Fire the Handicapped

There was an old Saturday Night Live skit with Roseanne Roseandanna ranting about the campaign to "fire the handicapped", which she misheard, in her handicapped way, but was instantly placated when it was explained that the campaign was "hire the handicapped"
It crossed my mind on the way back from fiddling with the spring yesterday morning (after a rain! yes, a rain!) Last year this time I would have taken my camera and several detours through various overgrown fields and woods to get back to the house, but this year, it has been my habit to head straight home.
Now, my personality is one that by nature does not entertain even a glimmer of avoidance when family has suffered cancer, slow death, amputation, death of an intimate, alzheimers, etc. Grannies have taught me, we make the best of what we have, we continue to love, support and respect, no matter the infirmity.
So why have I been avoiding my beloved woods? I guess I have been a sissy.
"I orta knowed by now"that the nature of life is impermanence. It's time to buck up and take it like a woman.
So chop me up and feed me to the vultures, but tomorrow begins my lemonade campaign on this blog.

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Gimme back my seasons

So we got rain, a couple a weeks ago, one inch and one quarter. I write this long hand, because it was a giant event. We are still two dozen plus inches behind, but for that one morning after, the woods perked up, the birds cheered, and the insects trilled and sang and my whole world and hollow rejoiced.
But, in the big picture, the creek only got its whistle wetted, it is back bone dry and the spring still drips a slow and lonley "plop". Conditions are pretty much the same as they have been all summer

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And in these pictures, if you look closely, there are things you can see that are amiss. Too open, missing overstory leaves, dead and dangling dry leaves, in the upper picture, there is a dead baby cedar in the foreground and mummified blackberries.

I miss my seasons. I am a person who solemnly nods to each equinox and solstice, to each full and medicine moon, one who notes in a little notebook the changes and counts the "firsts and lasts" First mushroom, last berry, first cherry blossom day, last frost. Now I don't know how to act. Usually, I have unhooked the outdoor shower by now, in preparation for first frost, and lovingly covered the fall lettuce. Usually by now I have already built a fire to warm the house on a chilly morning, and steeped my ritual first hops tea for my first long night of harvest sleep. This year, it is too dry for a shower, and for growing lettuce, but even if it weren't it is still in the 80's and 90's. What kind of October is that?


Ok, I promised myself I wouldn't blog without something nice to say (hence the lack of writing)
So, I have discovered that, I can throw the kayak in the back of my pickup truck, go to the river, have an "other worldy" experience and be back at the house in less than two hours....(hey, that is sort of counting thing, a first and last thing....a susbstitute for seasons, perhaps?)