a man and his hoe

every day is a good day

Month: April 2016

Don’t Forget to Smell the Lilacs

The summer-like weather has the lilacs in full bloom. It’s impossible not to smell them. The slightest breeze, and their heavenly scent floats inside. In a few weeks they will be gone until next year. Now is the time to smell them.

A spider has made a home inside a bunch of white lilacs. You can see its slender legs. Does the spider sense what a beautiful place it lives? Or does it just care about the hapless insects which come by? While it waits, does it caress the lilac petals and sigh at their softness? Spiders smell through their legs. Maybe that’s why it dangles its feet over the petals. Perhaps it finds the fragrance of lilacs as tantalizing as we do.

The warmth has the asparagus shooting high. The beauty of having an asparagus patch is that you can pick them at different lengths. I find the ones that are just starting to branch out especially delicious. Those are not considered salable and they’ll never find their way onto store shelves. For the next few weeks, asparagus are practically a staple here. For the home gardener, they are an effortless vegetable. Year after year they come back whether you want them or not.

April 21, 2016
To the Dearest of Friends

Here lie the dearest of friends. We buried our dear BB along with the ashes of his brother, Echo, on Monday, by the garden gate, a place they often sat, waiting for us to return when we went away. The dearest of friends I have ever known. For ten years they graced our lives. No friends brought more happiness than these two.

Echo passed away last May, and on Monday, BB went to sleep for the very last time. We were fortunate to have these two share their joy with us since March of 2006. May you have friends who bring you such joy.

April 20, 2016
Maybe the Rapture Happened During the Night

Bicycling home from the Bow Post Office this morning, I came across this mysterious sight on the climb up Bow Hill. A rock, a pair of boots, and a half-drunk latte. The boots and latte cup were laid too neatly to have tumbled out of a passing car. Maybe the shoes are those of someone who rose into the heavens when the rapture happened during the night. Out of everyone one earth, only one was raptured, which is why the only person who noticed it had happened is me, who came across the evidence while pedaling up Bow Hill Road. Though, if the shoes are of someone who was raptured, where are their clothes? Maybe their soul was so pure, they sensed the momentous occasion was at hand, and set out before the crack of dawn, wearing only their shoes, knowing they wouldn’t need clothes any more.

But the rock? What to make of it? It’s a mystery. Probably a puzzle I will take to my grave. I moved the boots, rock, and latte cup further away from the road.

Further up the road, more evidence that something momentous has happened. A hieroglyph of a fish god on the road. It’s actually a mark pointing to where the Olympic Pipeline, an oil line, is buried underneath the road. But it does look like an Aborigine from ten thousand years ago time traveled to Bow Hill during the night and painted a hieroglyph on the road.

April 19, 2016
Mouth Wide Open

All looks calm and peaceful with the peonies’ mouths wide open. But along the edge of the pond the struggle for life and death plays out. A garden snake has caught a fish.

It’s an effort for the snake to swallow the fish. It takes a long time, swallowing a scale’s width and waiting until its jaw can stretch a bit more to get the next bit of the fish down its throat. How did it nab it? It must have been waiting at the water’s edge, hiding among the cattails to snatch the fish when it swam by.

Away from the pond, it’s calm and peaceful. The peonies are in full bloom and the chickens are enjoying the late afternoon sun.

April 18, 2016
Spread My Wings And …

I don’t have wings like a chicken, but even I can see how good it must feel to spread your wings in the bright, warm sun. Sunbathing is a favorite pastime of chickens. They twist themselves into humorous contortions as they soak up the heat of the sun. Chickens need their time in the sun as much as they need nests, water, food, and roosts.

April 16, 2016