Paint

It's annoyed me for some time, the way the garden shed looks. The brown flanks faded, the equally tired red on the doors (which still puzzles me - was that a paint mismatch?) and the unattractive slate blue trim we are slowly eradicating from the house as well.  Add to that the decorative crossbucks on the doors pulling off or bits fallen away, and it was a sad but functional little shed that needed some love.

I told Himself one day, "Fix the trim on the shed doors and I'll paint it."  "Really?"  "Sure", and he and The Boy got to work on it not long after.

One of my trips to Lowe's I picked up brown paint. Himself, when asked to do the same, was daunted by the prospect. "I'm no good at picking colors."  "It's brown. Just...pick a brown."  "No, no", he avers, "You're better at the colors."

So I chose a shade called Labrador, like a dark rich chocolate.  We had white for the trim, and I added a thickly napped roller for the textured side walls, brushes for the trim. And I waited.

Of course, with a project ready to embark upon, my fingers itched and the weather did not cooperate. Until one day, it did. And off I went to the shed, paint and pan and roller and step stool and brushes in hand.  I worked east to north to west to south - sunwise - painting the body of the shed until I reached the fussy bits between the door trim. 

The trim came next, working sunwise again, but the evening snuck up before I could get all the way around again, and my work was ended for that day. The next fine Fall day saw the trim finished, a second coat put on (that slate blue resists to the last), and all but the two topmost boards on each gable end completed.

This is how she stood for some small time, until Himself set up a ladder like a little scaffold just tall enough for me to reach the last boards, and the shed was done. It looks fresher, not so tired, and I look out of my office window and think, "Some of that trim will need another coat come Spring..."

Alone in the back, the sounds of the squirrels foraging in the leaves or leaping from branch to trunk, the steady repetitious motion of the roller or brush...this is zen. I don't mind painting, not at all, but I'm not allowed to paint inside - I'm much too messy at it.  But if you've a shed or a barn needs painting...well, then, I'm your girl.

Falling

We are in full-on Autumn.  Himself can blow the grounds clear of leaves daily, only to wake up with a new carpet laid down over night. It's time to clean up, winterize, settle ourselves and the house for winter.

We spent one weekend clearing brush in the back. The cedar deadfalls that ring the cleared part of the property have always been on the list of things that need attention, and attention they got. My parents sad little chainsaw wasn't up to the challenge, which justified a new one for Himself as his birthday gift from me. We spent most of one weekend with assorted implements of destruction, cutting back thorn canes and Russian olive, ragweed and pokeberry all overgrown and out of control. We engaged the enemy in the northwest corner, working our way slowly eastward, gradually gaining ground. 

Deconstructing the dead-falls was an exercise in engineering and planning, untangling one fallen tree from another. Pulling brush and weeds out to the tarps, pulling the full tarps one by one to the curb ahead of the town's schedule brush pick-up week. Gradually, we cleared enough out to take one whole dead tree out, and then another. Himself limbed each and we stacked them to the side of the shed where his friend would eventually come to collect them.

We found treasure - 7 concrete cylinders, about 12" tall by 6" in diameter. They were not all together but were in the same area. Their provenance is a mystery, and I wonder if more lurk under fallen trees we have yet to conquer.

The reclamation of the woods edge is not complete, nor do I expect that it will be any time soon. But we have started and we can see progress, and that may be enough to entice us to engage the enemy another weekend if the weather and our bodies cooperate.

At the end of the weekend's efforts, we walked into the woods that are hidden from the house by the dead-falls. The Boy and Himself had made this trip before but I had not.  It's all cedars back there, straight through to the power lines. No underbrush, just cedar duff and dead limbs, some empty beer bottles and forgotten golf balls.  Once under the power lines, the undergrowth slows your travels, but provides cover for a woodchuck or skunk den and another larger den a bit away. Fox? Raccoon?

