It’s heel-dragging time

“There is more to life than increasing its speed.”  Mahatma Gandhi

Often, I drive township gravel roads rather than city, county or state paved ones. “Why?” you may ask. Have you heard of slow food? How about slow water? Each is premised on slowing down and  working with nature’s systems more than engineering a quick profit. In a similar vein, I’m working on slow travel, trying to learn how to enjoy the trip as much as arriving safely at the destination.

It’s rare that I drive less than the speed limit on a paved road or highway. On a gravel road, I’m more likely to slow down, put the windows down, and watch for roadside wildflowers. Not every rural road in Minnesota has prairie plants blooming between a cornfield and the ditch, but enough do that it’s worthwhile to enjoy the black-eyed Susans, bee balm/bergamot and occasional cluster of purple coneflowers. Sometimes there are even butterflies on the flowers and swallows on the telephone wires as further enticements to let beauty and pleasure, not speed, be my driving force.

a field of wild bergamot and ???

Photo by J. Harrington

One soy bean field I drove past this morning had a whitetail doe toward the back edge and her adventurous  fawn close to the road. As I approached, the fawn looked up, saw the Jeep, turned around, and started bounding toward mom with a whitetail flag waving and the fawn yelling: “Mom, mom! Did you see it? Why didn’t you warn me about those big, shiny monsters? I promise I’ll never go near the road again!” (Until the next time.)

Wise people from cultures much older than ours have advised us to slow down. The above quote by Gandhi is one example. Another is “Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.”  Lao Tzu

I was delighted the other day to learn that Joni Mitchell, who has written much of the soundtrack of my life, closed out this years Newport Folk Festival with a performance, her first in about two decades. Joni knows a lot about the problems going too fast can cause.

The Circle Game

by Joni Mitchell

Yesterday a child came out to wonder
Caught a dragonfly inside a jar 
Fearful when the sky was full of thunder 
And tearful at the falling of a star 

Then the child moved ten times round the seasons
Skated over ten clear frozen streams 
Words like when you're older must appease him 
And promises of someday make his dreams

And the seasons they go round and round 
And the painted ponies go up and down 
We're captive on the carousel of time 
We can't return we can only look 
Behind from where we came 
And go round and round and round 
In the circle game

Sixteen springs and sixteen summers gone now 
Cartwheels turn to car wheels thru the town 
And they tell him take your time it won't be long now
Till you drag your feet to slow the circles down 

And the seasons they go round and round 
And the painted ponies go up and down 
We're captive on the carousel of time 
We can't return we can only look 
Behind from where we came 
And go round and round and round 
In the circle game

So the years spin by and now the boy is twenty 
Though his dreams have lost some grandeur coming true
There'll be new dreams maybe better dreams and plenty
Before the last revolving year is through

And the seasons they go round and round 
And the painted ponies go up and down 
We're captive on the carousel of time 
We can't return we can only look 
Behind from where we came 
And go round and round and round 
In the circle game

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Post solstice solace of space and time

Yesterday was winter solstice, the shortest day and longest night of the year. According to my copy of the Minnesota Weatherguide Engagement Calendar, the sun rose at 7:48 am and set at 4:34 pm. Today the sun rose at the same time as yesterday but sets at 4:35 pm. That doesn’t mean we gained a whole minute. It’s actually as little two seconds if on Tuesday 4:34 was actually 4:34:59 and today’s 4:35 was actually 4:35:01. But that’s not what I’m trying to figure out. Does the extra time come at the beginning, the middle, or the end of the day, or all three? It probably doesn’t make much, if any, difference, but I’ve become curious about whether we’re measuring time or daylight or both and how it works. The twenty-four hours in a day is reported to be comprised of “23 hours, 56 minutes and 4 seconds to complete one rotation and that we round up to 24-hour days. But that additional 3 minutes, 56 seconds takes actually into account Earth’s movement around the sun.” And remember, every four years we add a whole day at the end of February.

where in time-space are the tree lights?

Photo by J. Harrington

So, it appears that our time-keeping is somewhat arbitrary, but not necessarily capricious. Does this have anything to do with Einstein’s time-space continuum? Possibly, according to this description from What is the Space-Time Continuum for Dummies?:

But in a relativistic universe, time cannot be separated from the three dimensions of space. This is because the observed rate at which time passes depends on the velocity of an object relative to the observer. Also, any gravitational field strength slows down the passage of time.

