Fans and humidity, summer colds, and hard-to-sleep-hot nights. It's here....sometimes I wondered if it was going to make it.....
They never stopped doing and loving and living right up until the end.
Covid made that end dark and lonely, something which is very hard to forgive at all, ever. Bad things were done and happened that I am not going to talk about here, but they sure should not keep families apart at such times.
Anyhow, more than they loved all of us, they loved each other. They were more entwined than anyone I knew...utterly dependent on one another. If one was in the hospital the other pined and did all they could to fix things if they could. They never went anywhere without each other, shared hobbies and pastimes and work and play.
Mom was so damned strong that it humbled me. She simply did everything she could to make life right for Dad. She taught me to go after what was needed no matter how hard it might have been to ask. He knew that he needed her and just how much and acted accordingly. I hope they are rewarded in Heaven for what they went through in their final weeks.
When they went it was as if the center shifted and the light went off in the world. I had them sixty-eight years, my whole life, and it wasn’t nearly enough.
But for three months I never cried. Not a tear, no dampness in the corner of the eye. Numbness and mournful malaise for sure but no tears.
Then one day I was listening to the High Kings perform the Dutchman on my cell phone playlist, while I washed the dishes.
Margaret and the Dutchman seemed to personify my parents’ relationship and the way they propped each other up and cherished each other for so many years.
I looked up at their pictures on the wall over the stove and started crying and couldn’t stop. The rest of that day was a melting watercolor of every loss I’ve ever felt, especially over the past 18 months.
Okay, everybody needs that. Good, maybe I will move on now.
Except that every single time I hear the song, no matter how determined I am to not react I do. Same way every time.
Many probably see me as a hard person. Or at least stoic. Farming can bring on the hard, all the while softening the center where no one sees. It certainly fosters stoicism. You just get used to things happening that you can’t control and learn to roll with it and just move on.
However, that song absolutely dissolves me right down to nothing every single time I hear it.
Should I take if off my playlist and harden the old shell, or leave it there on shuffle to sneak up on me with its reminders of all that is missing?
We lost so many close family members, beloved aunts, an amazing uncle, good friends from all over the world in the past few months……I just don’t know.
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| Orchard Grass in bloom |
At Schoharie Crossing SHS boat launch, Ralph thought he saw a fox as we drove in. I missed it entirely. However, after happily discovering a couple of Blackpoll Warblers in the canal lane, I heard barking from the woods up ahead.
It sounded like tiny little lap dogs having fun together, but I had a feeling it was nothing domestic.
However, I didn't see anything on my way back to the car.
Then on the way out the two little critters above were playing on the edge of the soybean field near the lane. Since they weren't in our chicken pen, I thought they were pretty cute.
Not so cute was the individual at the next park we visited. First thing we heard when we got out of the car was somebody banging rocks together.
Odd....but sure enough there was a tall, youngish kind of guy, seemingly on a walking tour or something judging by the little pack he carried and his general lack of recent grooming, making noise with rocks...or something that sounded like rocks.
I thought nothing of it. There are lots of people using the park for lots of things. I just wanted to find birds.
I did a quick scan of the waterfront, then headed up on the bike path to make sure that the noisy Chipping Sparrow there wasn't by some amazing chance a Worm-eating Warbler.
It wasn't, but as I climbed the little hill the guy came uphill too, into the parking lot. There he wandered back in forth aimlessly in front of our car, alternately peering into the canal or walking up and down the stone wall. It seemed kinda random....there is really nothing there....
As soon as I stopped up on the hill to bird he quickly hiked right straight up to me. I was a little disconcerted, but he said hi and seemed to be going to hike east on the path. He walked off briskly so I turned away, thinking he was just a hiker after all.
I was still a little uncomfortable though, so I thought, good, I'll go west. I stopped for a few seconds on the side of the road and heard a soft noise right behind me.
His brisk walk had taken him about six feet down the bike path and he was standing there with his foot on a post just a few feet away from me.
I meet people in those parks all the time, and rarely feel the least bit concerned, but his silent lurking so close and so quiet, creeped me right out.
I hustled down to the car as fast as I could walk and found the boss sleeping there with all the doors locked....guess he felt the same way I did.
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| Riverbank Grapes in bloom, my favorite fragrance in the whole world...better than cookies! |
The guy was still standing at the head of the path, staring into the bushes when we drove away.
We found another park so I could get my birding fix in a more comfortable atmosphere....
Am I too paranoid, or was there something off about the guy? Hard telling, but I wouldn't do anything different if the situation arose again.
For more Sunday Stills....
But I didn't...
So Happy Birthday, Liz! Hope you have a wonderful day and a joyful and productive year to come. Hang in there....
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| This deer and the one below are not the same deer, or even the same day |
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| This one was here on the farm a while back and the one above was today out on the road |
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| And these are bunnies. Eastern Cottontails Sylvilagus Floridanus |
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| Common Gallinules |
Many miles were driven that day in hopes of seeing birds we didn't see. Common Gallinule, Grasshopper Sparrow, Double-crested Cormorant and Black Vulture were featured prominently. There were others, but we looked pretty hard for these.
