every day is a good day
The forecast is for colder weather with snowflakes, but the daffodils pay no heed. They’re opening their bright yellow petals despite the nippy air.
The chickens love any day I make tofu. They pace back and forth by the cabin, waiting for me to appear with oakara おから, the soybean mash created during the process of making tofu. They go nuts if I have some spare tofu.
Cleaning out our closets, we uncovered this bright, snug, warm hat. Though I discovered that it strikes terror in the hearts of the chickens. If I wear it and step into the chicken yard, the chickens cry in horror and go running for the exit. It’s double terror for them if I show up in my bright yellow raincoat.
It must be the bright red of the hat which makes my head look like it’s on fire, or some misshapen comb on a giant rooster. For the safety and well-being of all, I take off the red hat before entering the chicken yard. The chickens don’t budge if I show up with a dull brown or dark blue or grey hat. I can step right over them without them even bothering to look up.
On this Sunday morn, of the 72 eggs I left at Tweets on Thursday, how many are left, or did the crowd who descended on Edison yesterday finish them all off? Customers from all over the world sojourn to Tweets. By this morning, the digested eggs laid by chickens in this peaceful patch of woods could be the flesh of rejuvenated customers getting off planes in Dubai, Sydney, or Cape Town. Could be, you know.
The sweet daphne is close to blooming and scenting the air with its dreamy fragrance. I love the scent of gardenias, but it is too cold for gardenias here. Sweet daphne’s perfume is just as heady, a scent so heavy you can float on it.
Each day the daffodil buds stretch ever higher. Soon the buds will be lemon yellow and ready to pop open.
A gift of many bags of pine needles is now a soft trail in the woodland. The pine tree these pine needles dropped from is a towering giant which sloughs off needles constantly. The friend who patiently sweeps these needles up says a gift awaits me every three to four months.
Yesterday our neighbor texted us that a neighbor warned them of a cougar in the area. Was it that cougar who scared some of our chickens two days ago? Something made a handful of them fly over the fence and run down the driveway. I found a few feathers from the spot where the chickens scattered, but no chickens were missing when I closed them up that night, and if it was a cougar it disappeared in a flash.
It gives me pause about walking the trails, or going into the woods to deal with the fallen trees, but I doubt a cougar would find a man carrying a chainsaw inviting. I don’t think a cougar would approach a man with a chainsaw running, making a racket, and sending a cloud of chips flying as he cuts into fallen tree trunks.
Well, if this post goes permanently quiet, you’ll know where I am, in the belly of a cougar plodding on soft, pine needle laden trails.
This morning was serene when I went out to make tofu in the cabin. Beams of sunlight made the frosty grass sparkle. In the trees, songbirds sang to the rising sun.
I had no idea a stampede of chickens was on my heels. The chickens come running when they see me go to the cabin to make tofu. They know that it won’t be long before they get a treat of okara, the ground, soybean mash, which is produced in the process of making soy milk. It is the soy milk which is made into tofu.
This unusually warm January has me thinking cherry blossoms. It’s too early to start counting, but once it is February 1, if you start adding the high temperature of each day in centigrades, by the time the total gets to 400, the cherry blossoms should be blooming.
On the far side of the pond, underneath the barren cherry trees, Happy is flapping his wings. It’s not the circular courtship dance he makes when he’s in love, it’s more a, “Look how big and strong I am,” happy dance.