I’m not enough of a physicist or philosopher to actually think I understand all this but the phrase "the observed rate at which time passes depends on the velocity of an object relative to the observer” makes me wonder if there may not be some significance to where in the day the extra light gets added. If you have thoughts about this, feel free to share them in the comments.

I spent part of the morning today helping the Daughter Person assemble some flatpak children’s furniture. I think that trying to follow the instructions may have caused my mind to slip into a different dimension. Plus, more cloudiness and cold is affecting my brain. I believe I need a dose of Alfred and the Chipmunks to get me back on the seasonal straight and narrow.

The Chipmunk Song (Christmas Don’t Be Late)

Alright you Chipmunks, Ready to sing your song?
I'd say we are
Yeah, Lets sing it now!
Okay, Simon?
OK
Okay, Theodore?
OK
Okay Alvin?...Alvin?...ALVIN!!!
OKAY!!

Christmas, Christmas time is near
Time for toys and time for cheer
We've been good, but we can't last
Hurry Christmas, hurry fast

Want a plane that loops the loop
Me, I want a Hula-Hoop
We can hardly stand the wait
Please Christmas don't be late

Ok Fellas, Get ready
That was very good, Simon
Naturally!
Very Good Theodore
He He He He
Uh Alvin, You were a little flat
Watch it, Alvin... Alvin?...ALVIN!!!
OKAY!!

Want a plane that loops the loop
I still want a Hula-Hoop
We can hardly stand the wait
Please Christmas don't be late
We can hardly stand the wait
Please Christmas don't be late

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Regaining balance and pace

It's less than a week until Summer Solstice and, at the moment, it appears unlikely we'll get enough rain by then to make it safe to ignite the backyard brush pile we turn into a mini-bonfire to celebrate. As a fall back, we'll enjoy a smaller fire in the burn pit. Our region of Minnesota (East Central) is beginning to feel like it's experiencing a drought. Fortunately, not as bad as much of the western United States, but enough that the "wet spot" behind the house isn't wet any more. Just ask the whitetail deer pictured below.

whitetail deer in "wet spot"

Photo by J. Harrington

The record-setting heat wave that recently ended left us feeling enervated and full of ennui. Progress in yard work and planting has been slow to non-existent. The same heat-dry wave that left us lazy also is convincing us that it's too late and parched to start a three sisters garden this summer. All of these weather vagaries are giving us an opportunity to practice "not being in control." In our younger days we called it learning to "go with  the flow." I was never very good at that, but I used to be better than I am these days. Time to refresh and improve old skills and relearn the nuance and balance between being in control and giving up.

small pond in summertime

Photo by J. Harrington

The pond north of the property has taken on it's summer appearance. Its flow is barely noticeable. There's a coating of pollen, dust and tree debris on its surface. An occasional duck takes refuge on its quiet waters. I'm overdue for spraying myself with tick repellant and going and sitting, and meditating, until I can  feel the quiet waters flowing calmly through me. Four years of a would-be autocrat in the White House, plus more  than a year's worth of pandemic, followed by the other party in power that then fails to use the their power, has left me more curmudgeonly than usual. It's past time I remember one of David Brower's wonderful insights: "It seems that every time mankind is given a lot of energy, we go out and wreck something with it."

The Pond

by Mary Oliver

August of another summer, and once again
I am drinking the sun
and the lilies again are spread across the water.
I know now what they want is to touch each other.
I have not been here for many years
during which time I kept living my life.
Like the heron, who can only croak, who wishes he
could sing,
I wish I could sing.
A little thanks from every throat would be appropriate.
This is how it has been, and this is how it is:
All my life I have been able to feel happiness,
except whatever was not happiness,
which I also remember.
Each of us wears a shadow.
But just now it is summer again
and I am watching the lilies bow to each other,
then slide on the wind and the tug of desire,
close, close to one another,
Soon now, I’ll turn and start for home.
And who knows, maybe I’ll be singing.