I am happy to stand out there and look around...no property is clear close up to that point. I hope that it stays that way. Knowing the wildlife might find a bit of sanctuary in our part of suburbia...well now, that makes the sore shoulders from hauling tarps and caretaking the land very much worthwhile.

Mabon

It's Mabon, but it's not like it's snuck up on us, at least not here.  The nights have been - with rare exception - getting progressively cooler.  The vines climbing the trees in the woods have started changing color, always a step ahead of whatever tree they've claimed as a host.  Leaves have been falling...one here, one there...not so many as to draw attention to themselves, veritable ninjas sneaking down to the lawn when they think you aren't looking.

This morning while my coffee brewed, I stepped out onto the deck. Perhaps not the wisest thing to do in sock feet, but my socks dried and no one died from the trauma.  I tossed four Macintosh randomly out into the back, a couple rolling into the brush line out of sight.  My efforts were rewarded later in the morning when I spotted the mama deer in the back grazing, with the fawn - no longer in spots - joining her soon after. They spent about half an hour meandering about while I stepped away from the computer long enough to take a few photos before they made their way back into the trees.

Not much is new in the front garden. The hummingbird feeder is kept full, as I've seen one come in to feed now and again, even this late.  The finches compete for thistle with the squirrels, who impatiently tear holes in the socks, spilling thistle seed on the garden floor to the delight of doves, the chipmunks and apparently the family of skunks who came by gleaning the other evening.  Today on my lunch break, I stepped out to water the hanging plants and refill the bird bath. Coming back up the step I spied a tiny head atop a sinuous length of scaled body - a tiny garden snake, sunning himself in sections in the crack between the step and the porch.  When I left for the grocery this evening, he was still there and I shared him with The Boy, both of us agreeing not to tell Himself so no steps to discourage this resident are taken, as they were with our briefly porch-dwelling bat.

The hydrangea only had one blossom, a modest one at that, the roses keep putting out the odd bloom here and there, but the alyssum and dianthus continue, and the sedum has finally blossomed enough to make the bumblebees efforts worthwhile.  The hanging plants endure, somewhat the worse for wear, but have two potted mums on the sides of the step to distract from their disheveled appearance.

The deer were back again this evening. The Boy noticed them first, and I took the camera and two more apples out to the deck with me.  I rolled the apples like bowling balls onto the lawn as they watched me warily.  Mama stomped and flicked her tail but neither fled.  I sat down on the deck floor, very still, to see what they would do.  Mama did not take her attention off me for very long at all, moving from one side of the yard to the other, a few steps closer, a few steps back, all while stomping and flicking, waiting to see if I would move.  They eventually moved off into the trees (without eating their treats) calmly. I'd like to see if they become more accustomed to my presence out there with them, to get pictures that aren't blocked by the house windows.  I went out for the apples and bowled them farther into the trees. Hopefully they come back around for them before the squirrel or skunks steal the fruit.

Tomorrow will be less peaceful as back to the office I go.  I'll hope for more of these crisp-to-warm sunny days before the drear of November sets in, and with it the cold of winter.

Non-Stinkers

I didn't leave work as early as I probably should have tonight. The only impact there is to me - I get less done at home, but (theoretically anyway) more done there.  Productivity notwithstanding, tonight I got home while it was still light enough to bring the bins up from the curb without fear of startling any local wildlife of the fragrant type.

Bins in, I started the dishwasher while the the pitcher filled to water the hanging plants. Second trip with the pitcher to clean and refill the bird bath, light the citronella candles and sit for a bit on the porch to reply to a text from The Boy.  It got progressively darker as I moved from texting to checking email on my phone, idly noticing the bat over the driveway making his nightly rounds.

Some small, odd noise caught my attention. It sounded as though it were on the porch ceiling and I wondered if it were possible a bat had gotten under the roof to hunt for bugs. Some may have been concerned at that notion, but I was merely curious, and the light from the candles was sufficient to keep me from seeing clearly. Even had I extinguished them, I didn't have my glasses, so it would not serve to improve my view at all, and so I left things as they were.

