Places to look for a Democrat's(?) vision of America

My email inbox is full of pleas for $ so democrats and progressives can flip the House and / or the Senate come November. It has almost as many email invitations to sign petitions and receive additional requests for $. The last time I checked, petitions do not contribute much to the governance of the country whose government isn't very inclined to pay attention to anyone whose name isn't Koch.

our foundations need shoring up

Photo by J. Harrington

Please don't misunderstand us. We know the Democrats aren't as bad as the Republicans, but what else do the Democrats stand for? Are the Democrats the party that helps protect the environment? We sorely need one of those. Do the Democrats truly support the labor movement? We need more and stronger unions to offset growing corporate power. Why has the single payer - Medicare for all issue taken so long to be accepted by the Democratic leadership? For that matter, whatever happened to the "public option" in the Affordable Care Act? Do the Democrats have a vision of the American they want, other than it's not run by Republicans? Where can we find that vision?

Remember the westerns of long ago? How about "Magnificent Seven," the version from 1960? Remember how the Mexican villagers hired the gunmen to protect their homes from the gang of bandits? Can we, would we honestly claim to be able to find the equivalent of the seven American gunmen among the Democrats? We can probably name three or four, but seven? What do Democrats think leadership stands for? Cutting deals for dollars? Getting people elected?

We once worked for someone who had the sense of humor to show up at senior staff meetings wearing a "seed cap" with the slogan "I am their leader, which way did they go." Since most of the Democrats we've seen recently actually need such caps, and the humility to wear them, let us suggest the Democrats look for their "followers" not in corporate board rooms, but in places like these:

• The Next System Project
  (The Next System Project is an initiative of The Democracy Collaborative aimed at bold thinking and action to address the systemic challenges the United States faces now and in coming decades.)


• Doughnut Economics
  Humanity’s 21st century challenge is to meet the needs of all within the means of the planet.


• Drawdown - 100 Solutions to Reverse Global Warming


• Hope in the Dark: Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities

"It’s important to say what hope is not: it is not the belief that everything was, is, or will be fine. The evidence is all around us of tremendous suffering and tremendous destruction. The hope I’m interested in is about broad perspectives with specific possibilities, ones that invite or demand that we act. It’s also not a sunny everything-is-getting-better narrative, though it may be a counter to the everything-is-getting-worse narrative. You could call it an account of complexities and uncertainties, with openings."

There are other places to look. But for now, that's the best we can come up on a Sunday afternoon with both literal and figurative clouds in the sky. Remember, while we're at this, what the wonderful Studs Terkel once wrote: "Hope Dies Last."

Of History and Hope

By Miller Williams

We have memorized America,

how it was born and who we have been and where.

In ceremonies and silence we say the words,

telling the stories, singing the old songs.

We like the places they take us. Mostly we do.

The great and all the anonymous dead are there.

We know the sound of all the sounds we brought.

The rich taste of it is on our tongues.

But where are we going to be, and why, and who?

The disenfranchised dead want to know.

We mean to be the people we meant to be,

to keep on going where we meant to go.

But how do we fashion the future? Who can say how

except in the minds of those who will call it Now?

The children. The children. And how does our garden grow?

With waving hands—oh, rarely in a row—

and flowering faces. And brambles, that we can no longer allow.

Who were many people coming together

cannot become one people falling apart.

Who dreamed for every child an even chance

cannot let luck alone turn doorknobs or not.

Whose law was never so much of the hand as the head

cannot let chaos make its way to the heart.

Who have seen learning struggle from teacher to child

cannot let ignorance spread itself like rot.

We know what we have done and what we have said,

and how we have grown, degree by slow degree,

believing ourselves toward all we have tried to become—

just and compassionate, equal, able, and free.

All this in the hands of children, eyes already set

on a land we never can visit—it isn’t there yet—

but looking through their eyes, we can see

what our long gift to them may come to be.

If we can truly remember, they will not forget.

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first frost, first freeze #phenology

Last night and early this morning, local temperatures fell below freezing. Sensitive plants (that we wanted to protect) were covered or came into the house. Tonight it's forecast to be warmer and to rain so today the plants were uncovered and returned to outside. Those years when we get a frost only this time of year, we just toss some sheets over plants. Its early for a hard freeze. The bird bath was covered with skim ice this morning. See!

ice-covered bird bath

Photo by J. Harrington

The blacktopping crews were back at it today. Now the entire road is blacktopped. There's about a two inch lip at the end of our drive. It's not clear if the crews intend to smooth the transition or not. Since the road committee was concerned about people driving on the edges of the blacktop, if it were me, I might have done the paving some time other than near the opening of hunting season, since about a third or so of the total length of this road borders a Wildlife Management Area open to public hunting, where folks often just pull to the side of the road (across the edge of the new pavement), park, and head into the woods.

