So it is that I deal with time and temperature.  

Rose-Breasted Grosbeak - May 13, 2011

I saw the first rose-breasted grosbeak on the trail last week. This sweet little bird used to migrate through my property every spring, just the one, then disappear.   I hadn't seen one for several years so I was delighted. I thought it a rare bird indeed.

Then I talked to Dan, the city handyman who goes around the city carrying binoculars in his pocket so he can check on his feathered friends.  (Dan and I created a pamphlet with a checklist, "The Birds of Seymour", two years ago.) He told me that the grosbeaks with their deep pink chest feathers had been returning to Seymour for the past two years. There are several pairs down at the lake park.

Then this morning, the grosbeak was at our suet feeders.  No, there was his lady and wonder of wonders, a second pair.  Will they be regulars here this summer?

As I look out the window now, I see him again munching safflower seeds. What more can we do to make him and his family feel at home?  They have food, water, and lots of trees. I'll put aside some grass clippings for their nesting material as I work in the garden this afternoon.

Around here, being the hostess with the mostest means providing for critters.

The Cherry Tree - May 11, 2011

Note:  Blogger has been down for a day, so I was unable to post yesterday.  I'll do two today.  

This morning I took my morning cup of tea and went to the deck to look at the cherry tree which is now in full lacy white bloom. It's an ornamental cherry tree, so it will never have fruit, but still it blooms each spring.  Good intentions, perhaps.

The pure white petals were good for my soul, but then there was a spot of orange moving through the branches. Yes, there it was, the first Baltimore oriole of the summer.  He flew down to the suet feeder so I got a good look at his orange body and black head.  Mrs. Oriole, a more modest yellow,  soon was at his side.

I called up to Gary, who found the oriole feeder and the grape jelly.

Later, we ate our lunch out on the deck.  Again, a bright spot, but this time red-orange.  It was an orchard oriole, only the second I've seen.   We followed him with binoculars to the cherry tree and then I saw the next bird arrival, the ruby-throated hummingbird working the cherry blossoms. Now Gary has to put up the hummingbird feeder.

Soon after, the cherry tree had another visitor. The first house wren chewed me out for having the temerity to exist in his yard.  Or perhaps he is upset that the roof of the old wren house finally finished rotting away.  His spring job is to build several nests for his beloved to check out, but he knew full well that she would choose the wren house....if it had a roof.  This makes his job more difficult. It's not easy being a wren male trying to impress a wren female.

One cherry tree.  So many stories.  Chekhov would be proud of me.

Atom

When Colette's German shepherd died, it nearly broke her heart.  Dogs do that to you.  

Because she didn't think she could afford another dog, she decided to foster dogs who no longer had homes.  The organization she worked with provided veterinary care and bags of dog food so there was no cost to her except her time.  She fostered one dog after another, a real mix of breeds, until permanent homes were found for them.  None of them stayed long enough to snare her heart...until Atom.  

Atom, a brindled breed that might be part Australian cattle dog, was a larger dog than the foster pets that went before, but he was a gentle soul.  His previous owners had taken the time to train him well.  He in turn must have missed them terribly.  When Colette took him for walks he would stop suddenly when he saw children.  He peered at cars to see if there was someone in them that he knew.  He wanted his people.  With the economic times, it is likely they couldn't afford to keep him any longer. 

Finally, Colette decided she had to adopt this sad, lovable dog. She didn't know how she could afford it, but then I got involved.  You see, Gary and I had our own love affair with Jake Dog, a goofy Australian shepherd. When he died, we thought that there could never be another like him.  As time went on, we realized that if we wanted to travel, there would be no dog in our future.  

I suggested that Gary and I become godparents to Atom.  This means I occasionally take him for a walk, we buy dog food, and we once contributed to his vet bills. This way I have access to a dog, but he doesn't tie me down when I want to travel. 

Today, I walked our god dog.  With a urinary tract infection, Atom had to go out often while Colette was at work in the library. He couldn't be home alone for so many hours.  She asked me to help out. 

We walked down the trail, almost to Park Lane, when a bus went by.  Atom stopped dead in his tracks and watched it go by longingly. At some point he must have waited for such a bus that still may carry the children who yearn for their beloved dog.  

Do those Wall Street bigwigs know that recessions hurt more than humans?   

Logistics

I began this blog on October 17, 2010 and haven't missed a daily posting since then.  It will become more difficult come summer.  Over the Memorial Day holiday, we'll be camping near Spooner, Wisconsin as we attend a memorial service.

