Apr 22, 2011 by Naomi.

No refuge work today or for this weekend either. So far I have neglected to critique the PNWA contest entries which I promised to do and with very imaginative excuses: water spruce transplants, sit in my sun room to get a tan, put new stamps in order in my albums, brown fresh pork chops because I bought them last week and can’t let them spoil, and I need lunch anyway, get plastic and paper out for recycle, dig a big hole and move the daffodils out of my waste basket so the roots have room to spread out, give the new argyle cat the narrow menacing look that will move her out of the back yard and save my robins, watch the crows protect their territory so I will know where they are incubating their young, listen as a house finch sings his heart out. There you have it.  Eight o’clock is too early to go to bed but I must. Only did ten sit ups down on my mat but after the digging and watering, enough is enough. I’ve had a full day.

Posted in Social Commentary | No Comments »

Apr 20, 2011 by Naomi.

A weekend passed and I am not feeling that much better, chicken soup notwithstanding. My sinuses are stuffed to the point of giving me bleary eyesight and I will have to stiffen up because I have the teepee learning station tomorrow for 25 third graders. I will not cancel that. I can be no slouch for those kids. But in the Indian setting? Tough to say the least. But I will stay put and not have the added trip to the bird hide that goes with other stations. I did get the time moved from morning to afternoon if that is any help. I will at least be inside the canvas with drawings for kids to translate into the communications used by early primitive peoples. Kids love to figure those out. I add drumming and stamping around as Indians might have done in rituals or festivals. Kids love that too. And I will be carried into the mode of the ancients. I hope.

Posted in Social Commentary | No Comments »

Apr 15, 2011 by Naomi.

I was bleary eyed when I got up this morning and moped about while staring out of my sun porch at the dreary rain that prevented me from taking a walk in my back yard. Hulking into my computer I hunted for some thing from which to launch into a blog and I clicked on a paragraph describing adventures in my past life. Now hear how I listed them. (Naomi walked the trekker’s trail in the Himalayas, slipped off her horse on safari in Australia’s Snowy Mountains, panted up Ayer’s Rock in the Northern Territory, tossed the starting ball for a polo chukkar in an outback cattle station in New South Wales, snorkeled on the great barrier reef off Queensland, boated down the Danube, climbed pyramids in the Yucatan and Guatemala, took a barefoot cruise on a windjammer in the British Virgin Islands, sprained her right wrist in Chili - South America not the bean soup, looked a right whale in the left eye in Argentinean waters from a little rowboat, and reconnoitered Europe by foot, bus, boat, and train.) Has my life been filled with adventure, or what? It was for sure. I felt some better And the most comforting thing I could think of was eat chicken soup and crawl back into bed for a recovery. It seemed to do the trick because I got up, dressed, and trundled to the post office to mail a letter and drop off some gently-used books for the Friends book sale. I still feel very much under the weather so I’ll get another bowl of soup and more nap time. I hope this feeling is just the blues and not the onset of flu.

Posted in Social Commentary | No Comments »

Apr 9, 2011 by Naomi.

The sun shone outside my window putting a kabosh on my plans to avoid leaf raking. Got out of that because of the hail and rain for a couple of days and if I had left the covers over my head this morning I could have done it again but the phone rang and I hopped out of bed wanting to know what such an early call was all about. I had planned not to go to the refuge today because of the government lockout and too late got word the money problem had been solved. Tough. I stayed home and organized the books Nancy helped me sort yesterday. With the back yard cleared of leaves my sun porch beckoned. (It was she who bagged the leaves.) Tulips and hyacinths were blooming. So pretty. And the glassed in room held the sun’s heat very well. A great place to sit and draw, however the squirrels were squirrelly and scampered up and down the Douglas fir. They were more fun to watch than sketch. And they are gutsy, too, as they ventured out on skinny limbs until I expected them to slip off. But Nancy had dug holes for the rabbit brush and buckwheat I bought the day before. And they look very happy in their new location. What a great native plant garden I have.

Posted in Social Commentary | No Comments »

Apr 5, 2011 by Naomi.

How nicely the leaves moved from the fence line into neat piles behind the muscle-driven rakes. Two rakes. Two shoulders. Four arms. Four legs. Piles of leaves shivering in expectation. From piles to stuffing. No big turkey dinner. Just stuffed garbage bags. Light a match. Burn em up. But not. Village fathers shake their heads with a big “no no” to such simplicity. So we rake ‘em up, bag ‘em up, pile ‘em up, and wait for big wheels to turn and make ‘em disappear. And eventually they will. Well maybe not really disappear but magically they will be gone from view. My view. Dumped into ditches carved by big growling smoke-puffing orange metal caterpillars. Then covered by the same. To lay and stew for who knows how long? They are out of our sight. Out of our control. We happily dust off the rakes and put them to rest until the next leaf-fall.

Posted in Social Commentary | No Comments »