frost-covered field and wet spot

Photo by J. Harrington

Now that we've had our first frost, we're eligible to enjoy Indian Summer, according to the Weather Service, or not, if you believe the Old Farmer's Almanac. We've also seen reports from elsewhere in Minnesota that the air has been full of snow flakes. That's not so unusual, since we think July is the only month in which snow hasn't been recorded here in the Northland.

from “Thoreau”

Cole Swensen, 1955

In the essay “A Winter Walk,” which predated the more famous essay “Walking”
by a few years, Thoreau paid particular attention to the astonishing array of whites

from fog to snow to frost to the crystals growing outward on threads of light. The
fact that white is separately known. That it is its own wildness, entirely exterior,

like all weather you notice is a version of an open room coming through
the wind in prisms. White holds light in a suspended state, unleashing it later

across a field of snow or a sheet of water at just the right angle to make the surface
a solid, and on we go walking. Goethe’s Theory of Colorsdepicted each one

as an intense zone of human activity overflowing its object into feeling there is
a forest through which something white is flying through a wash of white, which is

the presence of all colors until red, for instance, is needed for a bird or green
for a world.

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the wilds of Autumn

Each day we see more and more color in the local leaves. Still not dominant, but coming along nicely, especially around the low areas and wetlands. Tonight we have the season's first freeze / frost warning covering most of the state. We'll bring the mums and asters into the front hall and throw a sheet over the plant pots outside. Probably time to disconnect the hoses, too.

Autumn's colors developing

Photo by J. Harrington

This shift in temperatures is happening the same day the township and their contractors are paving our gravel road. We have, at best, mixed feelings about that change. Dust reduction will be nice but not if it comes at the expense of greater dangers from increased vehicle speeds. Plus, we'll not be expecting to see deer, or any other, tracks in the blacktop, nor many reptiles warming themselves on an early Spring day, although we may be proven wrong about the warming. We just don't know.

We've been reading another of Ed Abbey's books. This one a collection of essays titled One Life at a Time, Please. Mr. Abbey is known for having a dim view of much of what contemporary civilization refers to as "progress." As we age, we find ourself coming to be more and more in agreement with him about the downsides to many of the "benefits" of civilization. Climate change, confined animal feeding operations with flooded manure lagoons plus flooded and/or breached ash basins among them.

He's also known to have been a fierce defender of wild country, especially in the Southwest. Here are examples of what he fought to save: Rethinking Wilderness: Of Prairies and Deserts. We have a wild and scenic river just down the road apiece. It too looks like it needs more defenders. From the St. Croix 360 newsletter: Scandia gravel pit overflows, buries St. Croix Valley spring creek.

As we watched the heavy trucks, the blacktop machine, and the steam roller slowly proceed down what once was our gravel road, we remembered with fondness another of Abbey's works, The Monkey Wrench Gang. Try it! You might like it.

Wilderness

Carl Sandburg, 1878- 1967

There is a wolf in me … fangs pointed for tearing gashes … a red tongue for raw meat … and the hot lapping of blood—I keep this wolf because the wilderness gave it to me and the wilderness will not let it go.

There is a fox in me … a silver-gray fox … I sniff and guess … I pick things out of the wind and air … I nose in the dark night and take sleepers and eat them and hide the feathers … I circle and loop and double-cross.

There is a hog in me … a snout and a belly … a machinery for eating and grunting … a machinery for sleeping satisfied in the sun—I got this too from the wilderness and the wilderness will not let it go.

There is a fish in me … I know I came from saltblue water-gates … I scurried with shoals of herring … I blew waterspouts with porpoises … before land was … before the water went down … before Noah … before the first chapter of Genesis.

There is a baboon in me … clambering-clawed … dog-faced … yawping a galoot’s hunger … hairy under the armpits … here are the hawk-eyed hankering men … here are the blond and blue-eyed women … here they hide curled asleep waiting … ready to snarl and kill … ready to sing and give milk … waiting—I keep the baboon because the wilderness says so.

There is an eagle in me and a mockingbird … and the eagle flies among the Rocky Mountains of my dreams and fights among the Sierra crags of what I want … and the mockingbird warbles in the early forenoon before the dew is gone, warbles in the underbrush of my Chattanoogas of hope, gushes over the blue Ozark foothills of my wishes—And I got the eagle and the mockingbird from the wilderness.

O, I got a zoo, I got a menagerie, inside my ribs, under my bony head, under my red-valve heart—and I got something else: it is a man-child heart, a woman-child heart: it is a father and mother and lover: it came from God-Knows-Where: it is going to God-Knows-Where—For I am the keeper of the zoo: I say yes and no: I sing and kill and work: I am a pal of the world: I came from the wilderness.

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Can we thrive in a volatile world?

Minnesota, in the several decades we've lived here, has done a for job of handling the transition from Winter to Summer. Springs are all to brief, tumultuous, abrupt, rather than a gradual awakening and warming. This year it looks as though Autumn may replicate most Springs.