A second round of noises, these seeming to come from out in the garden caused me to sit more upright and really look outwards.  The motion light on the garage gable was still on from my trip in with the bins, and in it's light I saw them...a small gaggle of young skunks. They were traveling in that way unique to skunks in a group, where it seems one must always be touching another, the whole mass shifting and changing so that as you look you are never really quite sure how many of them there are.

They waddled along, clearly on a mission of import, for it was no casual noseying along I'm accustomed to seeing from the locals...up along the side parking area, onto the lawn and away out of sight down the side of the house.  The vision brought a smile.  I find them adorable neighbors, and since I heard them but never smelled them, their presence was nothing but delightful.  I blew out my candles and went in then, out to the back deck in the hopes that I would be able to see them in the ever-decreasing light, waddling along, touching one another, exploring the brush line.  Alas, they had gone.  I hope they come by again soon.

Adjust

Sometimes, the universe lifts away the curtain and shows you a glimpse of the future, or of the unthinkable. Then the curtain falls back and you adjust your vision once again to that which *is* rather than that which *could be*.

Things with mom have taken a turn in a better direction. Her nephrologist did get her in sooner (although not before I took a turn with her at the ER the day before); I went to the appointment with her and the information was  both eye-opening and heart-rending.  Her treatment plan of choice up until now was medical management of her disease "until the lethargy becomes so great you have Hospice care at home until you pass away naturally"...in the words of her doctor.  I was gobsmacked.  When we mentioned peritoneal dialysis to him, his head popped up and he asked her, "This is new? This is a change in plan?" and she just nodded.  He was ready to book her with a surgeon for catheterization then and there, but we held him at bay.

We want her treated closer to us and not in New London. We want a second opinion. Yes, we will take the information offered and my brother and I will read it and then we will discuss it with her...because regardless of how inconceivable to us her original plan, it is ultimately her decision.But she doesn't want a second opinion, she tells us.  "I just need to get that port put in" so they can start the treatment.

Now it's come to a matter of helping her manage her health. We know someone needs to attend each appointment with her, in order to keep track of the disease. We now know that her current doctor estimates that she has about 11% kidney function and we will see what her new doctor says.  She doesn't have only 3 months to live, she has been told she should start treatment before the end of the year.  The prognosis, while not great is better.

The advance health care planning workbooks we took down to them have been completed...another glimpse into those things that they hold dear, and that which gives them purpose.  I helped Dad complete his, talking about each question and helping him understand, brushing away the confusion until he was able to give me insight into what mattered to him. I felt as an archeologist must, delicately brushing away the inconsequential in order to reach, preserve and not contaminate that which is sought.  Mom completed most of hers ahead of time, and I asked only a couple of clarifying questions.  When I went over them with my brother, we grappled with the emotions of reading that my mother's life is given purpose by her family, and her greatest fear is leaving that family.

This will not be an easy road, nor a long one...but it will be longer than we once thought. It has shaken us all out of our complacency and made us realize that we can no longer pretend that the inevitable end isn't coming. It just doesn't seem to be coming quite as soon as we thought it would a couple of weeks ago.

Arachnid

From June 8:

A quiet evening on the porch - new cushions, new pillows, wrapped in a light throw. Listening to the birds settle in for the night, and suddenly realizing their songs have finally stopped. Watching the bat do circuits above the front yard, wondering if the chipmunk will find the seed I put out for him. Moment ruined by a big-ass spider moseying down the porch post and towards me. Both of our evenings ruined: mine by his appearance reminding me that the porch is also the domain of the 8-legged, his by the weight of the citronella candle I trapped him under.

Thunder

From July 3:

Sitting on the porch. Thunderstorm right over head. The wind blows the rain up under the porch roof like ocean spray. Lightning bugs are seeking refuge on the porch and the thunder rolls and their flashes are outshone by the lightning's gaudy display. The rain blows over the porch roof in waves and the driveway is barely visible in the downpour. I love this so much.