Once in a national forest campground, we won't have cell phone access, electricity, or internet service.  To find these usually requires a long drive and neither Gary nor I like to leave once we find our piece of paradise in the forests.  

At the moment, my plan is to write the blogs every day with a date as a label, then post them whenever I can.   I will be traveling to some beautiful places.  I want to post photos with the stories.

We'll see what happens come May 26.  I consider it a dry run for the summer tour.

The Dump

This morning we rushed to beat the rain to get our brush to the city landfill.

At this time of year, people cart refuse to the dump as they work on their yards.  You never know what you might find.  I have spirea, irises, and a few other perennials that I rescued from the landfill. As we emptied the trailer, I spotted bricks a short distance away. I scurried over.

These were chimney bricks, perfect for a path made entirely of dump leftovers that I've been working on for years. We loaded them onto the trailer then sort of slipped through the gate because there are some rules about these search and rescue missions. I consider them silly because we need less stuff in our landfills, not more.

Now the bricks are stacked up, to be added to the path.  Some of the older bricks on the first section have crumbled and will have to be replaced, but I estimate that we'll add another five feet to the path.  All I need to get started is the old tarp in Gary's storage unit and some good weather.  I can't wait.

Gary says it doesn't take much to make me happy.

Holidays Anonymous

I've thought for years that there should be an organization called Holidays Anonymous for people who go into tailspins on certain days on the calendar.  They could meet at a preordained spot and grouse about whatever went wrong that day.  

There are holidays I love.  Christmas depressions are not for me, I am giddy from the first carol I hear through the entire season.

The giddiness doesn't extend to New Year's Eve, which I've ignored since the early 1970s, when I saw Cher at a Chicago Gold Coast nightclub trying to sing to drunks.  She wasn't having a good time and neither was I.   From that day on, I stayed home on December 31, putting the photos for the year in an album and organizing the new year.

I love my birthday (St. Patrick's Day).  I am ambivalent about Easter which is OK, I guess, but I have memories of eating traditional sweet rolls, hard boiled eggs, jelly beans, and chocolate, finishing with a ham dinner then getting violently ill.  That combination of foods makes no sense at all.

So here's Mother's Day.  Even its founder, Anna Jarvis, wound up fighting against its commercialization.  It was definitely not the favorite day of this divorced single mother of a son.  A mother-son combination didn't work well.  Mother-daughter banquets were out, father-son banquets as well.

The worst Mother's Day was when Chris, then about eight, tried to do something for me by buying me a hamburger at Hardee's with his savings.   We got to the restaurant, had our meal, then he joined some other children in front of a big television set to watch cartoons. I looked down the row of booths and in each one there was a single woman, sitting alone, looking miserable, and there I was, one of them.  We were all pathetic.

Afterwards, I asked Chris, who had just spent all he had on this outing:   "Do you really want to celebrate Mother's Day?"   We agreed right then and there to forget it and so it was until he married Tisha who thought they ought to give me something or celebrate in some way.  It's taken years but I think she finally understands.

Today Gary grilled us hamburgers for lunch.  The rest of the day we worked in the gardens in the warm sunshine with occasional breaks on the deck reading books.  I did absolutely nothing that was in any way motherly.

I liked this day.  Maybe I won't need Holidays Anonymous after all.  

Meditation and Gardening

There's a reason there are gardens in monasteries and it goes beyond feeding the monks.  A garden feeds the soul.

With the spring finally giving us more than snow, rain, sleet and chills, I am finally back in the middle of my flowers: weeding, pruning, transplanting, and counting up my floral treasures.  There are forty different flower beds in my domain.  I was able to clear ten of them before the blizzard, then all activity came to an end until this week. Now I must finish each and every plot by the end of May and get in the vegetable garden as well.

It is a labor of love as I rediscover plants I'd forgotten were there.  Today it was the bed adjacent to the driveway.  Over there are the phlox, next to them the leaves of the Siberian iris, spurge, yellow loosestrife, peony, spiderwort, and red monarda.  And that's just one bed!

I found violets and grape hyacinth beginning to bloom.  Lamium is in bud.  I worried about the current bush and the yellow rose.  Did they come back?  Yes, they did as did the pink rose I transplanted from a neighbor's yard after he died.  He originally planted it for his wife who died several years before. It needed to be saved from someone who likes lawn more than flowers.

The cherry tree will be in bloom in another week. The lilac starts a few days after that. The pear and apple trees will follow a week later.  I know all of this from the bloom charts I keep from year to year.