High temperatures for the next several days are forecast to be in the low fifties. That's about 15℉ below average for this time of year. NOAA predicts a 33% chance of above normal temperatures for October through December. We're doubtful, even with the occurrence of Global Warming. The pattern we think we're seeing is greater variability in both temperatures and storm frequency and intensity. Even if averages don't change much, it can make a big difference if an average rainfall of 6" is comprised of equal numbers of storms of 2" and 10", or 5" and 7".

how volatile will our future be?

Photo by J. Harrington

As we've been watching much of the "Kavanaugh" hearing for much of the day, we see similar variability in the temperaments of the Judge and the Professor. Whatever a "judicial temperament" may be, from what we've seen, she (the Professor) has it and he (the Judge) doesn't. We see absolutely no way, if his nomination to the Supreme Court is confirmed, that he will add to the credibility of the institution. It's started us wondering if, to dampen what we see as emerging violent swings in our political governance, we need a constitutional amendment that decisions by SCOTUS must have at least 6 judges in favor. We've had too many 5 to 4 decisions. We're seeing too many rules and decisions by prior administrations getting undone. We've seen too much of political volatility instead of due process (Garland compared to Kavenaugh nominations). This democracy is unlikely to survive the kinds of "governance" we're experiencing.

There's an interesting and relevant piece in the Los Angeles Review of Books, by Guy Patrick Cunningham, on a similar theme about how we humans try to manage ourselves: Party of One: Democracy, Political Parties, and Simone Weil. Let's see if the penultimate paragraph tempts you to read the whole thing:

"Weil’s vision of democracy isn’t focused on plebiscites or elections — it’s about allowing people to make choices about how to live fulfilling lives. And while I might not agree with her answers, I think her questions are the right ones. To her, even the idea of a political party — as utilitarian invention as you can think of — is subject to an ethical investigation. And it should be. Because if political engagement is dependent on social identity, political struggle will ultimately become a struggle of competing values. After all, values define social identity."

If we fail in our struggle to define our common social identity, we'll find ourselves, in the midst of rising seas and howling storms, in

A Season in Hell

Arthur Rimbaud, 1854- 1891

A while back, if I remember right, my life was one long party where all hearts were open wide, where all wines kept flowing.

One night, I sat Beauty down on my lap.—And I found her galling.—And I roughed her up.

I armed myself against justice.

I ran away. O witches, O misery, O hatred, my treasure’s been turned over to you!
I managed to make every trace of human hope vanish from my mind. I pounced on every joy like a ferocious animal eager to strangle it.

I called for executioners so that, while dying, I could bite the butts of their rifles. I called for plagues to choke me with sand, with blood. Bad luck was my god. I stretched out in the muck. I dried myself in the air of crime. And I played tricks on insanity.

And Spring brought me the frightening laugh of the idiot.

So, just recently, when I found myself on the brink of the final squawk! it dawned on me to look again for the key to that ancient party where I might find my appetite once more.

Charity is that key.—This inspiration proves I was dreaming!

“You’ll always be a hyena etc. . . ," yells the devil, who’d crowned me with such pretty poppies. “Deserve death with all your appetites, your selfishness, and all the capital sins!”

Ah! I’ve been through too much:-But, sweet Satan, I beg of you, a less blazing eye! and while waiting for the new little cowardly gestures yet to come, since you like an absence of descriptive or didactic skills in a writer, let me rip out these few ghastly pages from my notebook of the damned. 

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Attack of the sandburs

One of the things we really hate about late Summer and early Autumn is that's sandbur time.

sandburs on the plant (shown upside down)

Photo by J. Harrington

Today it was Franco who picked up the sandbur in his pad. Last week, a couple of times, it was SiSi. We've noticed that there's a relatively standard sequence of events that follows the attack of the sandbur.

1. The dog looks accusingly at his/her walker, with an expression that says "Why'd you do this to me?"
2. On being told to sit, the dog looks uncertain. "What's going to happen next? Can we negotiate this?"
3. Walker approaches dog. Reaches to lift the wounded paw.
4. Dog pulls paw away, afraid that removal will hurt more than leaving the sandbur in place.
5. Dog walker gently reaches again for wounded paw. Quickly finds and removes sandbur, impaling walker's finger.
6. Walker again curses self for being an idiot who left several pair of needle nose pliers in the house.
7. Dog promptly forgets discomfort and trots down the gravel road without so much as a look of gratitude.

That's about all we've got for today. It's kind of a quiet time for local phenology, although the percent leaves that have turned color keeps increasing. Another reason for the short posting is we're under the weather with a head cold.