Weeds

The evening cool came later than I thought it would, and so the evening weeding started later than it should have.  The point of the front garden completed, a little more of the secondary pathway reclaimed. Purslane and creeping spurge, goose grass and wood sorrel, all fell victim to my hand and fervor.

It got dark faster than I'd hoped, the small solar lantern coming alight and the mosquitoes making their unwelcome presence known.  I weeded until I could no longer see the weeds clearly, then admitted defeat. The balance of the enemy would have to fall in another battle, the war was done for the day.  

Before the sun had gone too far down, and before Himself came out to mow, I did hear a good bit of rustling in the brush behind the junipers and down the bank. I wasn't sure if I was more hopeful or wary that it might be one of our little skunks. It surely wasn't the local cat - the birds would have raised a ruckus had it been he - and it sounded overly large for a squirrel.  My curiosity was not satisfied, as the beast never did make an appearance.

There is something oddly and eminently satisfying in weeding a garden.  When undisturbed by the sounds of lawn equipment or cars on the road, it can be meditative and trance inducing. To look up and realize you've done that much and not really aware as it happened.  Noticing the bumblebees slowly foraging on the salvia as the air cools, then coaxing them onto your garden glove trustingly.

I've not felt productive this weekend, overlooking that I've watered plants and scrubbed bird baths and completed loads of laundry.  Maybe it was dozing on the porch yesterday when I was trying to watch finches on the thistle, or maybe it was just having that last lazy day before I was no longer alone in the house.  Either way, now I wonder if I can get motivated enough to get up early, weed a bit, and then get ready for work.  Then I remember the book I'm reading and know I'll more likely stay up too late with that, and be dead to the world in the morning.

The weeds will be there, won't they?

Time

It's been a bit, I apologize for that if you were looking for me.  If you weren't, well you never knew I wasn't here, right?

It's been a rough week. Lots of things to process, lots of emotions.  Mom continues to be unwell, and a change of PCP reveals information she had been concealing from us, information she finally decided she needed to share.  Seems she's supposed to have been on dialysis for some time now.

Monday's trip to the clinic led to a follow up appointment with her PCP's practice. She changed doctors at that time, something we supported her doing.  I only wish I had been there to hear what the new doctor said to her to make her finally reveal her situation.  She told me one version, my brother another but that's her MO and we compare notes as a result.  She told me he said, "Well it's dialysis or I cash in" (her phrase for dying).  When my brother called she told him without dialysis, she has 3 months to live.  

While it is not outside the realm of the possible that she has misinterpreted something with regard to that time-frame, I believe it unlikely.  Some quick research on kidney failure presented us with a list of all the symptoms we'd seen in her (and seen her treated for) over the past couple of years:  edema, shortness of breath, lethargy, loss of appetite, anemia. Other common complaints she's made: getting up to go to the bathroom several times a night, inability to sleep, nausea, vomiting....the list goes on.

After processing this information, and talking extensively with my brother, we at least have an outline of a game plan. How that moves forward depends very much on her. She's stubborn. Anyone that knows her, knows this.  She is incredibly protective of her independence (such as it is) and making her own decisions. We have asked her to move her nephrologist's appointment up sooner; she can't, she says.  We ask when she's going for the bloodwork she needs to see him; she can't until the bruises from Monday's IVs heal, she says.  She snarls at my brother, tells him she doesn't need him nagging at her; my brother tells her to get used to it.

As for me, I have printed out forms and done research. Medical powers of attorney, healthcare advance planning booklets; information on home dialysis and dialysis at medical centers. I've talked with a nurse acquaintance who reminded me that the VNA is an option if her physician so orders.

