every day is a good day
Autumn is just as colorful as spring. The sun was out a few days ago, shining on the last comfrey in bloom. In the spring comfrey blooms against a backdrop of new green. In the fall its purple flowers shine against a backdrop of fiery red leaves.
Arugula and shungiku 春菊 are still in green in the garden. How much longer will they grow?
This is what makes living in the woods worth every day. The spectacle of a maple ablaze in the woods is a welcome sight each time I come home.
It’s not unusual to have the first frost during the second week of October. Today the skies were cloudless all day, from before sunrise and even now with the stars filling the night sky.
The first frost is a warning to hurry up and get all the garlic planted, start new compost piles, pick the last of the pears, and start raking the falling leaves, of which there is no end.
Who eats apples? The question is more like who doesn’t eat apples. The Flickers and Stellar Jays joyfully peck at the apples we haven’t picked. I don‘t mind sharing. There are more apples than we can eat.
What I didn’t expect was to find wasps eating apples. The holes the Flickers and Jays make turn into all you can eat buffets for the wasps, though technically, I can’t call it a buffet. The dictionary says a buffet consists of several dishes and here we have a single dish, apple.
More Shaggy Parasols keep popping out of the forest floor. This is quite the season for them this year. We’re not the only ones eating them. I see spots on the larger ones where forest creatures have been nibbling.
After a first of October with the bluest of skies, the stars are out tonight, satellites and shooting stars among them. The nippy mornings are bringing out the fall colors.
The bees and wasps are having their last meals. In about a month frost will put an end to most of their lives. There is a sadness to fall, a sense of loss at seeing the plants succumb to the coming winter, saying good bye to the song birds, watching the leaves fall. Planting garlic and flower bulbs is comforting. I can imagine their strong shoots bursting out of the soft soil as I bury them.
Each day old Sven is still alive is a good day. I’m sure he thinks that getting old is for the birds too.
This may never happen again, an apple tree with red ripe apples and blossoms at the same time.
This will happen again and again, red maple leaves at the start of fall.
The fall rains have set off the mushrooms. The forest floor is covered with them. I bought an extensive guide book on mushrooms of the Pacific Northwest, but even with all the pictures and descriptions, I don’t have the nerve to pick one and take a nibble.
Back in my grade school days in Japan, I brought back an interesting plant from the forest. The stalk looked succulent and tasty, so my mother and I took a few bites. I don’t remember clearly what it tasted like. I do remember the fear I felt when our tongues and lips went numb. We didn’t die, but that was a good lesson not to eat plants you don’t know.