Dog

By Lawrence Ferlinghetti

The dog trots freely in the street

and sees reality

and the things he sees

are bigger than himself

and the things he sees

are his reality

Drunks in doorways

Moons on trees

The dog trots freely thru the street

and the things he sees

are smaller than himself

Fish on newsprint

Ants in holes

Chickens in Chinatown windows

their heads a block away

The dog trots freely in the street

and the things he smells

smell something like himself

The dog trots freely in the street

past puddles and babies

cats and cigars

poolrooms and policemen

He doesn’t hate cops

He merely has no use for them

and he goes past them

and past the dead cows hung up whole

in front of the San Francisco Meat Market

He would rather eat a tender cow

than a tough policeman

though either might do

And he goes past the Romeo Ravioli Factory

and past Coit’s Tower

and past Congressman Doyle

He’s afraid of Coit’s Tower

but he’s not afraid of Congressman Doyle

although what he hears is very discouraging

very depressing

very absurd

to a sad young dog like himself

to a serious dog like himself

But he has his own free world to live in

His own fleas to eat

He will not be muzzled

Congressman Doyle is just another

fire hydrant

to him

The dog trots freely in the street

and has his own dog’s life to live

and to think about

and to reflect upon

touching and tasting and testing everything

investigating everything

without benefit of perjury

a real realist

with a real tale to tell

and a real tail to tell it with

a real live

              barking

                         democratic dog

engaged in real

                      free enterprise

with something to say

                             about ontology

something to say

                        about reality

                                        and how to see it

                                                               and how to hear it

with his head cocked sideways

                                       at streetcorners

as if he is just about to have

                                       his picture taken

                                                             for Victor Records

                                  listening for

                                                   His Master’s Voice

                      and looking

                                       like a living questionmark

                                                                 into the

                                                              great gramaphone

                                                           of puzzling existence

                 with its wondrous hollow horn

                         which always seems

                     just about to spout forth

                                                      some Victorious answer

                                                              to everything

Notes:
Correction: "a seriously dog" was corrected to "a serious dog" on 10/20/2010.

Lawrence Ferlinghetti, “Dog” from A Coney Island of the Mind: Poems. Copyright © 1958 by Lawrence Ferlinghetti. Reprinted by permission of New Directions Publishing Corporation.

Source:A Coney Island of the Mind: Poems(New Directions Publishing Corporation, 1958)

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A different kind of power

Chicago county is at the southern end of Minnesota's Eighth Congressional District. With the exception of some sand and gravel operations, we don't know of any significant mining operations in the county. Toward the northern extremities of the CD, iron/taconite mining has been in operation for some time. More recently, "hard rock" sulfite ore mining is being proposed, primarily for copper-nickel mining. From what we've read, mining is an energy intensive operation with numerous opportunities to improve energy efficiency. Electricity is the second largest fuel consumed in the US mining industry. The United Nations has identified how mining can contribute to the world's Sustainable Development Goals. Minnesota continues to oppose the prospect of copper mining because of the risk/reward profile of such untested operations. Meanwhile, at the southern end of the CD, Chisago county has been successfully moving ahead with a previously untested approach to providing power to the school system and enhancing the profitability of marginally useful spaces such as school roof tops and sub-prime farm land. Is there a lesson here that would help diversify the economy of the entire CD?

At the #Chisago Lakes Schools, 1,000 panels are located on the roofs of five schools. Over the next 30 years, @IPSsolar predicts that power along with power the district is purchasing from panels in other parts of the county, will save the district $100,000 each year. #powerofmn pic.twitter.com/CDdAUq1Q2u

— The Power of Minnesota (@PowerOfMN) September 24, 2018

What we've been trying to understand for months and months and ... is how such a "leftish, progressive" sequence of actions took hold and got implemented in a basically conservative, Republican county that supported Trump over Clinton by almost 2 to 1.

source: Politico

Part of an explanation can be found in this piece from MinnPost: "Chisago County has become a case study in the possibilities and politics of solar energy in Greater Minnesota." [We'll wait while you read it.]

Chisago county solar farm under construction

Photo by J. Harrington

There's a theory and strategy in the economic development field known as "plugging the leaks." Picture a local economy as a bucket that has some holes in it. The holes are where funds (electric utility profits?) leave the community rather than recirculating as a local flow. Chisago county and the school district are plugging holes in their local economy, in addition to adding to its diversity. And yet, the Chisago voters went heavily for a candidate who's doing his best to revive coal power and expand oil development, climate change be damned. Are people not connecting the dots, or are they connecting dots in ways that progressives and neoliberal don't yet understand?

Chisago county solar farm in operation

Photo by J. Harrington

It's becoming more and more clear to us that, if humans have much of a future ahead of them, then the future needs to be much more sustainable, even restorative, than has been the case in the past. Chisago county seems, in at least some surprising ways, headed in the right direction. (No pun or political observation implied.) We're constantly surprised as we drive around the county with the way "solar farms" seem to pop up like mushrooms during a wet Spring.

