nature

Update on “Butterflies”

/ still a dreamer / 10 Comments

Pictured here is our final cover for Where Do Butterflies Go at Night?, published by Ethicool Books.

I am pleased to announce that our latest/updated release date is mid-June, 2022, and it is available for pre-order now on Bookshop which supports Indie bookstores, Barnes & Noble, and Amazon.

I’ll soon be meeting with one of the owners of a local bookshop to discuss my launch! Stay tuned ..

The Gifts We’re Given

/ still a dreamer / 20 Comments

As I sat in the corner of the couch next to the front window, journaling as I do each morning, Jazzy curled up next to me, I looked outside. It was breathtaking. The sun had barely risen and there was a low fog clinging to the ground.

If I were the kind of person to run outside at that hour in my bathrobe, I would have been everywhere, taking pictures of the neighborhood in that ethereal atmosphere. But I am not. I waited until I had showered, made coffee, fed Jazzy, and then I ran out. The sun was just clearing the mist, and casting shadows across a large pine and the leaves along the road’s edge.

At the end of the block, the mist was thinning on the river. This is a view of the Delaware that I never tire of, though I love it most in fall and winter. The white tree – perhaps a sycamore – always just pops in the landscape, like someone took a brush and painted it there.

I walked past this tree that seems aflame. The color is so all-consuming that I honestly can’t remember what it was before, if it was ever green. Even as I write this, I’m smiling, because some of my gardener and blogging friends probably know exactly what all these trees are. Me? I’m by and large a humble fan.

Before I came to this side of the state, I didn’t know what rural delivery was. Sure, you saw mailboxes like those above in movies, but my mail had never been delivered like that. It came in the mailboxes on our houses or in apartment vestibules, and we dropped our mail off in the big, blue mailbox on the corner, or at the post office. Here, I can put outgoing mail in my mailbox, pull up the little red flag, and the postal driver takes it away. I found this convenience magical.

My neighbor texted a photo to me on Halloween, showing me how an ancient tree that had been slowly dropping lower and lower over the nearby street had finally given up and broken. Local traffic could not pass, and this would undoubtedly be a problem for trick-or-treaters. Soon after, I heard the sound of chain saws. This morning I had the first moment to look at the tree, one I’d known and passed by for fifteen years. It was a sad sight, yet I couldn’t help but notice the bright yellow sprout, now visible behind the remains of the aged tree, as if carrying on the torch of the brilliance of life.

I am always awed by the beauty of this river, whether edged with crisping rust leaves, swollen and grey after a storm, or reflecting a bright blue sky on a sunny day. I am so grateful for the richness around me, even that which can be found on a short walk. The simplicity of our natural world is such a balm to all the worries and negativity of the world that might assault us if we’re not careful.

There is so much to be thankful for … in this brief moment of time in which a holiday reminds us to consider our many gifts, but also in every day. We only need to remember and look around us.

Little Bright Spots

/ still a dreamer / 10 Comments

This past June was the hottest on record in the United States. July saw the issuance of multiple tornado warnings in my state, one specifically for my town and the surrounding areas. Never in my life here in Jersey, have I ever had to seriously sequester myself and animals in either the basement or lowest interior space in the house (my chosen option), in response to serious tornado warnings. And they did hit, too, just, fortunately for me, not here.

But let’s look on the bright side, because there always is one.

One of two dwarf red maples on the property, this one is more a deep bronze than a shade of red. Unless, of course, you’re a little newbie sprout. This close-up doesn’t tell you how tiny the new leaves are in comparison to the whole, which is huge. But it might tell you why it brings a smile every time I look at it.

One morning, I looked out my kitchen window and saw something indiscernible in between two of the ornamental grasses out back. It looked like a face. Oh …. it WAS a face. The face of a very young (and adorable) deer holding very still but just about ready to chow down on a hosta. I went down the porch stairs to gently shoo her away. Maybe only 4-5 months old, she easily cleared the nearly 4′ garden gate. As I returned, I saw she had been on my porch, and had eaten the front half of the impatiens above and a few other potted plants. It’s discouraging, but that little wide-eyed face holding soooo still, trying to be invisible …

For some reason, this pretty pair was spared, and is now starting to bloom.

