The Mark of the Beast
Weather: Early summer -- hot afternoons, cool nights.
Activities:
1. Watering garden in the dusk; listening to the whip-po-will's after the fireflies settle down for the evening.
The green beans were hiding under the leaves, but I managed to find them and pluck them from their stems. There were quite a lot of them, too. Too bad The Wayward e and the Prodigal son won't be here to snap off the ends and drop them into a merrily boiling pot of water and sautee up the yellow squash with onions, to which I would add a steaming pile of fried corn fritters.
Last year I planted hollyhocks in front of the white shed. They made a disappointing clup of leaves. This year the stalks topped five feet with crimson clusters of flowers. Around the corner are the new tea roses. The have the fragrance of old ladies, which is a comfort. One is yellow; one is blood red; one is lilac; and one is white, and together they form a living bouquet with the Hollyhocks and the day lilies.
In the front, the Confederate jasmine vine is climbing the porch and blooming with the gardenias. So classically Southern-- rich, exotic, overwhelmingly sexual. I expect to hear the strains of Billie Holliday singing "Am I Blue?" in the distance.
2. Commiserating with a friend whose mother is (finally) dying after succumbing to Alzheimers ten years ago. She is curled in a fetal position, unable to unfold her arms. This week, when she got dehydrated, the doctors put a feeding tube down her nose because they couldn't find a vein to insert an IV in. She couldn't swallow, and was choking on the feeding tube, so they recommended doing surgery to put a tube in her stomach. My friend said that her father just wasn't ready for her mom to die. How utterly sad. The surgeon came back after cutting her open to say that her stomach wasn't big enough for the feeding tube and that they would have to put it in her intestine. But they didn't. So now she's going to be allowed (finally) to die.
We would never make a beloved animal endure such an end.
3. Reading a book on evolution; another on reality; and a couple by Shinoda Bolen.
4. Wondering what makes people insecure. I'm thinking that it may corellate with leaving one's natal shore, where one has a place, well-defined and secure. But then I think back and realize that I was probably never more insecure than when I was with the people I'd known since childhood. I don't suppose we ever get over the comments of the rulers of our kindergarten classes-- the ones who decided who was popular and who was not, a designation that oddly never changes as we grow older, or at least, not in our own minds. Needless to say, I was one of the ones who were always chosen last for every game, left waiting for , "Ok, you get... and I'll take ..., my co-equal in undesirability. Why was it that everything revolved around some game or another? On one of my endless drives it occurred to me that every human culture hones hunting skills with games children play. Baseball, football, soccer--- all sharpen one's aim, strenghten ones' ability to work together to accomplish a goal. So even now, although we don't use a bow and arrow, we still keep those sills at a high level.
5. Sleeping.
Activities:
1. Watering garden in the dusk; listening to the whip-po-will's after the fireflies settle down for the evening.
The green beans were hiding under the leaves, but I managed to find them and pluck them from their stems. There were quite a lot of them, too. Too bad The Wayward e and the Prodigal son won't be here to snap off the ends and drop them into a merrily boiling pot of water and sautee up the yellow squash with onions, to which I would add a steaming pile of fried corn fritters.
Last year I planted hollyhocks in front of the white shed. They made a disappointing clup of leaves. This year the stalks topped five feet with crimson clusters of flowers. Around the corner are the new tea roses. The have the fragrance of old ladies, which is a comfort. One is yellow; one is blood red; one is lilac; and one is white, and together they form a living bouquet with the Hollyhocks and the day lilies.
In the front, the Confederate jasmine vine is climbing the porch and blooming with the gardenias. So classically Southern-- rich, exotic, overwhelmingly sexual. I expect to hear the strains of Billie Holliday singing "Am I Blue?" in the distance.
2. Commiserating with a friend whose mother is (finally) dying after succumbing to Alzheimers ten years ago. She is curled in a fetal position, unable to unfold her arms. This week, when she got dehydrated, the doctors put a feeding tube down her nose because they couldn't find a vein to insert an IV in. She couldn't swallow, and was choking on the feeding tube, so they recommended doing surgery to put a tube in her stomach. My friend said that her father just wasn't ready for her mom to die. How utterly sad. The surgeon came back after cutting her open to say that her stomach wasn't big enough for the feeding tube and that they would have to put it in her intestine. But they didn't. So now she's going to be allowed (finally) to die.
We would never make a beloved animal endure such an end.
3. Reading a book on evolution; another on reality; and a couple by Shinoda Bolen.
4. Wondering what makes people insecure. I'm thinking that it may corellate with leaving one's natal shore, where one has a place, well-defined and secure. But then I think back and realize that I was probably never more insecure than when I was with the people I'd known since childhood. I don't suppose we ever get over the comments of the rulers of our kindergarten classes-- the ones who decided who was popular and who was not, a designation that oddly never changes as we grow older, or at least, not in our own minds. Needless to say, I was one of the ones who were always chosen last for every game, left waiting for , "Ok, you get... and I'll take ..., my co-equal in undesirability. Why was it that everything revolved around some game or another? On one of my endless drives it occurred to me that every human culture hones hunting skills with games children play. Baseball, football, soccer--- all sharpen one's aim, strenghten ones' ability to work together to accomplish a goal. So even now, although we don't use a bow and arrow, we still keep those sills at a high level.
5. Sleeping.
posted by Merrrrde at 8:46 PM
1 Comments:
That was beautifully written. You (ALMOST) made me want to garden. The weather here is grey--I suppose that the rain never really lets up here, even in the summer. W's sister arrives in P-town tomorrow. I'll be sending you those pictures soon, I promise. Really, it's quite nice.
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