Tomorrow, while my husband distracts my father so that my father cannot distract from the conversation, we will talk to my mother about all of this.  We may, whether for good or ill, use her fear if we must.  Ask her if we can help her to expedite an appropriate treatment. Ask her how we're supposed to know what she wants if she refuses treatment and falls into a coma, or her organs begin to fail.  Ask her what she thinks we should do about my father, who cannot live on his own, and who is utterly lost in her absence or outside of his own home.  We need to make her think about the consequences of her inaction, past and future, and the consequences of her preconceived notions and fear of medicine. 

Our actions will be driven by her decisions - they have to be. We will try to drive her to making good decisions, ones that will improve her quality of life.  We will be her advocates, we will do the things she finds too daunting in her current state.  We will do what we can to give her reason to live.  But ultimately, we are restricted by her future decisions as she is by her own body right now.

Gibbous

The call never came last night. Rather it came (or so I thought) while I was in the shower this morning, the house phone ringing as I was shutting off the water and me too slow to get to it. I tried calling the number back - my brother's cell - with no luck, becoming more concerned each time. In between attempts, I raced to dress and throw the last few items into my duffel, convinced that a call from him that early meant I needed to scramble. 

I finally gave up on him and tried my mother, to find she sounded worse, unable to keep any food down.  She told me my brother was planning to call her physician when the office opened, and a plan would be developed.  When I finally reached him, he confirmed this.  I checked my schedule - did I dare load everything up and drive to the office?  It was a light day, so I opted to work from home. It was odd, deciding at the last minute like that, all showered and dressed and lunch packed, coffee in a travel mug.  Planned work-from-home days are sketchier - maybe I shower, maybe I don't; maybe I'm wearing jeans, maybe yoga pants. Definitely no shoes, and coffee is taken earlier, leisurely, on the porch while the birds find their way to the feeders and before the heat of the day.

Oddly, it was a productive day - I knocked a couple things off my "To Do" list, while I waited anxiously for a text update. They were waiting in the clinic.  He was entertaining my father. She was going in for a CT scan.  The longest waiting then, for an outcome, results, something that would indicate the direction this was going.  And then at long last a text  "They see nothing" and a diagnosis of sorts - she has a sensitive stomach and needs to stop eating at the greasy spoon dives they favor. That word - nothing - such a relief.  Your mind jumps to conclusions, you start thinking of and planning for the worst, even as you can't plan for it.

Like a weight lifted, my work day ends.  Loose ends are wrapped up and I text a friend.  

"Free tonight?"  
"Sure", she says.  
"Dinner?"
"Where and when?"

We finalize our plans, and I pick her up.  We catch up as we walk around the wholesale club, me buying candy for the office, and fruit for me, her grabbing a case of water and teasing me for the sheer volume of candy in the cart.  It's been a few weeks since we've seen each other, but we have that ability, to just pick up where we left off.  It's comfortable, it's good.

Dinner is too much food (always) and having some fun with our waitress.  It's one cocktail each even though we both want more, and not finishing the last bites, and talking about her work and my work, and the husbands and the kids.  And before you know it, it's time to go and attend to more of our mundane worlds.

Coming home means rolling the trash bin to the curb, which reminds me of last week when the boy and I had a close encounter with Stinky. It's skunking hour, just about dusk, and I hope there are no unfortunate brushes with nature as I walk silently back up the driveway.  

There is still time to sit on the porch, watching the gibbous moon rise, bright in the sky and pushing away more of the shadows in the front garden. Are the cooler nights leading to fewer lightning bugs, or is it just the brightness of the moon?  When the mosquitoes find me, it's time to come in - I don't want to ruin the kiss of the moonlight by lighting the citronella candles anyway.  And so another day ends, and the house prepares for the next.

Prepare

You've heard of woman's intuition...that feeling in the gut.  I'm having a touch of that, and I don't think it's without cause.  You see, my mother's not feeling well.  We have a history with this, where "not feeling well" can escalate rapidly into "I need an ambulance" or "I need to go to the ER".  Last time it happened, there was 3 feet of snow on the ground, her road and driveway were not cleared, and it took a National Guard pay loader and Humvee to get her (and Dad, who cannot be left alone) out to an ambulance waiting at the main road.

