Reflections
-
Creatures Under Heaven (updated)
“To deal the tortures of hell to the animal creation is a way which too many people have of showing their belief in it….” from A Dog of Flanders by Ouida, 1872 This afternoon we did some needful grocery shopping, and on the way home Mrs. Orr asked me to swing into the drive-thru of our favorite local burger joint. She wanted to pick up a gallon of their tea, the best in the region. Idling behind a couple of other cars in the lane, I looked across at the back yard of a home a couple hundred yards away from the burger place. In the yard is a small…
-
October Settles In
A week ago today, Mrs. Orr and I spent the afternoon on the back porch with a fan on, swatting yellowjackets and watering the flowers. Today? The promised cold front swept in night before last, and we are snuggled in the living room, wearing sweaters. We finally fired up the furnace this morning and it was pleasant to feel the chill melt out of the rooms. Putting the flannel sheets on the bed will be the final sob in our season of grieving the loss of warm weather. But…this is life, and we are grateful for it. Can one describe an October day without using the word “crisp?” The day…
-
Mow No Mo
Late yesterday afternoon, I decided to do my final full mowing of the year, since the temperatures are slated to drop steadily throughout this week. This is typically the timeframe in which I drive the little yellow tractor out of the barn for the last time of the season. It was a most glorious day to ride the machine and cut the grass down. I did the front and back yards, along with the front meadow. My neighbor’s son always mows the south pasture because he rakes and bales the grass for hay. I chewed up the leaves with the blades and they will make good compost material; I’m determined…
-
October, Enter Stage Right
The hummingbirds are gone for the year, I think. We saw a couple yesterday, and heard them as they were droning around in the trees, but that was earlier in the day. By early evening, they were not to be seen. This morning, no hum nor squeak greeted me when I opened the back door. We watched all morning for them but no hummingbirds. I took down all the feeders and replaced the nectar except in one, which was mostly being used by wasps, anyway. All the day long while we were outside, we strained our ears and eyes, but never heard nor saw any of the beautiful little paint…
-
Quiet Entry
Purple-Hull pea blossom The first Sunday of fall, and it has strolled in quietly. The sky is completely overcast, but no approach of rain. It was chilly enough on the front porch this morning for me to have to don a light jacket. Mrs. Orr and I sat out there, her shelling peas, me watching the birds. A downy woodpecker was on the downed pine, his steady staccato attack ringing across the valley. A pair of titmice took turns bathing in the birdbath while a goldfinch perched at the edge, sipping and watching. A murmuration of starlings in the next pasture swung and swooped and startled my wife with…
- Bluebelle, Daily Life, I Never Thought I'd Be In This Situation, Jinx, Mrs. Orr, Photographs, Reflections
Joy & Sun & Peas & Nails On Woden’s Day
…they chafe their knees….(Bluebelle) I was out in the sun today, which felt blissful. My solar therapy was inspired by a neighbor of ours who recently described a conversation she had with a doctor about her difficulty maintaining a good sleep pattern. Since this is something that affects both Mrs. Orr and me, we were very attentive to her description of the chat she had with the sawbones. Our neighbor’s doctor recommended she go outside and take the sun for about 20 minutes twice a day, between 0700 and 0900 each morning, and again within the last two hours before sundown, whether sunny or cloudy, since the sun’s rays penetrate…
-
Days Upon Days
The temperatures are so very mild here now…about 72F , sunny and mild, with rock-bottom humidity. The sensitive antennae of my bones tell me that winter will approach with more speed than I had anticipated. Mrs. Orr and I were talking recently about how we used to dread the hot weather — because in Texas, that’s really all we had — and how we welcomed the fall and winter months. Not no more, ese! The cold has an effect that it didn’t in our salad days, so there is a novel sense of dread now with the shifting sun patterns and the almost-chilly breeze. I am watching the hummingbirds closely,…
- Bluebelle, Books, Church Life, Daily Life, Dixee, Dreams, Jinx, Mrs. Orr, Music, Photographs, Quotations, Reflections
Royal Pains
It’s raining softly here today, and the valley is quiet except for the protestations of cows who are methodically being separated from their calves. We love the rain and the clouds, but there is an uncharacteristic sad feeling in the very air. And time is passing much too quickly. There is some Alanis-level irony in the fact that the squash we so carefully planted in the garden has done poorly, but one lone “volunteer” plant that sprang up, probably because of a bird depositing a seed, in a bed of shrubs bordering the back porch. This one unintentional plant has provided enough good squash for several meals so far, and…
-
Labor Day
The humidity was heavy in the air this morning, much more pronounced than yesterday. It will be an oppressively hot day, but looking at the calendar, I am mindful that this will change more quickly than I like to believe. The sun is beginning to get that Emily Dickinson “certain slant” to it, and the days and evenings feel slightly different, as though there has been some subtle but great turning — which there has. This earth is moving and tilting in preparation for the months that will bring winter to this hemisphere. When I look at the skies, whether in the blue of day or the pinpricked black of…
-
The Only Day
Today marks the ninth anniversary of the day my mother departed this life and went on to the next one. My sister and I chatted about this last night, remembering some of the happy times and some of the not-so-happy times we shared with the stoic, flinty old woman who gave us life and fed us and sheltered us and tried to guide us. I miss you, Mother, and I love you. I hope to see you again when my own time comes to sail into the west. *** It’s still hot here and will reach 90 today and for the remainder of the week, but the mornings have been…