Guess what we saw when we went out this morning...or heard in the case of the Grasshopper Sparrow...
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| Double-crested Cormorant |
Yeah, all four of the above. The only species I was able to photograph were the gallinules and cormorant, but the vultures sailed right over my head when I was hanging out the laundry, and the sparrow sang to us from the edge of the road on a farm we visit often.
It's okay. I will take them any way I can get them.
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| Wood Duck...just because he was pretty |
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| Optimistic Osprey |
This incorporated rising at 2 AM to go owling and lasted until after eight PM. I'm an early riser anyhow, nearly always awake by 4, although I stay upstairs until 5:30 because Mack barks when he hears me. I hate to rouse the whole house.
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| Broad-winged Hawk |
However, 2 was reminiscent of midnight calf check days, when I stumbled to the barn in boots and bathrobe, pulled a calf if necessary and stumbled back to bed, attempting to open only one eye at a time in the process.
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Upland Sandpiper disguised as a Killdeer |
It is amazing how fast you wake up though when you get a life bird on one of the first stops...at least as far as eBird is concerned. I've seen and heard many Eastern Screech Owls, but all before I started eBirding, so it is going to look new on paper. Score.
It was a long and eventful day, with many new county birds for me for the year, and one I have been looking for for five years in our home county.
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| Eastern Meadowlark |
That was a Virginia Rail calling up a storm on Sara Lib Road in the place that Ralph refers to as "The place where that tree almost fell on your head."
The tree was a small one and still languishes at the edge of the water next to its luckier, still-standing, Red Maple neighbor. It probably wouldn't have done me much harm if it had hit me, but I'm glad it didn't.
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| Through-the-windshield-on a-busy-road Orchard Oriole |
Anyhow, it was an adventure, but we lost that hundred-and-second bird. It was, by its call from its spot hidden in a shrubbery, a Golden-winged Warbler. Alas however, according to eBird review, only possible to be definitively identified by being clearly viewed, as it hybridizes with Blue-winged Warbler (we found lots of those) and both purebreds, plus the hybrids, mimic each other's calls.
It's all right though. I'll take the Eastern Screech Owl, the rail, the bittern, the Orchard Oriole and the like, and be contented indeed.
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| Willie Marsh |
Meanwhile, it is great to be home too.
Note to everyone who lives here...Do NOT close the pony barn door! Barn Swallows are investigating!
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| Strange bird at Yankee Hill Lock |
I atlased the occupants and checked them out now and then, but thought little of it until...
One afternoon about a week ago as we pulled into our parking spot behind the house a dove shot up from the ground and flew straight toward the mulberry trees.
I was watching idly when WHAM!! a hawk hit it so hard there was a cloud of feathers lingering in the air as it passed. I was unable to identify the predator, but I think it might have been a Merlin.
A couple of days later we noticed the little guy above hanging around. He seemed to be kinda close to the right age to fledge, but not quite right somehow. Really tame, begging all the doves that landed to eat on the tray feeder to feed him, and only able to fly a few feet.
We quickly became enamored and more diligent than ever at chasing away the stray or dropped cats that pass through regularly...although I have yet to see that big Siamese take anything but rodents, so I don't chase him too hard.
Then I found a matching birdling drowned in the garden pond.
Aha! I'll bet they came from that nest, which is much torn up with dangling twigs and grass now.
However, I didn't connect the events until yesterday. Then the penny dropped. I'll bet the dove we saw killed was brooding the two little ones and left them not quite ready to fend for themselves.
They probably struggled out of the nest in hungry desperation, one landed in an unfortunate spot and other other right at the feeder.
Anyhow, we are cheering the little guy on, and making sure there is food where he can easily find it. I think I will make sure the rhubarb leaf bird bath is full too, although there is so much water everywhere I am sure he is getting plenty to drink.
I know the odds aren't good, but I hope he makes it.
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| Peggy's first ever soccer game Great fun! |
For more, go here.
A very Happy and Blessed Mother's Day.
With love from Northview Farm....
I recently began to reread the book by Kenneth Roberts with the same name as this post. I have read the whole series several times over the years with each rereading bringing a new perspective on the stories.
I didn't realize though, until I cracked the pages of the book...or in this case started scrolling on my NOOK...that I could envision everything that was happening in the story about a thousand times more clearly than before.
Because I'd been there. Those rock ledges? Yeah, watched the tide swirl the seaweed that clung to them as gulls cried overhead. Those marshes? Scott drove us through them every day.
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| Do you suppose one of these seals is called Eunice? |
And having been up the Golden Road with Alan a few years before...in the Camaro (!) if you remember.... I could well imagine the march on Quebec as well.
So thanks for an enriching set of experiences that just keep on giving. What a wonderful state....
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