Now, the events of two winters ago notwithstanding - since everyone but my mother seems to think it was an anxiety-generated event - these episodes are not usually without cause.  When the parental health roulette wheel spins, we can never be sure if it's going to land on her name or his.  After all, they are no longer young, nor in the best of health.

As with any of this type of thing, there is no good time for them to occur.  Except now.  I am home alone - not responsible for getting a small human to camp, or getting a small human from camp.  Yes, I have to work but a family health emergency would trump that. Yes, the cats need to be fed and watered and their box cleaned - but I'm pretty certain I could make that happen from a distance if needs must.  The biggest conundrum would be what to do with Dad should we need to scramble.  Poor man, mostly we solve that by hauling him along with us, to emergency rooms and hospitals.  When he can't see her, if we aren't with her, he questions us endlessly:  "Are we going to see Ma?" or "Are we going to get Ma? Is she coming home today?"  Worst is when he cries, bereft in her absence, lost when out of his own familiar and comfortable space and a temporary occupant of my house or my brother's.

So tonight I will do only that which I can do - I will prepare.  I will prepare and hope that it is all for naught. That I do not get a middle of the night phone call, that I do not have to leave work suddenly.  That her issue is less than her insomniac mind has made it, and that she feels better tomorrow, or the next day.  But until I know for sure...my cell phones are charging, my laptop is loaded, I will locate spare electronics chargers and I will pack an overnight bag of essentials to keep in the car.

Because right now, that's all I can do.

Camp

A busy day following a busy week...a day spent washing, drying, folding. Printing out packing lists, rounding up stray items, making sure The Boy has all he needs for two weeks away at camp.  The good news is that he did this last year, and we know which items he can do without and which are truly needful.

In between loads of clothes, he hunted down sunscreen and insect repellent, rain jackets and hiking boots. I scrubbed birdbaths and filled bird feeders, topped plants off with more potting soil and cleaned out the cargo area of the truck.

We took a break before diving into the actual packing to run out for dinner, calling one Grandma as we drove. We earned a couple of sour glances from a sour woman sitting nearby in the restaurant when we sat on the same side of the booth, giggling over something The Boy showed me on his phone.  Dinner conversation alternated between planning the following day, silly jokes, sharing the text conversation I was having with his father.

Once home, we got serious about getting everything into the guest room to pack. Suitcase out, items gathered and packed and checked off the list. We scrounged him up a new soap dish, and new toothpaste, emptied his backpack, loaded his gear and made it all fit.  As we put a copy of the packing list in the suitcase...the last thing before zipping it up...he sat on my lap on the floor, this kid as tall as I am now, and hugged me and thanked me "for doing all the hard work."

Tomorrow we will add a pillow and a baseball cap and a kid who has shot up this summer to the pile of things now on my guest room floor. We will load it all into the truck and deliver it to camp, where The Boy will make new friends and the only guidance I will be able to provide is that which is already in his head. I will watch the photos posted nightly for glimpses of him, to follow his adventures with a timed delay, like a show pre-recorded for the audience.

He is inside, enjoying his last night of television and iPhone and computer for a time, while I muse on  his increasing independence from the porch, listening to the crickets, frogs and occasional car. Over the next two weeks, I will watch my lightning bugs here and wonder if there are so many where he is, and I will hope he's warm enough at night and that he is having the time of his life.

Seeds

It's been a helluva week, the kind that seems to run from one day to the next in a homogenous blur.  My boss in town (= more meetings, every day), Himself out of town for a project (= no one to trade camp drop off and pick up with) and all the day-to-day that goes with life in general.

