Autumn, weather or not

Recently I've found myself wondering where's the liberal, progressive, Democrat equivalent to Project 2025. Eventually I realized Will Rogers anticipated the question and provided an answer many decades ago when he noted "I am not a member of any organized party — I am a Democrat." He also shared a number of other still trenchant observations that indicate how unfortunately little our politics and culture have changed over time.

Yesterday the Better Half and I joined several hundred others in downtown Lindstrom, MN to protest in favor of "NO KINGS" for US. The weather and passers-by were both generally supportive although there were several pickup drivers wearing red caps and raising middle fingers to demonstrate they're among the fat, dumb, and sappy locals.

October brings peak color to the neighborhood

Photo by J. Harrington

So far this Autumn we’ve seen one woolly worm that was predominantly red and, a week or so later, another mostly black. Given the way we’ve had well above average temperatures this fall, it’s hard to guess whether La Nina or global warming (or something else) will dominate weather patterns this winter. Meanwhile, we’re at or neat peak color this weekend and the wind for several days has been doing its best to spread the vibrant colors in the trees onto the ground.

Halloween is rapidly approaching. I bought three pumpkins this past week, although the flower pots they usually stand in are still full of living plants. No killing frosts yet. Will we see one by month’s end? Hard to say this year. At least so far neither deer nor rabbits have nibbled on the pumpkins. I’m grateful for that.

October

Paul Laurence Dunbar
1872 – 1906

October is the treasurer of the year,
    And all the months pay bounty to her store;
The fields and orchards still their tribute bear,
    And fill her brimming coffers more and more
But she, with youthful lavishness,
    Spends all her wealth in gaudy dress,
And decks herself in garments bold
    Of scarlet, purple, red, and gold.

She heedeth not how swift the hours fly,
    But smiles and sings her happy life along;
She only sees above a shining sky;
    She only hears the breezes’ voice in song.
Her garments trail the woodlands through,
    And gather pearls of early dew
That sparkle, till the roguish Sun
    Creeps up and steals them every one.

But what cares she that jewels should be lost,
    When all of Nature’s bounteous wealth is hers?
Though princely fortunes may have been their cost,
    Not one regret her calm demeanor stirs.
Whole-hearted, happy, careless, free,
    She lives her life out joyously,
Nor cares when Frost stalks o’er her way
    And turns her auburn locks to gray.

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Ban hate, not books

This week, Oct 5 - 11, is Banned Books Week. Please try to read at least one from the lists of thousands of books banned during the past year. Remember, an idle mind is the devil’s workshop. Keep your mind busy by reading. Disobey Big Brother and The Party!

If you think you don't have enough time and/or money to tackle a whole banned book, you can at least take a crack at following this link and reading: Why Intolerance and Extremism Happen (and how to protect democracy in a divided world). I haven't quite finished it yet, but I'm pretty sure you'll find it worth your time.

After today, actual temperatures should approach a more seasonable level than the windy mid- to upper- 80s we've been experiencing, at least most places other than Washington, D.C., where folks are busy exhaling hot air and blaming someone else rather than actually solving problems for anyone other than pedophiles or the top 1% of wealth holders.

According to the Minnesota DNR, locally we should experience peak leaf color about the end of the week, so next weekend would be a good time to put down the banned book you've been reading and got for a walk or drive and do some leaf peeping. While you're doing that, you might want to think about how Joy Harjo has managed to not get any of her books banned.

This Morning I Pray for My Enemies

by Joy Harjo

And whom do I call my enemy?
An enemy must be worthy of engagement.
I turn in the direction of the sun and keep walking.
It’s the heart that asks the question, not my furious mind.
The heart is the smaller cousin of the sun.
It sees and knows everything.
It hears the gnashing even as it hears the blessing.
The door to the mind should only open from the heart.
An enemy who gets in, risks the danger of becoming a friend.

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Autumn, approaching

I missed posting yesterday. The day was devoted to celebrating the birthday of a certain 5 year old granddaughter and I obviously failed to plan ahead and post on Saturday in anticipation. The celebration(s) was / were successful and everyone enjoyed the party, presents and cake, especially the guest of honor.

Over the past week or ten days I’ve noticed half-a-dozen or so new dandelion flowers along our roadway and three or four (common?) lilac bushes in bloom in the area. This is not the Minnesota I moved to about fifty years ago.

a hint of color tints nearby trees

Photo by J. Harrington

As we enter October in a day or so, temperatures are forecast to exceed 80℉ and approach ninety℉ by Friday.The regular waterfowl season opened Saturday last to weather too warm to get serious about duck hunting. Local leaf color looks to be about 5% so far, maples showing best. The bur oak at the end of our drive is dropping leaves faster than changing color.

Someone (deer?) knocked over and off the wire protector cage from one of the replacement serviceberry bushes. Neither bush is showing any color yet but at least they’ve lived longer than last spring’s plantings. Our fingers remain crossed these bushes will make it through the winter and beyond.

And Now It’s September,

By Barbara Crooker

 

and the garden diminishes: cucumber leaves rumpled

and rusty, zucchini felled by borers, tomatoes sparse

on the vines. But out in the perennial beds, there’s one last

blast of color: ignitions of goldenrod, flamboyant

asters, spiraling mums, all those flashy spikes waving

in the wind, conducting summer’s final notes.

The ornamental grasses have gone to seed, haloed

in the last light. Nights grow chilly, but the days

are still warm; I wear the sun like a shawl on my neck

and arms. Hundreds of blackbirds ribbon in, settle

in the trees, so many black leaves, then, just as suddenly,

they’re gone. This is autumn’s great Departure Gate,

and everyone, boarding passes in hand, waits

patiently in a long, long line.