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Time for a democratic initiative

There's a loaf of artisan sourdough bread that just came out of the oven. Other than waiting for the rise to occur, bread baking is not a passive activity. It's know as "shaping a loaf," right? The starter has to be active, correct? Keeping and improving a democracy is like that. You don't get the results you want if you're always reacting (correcting problems) rather than acting (deciding on ingredients, assembling, baking, etc.)

Democrats, the political party kind, have been doing too much reacting to the initiatives of tRUMP and the Republican Party, rather than setting their own course of action and executing on it. Now seems to me to be the time to reverse roles.

We don't need the United States Postal Service to successfully flush tRUMP and the GOP out on a tidal wave of Blue Votes. Each state has its own voting procedures as, I believe, each county does. Our county has a web page that explains how to successfully request and return an absentee ballot without relying on the US mail. Here's the options they list. Your county should have something similar. DO NOT, PLEASE, USE THE  MAIL IT option!

Return the ballot on or before Election Day. Delivery options are:

• Mail it in the provided pre-paid envelope. The ballot MUST arrive by 8pm the day of the Election. [strikethrough added by blogger]
• Deliver it in-person to the ... County Auditor-Treasurer’s Office by 3:00pm the day of the Election.
• Have someone else return your ballot by 3:00pm on Election Day. This person cannot deliver more than three ballots.
• You MAY NOT deliver or use your absentee ballot at the polling place on Election Day

Instead of spending as much time and energy as they have chastising the tRUMP regime and the USPS for making it difficult to impossible to vote by mail this election, why don't the Democrats, progressives, liberals and anyone who actually gives a damn about democracy in these United States make sure that all potential voters know how to vote absentee without depending on an increasingly unreliable USPS. Remember the old saying about "First we win the battle, then we fight over how we divide the spoils?" Democrats and other democracy lovers could also organize volunteers to collect and return ballots consistent with state and county requirements. That would help those who have neither time nor transportation to deliver their own ballots.

[UPDATE: RULES FOR

Early voting by state

I've already suggested something like the paragraph above to someone I know who's involved in the local Democratic establishment. I'm posting it here in hopes that it makes sense and others will shake their local Democratic party trees to get people to realize this isn't the time to stick to many principles or chains of command as much as it is to make sure there's a Blue Tsunami. The Republicans need to be beaten so badly that they'll be licking their wounds for the next dozen or so presidential elections.

One Vote

Aimee Nezhukumatathil

            ^{After reading a letter from his mother, Harry T. Burn cast the deciding vote to ratify the 19th amendment of the U.S. Constitution}

My parents are from countries
where mangoes grow wild and bold
and eagles cry the sky in arcs and dips.
America loved this bird too and made

it clutch olives and arrows. Some think
if an eaglet falls, the mother will swoop
down to catch it. It won’t. The eagle must fly
on its own accord by first testing the air-slide

over each pinfeather. Even in a letter of wind,
a mother holds so much power. After the pipping
of the egg, after the branching—an eagle is on
its own. Must make the choice on its own

no matter what its been taught. Some forget
that pound for pound, eagle feathers are stronger
than an airplane wing. And even one letter, one
vote can make the difference for every bright thing.

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A week for the birds?

This week included National Napping Day on Monday and, in Minnesota, Township Day yesterday. It would have worked out better for us if Napping Day came after Township Day. Today is when we actually celebrated Napping Day. Our township's Annual Meeting was last night. It ran later than we expected, and then we had a family conversation about it when we got home. There had been a lengthy presentation and discussion at the Meeting about a Road Committee proposal to pave all the 39 miles or so of gravel roads with either chip seal or hot mix asphalt, mostly the former. We have some continuing reservations about the advisability of the proposal, particularly from an economic perspective. If any of you have experience with the conversion of local roads from gravel to chip seal, please use the comments to let us know how it went.

blue jay under the front feeder

Photo by J. Harrington

This coming Saturday is not only St. Patrick's Day, it's also the day for the Senate District 32 DFL convention. Obviously, Senate District 32 is inhabited by many more Scandihooligans than Irish, unlike Boston where we were raised. We continue to be concerned about the degree of opposition many Democrats are exhibiting to their more progressive brethren, so we'll see if our participation in the convention turns out to be part of the problem or part of the solution.

