Night Sky

I burst outside through the front door like a pent up cat. Even at eleven p.m. the air was still warm but stirring gently like cool fingers against my face and bare arms and legs. Don had just reminded me that it was the last night of the meteor showers and I also wanted to see if I could find Mars, which was supposed to be closer to Earth and easier to see than it had been in something like 600 years.

Normally, I either forget opportunities like this or procrastinate breaking my normal, lazy routine until it is too late, but this time I didn’t hesitate. I have felt a little like a hibernating slug lately, letting most of life pass me by, so not stopping to rationalize as the words came out of Don’s mouth, my reaction was similar to pouring vinegar into a box of baking soda.

Although I was rewarded with both Mars and the long streak of a meteor crashing through the atmosphere, it was something much more mundane that took my breath away and made me wonder why I had waited so long to come out of my cave. My headlong rush into the summer night instantly enveloped me in a stillness that made me feel alone, but not lonely. The dark sky was huge and clear and lured me into the street for a better look. Wrapped in the inky silence, I strolled around with my head cocked back, one hand raised to block out the glare of the only nearby streetlight, noticing how much more three-dimensional the sky looked at night. Constellations and the Milky Way greeted me like old friends wondering where I had been. The vastness, which was freeing, was filled with stars and I wondered, myself, how I ever came to take simple, private moments like this with the universe for granted. Twenty minutes later I went inside a different person.

Taking a Break with Friends

I spent some time at one of my favorite parks recently. Although I didn’t take anyone with me, I managed to make some friends when I got there.

I like this park because it is large enough to give everyone some private space, open enough to feel safe, and sculpted enough to be beautiful and interesting. The ornamental varieties of flora create a soothing background and canopy of green, an accommodating combination of shade and sun, and bursts of color. Picnic tables are provided for picnickers, a gazebo for weddings, play equipment for the young at heart, an outdoor aviary for the curious, and a scenic pond and benches for the loiterers. My children have all had senior pictures taken here and I think Dad even came here as a kid. (Said children may now breathe a sigh of relief with this confirmation that I am refraining with great self-constraint from inserting said senior photos here.) I am drawn into this park by the aesthetics of the place, but I am rewarded by the calm quiet that pervades my visits.

This time, after eating my #2 Value Meal at a table in the shade, unharrassed by the very polite squirrels that watched me from a distance, I wandered, library book in hand, toward the pond. Coming to a 12-inch rock ledge, behind a Do Not Feed the Birds sign, I sat on the edge with my feet on the narrow, paved path determined to take a few pictures before retreating to a shady bench with my book. Immediately, however, the picturesque ducks and geese that I had my eye on swam smoothly over to me and, much to my surprise, unhesitatingly stepped right out of the water and came across the path to my feet. Knowing how testy and territorial geese can be, it was a little unnerving to see how close they were coming as they looked me directly in the eye and honked their intentions. I gently spoke back and kept the camera to my face, however, and they politely stayed within two feet of me while I clicked away. When I put the camera down and they decided I had nothing to share, they continued to waddle beside me to the grass. Eventually, I moved over a few feet into the shade and read my book while another lone duck came over, got out of the water, nestled at my feet, and dozed, his beak resting against his chest and one eye watching me for awhile to make sure I didn’t wield any surprises.

It was a peaceful way to spend a couple hours and I feel rejuvenated with every visit. I am learning to surrender more willingly to opportunities that offer moments of diversion from my well-worn routine and to spend time in places that build my energy instead of depleting it. Besides, time spent with good friends, even new feathered ones, is always a joy.

Deluge

Okay. I’m done. We have had rain off and on for weeks, but this week, this day, is enough for me. I feel like my home has been moved into a rainforest. I have foregone complaining until now for selfish reasons. Rain is good for the crops and good for my yard. It means a lower water bill and that no one, including myself, will expect me to go out and pull weeds. Rain adds to the water table, which sustains this area through the dry summer months, cleans the air, prevents forest fires, and washes the bird poop off my car. But a weather dial that is permanently stuck on this setting is not a good thing for me. A spring shower is one thing, but this bone-drenching downpour-that-never-ends is depressing. When it is finally over and the sun has come back out to play, I will be able to cheerfully proclaim how refreshing a good Eastern Oregon rain is, but for now, all I want to do is feed my growing depression with food. Where did I leave those potato chips?

A Wednesday Drive

A week ago yesterday, as I traveled along the Columbia River Gorge on my way home from an unexpected trip to the city, I couldn't help but admire the beauty of an area that I often take for granted. Five days earlier, the trip down had been less than inspiring since I was battling torrential rains, as only a mother can, to get to my children.