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See sun's change

The pointillist leaf color changer is painting our North Woods. A few leaves here, a splotch there, first sumac, now maples, against back drop fields of goldenrod, ripening field corn, and soy beans. Tomorrow is the first day of meteorological Autumn. Even the weather is showing tinges of the changing season so today I finally did what should have been a Spring chore of washing the outside of some windows. Return of lower angle, late afternoon sun made the need obvious.

maple leaves trading chlorophyl for gold

Photo by J. Harrington

Hummingbirds are still coming to the sugar water feeders. I expect those birds to head south before autumn equinox (Alban Elfed to the Druids among us). Meanwhile, Minnesota's early season for teal and geese opens next Saturday, September 6th. I'm still contemplating whether to participate. It's been a few years since I've hunted waterfowl and I miss it but I'm also far out of practice. We'll see what the weather is looking like and how the chores are going.

Recently I stumbled onto a resource that looks like it may be increasingly helpful, the way things are going with the regime in Washington, D.C. In case you've been looking for something like The Anti-Autocracy Handbook: A Scholars’ Guide to Navigating Democratic Backsliding, click the link. A quick skim suggests it can be useful even to those who aren't scholars. If you scroll and click around a bit, you may well find some other helpful resources at the site. I'm getting more and more frustrated by the lack of really effective pushback at authoritarian Executive Orders combined with incompetence and malfeasance. American Democracy, even with all its flaws, deserves better protection and restoration than we're providing.

[Update, just discovered despite its 1993 publication: 

From Dictatorship to Democracy: A Conceptual Framework for Liberation]

Perhaps the World Ends Here

by Joy Harjo

The world begins at a kitchen table. No Matter what, we must eat to live.

The gifts of earth are brought and prepared, set on the table. So it has been since creation, and it will go on.

…It is here that children are given instructions on what it means to be human. We make men at it, we make women.

At this table we gossip, recall enemies and the ghosts of lovers.

Our dreams drink coffee with us as they put their arms around our children. They laugh with us at our poor falling-down selves and as we put ourselves back together once again at the table.

This table has been a house in the rain, an umbrella in the sun.

We have given birth on this table, and have prepared our parents for burial here.

At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks.

Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.

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Time for a change (or two)

It’s actually starting to seem like Spring here in the North Country. Once again the snow has melted and, come midweek next, overnight low temperatures are forecast to stay above freezing. Leaf buds on the maple trees have burst and, but for a few outliers, the oaks have dropped their overwintering leaves as the new buds swell.

maple leaf buds opening

Photo by J. Harrington

I hate to admit this but I spent way too much time last week doom scrolling and being in an absolutely funky mood. Between laying off thousands of federal staff and laying on thousands of tariffs, it was down the rabbit hole time again. We’re going to be years, if not decades, working to recover once we rid ourselves of our first (and only?) FOTUS [Felon Of The United States]. Despite all the madness, I did complete a preliminary, informal, climate action VENN diagram. It turns out to be trickier than I thought it would, especially since the DrawDown listing doesn’t really cover my interest: the relationships among climate change, the hydrologic cycle, and stream restoration. I made some progress and will keep picking away at it. Stay tuned and, meanwhile, if you’re interested, here’s a link to some local postings that explore climate change and trout fishing.

Speaking of changes, I think this will be the week I take the bback blade off the tractor and start to clean up some of the leaves and branches that came down over the winter. It's also time to get this year's fishing licenses and begin some exploring. That's one of the better ways I can think of to shake the residuals of cabin fever.

Also, please note that April is National Poetry Month. Enjoy Paul Simon's lyrics to help celebrate the month and the changing of the seasons.

      April Come She Will

Lyrics:

April, come she will
When streams are ripe and swelled with rain
May, she will stay
Resting in my arms again

June, she’ll change her tune
In restless walks, she’ll prowl the night
July, she will fly
And give no warning of her flight

August, die she must
The autumn winds blow chilly and cold
September, I’ll remember
A love once new has now grown old

© 1965 Words and Music by Paul Simon

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Approaching Samhain

Great clouds of leaves have floated away from their homes of origin. They now clutter the ground and complicate the last grass cutting of the past growing season. Bare branches begin to dominate country skylines. Halloween / Samhain arrives Thursday. Candles are lit at dinner time. Autumn is here and next weekend we begin to anticipate celebrating Thanksgiving in hope that “our fellow Americans(?)” will leave US something to celebrate after November 5.

All Hallow's Eve visitors

Photo by J. Harrington

Not only was Halloween itself more fun when I was a kid, I didn’t know enough in those days to worry about elections and outcomes. An example that getting older doesn’t always mean getting wiser? Anyhow, I’m anticipating that, again this year, we’ll have at least one Trick or Treater, our 4 year old granddaughter. I think she’s the only one that’s shown up in the 25+ years we’ve lived here. I’ll spend some time over the next few days debating whether to bring in our political signs for the haunted evening rather than leave them subject to pranks or vandalism.

Flocks of Canada geese and sandhill cranes are still to be seen in our local airways. So far there’s still plenty of food and open water so no reason for them to head south. The Son-In-Law has captured some pictures of a nice buck oor two on his trail cam. I tried deer hunting off and on over the years. I just don’t enjoy sitting that still for that long to get good at it. When I was younger, I’d rather bust brush for grouse or fiddle with decoys for ducks than sit in or on a deer stand. If I had had an enclosed stand, I’d probably been guilty of too much napping. This reminds me, after Samhain, I need to send Santa a letter asking for more accommodating weather next fly fishing season.