oak under which blue jay feathers were scattered

Photo by J. Harrington

These are strange times, and not only in politics. For better than a week we haven't seen any birds at the feeder out front. It used to attract blue jays, cardinals, chickadees, nuthatches, woodpeckers and squirrels. Not a one have we seen recently. While walking the dogs yesterday we may have come upon a hint of what's going one. We discovered a number of blue jay feathers scattered in a circle under a roadside oak tree. Perhaps a hawk has moved into the neighborhood? We haven't seen one but that hypothesis is the leading candidate for why there are no longer birds seen where they used to abound. On the other hand, in the past we've seen hawks soaring above the feeder behind the house. Everything and everyone goes very, very quiet for a bit, and then returns to normal. Maybe the birds have just taken a hint from the tRump administration and left in great numbers for better opportunities. Would that help support a hypothesis that the current administration is for the birds?

a scattering of blue jay blue-gray feathers

Photo by J. Harrington

Blur

Andrew Hudgins

Storms of perfume lift from honeysuckle,
lilac, clover—and drift across the threshold,
outside reclaiming inside as its home.
Warm days whirl in a bright unnumberable blur,
a cup—a grail brimmed with delirium
and humbling boredom both.  I was a boy,
I thought I’d always be a boy, pell—mell,
mean, and gaily murderous one moment
as I decapitated daises with a stick,
then overcome with summer’s opium,
numb—slumberous.  I thought I’d always be a boy,
each day its own millennium, each
one thousand years of daylight ending in
the night watch, summer’s pervigilium,
which I could never keep because by sunset
I was an old man.  I was Methuselah,
the oldest man in the holy book.  I drowsed.
I nodded, slept—and without my watching, the world,
whose permanence I doubted, returned again,
bluebell and blue jay, speedwell and cardinal
still there when the light swept back,
and so was I, which I had also doubted.
I understood with horror then with joy,
dubious and luminous joy: it simply spins.
It doesn’t need my feet to make it turn.
It doesn’t even need my eyes to watch it,
and I, though a latecomer to its surface, I’d
be leaving early.  It was my duty to stay awake
and sing if I could keep my mind on singing,
not extinction, as blurred green summer, lifted
to its apex, succumbed to gravity and fell
to autumn, Ilium, and ashes.  In joy
we are our own uncomprehending mourners,
and more than joy I longed for understanding
and more than understanding I longed for joy.

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Now and zen, emergence #phenology

Down the road a couple of miles there's a hillside that's been covered with trillium the past few years, sometime in late May or early June. I slowed down this morning long enough to take a careful look and the drive-by didn't show any blooms yet. At least around here Spring may have started a few weeks early but it now seems to have reverted to a more traditional schedule. If you watch much horse racing, you may have noticed that many who set the pace early in the race aren't always among the top finishers. Maybe that's how Spring is running this year's race through the season. Just because Nature is never hurried doesn't mean she doesn't occasionally pick up the pace.

sun-dappled woods sprinkled with trillium

Photo by J. Harrington

As the weather's warmed and the season's progressed, we've noticed dandelions are now joined by ground ivy (the cursed creeping Charlie to turf lawn lovers), which is encroaching on our wild strawberry-filled front yard, and common blue violets, I think, on the gravel road side. Once again the local herd of whitetails appears to have spent part of the Winter nibbling on our black chokeberry (Aronia melanocarpa) bushes. Maybe this year, come Autumn, we'll remember to use some repellant. I wonder if dog hair would work. Lord knows we've got more than enough to spare.

ground ivy with strawberry leaf

Photo by J. Harrington

Today is the birthday of Gary Snyder, one of the best writers and wisest, most sane, people I know of. Please join me in wishing him a Happy Birthday and many, many happy returns of the day.

Riprap

Lay down these words
Before your mind like rocks.
              placed solid, by hands
In choice of place, set
Before the body of the mind
              in space and time:
Solidity of bark, leaf, or wall
              riprap of things:
Cobble of milky way.
              straying planets,
These poems, people,
              lost ponies with
Dragging saddles –
              and rocky sure-foot trails.
The worlds like an endless
              four-dimensional
Game of Go.
              ants and pebbles
In the thin loam, each rock a word
              a creek-washed stone
Granite: ingrained
              with torment of fire and weight
Crystal and sediment linked hot
              all change, in thoughts,
As well as things.