I am ruthless with weeds.  Out they come by their roots, to be thrown in a heap to be taken to the city dump next week.  All frustrations, angers, and anxieties go with them.

I make mistakes.  Every year, I begin to pull out plants before I recognize their leaves. This year I was mean to Sweet William, a flower I love.  Oh well, I have more seeds and will re-sow. I can't manage without him.

I come away from my garden with an aching back and sunburned arms, but a mind refreshed.

Waukau, shoes, and friendship

     Norma Miller and I met at Seymour High School at the eighth grade introduction to the school when I was fourteen and she was thirteen.  We were in the eighth grade at two different one room schools about four miles away, yet we had never run into each other.  She was my first true friend, a bright girl with interests similar to mine.  There was a track meet going on but we just began to talk and talk and talk. 
     We've been BFs every since. Even when we went to separate colleges, we kept in touch and so it has been all these years.  
     These days, Norma lives in Chicago, but she occasionally comes to Oshkosh, Wisconsin to visit her mother and I inevitably drive down there so we can have a catch-up chat.   
     Today was such a day.  I picked up Norma and her husband Rich for a hike into spring.  She read something about the Waukau Nature Preserve west of Oshkosh.  I had never heard of it but I was willing to give it a try. 
     Using my hit or miss navigation system I call zen driving, we found the village of Waukau and soon after the Waukau dam.  We wandered around that area for a while passing over bridges, looking at falling water, smelling dead carp on the shore, and watching clouds drift by.  However, this wasn't the preserve we were looking for, so we asked directions from some other wanderers. 
     True to form, we missed a turn and ended up in a bar in yet another village, Eureka.  This time we got better directions from the fish fry patrons and found the nature area.  
     We followed the path, climbed down a bank, photographed wildflowers, especially a white kind of trout lily.  We found bloodroot, too and even a patch of that shy spring flower, the hepatica.  
     Norma and I remembered breaking open the stems of the bloodroot and painting ourselves with the red sap.  Rich, a city boy, never heard of that.  These days, the flowers are protected.  We were satisfied with photographing them.    

     We worked our way over muddy spots and kept going until I ran into a branch. 
     A head wound bleeds profusely, so holding napkin Rich supplied to my forehead I worked my way back up the bank to the car and the first aid kit New Zealander Liz Miller gave me years ago.  It had what I needed but I realized I would have to replenish my stock of medical supplies before mid-June. 
     We returned to Oshkosh for lunch and shoe shopping, sharing a BOGO at the Payless Shoe Store.  We checked out a dollar store for items useful to travelers.   Norma gave me some seeds to plant in my garden. 
     And we talked and talked and talked. 
     Until the next visit, dear friend.   

When it All Comes Together

Today was one of those days when things go your way.

First of all, the sun was shining, the temperatures were moderate, and the wind died down. It was a day for walking around to see what was happening. I went downtown and found a big sign on the old pizza parlor, which closed down when the owner died suddenly. The sign read:  "Coming soon, China Garden!"  Whooooo---eeee!   A Chinese restaurant in Seymour.  Bliss!

Next, I went for my yearly physical.  My old doctor retired this past year and I met his replacement, Dr. Erin Kimball.  I found out I am healthy, though there are tests to come in June.  We compared travels.  Dr. Kimball worked in a hospital in Botswana.  I've been reading the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency novels, which are set in Botswana.  "I would love to go there, but who would hire me?"  Dr. Kimball told me that unlike many African countries, Botswana is rich in diamonds.  She encouraged me into looking for work there.  And so I shall.  I'm thinking January, 2013 which is our winter but their summer.  I have too many other commitments until then.

Then there was the e-mail from a writers' colony in Arkansas.  Nikki spent two weeks there recently and recommended me for a residency. It would be time to concentrate on my novel.  I got the application.  I am thinking about March 2012 for that adventure.

Then I heard from an editor who wants to publish my short story "Candle in the Window" in the on line magazine Mobius.  After thinking over the terms, I agreed.  Though I've published many articles, this is my first adult fiction sale.

I received an e-mail invitation from a friend who is having a Solstice celebration June 18-19 with friends camping over.  I am leaving on my tour on June 20, so this is a great kickoff.

I finished the day gardening in the sunshine.  My friend Susan came over and I gave her a big bouquet of daffodils.  She brought me a loaf of her homemade bread a couple of days before.  That's a good exchange of gifts.

Finally, Gary, who has been in Illinois helping his aunt on the family farm, came home.

What a lovely day it was, a day when things came together, putting my life in focus.