Samhain

By Annie Finch

(The Celtic Halloween)

In the season leaves should love,

since it gives them leave to move

through the wind, towards the ground

they were watching while they hung,

legend says there is a seam

stitching darkness like a name.

Now when dying grasses veil

earth from the sky in one last pale

wave, as autumn dies to bring

winter back, and then the spring,

we who die ourselves can peel

back another kind of veil

that hangs among us like thick smoke.

Tonight at last I feel it shake.

I feel the nights stretching away

thousands long behind the days

till they reach the darkness where

all of me is ancestor.

I move my hand and feel a touch

move with me, and when I brush

my own mind across another,

I am with my mother's mother.

Sure as footsteps in my waiting

self, I find her, and she brings

arms that carry answers for me,

intimate, a waiting bounty.

"Carry me." She leaves this trail

through a shudder of the veil,

and leaves, like amber where she stays,

a gift for her perpetual gaze.

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The autumn leaves drift by my window

The local leaves are just about at peak color, sliding past peak any day now as the colors drift down with the leaves. It sure is pretty around here for now. Yesterday I noticed a new dandelion blossom. Today there’s a small cluster of little white flowers. Garter snakes are out and about. I wish they’d feast on more of the mice that keep getting into the house. We must have trapped almost two dozen since last Sunday.

Autumn's silver and gold

Photo by J. Harrington

The Better Half, plus our son, plus me, have all voted early. I wonder how long post November 5 the suspense may continue and how long after that the prospect of violence may hang in the air. Meanwhile, critical global and national issues continue to fester instead of getting the attention deserved and needed. For example, a report issued this past week calls to our attention, inter alia, the following:

Most gravely, while itself a victim of climate change,

the degradation of freshwater ecosystems including

the loss of moisture in the soil has become a driver

of climate change and biodiversity loss. The result

is more frequent and increasingly severe droughts,

floods, heatwaves, and wildfires, playing out across

the globe. And a future of growing water scarcity,

with grave consequences for human security.

Nearly 3 billion people and more than half of the

world’s food production are now in areas where

total water storage is projected to decline.

We’ve seen examples of these issues with recent hurricanes and flooding in major parts of our country. Most Republicans I’ve read about claim climate change is some kind of scam. Of course many of them also continue to incorrectly refer to the 2020 election as “stolen.”

Things got more than a little hectic around the homestead this week, especially today. The Better Half noticed one of the kitchen cabinets needs major repairs. An electrical circuit that, about this time last year,, started tripping the breaker for no reason that we or the electrician could figure out, is doing it again this year. My theory is that mice in the garage are biting into a hot wire because the breaker can be reset after a few hours. Anyhow, I’m tuckered so this posting is short and as sweet as I can make it. More next week.

Neighbors in October

By David Baker

All afternoon his tractor pulls a flat wagon

with bales to the barn, then back to the waiting

chopped field. It trails a feather of smoke.

Down the block we bend with the season:

shoes to polish for a big game,

storm windows to batten or patch.

And how like a field is the whole sky now

that the maples have shed their leaves, too.

It makes us believers—stationed in groups,

leaning on rakes, looking into space. We rub blisters

over billows of leaf smoke. Or stand alone,

bagging gold for the cold days to come.

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On the eve of Indigenous Peoples’ Day

Last Friday I was doing some outside chores and, as I looked up from time to time, it seemed as if I could actually see colors changing in the maple leaves. We are rapidly approaching peak color and the area is looking mighty pretty.

St. Croix River Valley colors

Photo by J. Harrington

Today’s clouds and wind served as backdrop to flights of Canada geese and sandhill cranes either heading south or practicing for the trip. Another sign of autumn’s progress: increasing numbers of mice getting into the house and caught in traps. This past week we eliminated about a dozen and a half. I don’t remember ever, in 25+ years here, dealing with as many mice as this year. I’m not sure what happened over the spring and summer to produce such a bumper crop. It would be better for all concerned if they’d settle for outside nests and get fat on the acorns that have dropped everywhere.

Early voting has started. Election day is three weeks from Tuesday. Pundits torment US with their assessments of races depending on a handful or two of battleground states or congressional districts, all within a polling margin of error. If candidates were at all comparable in their capabilities and integrity and sanity, I’d be less troubled. Regardless of the election outcome, the fact that one of the major presidential candidates is a convicted felon and adjudicated rapist, among other unsavory attributes, seems to me disqualifying on its face, and yet....

At least we have three months with joyful holidays to celebrate. This month it’s Halloween and Samhain; next month it’s Thanksgiving; and, come December, Christmas. They’re all better if shared with family and kids and we’re lucky that way.

Tomorrow is Indigenous Peoples’ Day. Information about activities and resources in Minnesota can be found here. My personal celebration involves starting to read Louise Erdrich’s Original Fire, selected and new poems.

That Pull from the Left

By Louise Erdrich

Butch once remarked to me how sinister it was   

alone, after hours, in the dark of the shop

to find me there hunched over two weeks’ accounts   

probably smoked like a bacon from all those Pall-Malls.

Odd comfort when the light goes, the case lights left on   

and the rings of baloney, the herring, the parsley,   

arranged in the strict, familiar ways.

Whatever intactness holds animals up

has been carefully taken, what’s left are the parts.   

Just look in the cases, all counted and stacked.

Step-and-a-Half Waleski used to come to the shop

and ask for the cheap cut, she would thump, sniff, and finger.   

This one too old. This one here for my supper.   