Minnesota is becoming known more and more for its growth in clean energy jobs. But, conservative think(?) tanks such as the Center of the American Experiment would have us return to those dirty energy days of yesteryear (Rising Electricity Prices Threaten Mining Jobs, the Iron Range). The mining industry itself is turning more and more to renewable energy. Here's a link to a data base of Solar & wind systems in the mining industry. Perhaps Minnesota's Iron Range leadership, as well as the Center of the American Experiment, should spend some time talking to those in Chisago county who helped bring about the transformation of marginal lands (and unused roof tops) into profitable, cost saving, energy generating activities. Could it be time for mining in northern Minnesota to help lead the way back to the future?

Heaven's Light (lyrics)
Playful waves of water Caught the colors of the sky, And cast the hues of sunset Rippling softly in my eyes. Mesmerizing moments, Opened...wide to heaven's, Heaven's light. Then the lovely moon arose She shimmered on the sea; Sunlight beaming from her face, To playful waves, then me... Memserizing moments, Opened...wide to heaven's, Heaven's light. Mesmerizing moments, Opened...wide to heaven's, Heaven's light... Mind adrift, From troubled shores...	[Guitar Solo] Then the lovely moon arose She shimmered on the sea; Sunlight beaming from her face, To playful waves, then me... Mesmerizing moments, opened... Wide to heaven's, heaven's light... Mesmerizing moments, opened... Wide to heaven's, heaven's light... Mind adrift from troubled shores... My mind adrift from troubled shores... I feel the gift of heaven's light... Mmmm Mmmm Heaven's light... Mmmm Composed and performed by Cherilynn Morrow and Jeff Ballard

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Harvest moon - whitetail visit

At dusk yesterday a whitetail doe nibbled her way through the back yard. In the twilight, her dark gray coat looked like a shadow against the paler gray grasses. She might have been eating acorns scattered about, or the grasses may have had some fresh growth after all the rain we've had recently. (We didn't think deer ate grasses.) We just watched quietly as she picked her way through the yard until she started to help herself to the forsythia bush. Then we stepped out onto the deck and ordered her to "cease and desist." She scampered away 25 or 30 feet and stopped. Maybe she realized we couldn't reach her from the deck. After looking about, she slowly wandered into the woods North of the house.

whitetail doe, Autumn twilight

It's actually lots more fun and exciting to have one deer within 15 yards or so of the house than to have several 25 or 30 yards away munching pears on the hillside. Having just one deer wander through is a little unusual though. Do you suppose it would help get the driveway cleaned up if we left a trail of acorns and some signs (more this way -->) from the back yard to the acorn windrows on the South side of the driveway? We'd rather have the deer and squirrels eat them than have to rake them up.

There's a few yellow hawkweed plants in bloom, and a couple or five purple vetch flowers in the grassy fields. That's about it for wildflower blossoms. That probably helps explain the dearth of butterflies.

harvest or rice moon

Tonight is the harvest moon (full moon nearest the Autumn equinox), although we doubt we'll be able to see it since the weather forecast is for clouds and rain. It's also known as manoominike-giizis - rice moon, for the Anishnaabe.

The Harvest Moon

by Ted Hughes

The flame-red moon, the harvest moon,
Rolls along the hills, gently bouncing,
A vast balloon,
Till it takes off, and sinks upward
To lie on the bottom of the sky, like a gold doubloon.
The harvest moon has come,
Booming softly through heaven, like a bassoon.
And the earth replies all night, like a deep drum.

So people can't sleep,
So they go out where elms and oak trees keep
A kneeling vigil, in a religious hush.
The harvest moon has come!

And all the moonlit cows and all the sheep
Stare up at her petrified, while she swells
Filling heaven, as if red hot, and sailing
Closer and closer like the end of the world.

Till the gold fields of stiff wheat
Cry `We are ripe, reap us!' and the rivers
Sweat from the melting hills.

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Naming Fall's leaf colors

While heading back to the house after walking the dogs midday, we saw something we've never seen before. Six red squirrels, all in a line, scampered across the road. Actually, five proceeded across and the last one turned around and disappeared into the woods in front of our house.

red squirrel looking down on Franco's deck domain

Photo by J. Harrington

We see red squirrels regularly. In fact, one of the joys that Franco, the Better Half's border collie cross, has is keeping "his" deck domain free of those dratted squirrels. Franco even recognizes the word unless we spell it out like this:  S-Q-U-I-R-R-E-L. As we watched the reds crossing the road, we could almost hear Franco's brain trying to process whether there was any way he could herd that many squirrels, since he hasn't yet signed up for tree climbing lessons. Watching all of them bounce across the road did look like something out of a Disney movie. We don't recall ever before seeing a squirrel family, never mind on crossing the road. Please don't ask why they were crossing.

Earlier today we ended up taking a long way around through northern Anoka County as we returned from a visit this morning. We remain surprised at how little we saw in the way of leaf color. The MNDNR's Fall Color Finder confirms our observations. There's a bizarre pattern around much of the Twin Cities East, North and West edges showing essentially no Fall colors yet. And as we think of Fall colors, take a look at these 11 Colorful Words for Autumn Foliage so you'll know what you're seeing when the local colors finally arrive.