Gary Snyder

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Summer's golden days

This is the time of year when the local road sides fill with yellow flowers: goldenrod, sunflowers (mostly Maximilian, I think), black-eyed Susans, and cut-leaf coneflowers, some of each sometimes topped by the flame of a monarch butterfly. Less frequent, swamp milkweed shows its pink to pale purple flowers, as does something else with purple tones I've only seen when driving by at 70 miles an hour and haven't been able to identify. (One of the disadvantages of our high speed society: speed and wildflower identification are a tough combination, also on flying monarchs that float too close to the car.)

Black-eyed Susans with some spikes of curly dock

Photo by J. Harrington

Yesterday, the ninth chipmunk of the season wandered into our Hav-a-Hart trap. I've been releasing them more than two miles away so I don't think I'm getting repeat captures. Over the Winter I may have to research techniques for marking chipmunks the way bee keepers do with queen bees. Heavy gloves and dipping their tails in blaze orange paint? A small caliber paintball gun?

Late afternoon brought one of the local does and her twin, almost grown, fawns foraging on the hillside. They might have been looking for early acorns that had dropped. This photo is from several weeks ago.

mid-Summer doe with fawns

Photo by J. Harrington

I doubt we could apply this approach to non-ferrous mining in all of northern Minnesota, but I really like the creativity involved, as I enjoy the creativity with which Tara Bray captures the ennui that can arise at this time of year.

Once

By Tara Bray 

I climbed the roll of hay to watch the heron

in the pond. He waded a few steps out,

then back, thrusting his beak under water,

pulling it up empty, but only once.

Later I walked the roads for miles, certain

he’d be there when I returned. How is it for him,

day after day, his brittle legs rising

from warm green scum, his graceful neck curled,

damp in the bright heat? It’s a dull world.

Every day, the same roads, the sky,

the dust, the barn caving into itself,

the tin roof twisted and scattered in the yard.

Again, the bank covered with oxeye daisy

that turns to spiderwort, to chicory,

and at last to goldenrod. Each year, the birds—

thick in the air and darting in wild numbers—

grow quiet, the grasses thin, the light leaves

earlier each day. The heron stood

stone-still on my spot when I returned.

And then, his wings burst open, lifting the steel-

blue rhythm of his body into flight.

I touched the warm hay. Hoping for a trace

of his wild smell, I cupped my hands over

my face: nothing but the heat of fields

and skin. It wasn’t long before the world

began to breathe the beat of ordinary hours,

stretching out again beneath the sky.

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Encounter on a snowy road

© harrington

The tops of the oak branches outside the window are covered with an inch or so of snow. This morning's flakes were small but multitudinous. Driving was like looking through a gauze curtain. In the dark, I barely saw the doe lying in the middle of the road. Whether she had run into or been hit by a car ahead of me (none were in sight) or has lost her footing on an icy patch, I'll never know. I was grateful that I had a chance to drive around her. Thank you all-wheel drive! I continued on for a bit and then called 911 on my cell phone (after pulling to the roadside). The person who answered seemed impatient to be done with me, perhaps thinking that I was reporting a deer crossing the road, not lying in it. She disconnected with a "we've got it, someone will check it out." Perhaps I'm being too judgmental in my impression that the operator was intent on clearing the line in case there was a real emergency. If some driver didn't see the doe in time to miss her, or if they swerved and went into the ditch, it would become a real emergency for someone as well as for the doe. On my way home, I looked but didn't notice any signs of an accident or blood near the road. Maybe everything turned out well for all concerned on a snowy Winter morning along county road 36 in My Minnesota. The situation reminded me of William E. Stafford's poem Traveling through the Dark. Car-deer crashes happen all too often. Clearly, wild animals haven't adapted to something traveling at 30 to 70 miles an hour. I'm not so sure humans are adapting well to traveling speeds at the higher end of that range. There's a saying I came across a long time ago that goes something like "just because you can do something, doesn't mean that you should." Sort of like Justice Holmes' analysis of falsely crying fire in a crowded theater. So, please remember that it is possible to go slower and still get to where you're going in a reasonable amount of time. This is especially true if the alternative may involve tow trucks, wreckers or ambulances. There's a reason we humans need to stop and smell the roses. It's hard to do at seventy mph. Speaking of stopping, I'll stop now and hope you stop back again. Thanks for coming.