Two days and you do notice change in the texture.

I have seen them the day before slaughter.

Knowing the outcome from the moment they enter   

the chute, the eye rolls, blood is smeared on the lintel.   

Mallet or bullet they lunge toward their darkness.

But something queer happens when the heart is delivered.   

When a child is born, sometimes the left hand is stronger.   

You can train it to fail, still the knowledge is there.   

That is the knowledge in the hand of a butcher

that adds to its weight. Otto Kröger could fell

a dray horse with one well-placed punch to the jaw,   

and yet it is well known how thorough he was.

He never sat down without washing his hands,   

and he was a maker, his sausage was echt

so that even Waleski had little complaint.   

Butch once remarked there was no one so deft   

as my Otto. So true, there is great tact involved   

in parting the flesh from the bones that it loves.

How we cling to the bones. Each joint is a web

of small tendons and fibers. He knew what I meant   

when I told him I felt something pull from the left,   

and how often it clouded the day before slaughter.

Something queer happens when the heart is delivered.

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The month peak color comes and goes

It looks like the weather may have finally turned the corner from Summer to Autumn, more than a month after the start of meteorological autumn and a couple of weeks after the equinox. Maple trees are showing more color. Pines are shedding their needles. Aspen and birch leaves are mostly gold. Seed heads from purple love grass are flying everywhere and the last few really windy days have turned a few trees almost leafless.

maples starting to show color

Photo by J. Harrington

Today we saw another wooly bear looking very much like the one we reported on last week, about four ginger bands in the middle and each end black. No frost yet locally. Most birds coming to the feeder are year round residents like woodpeckers, nuthatches, chickadees, cardinals and goldfinches. Every now and then a pair of bluejays stop by.

We’ve been going through an extended dry spell for the past month or so. Fire danger has been high enough that I’ve not even thought about torching the back yard brush pile. If it sits until spring, that’s no big deal although I would like to get it gone so we can replace it with more of the downed branches lying around. The electric weed whacker we recently acquired is helping to bring a modicum or orderliness to some of the overgrown areas around the place. That’s going to be a continuing project. We may see if the battery-powered chain saw diminishes the buckthorn that’s trying to overrun the woods.

All in all it’s been a mostly pleasant week up North here. We celebrated the Granddaughter’s fourth birthday and her parents tenth anniversary. No signs of Helene but we may well pay for it come blizzard season, or might climate change temper our upcoming winter? We’ll see.

Autumn's Gold

by George MacDonald

Along the tops of all the yellow trees,

The golden-yellow trees, the sunshine lies;

And where the leaves are gone, long rays surprise

Lone depths of thicket with their brightnesses;

And through the woods, all waste of many a breeze,

Cometh more joy of light for Poet's eyes—

Green fields lying yellow underneath the skies,

And shining houses and blue distances.

By the roadside, like rocks of golden ore

That make the western river-beds so bright,

The briar and the furze are all alight!

Perhaps the year will be so fair no more,

But now the fallen, falling leaves are gay,

And autumn old has shone into a Day! 

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Happy Autumnal Equinox and Alban Elfed

As of 7:43 this morning, local time, we are into full autumn, if not fully into autumn. The equinox has occurred but the season has not matured. Leaf color is still less than 10%. Some monarch butterflies have fluttered by. Flickers are flittering through the backyard. Strangely, several lilac bushes in the neighborhood have produced a second bloom recently. Meanwhile, the size of sandhill crane flocks has grown and Canada geese are doing training flights. We even saw a woolly bear caterpillar this week past.

just a hint of color in the trees

Photo by J. Harrington

No sign yet of the first frost or the first snowflake in our neck of the woods. Either could arrive any day now. The local crew of hummingbirds seems to have headed south. We’ll leave the feeders up for another week or two in case northern migrants stop by. I think, and hope, high temperatures will now stay seasonably less than 80℉ at least until next April.

As we enter the darker seasons, many of US hope that will only be literal and not figurative. The latter depending on the results of the upcoming presidential election. In our funkier moods, we wonder how many days of relative peace and quiet we’ll get before campaigns for the mid-term elections start up.

Archery deer season opened the beginning of last week Friday brought a handful of thunderstorms, complete with boomings, lightning flashes, and downpours. Will that be the last until next year, or might we experience thundersnows? Stay tuned.

Something we couldn’t share before this because it might have spoiled a birthday surprise was one of this month’s high points. For his birthday, we got the Son-in-Law an Early Lessons print from the BobWhite Studio. The Studio is located not far from our home so we made arrangements to take a peek prior to completing the purchase. In the process, we enjoyed a nice visit with Bob and his charming wife, Lisa. The story behind the print as a gift is that it depicts a man, presumably a Dad, standing behind / beside a girl holding a fly rod. The Son-In-Law has been taking his almost four-year-old daughter fishing quite a bit this summer. She’s a bit young for a fly rod, but, as most Minnesota sports fans have learned to say, “maybe next year.”

Poem Beginning with a Line from It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown

Maggie Smith

Just look—nothing but sincerity 
as far as the eye can see—
the way the changed leaves,

flapping their yellow underbellies
in the wind, glitter. The tree
looks sequined wherever

the sun touches. Does anyone
not see it? Driving by a field
of spray-painted sheep, I think

the world is not all changed.
The air still ruffles wool
the way a mother’s hand

busies itself lovingly in the hair
of her small boy. The sun
lifts itself up, grows heavy

treading there, then lets itself
off the hook. Just look at it
leaving—the sky a tigereye

banded five kinds of gold
and bronze—and the sequin tree
shaking its spangles like a girl

on the high school drill team,
nothing but sincerity. It glitters
whether we’re looking or not.