MNDNR Fall Color Finder 9/23/18

Fall

Edward Hirsch, 1950

Fall, falling, fallen. That’s the way the season 
Changes its tense in the long-haired maples 
That dot the road; the veiny hand-shaped leaves 
Redden on their branches (in a fiery competition 
With the final remaining cardinals) and then 
Begin to sidle and float through the air, at last 
Settling into colorful layers carpeting the ground. 
At twilight the light, too, is layered in the trees 
In a season of odd, dusky congruences—a scarlet tanager
And the odor of burning leaves, a golden retriever 
Loping down the center of a wide street and the sun 
Setting behind smoke-filled trees in the distance, 
A gap opening up in the treetops and a bruised cloud 
Blamelessly filling the space with purples. Everything 
Changes and moves in the split second between summer’s 
Sprawling past and winter’s hard revision, one moment 
Pulling out of the station according to schedule, 
Another moment arriving on the next platform. It 
Happens almost like clockwork: the leaves drift away 
From their branches and gather slowly at our feet, 
Sliding over our ankles, and the season begins moving 
Around us even as its colorful weather moves us, 
Even as it pulls us into its dusty, twilit pockets. 
And every year there is a brief, startling moment 
When we pause in the middle of a long walk home and 
Suddenly feel something invisible and weightless 
Touching our shoulders, sweeping down from the air: 
It is the autumn wind pressing against our bodies; 
It is the changing light of fall falling on us. 

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Autumnal Equinox? Celebrate!

Autumn begins today, unless you've been observing meteorological Autumn since the start of September. Or if you're reading this from the Southern Hemisphere, enjoy the beginning of Spring! There are many other festivals, holidays and feasts celebrated around the world about now. Here's a list.

Autumn afternoon, grasses

Photo by J. Harrington

One of the beautiful aspects of this season is the quality late afternoon light takes on. A day or so ago, around mid to late afternoon the sun came out briefly while two does and their almost grown fawns were munching their way through the pears blown down in this week's storms. The light on the grasses and the deers' tawny coats was magical.

male cardinal

Photo by J. Harrington

Another reappearance this week brings back a male and female cardinal to the feeder. We noticed the bright red male a couple of afternoons and the strawberry blond female once. Autumn's colors aren't limited to tree leaves. With luck and a full feeder, the cardinals will add bright colors to all of Autumn, Winter and early Spring.

Someone must have made sure Mother Nature was reminded that astronomical Autumn starts today. The early morning temperature, under a mostly clear sky, was below 40℉ locally. At least that's what one of our smart phone weather apps told us. The breeze was strong enough that we almost thought of that horrible phrase "wind chill." This afternoon there's still a very cool breeze blowing from a southerly direction. That seem's unusual, but maybe we haven't been paying enough attention. Anyhow, if this weather ever settles into a more typical pattern, some time over the next couple of weeks or so we can expect our first frost. This morning, while cleaning up some dead branches brought down by our recent storms, we wore our down vest for the first time in months. We do seem to have arrived at that time of year.

Autumn Equinox

by Jacqueline C Nash

On this the first day of Autumn
the sun is now on the wane,
day and night are of equal length
so a balance of light and dark will reign.

Now the nights begin to get colder,
increasing darkness ensues,
the sap returns to the trees roots
and the leaves will be changing hues.

This is a time to look back on our past
and for a future to be planned.
The wheel turns to an ageing year
when we remember all things must end.

We must say farewell to the Summer
as Autumn leaves start to fall
and if we listen very hard we'll hear
the chill of Winter's call. 

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When IS Summer's last day of 2018?

The Autumn Equinox is at 9:54 pm EDT tomorrow. We're sure that someone, somewhere, might be able to disabuse us of the following quibbles, but not even Google has satisfied us thus far and we don't believe these questions warrant awakening Siri.

• How can equal periods of day and night begin tomorrow at a time when there's only 2 hours and 6 minutes left in the day? Does this expose the arbitrary capriciousness of our 24 hour day?


• Is there somewhere that "officially" identifies the geographic location where Equinox starts, sort of the way New Year travels around the world.


• We live near St. Paul, MN. There the day length closest to 12 hours is on September 25th. Why isn't that the Equinox? In calculating length of day and night, where does dawn and twilight fit in?


• There's plenty of light before sunrise and after sunset. What are we actually measuring?


• Is the last "day" of Summer today or tomorrow, since the Equinox is after sunset tomorrow?


