Vacation All I Ever Wanted

Day two of my mostly stay at home vacation. It hasn't been quite what I expected, as work invaded about 4 hours of my first vacation day, and my daughter stayed home sick from tennis and day camp. Today she had a "recovery day," so my plans of having a couple days to myself to decompress and transition into full vacation mode were thwarted. But today we made the best of it. Instead of a road run with my dog, we headed to the track so the girls could roam safely while I ran my 3 miles. I even did a little speed work, inspired by the monotony of the oval. Then home for a little time in the garden while my girls did some "creative reapportionment" of saplings in the woods behind my house, which will soon be flattened from a steep, forested hillside into a girls' softball field for the local high school. (Grrrr) They even rolled a nice sized stone that I had admired down the hill for me. Way to go, girls!

Next, I regrettably gave into an impulse to cut my own hair. It's not terrible - no one in my family even noticed - but it's not quite...right. Oh well. Then on to bread baking with a nap squeezed in between first and second rise. A risky move, but it paid off with my best bread yet.

The highlight of the day has been watching the river by our house rise, and rise, and flirt with the top of the bank, making me wonder if I should evacuate my five barred rock hens from their new chicken coop. This is the highest the river in the four years we've lived here - a good 9 feet above its standard summer depth of about a foot. It is something to see, with entire trees raging by, and our own trees along the bank cracking ominously. We watched a Merganser mama and her 6 ducklings navigate the swollen waters with amazing skill - flapping madly and skimming the surface when they crossed the racing current, but otherwise tracing the shoreline, making improbably quick progress upstream.

Mama Merganser plans her approach...Then shows the youngsters how to do it!

One of our less favored fauna, a woodchuck, found himself flooded out of his den, so in spite of the presence of a bunch of humans, he had no choice but to come out and join us on the river bank. He announced his displeasure with a series of chatters, but we soon made our peace.

The river began to recede while we ate dinner. I finally had enough food for my regular foursome plus my strapping young adult stepson and his buddy. It's taken me almost 2 weeks to adjust my shopping and cooking to accommodate those adolescent appetites! But I made it up to them with steak, corn on the cob, pasta salad with fresh mozzarella, veggies from our CSA basket, and herbs from my little garden. And of course the fresh homemade bread. Yum.

Chemistry Lab

Sometimes, in spite of instincts that try to warn me off, I mix things that ought to remain apart. Elements that conspire to be together, but really shouldn't. I had this realization yesterday when a heavy soaking rain made it all but impossible to go outside. I'd already been in my head a fair amount, reading poetry, staring at the rain, considering the possible fruits of this sodden state of affairs. I was kneading dough - pizza dough - a pleasant meditative task. Considering possible toppings that would break new ground and still be palatable for my fairly easy to please family. I was hit with a craving for Ryan Adams, and wouldn't you know it, Gold was right there on the counter.

Here's what I learned: a disposition prone to blues + Ryan Adams' trainwhistle voice + a saturating rain = a ticket to my not-so-happy place. The path here is well worn; once I head in this direction I'm pulled in like an unfortunate fish on a hook. Or like the tractor beam on Star Trek (or was it Star Wars?).

Anyway, the pizza was divine. One with scallion butter, mozzarella, prosciutto and arugula; another more experimental one with steamed beets, feta, olive oil and arugula. Sometimes chemistry experiments pay off.

Good Love #1

Stolen moments strung
between acts in our
three ring circus.
We unfurl at dawn to the little one
singing herself awake,
and the elder carefully
assembling – not matching –
another uniquely flamboyant
outfit, the likes of which
have never been seen
in her second grade classroom.

A moment of caffeinated bliss,
the freshly roasted beans our brief escape.
We explore the terroir of the coffeelands
from our snowbound bed
and dream of rickety bus rides
through mountain tracts in search of
an honest Huehuetenango.

“Time to brush your teeth!”
in my screechiest mama voice.
Pulling up tights for the umpteenth time
on those perfect, plump legs.
A frantic hunt for the fancy shoes
with the bows, or the sparkles.

Then it’s the blur of day, transitions
bookend the time apart.
Not the type to phone at intervals, us.
Needs met during the stolen times
when I wrap my arms around you
and you can almost hear
the click.

An out of season Poem

Just getting caught up here. Fortunately I haven't been very prolific...


November
The maple tree outside my window
disrobes by degrees. Long after
the others stand naked and stoic
in the face of what lies ahead,
she enthralls, burlesque;
her flamenco skirts cartwheeling
beside the buttoned-down
houses of my street.

As her plumage falls away, bony limbs
rattle in mournful percussion.
A bittersweet pall descends. The eye
longs to capture the last radiance
of the too-short season,
but the heart tightens at the approach of
darker days and restless confinement,
and is forced to look away.

Waterworks

I sat midstream, a river rock
worn smooth and rounded by
caresses of constant companionship.
Tickled by playful eddies;
hypnotized by the prismatic effect
of my good loves.

When the penstocks and sluiceways
went to work upstream,
the water disappeared with a shock;
diverted to some other purpose.
Exposed and achingly dry,
I felt myself cracking.

After a time the water returned, crystallized;
abrading edges and points.
After a dozen years of quiet contentment
I find myself rubbed raw.

I crave the natural cycles of flood and drought,
the surface of the water alternately
within reach, my fingertips dancing
just below the glassy mosaic;
then rushing far overhead,
the strong current carrying
artifacts from upstream
while I remain firmly settled
in my rightful place.

-oct 07

Taproot

An afternoon in the garden
Yields swathes of disturbed earth
Heaps of vanquished weeds
An hour of sweet solitude
And satisfying strain.

Loam infiltrates and settles in,
Emphasizing lines on my palm
Life line, head line, heart
The way gravestone rubbings
Highlight the parenthesis of short lives.

Long life, straight head, forked heart
Divided allegiances, delicious tension
Between orderly beds of cultivated beauty
And the riotous tangle of opportunity.

The struggle is layered;
While blooms race toward the sun,
Roots knit blind boundaries,
Or send a thick tap deep, deep
Staking claim to the salt of the earth.

--july 07