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Here’s to full days with color

It's Labor Day weekend here in Minnesota. The weather is turning autumnal. Thanks to the Better Half, there's a couple of pots of asters on the stairs to the front stoop. Due to a couple of severe thunderstorm evenings this past week, the yard and driveway are again cluttered with dead, broken branches. We're not sure what’s left in the air after all the rains, but both dogs are exhibiting allergic reaction signs, licking their paws.

pots of asters on the steps

Photo by J. Harrington

Hummingbirds are still showing up at the feeders. I expect they'll start heading south over the next few weeks. Local sandhill crane colts are fully grown, or close to it. We expect to see crane flocks grow in size this month before they head off to warmer locales to spend the winter. Other than hay, we’ve not seen any signs of fields being harvested. May be a late harvest this year if the snow holds off.

I’m looking forward to cooler weather and warmer colors in the days ahead, although the MNDNR Fall Color Finder isn’t yet updated from last year. We’re coming into the season of soups and stews and homemade pies and .... I’ll no doubt get back into some sort of regular bread baking routine.

It’s now time to start watching for woolly worm caterpillars migrating. If they make it through until spring, they’ll become Isabella tiger moths. Monarch butterflies are heading south, although we’ve seen very few this year so expectations are tempered. If the changing of the seasons brings cooler, dryer weather and pleasant times out doors, plus a blue wave on November 5, we’ll have enough to be thankful for in late November. Summer community supported agriculture shares just ended. Autumn’s start next weekend.. Here’s what was in yesterday’s box:

Watermelon Heirloom Tomatoes Mixed Sweet Peppers French Breakfast Radish Curly Parsley Broccoli or Cauliflower Decorative flowers (not for eating!)

September

Helen Hunt Jackson

O golden month! How high thy gold is heaped!
The yellow birch-leaves shine like bright coins strung
On wands; the chestnut's yellow pennons tongue
To every wind its harvest challenge. Steeped
In yellow, still lie fields where wheat was reaped;
And yellow still the corn sheaves, stacked among
The yellow gourds, which from the earth have wrung
Her utmost gold. To highest boughs have leaped
The purple grape,—last thing to ripen, late
By very reason of its precious cost.
O Heart, remember, vintages are lost
If grapes do not for freezing night-dews wait.
Think, while thou sunnest thyself in Joy's estate, 

Mayhap thou canst not ripen without frost!

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At Autumn’s door step

A few days ago we started to notice leaves had begun to change color. First were the sumac leaves in red. Plus, there were hints of color in a large deciduous tree on the north side of county highway 36 ay the Sunrise river bridge.. Then, on Friday, we noticed color in a clump of maples as we were driving home from Taylors Falls. We’ve had color change this early in other years but it does go nicely with the cooler temperatures we’ve enjoyed for the past week or so.

even some local maples are beginning to turn

Photo by J. Harrington

Hummingbirds continue to chase one another away from the sugar water feeders. According to our traps, more mice are trying to move into the lower level and the garage. Although we see sandhill cranes in the fields from time to time, they’re in clusters of two, three or four. No signs yet of major flocks forming for migration.

A boule of sourdough just came out of the oven. The last loaf I baked had, to my taste, almost no flavor, so I reformulated the starter using about half whole wheat flour and the other half bread flour. I’ll know, shortly after this is posted, if the flavor has been enhanced or if more fiddling is called for. We’ll report in our next posting.

I have made some progress on one of the other writing projects I’m starting, and Sunday seems like a good day to post if I decide to shift to a weekly blog schedule. Blogger aappears to have made whatever adjustments were needed to allow me to again include images in these posts so we’ll just play it by ear.

Fall Song

by Mary Oliver

Another year gone, leaving everywhere
its rich spiced residues: vines, leaves,

the uneaten fruits crumbling damply
in the shadows, unmattering back

from the particular island
of this summer, this NOW, that now is nowhere

except underfoot, moldering
in that black subterranean castle

of unobservable mysteries - roots and sealed seeds
and the wanderings of water. This

I try to remember when time's measure
painfully chafes, for instance when autumn

flares out at the last, boisterous and like us longing
to stay - how everything lives, shifting

from one bright vision to another, forever
in these momentary pastures. 

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Pacing the seasons

A month or so ago, the crowns of trees around the house were all bare and skeletony looking. Now they’re mostly filled in, or out, as you prefer. and the tree-line is looking almost solid, although we know it isn’t.

tamaracks leafing out

Photo by J. Harrington

All of a sudden, it’s too warm (70℉) to comfortably do yard work. I know, for some of us it’s almost always too cold or too wet or too dry or too warm. There are those of us who are more in the hunter-gatherer mold than in the farmer or suburbanite mold. I should be standing in a river, waving a stick, to borrow from John Gierach. Instead, I’ve been mowing last year’s leaves into the mower’s bag and putting the contents onto the Better Half’s lily garden as mulch. Mother’s Day is Sunday, you know.

The older I get the more I find that the transition from a largely sedentary winter to more active, warmer, seasons to be full of discomforts. It reminds me of the old saying “I’m not the man I used to be, never was.” Although I know better than to expect to return to the vim, vigor, and resilience I had twenty or thirty years ago, I remain hopeful of remaining ambulatory and then some for at least a few years more. Under the heading of teaching an old dog new tricks, I think I’m finally learning to pace myself and quit before I collapse. I have taken to heart the Lao Tzu observation Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.