There are snowball hydrangeas all over this property. They bloom snow white, and are now in their green phase, to turn a stunning rust as the summer wears on, and it becomes cooler.

Hello, little fella. This very young praying mantis greeted me one morning on a kitchen window screen. Soon after, he disappeared. But he hadn’t gone very far, I later discovered. It was turning out to be a very hot afternoon, but I managed to find myself a little time to sit on the back porch and read while there was still some shade nearest the house. And there he was. Not far from me on the decking, in the very hot, bright sun.

I thought to make his way a little easier by moving him into the shade. I offered him a large hydrangea leaf to climb on, as I didn’t want to handle and frighten him. He very calmly walked right over the leaf, and into the shadow of the railing. “Thanks, ma’am, but I’ve got this,” I imagined he said as he found his own shade. And then over the next half hour or so, he slowly made his way across the length of the porch and disappeared.

All I could think of was that that must be what `biological imperative’ means. He knew where he was going and what he had to do, because at the other end of the porch is where I often see adult green praying mantises, like the one next to Pumpkin in a photo from a few years ago.

I know for myself, and most everyone I know, that the last year and change has had a lingering impact in one way or another. And yet, we find, there are still always bright spots. Hope you keep finding yours.

Spring Daffodil

/ still a dreamer / 18 Comments

“A wizard must have passed this way

Since — was it only yesterday?

Then all was bare, and now, behold,

A hundred cups of living gold!”

~ Emma C. Dowd, “Daffodil and Crocus,” April 1902

Inspired by the daffodil above, my niece shared some of the lovely daffodils from her own garden, sitting pretty in a vase she rescued from a neighbor who was about to get rid of it. What a happy choice!

The Walk Before the Green

/ still a dreamer / 16 Comments

It was only about a week and a half ago that I went out walking … the earth was still slumbering, content in its dried weeds, quiet soil, bare trees. But the warmth in the air, the sun, spoke of a greener time to come.

The river was high and moving swiftly towards the bay at the southern part of the state. Although turbulent and muddy-looking from this view, it was still beautiful.

I walked past what is probably the neighborhood eyesore. It’s a long, low red building, at the end of which are a loading platform and garage doors, awaiting a shipment that has long since failed to arrive. I love the chair sitting there, keeping the faith that someday the neglected warehouse might live again. The red checkerboards above the garage doors tell me that this may have once been a Purina distributor, perhaps for large animal feed, serving the farmers who are just a few miles away. In a tonier town, this would have long since been demolished. We all seem to just take it for granted.

A bed of purple crocus had pushed its way through the dirt edging the road, no grass yet in, looking rather alone, barren, and brave.

Across the street a stream of bright golden grasses filled the space between the old train rails, brilliant in the sun, and threw shadows on what was once a second set of tracks.

A small bunch of snowdrops struggled to announce an impending Spring among dried grasses and old walkway weeds. I couldn’t help but imagine them surrounded by a bed of rich grass or maybe even some mulch, just something more complimentary to their delicate, pioneering spirit.

An old building on the walk to the bridge. I’m sure it’s the same age as some of the other stone buildings I’ve photographed, but I am always puzzled by the doors stacked above one another. Perhaps there was once a stairway down the front, like a fire escape, but there are no clues in the stone or cement. I’ve been told it has housed, and still does, floors of antiques and collectibles. As long as I’ve lived here, someone (I suspect the owner) always places one item in the doorway, there for the taking by whoever passes by.

An old-fashioned doll rests in the corner today.

The Delaware looks stunning as always, its racing south not as immediately apparent as in the earlier view. Here it better reflects the cloudless blue sky, and wears an aura of peacefulness.

At last … the first sheen of green! That sly, subtle wash of the palest green creeping into the grassy areas, letting us know that in maybe as little as a week’s time there will be more of Spring poking its head through the ground – daffodils, more crocus and snowdrops, the blush of yellow on the forsythia.

It’s been a long winter, a long year. We’ve survived and carried with us a great weariness and a need for the promise that a greener season brings. Soon … more hope, more sun, more people about. The simple things that make our hearts grateful that we’re still here and can lift our faces to the warmth.