• How, if at all, will climate change affect our definition of seasons, for example, "Landsat-derived Spring and Autumn Phenology, Eastern US - Canadian Forests, 1984-2013"

Autumn dawns in the North Country

Photo by J. Harrington

This has all confused us enough that, after walking the dogs in a gusty Northwest wind (a sign of Winter in our North Country) and a temperature well below 60℉, we're now eating an ice cream cone in order to celebrate the end of Summer for this year. Maybe we'll eat another cone tomorrow unless we can confirm that today is indeed the end of Summer and daytime tomorrow is the first day of Autumn.

End of Summer

By Stanley Kunitz

An agitation of the air,  

A perturbation of the light

Admonished me the unloved year

Would turn on its hinge that night.

I stood in the disenchanted field

Amid the stubble and the stones,

Amazed, while a small worm lisped to me

The song of my marrow-bones.

Blue poured into summer blue,

A hawk broke from his cloudless tower,

The roof of the silo blazed, and I knew

That part of my life was over.

Already the iron door of the north

Clangs open: birds, leaves, snows

Order their populations forth,

And a cruel wind blows.

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Equinox approaches

It's another rainy day. We may, or may not, get some severe weather this afternoon. The most excitement so far today was triggered by the discovery that one of the neighbor's yaks had wandered loose and was calmly munching the grasses growing in the roadside ditch. We noticed the errant yak as we were headed off to do some errands and notified a neighbor who in turn notified the yak's owner. The beast was nowhere to be seen as we returned so we assume a yak-herder was sent to reclaim the wayward animal.

neighbor's yaks where they belong, behind a fence

Photo by J. Harrington

On our trip out, we next noticed, another half a mile or so down the road, a small herd of four whitetail deer standing on a hillside next to the road. The deer were on the opposite side of the road from the yak. As we passed, they continued uphill and into the woods with no undue incidents. We wonder how the deer, and yak, populations will fare once the town board has its way and our gravel road is paved. Will increased speeds on the part of those just passing through lead to increased fatalities?

late Autumn deer-nibbled pumpkins

Photo by J. Harrington

Yesterday, the Better Half arrived home with four moderate sized pumpkins and a table-top's worth of gourds and small pumpkins. The larger four are now lining the North side of the driveway in approximately the same location that the chrysanthemums are usually placed. In years past, proximity to the house has not deterred deer from nibbling on the decorative pumpkins. In any case, we should now be almost all set to celebrate Autumn Equinox and Halloween, but not necessarily Samhain. If, as forecast, the sun actually returns on Saturday, we think we'll celebrate Equinox with a cup of coffee on the patio of one of our favorite local coffee shops. If it doesn't shine, we'll at least try to not grump very much. Equinox is a good day to try to maintain a balance, right?

In Autumn

Mark Irwin

When within ourselves in autumn we feel the autumn

I become very still, a kind of singing, and try to move

like all things green, in one direction, when within ourselves

the autumn moves, thickening like honey, that light we smear

on faces and hands, then touch the far within one another,

something like autumn, and I think when those who knew

the dead, when they fall asleep,then what, then what in autumn

when I always feel I’m writing in red pencil on a piece

of paper growing in thickness the way a pumpkin does,

traveling at fantastic speed toward orange, toward rot, when

in autumn I remember that we are cold-smitten as I continue

smearing red on this precipice, this ledge of paper over which

I lean, trying to touch those I love, their bodies rusting

as I keep writing, sketching their red hands, faces lusting for green.

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Changing colors? #phenology

Damp, approaching soggy, describes the local conditions. The dogs have been carefully checking fresh whitetail tracks in the gravel road. We know they're fresh because those tracks weren't there yesterday when we took our walk. When and if the township gets around to blacktopping our road, tracks will disappear and, we suspect, so will scents other than bituminous. Some might call it progress. The dogs and we beg to differ. At least we'll still have autumn colors to enjoy, we hope.

by September 20, 2014 many leaves showed color

Photo by J. Harrington

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Please be kind to each other while you can. Looking at the local leaves, it seems that colors are developing later this year than in many years past. Even the roadside poison ivy, which often is among the first to show color, remains predominantly green. Local maples haven't yet turned much either, in comparison with today's photo. We're not sure if it's the crazy weather (90's over the weekend, less than 60 today) that's affecting the color change. The photoperiodicity shouldn't, we hope, change much regardless of climate change, but might it be affected by extended periods of cloudiness or sunshine? Follow the link in the preceding sentence if you're interested in the science of color change.

Song for Autumn

by Mary Oliver

In the deep fall
don’t you imagine the leaves think how
comfortable it will be to touch
the earth instead of the
nothingness of air and the endless
freshets of wind? And don’t you think
the trees themselves, especially those with mossy,
warm caves, are beginning to look for

the birds that will come — six, a dozen — to sleep
inside their bodies? And don’t you hear
the goldenrod whispering goodbye,
the everlasting being crowned with the first
tuffets of snow? The pond
vanishes, and the white field over which
the fox runs so quickly brings out
its blue shadows. And the wind pumps its
bellows. And at evening especially,
the piled firewood shifts a little,
longing to be on its way.