Way back when I was in high school and learning Latin, I came across a description of someone who wanted to enjoy all the bonus [good] with none of the onus [work]. We know that, except for politicians and the 1%, that’s not really viable.

Cloud

By Kay Ryan

A blue stain

creeps across

the deep pile

of the evergreens.

From inside the

forest it seems

like an interior

matter, something

wholly to do

with trees, a color

passed from one

to another, a

requirement

to which they

submit unflinchingly 

like soldiers or 

brave people

getting older. 

Then the sun 

comes back and

it’s totally over.

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The reign of rain

Things the Better Half has heard me say in the past few days:

• We need the moisture to recover from the drought
• At least it’s not snow
• It’ll cut down on the wild grass fire danger
•  I hope this keeps up (then it won’t come down)

I can almost see the leaves growing as I look out the windows. The freshly opened buds glow with vibrant color. Come summer, green tree crowns will be old hat, but for now a transition from bare branches is new and refreshing. Our neighborhood is starting to look like this.

Spring leaf out and green up

Photo by J. Harrington

The wet spot in our back yard shows more water than is has for months (and months). Once the ground dries out a little, I’ll start to do a little tidying outside and hope for gentle breezes rather than howling ones. In the quarter century plus that we’ve lived here, the wind has been out of the east about a dozen times, four or five of them during the past couple of weeks. After a very unusual winter, spring has added a few surprises too.

Meanwhile, today’s sourdough boule has come out of the oven looking good. We’ll taste it shortly after this is posted since it should be cooled enough by then. For years I’ve been trying to create a much more open crumb in my bread. Last week I bought a loaf from a local bakery. The crumb was so open the when I toast a slice, the butter drips through the holes. I’m reconsidering my wishes about a more open crumb. It’s a classic challenge of “be careful what you wish for, you may get it.”

The Call of the Wild 

Alexander Posey
1873 – 1908

I’m tired of the gloom  

In a four-walled room;  

Heart-weary, I sigh  

For the open sky,  

And the solitude  

Of the greening wood;  

Where the bluebirds call,  

And the sunbeams fall,  

And the daisies lure 

The soul to be pure.  

 

I’m tired of the life 

In the ways of strife;  

Heart-weary, I long  

For the river’s song,  

And the murmur of rills  

In the breezy hills;  

Where the pipe of Pan— 

The hairy half-man— 

The bright silence breaks  

By the sleeping lakes.   

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On the eve of Earth Day

Leaves are emerging on some bushes and tree tops, really noticeable on aspens. It’s near time to watch for wild plums to bloom. A few hours ago I began reading a digitized version of a book I’ve been attracted to for some time now, Traditional Ecological Knowledge. I was pleased to note references to Leopold’s land ethic and works by other authors with whom I’m familiar mentioned in the introduction. The three sisters garden I wanted to plant last year never happened so, with luck, maybe this year will see seeds planted. The Better Half gave me a couple of packets of glass gem corn seeds at Christmas, so I’ve even more motivation this year. Where to plant is a major question and last year the persistent drought was a disincentive to starting.

it’s leaf out time

Photo by J. Harrington

Blogger’s software seems much better behaved today, although we can’t be sure until this is actually posted. I’m now facing a question of whether I want to and can download/backup more than a decade’s worth of daily postings. I know, it would have been better if I’d done backups all along, but who knew I’d keep at this?

Last week a purple or house finch, or one of each, showed up at the feeder. Dark-eyed juncoes were pecking away at the back yard until a day or so ago. Warmer, wetter, weather in the week upcoming should bring more indicators of spring. One we’re reasonably certain of is the first community supported agriculture share should be available Friday or Saturday. That’s up-lifting, as is the increasing number of bergamot seeds that are germinating. Isn’t it wonderful what some sunshine and water can help make happen?

Until Earth Day...

Gidiskinaadaa Mitigwaakiing/Woodland Liberty

Margaret Noodin

Apii dibikong gaashkendamyaan miinawaa goshkoziyaan
When in the night I am weary and awake wondering
endigwenh waa ezhichigewag bagoji Anishinaabensag odenang,
what the wild young Anishinaabeg of the cities will do,
mitigwaakiing izhaayaan miinawaa anweshinyaan.
into the woods I go and rest.
Nimawadishaag zhingwaakwag miinawaa okikaandagoog
I visit with the white pines and the jack pines.
Nibizindaawaag zhashagiwag miinawaa ajiijaakwag.
I listen to the herons and the cranes.
Nimaatookinaag zaagaa’igan ogaawag miinawaa apakweshkwayag.
I share the lake waters with the walleye and the cattails.
Niwaabaandaanan wesiinhyag-miikanan miinawaa nakwejinaanig
I marvel at the complexity of wild paths and webs woven.
Miidash apii bidaaban niswi giosewag miinawaa
Then when the dawn hides the three hunters
niizhwaaswi nimisenhyag dibiki-giizhigong gaazhad
and seven sisters of the night sky
baabimoseyaan nikeye naawakweg zoongide’eyaan.
I walk bravely toward the noonday.
 

This poem was written in response to "The Peace of Wild Things" by Wendell Berry.

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We now have a sprung Spring

It feels good to have sun shining, green leaves emerging from the ground, Scilla blossoms opening -- as if Spring is here to stay for awhile. The outlines of many trees have been softened, almost made furry, but bud burst and the start of leaf growth. Maybe next week we’ll shut down the snow blower and fire up the lawn mower. The local drive-in restaurant has opened for the season. Earth day is rapidly approaching and, before that, Monday has the potential to be, as Arte Johnson would say, “verry interresting, but shtupid!”

winter’s harsh, bare, outlines begin to soften

Photo by J. Harrington

We have our fingers crossed that sometime next week we’ll see signs of gemination of the bergamot seeds we started last week. If there’s no sign by the end of next week, we’ll plant some more seeds and try again. I suspect the trays have been in a location with a temperature near the lower end of ideal for germination. Maybe, if it’s not too windy, we’ll put the trays out in the 70℉ sunshine this weekend to warm the “planting medium” in the trays.