And suddenly there it is - Friday. And with it, the weeks' mail all on the kitchen table to sort, bills here, trash there, things to take away to a quiet corner to read set aside.  Going to my office to pay the bills and what do I spy? The fantastic bargain book I snagged at B&N last weekend, Sunset's 365 Days of Garden Color (Keeping Your Garden in Bloom) and on it the scribbled notes from a rainy Sunday past of perennials I think I might like to start cultivating.  Since bills are no fun, and garden planning is, I may have made record time finishing the former so I could move on to the latter.  All my scribbled notes into a spreadsheet (if you're reading this, and you know me, you aren't surprised at that.  So I'm a little OCD...so shoot me), notes on uses and habit and cultivation needs, notes on varietals of particular interest.

This of course, led to the next logical indulgence...the ordering of seed catalogs.  Johnny's and Jung and Park and Burpee, all destined to appear in my mailbox for future fantasizing planning.  Himself may come to regret his passing comment, no doubt dropped without a hint of sincerity, that I would soon need a greenhouse.  I've stayed up too late nights this week, looking at kits and calculating how many 12" pavers would be needed for a nice heat-absorbing floor.

In other news, I decided it had been far too long since I'd indulged in a pomegranate martini*, so I did my part to make room in the bar for the new bottle of Johnny Walker Double Black Himself got from his boss by finishing off the last of the 3 Olives Pomegranate vodka as well as the last of the Pama liqueur. 
*the term martini being used loosely where I mean "ingredients that should go into a shaker of ice and then served in a fancy triangular glass, but which I will instead pour into a pint glass and be damned."

The debate rages in my brain as to whether or not I have missed the best part of the evening on the porch by indulging my gardening fetish in front of the computer, and justifying not venturing out by convincing myself it's much too buggy at this point.

Himself called to check in from St. Louis, during which call I find out that his mother took a fall and injured her shoulder. So now there's the waiting to hear if they were able to re-seat (Re-seat? What does one do to a dislocated shoulder when putting it back? Relocate? That sounds like it is to be moved to a new location on her body, it can't be right) her shoulder and hope nothing was broken.

I suppose at this point, I'll just continue to sip my pseudo-martini and keeping surfing the web for plants and seeds and greenhouses...someone hide my wallet, would you please?

Quiet

In the time after dinner and before bed, I often think I have more things I should do.  Then in my desire to avoid doing those things, I go out to the porch and sit in the dark, watching lightning bugs. The things that need doing will still be there; come fall, the lightning bugs will not.

Peace

Sitting on the porch as dusk turns to dark, citronella candles the only light beyond stars and lightning bugs. Watching the resident bat take laps in the open space above the driveway, and having The Boy come out to join me, wordlessly curling up on the love seat as we watch the day drift away into night.

Stinky

After dinner tonight, we put on our shoes to take the bins to the curb, joking between us that we needed to do it before the skunks came out.

We wheel the bins down, and hear the neighbors dog 'ba-rooo'ing at us. "Ramsay hears you singing", I tell The Boy, and we giggle. Then we hear a rustle in the brush between our driveway and the neighbor's house.

"Look!" The Boy points. "The skunk!" And sure enough, waddling through the underbrush TOWARDS us, is a half-grown skunk. We made haste up the driveway to give him right of way, but the silly beasty seemed less concerned about us than we were about giving him a fright.

Worship

Some people go to buildings with other people to offer devotions or worship or pray to their god(s). I go out to the garden in the cool quiet of the morning while the rest of the house sleeps.

Who is to say that my worship is less for being under the open sky, kneeling amongst the plants...hands in the soil, listening to the hymns of the birds? Who is to say that my contemplations are less prayerful for being focused on the living things I tend: the flowering plants, the scurrying spider with her egg case disturbed by my turning of the soil and pulling of weeds?

My communion today was with a brave chickadee who ventured close enough to drink from the birdbath as I worked, and with small insects feeding in the salvia.

My sermon was delivered by a scolding cat bird, chastising me for being too close to the feeder.

My blessing came in the form of cooling rain, reminding me that Nature and the gods will do as they shall and the work of a human hand is fleeting.