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Crossing permaculture with #phenology?

Minnesota has several wildflowers of the Gentiana family. The Minnesota Wildflowers web site lists five Gentiana and three other "Gentians" that bloom in September. The plants in our front flower garden are, we think, bottle gentians, but don't hold us to that. Our listing of Chisago County wildflowers includes only two Gentianas, but also has two "gentians" from the Triostium family. This has possibly been a classic exercise in why scientists rely on Linnaean rather than common names.

bottle gentian(?) in September

Photo by J. Harrington

The leaves on the remnants of the black chokeberry bushes left by our local whitetail herd have started to change to bright orangey-yellow instead of the reddish-purple (purplish-red?) many cultivars are listed as producing. Perhaps it's the lack of full sun that's altered the color? We're now thinking that, instead of transplanting some of the existing bushes, maybe we should buy more and see if we can convince the deer to leave at least some of them alone? The photo shows a partial yield several years ago from one bush before the deer discovered them.

a rare harvest of black chokeberries

Photo by J. Harrington

We discovered on-line this morning a resource we'll check more thoroughly over the next few days. PERMACULTURE 101: AN INTRODUCTION TO REGENERATIVE DESIGN may, or may not, offer helpful suggestions on dealing with the pocket gophers, rabbits and whitetails that seem determined to help themselves to "our foods." Actually, the real problems is each of these critters, in their own way, tends to kill the geese that lay the golden eggs, if we may thoroughly mix our metaphors. Pocket gophers have eaten the roots of most of the fruit trees we've planted, and replanted. The results are dead trees. Rabbits and deer browse on the bushes to the point that few flowers and no fruit is produced, and several of the branches die from browsing. It's hard to share the yield of a dead or non-producing plant or tree. Mr. Frost, Robert, not Jack, certainly seems familiar with our trials and tribulations.

Good-bye, and Keep Cold

By Robert Frost

This saying good-bye on the edge of the dark

And cold to an orchard so young in the bark

Reminds me of all that can happen to harm

An orchard away at the end of the farm

All winter, cut off by a hill from the house.

I don't want it girdled by rabbit and mouse,

I don't want it dreamily nibbled for browse

By deer, and I don't want it budded by grouse.

(If certain it wouldn't be idle to call

I'd summon grouse, rabbit, and deer to the wall

And warn them away with a stick for a gun.)

I don't want it stirred by the heat of the sun.

(We made it secure against being, I hope,

By setting it out on a northerly slope.)

No orchard's the worse for the wintriest storm;

But one thing about it, it mustn't get warm.

"How often already you've had to be told,

Keep cold, young orchard. Good-bye and keep cold.

Dread fifty above more than fifty below."

I have to be gone for a season or so.

My business awhile is with different trees,

Less carefully nourished, less fruitful than these,

And such as is done to their wood with an axe—

Maples and birches and tamaracks.

I wish I could promise to lie in the night

And think of an orchard's arboreal plight

When slowly (and nobody comes with a light)

Its heart sinks lower under the sod.

But something has to be left to God.

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Summer's recap #phenology

September meadows have turned from green to tan, washed by pinkish-purple or purplish-pink. Our meadows have been brightened by the colors of little bluestem and purple lovegrass, with brown accents of round-headed bush clover.

purple love grass and bush clover in August

Photo by J. Harrington

Thinking back over the Summer now almost entirely past, we have no recollection seeing any snakes or turtles; fewer sightings of turkeys [than most years]; no bucks in velvet; plus, we know we missed several local patches of wildflowers while they were in bloom. On the other hand, we did see our first monarch chrysalis; our first katydid; we also noticed several tree frogs and American toads; plus the usual mix of songbirds but with fewer exotics than most years.

a pair of whooping cranes, an endangered species

Photo by J. Harrington

Although we still haven't labeled the photos, our visit to the International Crane Foundation let us see more kinds of cranes than ever before. A second trip this year to the Aldo Leopold Foundation's buildings near Baraboo let us see many sandhill cranes and Canada geese gleaning some harvested small grain fields between the city and the Foundation's buildings. In between our two trips to Baraboo, we visited the driftless area around Viroqua. Unfortunately, several of those valleys suffered severe flooding several weeks after our visit. Perhaps another visit next Summer would be in order, to help restore local economies eroded this Summer.

Autumn Grasses

Margaret Gibson

In fields of bush clover and hay-scent grass
the autumn moon takes refuge
The cricket’s song is gold

Zeshin’s loneliness taught him this

Who is coming?
What will come to pass, and pass?

Neither bruise nor sweetness nor cool air
not-knowing
knows the way

And the moon?
Who among us does not wander, and flare
and bow to the ground?

Who does not savor, and stand open
if only in secret

taking heart in the ripening of the moon?

(Shibata Zeshin, Autumn Grasses, two-panel screen)

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