All in all, if it weren’t for a world at war in too many places, and the uncivil political wars being fought on the home front, life would approximate good. Stay tuned.

Planting the Meadow

By Mary Makofske

I leave the formal garden of schedules 

where hours hedge me, clip the errant sprigs 

of thought, and day after day, a boxwood 

topiary hunt chases a green fox 

never caught. No voice calls me to order 

as I enter a dream of meadow, kneel 

to earth and, moving east to west, second 

the motion only of the sun. I plant 

frail seedlings in the unplowed field, trusting 

the wildness hidden in their hearts. Spring light 

sprawls across false indigo and hyssop, 

daisies, flax. Clouds form, dissolve, withhold 

or promise rain. In time, outside of time, 

the unkempt afternoons fill up with flowers.

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Leaf me alone to get organized!

[Google is still making it difficult to add photos.]

It’s probably my fault that we’re in line for some unseasonably warm weather. A week or ten days ago I swapped my summer pjs for fleece-lined sweats. Of course, now I get overheated about every night. The windy weather? Also my fault. I keep clearing the leaves from the stoop and away from the front of the garage using our electric leaf blower. Then I chase them down the driveway. Of course, that prompts Mother Nature to huff and puff another load of leaves out of the trees and off the garage roof down to the front of the garage and onto the stoop. She knows how she likes to have the place decorated for Thanksgiving and won't tolerate my feeble efforts to modify her arrangements.

At least most of yesterday’s voting turned out to my satisfaction. The outcomes restored a smidgeon of my hope for the future of the human race, although there’s lots of countervailing evidence in today’s news. November’s persistent cloudy weather doesn’t much help my overall outlook. I keep thinking that restoring order to my personal life would boost my spirits but then I look at the many stacks of read, partially read, and unread books and am struck with a sense of futility [tsundoku]. I keep arguing with myself about authors versus genres versus themes as primary, secondary and tertiary sorts without resolving anything. Yes, thank you, I have considered, and rejected, arranging the books by the color(s) of their spines. I doubt I’ll be any more successful with books than I have been with flies and fly boxes. Sigh!!!

It may again [still?] be time for me to follow some of my own advice and

• live in the moment
• one day at a time
• don’t sweat the small stuff
• remember, it’s all small stuff

The Long Hand Wishes It Was Used

Jackie Clark

Sometimes I wish I didn't think in words
and that instead for each thought I thought I drew upon an image,
and that I was able to organize each image in a linear way that would be like sort of like reading
and that instead of trying to describe the edges around something
I could just think the color around the edges of the image to be darker,
that the detail on the image could become more or less detailed depending
on how much clarity I believe I needed to disclose at the time
For instance, instead of saying love, I could just think watermelon
I could just think of a watermelon cut in half, lying open on a picnic table
The inside would be just as moist as it was pink
I could picture cutting up pieces and giving them out to my friends.
It wouldn't have to be sunny
It wouldn't have to be anything else then just that
It would really simplify my walk home at night,
where every thought I think is some contrived line I repeat over and over to myself
Words are always just replaced with new ones
The pictures would never need to know otherwise

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Oh, deer! November

For the next eight days or so, local style guides call for fluorescent orange or pink outerwear. Through November 12 it’s deer firearms season in our neighborhood.

I’ve never been much of a deer hunter, although I love being out in the woods, I have trouble sitting still. I’ve usually been happier chasing grouse or ducks, or, many springs, turkeys.

early snow, whitetail deer

Photo by J. Harrington

Compared to years past, we’ve seen few “backyard” deer or turkeys this year although yesterday afternoon, while walking the dogs, we saw a small flock of turkeys emerge from the neighbor’s woods, walk a short way down the middle of the road, get spooked and fly away. Maybe they encountered a spirit or two left over from Halloween.

Back in the years when I was a more dedicated duck hunter, I recall getting annoyed by the fluoresccnt orange requirement since we didn’t want to wear it in a duck or goose blind. Of course, neither did we want to take a chance on getting shot by mistake nor written up by a conservation officer on purpose.

These days I’ll get my exercise and fresh air clearing as many leaves as I can from the driveway in hopes they won’t clog the snow blower come that season.

November

Elizabeth Drew Stoddard

Much have I spoken of the faded leaf;	
    Long have I listened to the wailing wind,	
And watched it ploughing through the heavy clouds,	
    For autumn charms my melancholy mind.	
 
When autumn comes, the poets sing a dirge:
    The year must perish; all the flowers are dead;	
The sheaves are gathered; and the mottled quail	
    Runs in the stubble, but the lark has fled!	
 
Still, autumn ushers in the Christmas cheer,	
    The holly-berries and the ivy-tree:
They weave a chaplet for the Old Year’s bier,	
    These waiting mourners do not sing for me!	
 
I find sweet peace in depths of autumn woods,	
    Where grow the ragged ferns and roughened moss;	
The naked, silent trees have taught me this,—
    The loss of beauty is not always loss!