Although they are perfectly capable of handling just about everything, Jennifer's diagnosis of H1N1 and Pneumonia was more than I could stay away from; that old mother lion instinct does not diminish over time. Sarah and Danielle had everything under control, but, well...you know...I could at least cook for them, or clean something, or get in their way. As it was, while Danielle was at work I contented myself with making sure medicine was taken, finishing laundry, carrying water glasses up and down the stairs, and hovering in the doorway, as I'd often done with all the kids when they were little, making sure Jen was breathing.

Anyhoo, the little pickup Danielle is using had some issue and wanted to come home with me for a checkup so I traded vehicles and drove home at a careful 58 mph. Bearing in mind that the freeway speed limit is 65 mph, that's one slo-o-o-ow trip home. I had many hours, especially through construction zones, to admire Oregon scenery. This particular section, where some of the worst weather often rares an ugly head as it had on my way down, is breathtaking in the fall when the river along one side of the road and the mountains on either side provide smoky blue backdrops to the vivid colors of the deciduous forest that creates a stunning corridor. On this day, low clouds added a mystical quality to the whole scene.

Tonka Tym and I made it home safely, and left three coughing, but resilient girls behind. Between Danielle's massive decontamination efforts before I got there, and all our efforts to maintain sterile conditions, I did not bring the flu back to Don and Mom. It certainly is nothing to mess with; even the cough of the lessor version caused Sarah to pull a muscle in her back, Jeremy to crack a rib, and Danielle to have an elderly lady run away from her in the store.

The pictures I took on this trip remind me of the daily beauty inherent in life that I often stumble past in a fog of routine, to-do lists, and distraction. The combination of power and delicacy in texture, color, and design represent the power and delicacy of the relationships for which I am eternally grateful to have in my life. Gratefulness is not just for Thanksgiving Day. Take care of yourselves.

My Roots

Mom and I went for a drive today. At first we were just going to go fifteen minutes away to a neighboring little town where I wanted to turn in an application for substitute teaching and then come right back. However, it was so pleasant out that we decided to go further through a rural area that she wanted to see, then loop around through Pendleton for lunch before heading home. The mountain range was a hazy blue that nearly matched the sky and the harvested fields on the foothills around us were a clipped gold interspersed with brown, fallow fields that were a rich hue from the recent rain.

Too often I take this country for granted. People either love it or hate it and for almost the same reasons. It is as colorless and dead-looking in the winter as it is vibrant and alive in the spring. One nearby mountain range or another can make the weather change quickly and the road conditions a bit of an adventure to navigate whether from frozen fog, blowing topsoil, or snow. Streams and rivers cut into the soil and basalt rockbeds, swelling in the spring and almost petering out by summer’s end; luring fishermen, swimmers, and rafters.

Towns are much farther than a stone’s throw apart and many are only held together by narrow, twisting roads that are vulnerable to the upheaval of the land and small county budgets. It is a rough country, carved by glaciers and rivers into occasional plateaus and valleys lined by rim-rocked hills. Although humans try to tame it with precariously plowed hilltop fields, much is still covered with boulders, sagebrush, wild grasses, and scrub pine.

It is a big country, where one can truly be alone to the point of isolation and come to fully realize his or her insignificance compared to the immensity of Earth. Many find it lonely to the point of desolation. I, however, love standing alone on these rough hilltops, feeling the timelessness of their existence, the simultaneous strength and vulnerability of the rock beneath and beside me and feeling a kinship with the creatures that struggle to do more than just survive amongst them.

Is it age, wisdom, or my new glasses that gives me such a sentimental viewpoint today? Perhaps, knock on wood, if we’d had car trouble during our morning excursion, my environmental opinion wouldn’t be quite so rosy and thoughtful! Such is life in the far, far, West.

Vive bene.

Heaven's Tears

Spattering drips
of promise.
Gathering,
wet
drops in
downward
motion.
Cool, fragrant air.
Misted windows.
Dripping downspouts.
Wet,
mirroring
pools
graced by
ripples.
Liquid
nourishment for all.
Rain.

Home

There is nothing like Eastern Oregon in the spring. It is the one time that even the Blues are green.

Who's In Control?

See this weed. It is one of two main menaces in my flowerbeds. It is a vine never quits growing.

The stems and leaves are covered with tiny hairs that cling to everything; my clothes, my flowers, my cats, everything. All summer long I find them wound around my flowers, choking the life out of them, which infuriates me. Diligently I try to track them down to their roots and pull them at their source, but they have so many underground runners that I have little hope of ever getting rid of them. Yesterday, I tried to rid an area of them as I weeded. It should have been be easy since they are only 6-8 inches tall at this point. However, with all of the bulbs that are sprouting now, I ended up pulling them up as well and spent more time in damage control than in eradicating the menace. Grrrr.