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on the eve of All Hallow’s Eve

We’ve reached the time of year when there are more leaves on the ground than on the trees. There are more leaves than water in the bird bath. Leaves, like Halloween spirits, daily fly through the air. The moon is, technically speaking, past full, but not so’s you’d really notice. There’s snow in the overnight forecast, with a prospect that it will have melted before Trick of Treaters start their rounds. Tomorrow’s the big night and the Better Half has a Treat bowl ready in the front hall and, as usual, has masterfully carved a Jack O’Lantern. (I reserve my fine motor skills for things like tying dry flies to tippets.)

leaves aren’t all that flies through the night air

Photo by J. Harrington

Come Wednesday, November brings Native American Heritage Month, so we’ll be touching on that theme off and on. Explore Minnesota has a web section on the state’s Native American heritage. I’m assuming the Governor will again issue a proclamation on November 1. In the interim, feel free to read up on land acknowledgements.

We’ve noted elsewhere in these postings that, as near as I can tell, we live very close to what was once a boundary or buffer region between the territories of the Dakota and Ojibwe peoples. I’m still looking for resources that may help me better understand the history of the land on which we’re living.

Samhain

By Annie Finch

(The Celtic Halloween)

In the season leaves should love,

since it gives them leave to move

through the wind, towards the ground

they were watching while they hung,

legend says there is a seam

stitching darkness like a name.

Now when dying grasses veil

earth from the sky in one last pale

wave, as autumn dies to bring

winter back, and then the spring,

we who die ourselves can peel

back another kind of veil

that hangs among us like thick smoke.

Tonight at last I feel it shake.

I feel the nights stretching away

thousands long behind the days

till they reach the darkness where

all of me is ancestor.

I move my hand and feel a touch

move with me, and when I brush

my own mind across another,

I am with my mother's mother.

Sure as footsteps in my waiting

self, I find her, and she brings

arms that carry answers for me,

intimate, a waiting bounty.

"Carry me." She leaves this trail

through a shudder of the veil,

and leaves, like amber where she stays,

a gift for her perpetual gaze.

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“Late" autumn #phenology

By the calendar, we’re close to mid-Autumn but you wouldn’t know it by the weather. Normal temperatures for this time of year are ten to fifteen degrees higher than we're experiencing. Last night and this morning we were under a full moon known as the Falling Leaves Moon by both the Ojibwe and the Lakota peoples. Today’s leaf fall confirms their accuracy. When we noticed the setting moon this morning, it had a ring around it, which is often a sign of precipitation on the way. So far, much of the day has been partly sunny, a pleasant change, and partly cloudy, same old same old.

ice covered bird bath

Photo by J. Harrington

It’ll probably be a month, or six or eight weeks, before we see local lakes ice in. (The bird bath warmer has been plugged in to keep it ice free.) We’ll try to keep track of open water versus ice even though ice fishing isn’t our thing (flies and poppers just bounce on the ice when we cast) and we gave up ice skating many decades ago. We anticipated a major movement of waterfowl with the storm that came through last week, but so far haven’t noticed any signs of migration. I’m not sure there’s been enough snow and ice in Canada to move birds south.

The Better Half took on seasonal wardrobe change this past week. That’s a chore I’ve not yet faced up to. Maybe after Halloween I’ll sort out the “what to wear” tricks and treats. This is a time of year when I feel a need for three or four wardrobe changes during a single day since we start cold, warm up, cool off and end cold. That reinforces my belief that these are times I need to live one day at a time, except when it comes to sourdough bread, for which I have to plan several day’s activities to create the levain, then the dough, then fermentation and, finally, baking. We are definitely back in baking season.

As you can tell, we’ve nothing terribly exciting to report on the home front, for which we’re grateful. The Twins did a quick exit from the MLB playoffs. The Vikings are playing .500 ball going into today’s game and the Wild season has just begun. Our son is much more of a sports fan than I but I try to keep up for his sake.

Leaves

Lloyd Schwartz     1941 – 

                        1 

Every October it becomes important, no, necessary
to see the leaves turning, to be surrounded
by leaves turning; it's not just the symbolism,
to confront in the death of the year your death,
one blazing farewell appearance, though the irony 
isn't lost on you that nature is most seductive
when it's about to die, flaunting the dazzle of its 
incipient exit, an ending that at least so far 
the effects of human progress (pollution, acid rain)
have not yet frightened you enough to make you believe
is real; that is, you know this ending is a deception
because of course nature is always renewing itself—
        the trees don't die, they just pretend,
        go out in style, and return in style: a new style.





                        2 

Is it deliberate how far they make you go
especially if you live in the city to get far 
enough away from home to see not just trees 
but only trees? The boring highways, roadsigns, high 
speeds, 10-axle trucks passing you as if they were 
in an even greater hurry than you to look at leaves:
so you drive in terror for literal hours and it looks 
like rain, or snow, but it's probably just clouds
(too cloudy to see any color?) and you wonder, 
given the poverty of your memory, which road had the 
most color last year, but it doesn't matter since 
you're probably too late anyway, or too early—
        whichever road you take will be the wrong one
        and you've probably come all this way for nothing.






                        3 

You'll be driving along depressed when suddenly
a cloud will move and the sun will muscle through
and ignite the hills. It may not last. Probably
won't last. But for a moment the whole world
comes to. Wakes up. Proves it lives. It lives—
red, yellow, orange, brown, russet, ocher, vermilion,
gold. Flame and rust. Flame and rust, the permutations
of burning. You're on fire. Your eyes are on fire.
It won't last, you don't want it to last. You 
can't stand any more. But you don't want it to stop. 
It's what you've come for. It's what you'll
come back for. It won't stay with you, but you'll 
        remember that it felt like nothing else you've felt
        or something you've felt that also didn't last.

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