nature

Oh What a Beautiful Morning

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130630 Morning Mist

 

There is nothing better than getting up just before the sun peaks over the mountains to the East.  The mist rises off of the back field and the sunlight begins to shine through it sending it’s rays to the ground.  This is the first day of our staycation here this summer.  Quiet, drinking my morning coffee in the field with the birds, once again connected with the earth and nature around me.

The dew is thick this morning and the one thing that keeps me from being relaxed is as the sun casts its light on the dew covered plants it accentuated every weed in the garden.  So after that quiet little interlude, soaking it all in, all I could think about was weeding the garden.  Sigh.

Survival

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130526 (1)It’s cold, wet, did I mention cold?  Right now it’s 41 degrees, it’s raining and the wind is blowing.  I had grand plans for gardening this weekend and the only thing I’ve accomplished is going through my seeds and drawing out a garden plan.  I had to take all my pots in last night because it was so cold.

Of course I haven’t mentioned all of the indoor projects I could be doing – but it’s Memorial Day weekend, I should be in the garden.  I guess I will just keep the fire going until tomorrow morning and hope it dawns sunny, warm and dry.

 

Pay it Forward

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130429 (7)

All along the Mohawk Trail through the town of Charlemont someone planted daffodils years ago.  It’s probably a 10 mile stretch of the road on the north side where there are clumps of various types of these flowers.  I look forward to seeing them every year and am always sad to see them go.

Daffodils also grow in what seems to be random places.  You drive by what may once have been someone’s home, now gone and there are daffodils blossoming on what may have once been their front yard. I find the resiliency of these flowers amazing.  Not only do they come back year after year they multiply.  A few turn into hundreds.

This is one of the things I’ve learned about gardening over the years – it’s slow.  Whenever you are planting perennials, shrubs or trees you always have to think years down the road.  Don’t plant things too close together or you will end up digging them up.  Take into consideration the spread of some plants before you plant them.  I have echinacea that takes up a good part of a garden now, that was the intent.  It has other things growing with it but I love that sea of pink in the summer.

Bill thinks the idea of planting new maple trees in the front yard of the house as pointless because we won’t live to enjoy the shade.  I say plant them now so my grandchildren will have beautiful trees shading the front of the house in the summer like they did when I was a child.

Perennial gardens are gifts to future generations in my opinion.  Some of the gardens I have in Rowe were planted by my mother, most of the plants cames from her friends and aquaintances.  She planted them for herself and to beautify the property but as a gardener you know that she probably knew that the garden would go on long after she was gone.  I love being able to go through my flower gardens and know where the peony came from or the dark purple iris.  They came from people I loved dearly that are no longer with us.   I love my gardens because I remember a day spent with Bill or my sister sweating with a shovel or moving stones.  Year after year I will walk down the stone path and see how my flowers are filling in.  A few years from now I won’t have to worry about the weeds because the perennials will have taken over.  A few years after that I will be dividing things up and giving them away – to people I care about.  It’s all about paying it forward.

Retreat

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IMAG0523-1-1

I’ve been in Rowe for the past few days, needed a retreat of sorts.  The weather is beyond beautiful and there is so much that I wanted to get done.  What I’ve found is that I’ve been most distracted by the quiet – in a good way.  The lack of activity all around you helps to bring you back to yourself, it helps to restore your soul.  Very few cars go by, very few planes fly over, there aren’t any people that I run into that I don’t already know.  My shelves are stocked if I want to make myself something to eat.  There is no schedule. The only thing you really have time to do is think.  It’s as if your entire day is spent in meditation.  It’s a good thing.

Sophie likes to spend her day on the pillows on the sofa.  As you can see she has no trouble relaxing at all.

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120828 Back Forty Sunset (1)

 

The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely, or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere where they can be quiet, alone with the heavens, nature and God.  Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be and that God wishes to see people happy, amidst the simple beauty of nature. As long as this exists, and it certainly always will, I know that then there will always be comfort for every sorrow, whatever the circumstances may be.  And I firmly believe that nature brings solace in all troubles.

Anne Frank wrote those words when she was 14 years old.  She must have been an old soul, so much wisdom, so young.

It’s been almost two weeks since I’ve been to Rowe.  I need to see the stars and get away from traffic, take a walk in the woods.

The pear tree needs trimming although it’s later to do it than it should be, it still needs to be done.  The raspberries need trimming, the beds need to be semi cleaned out, mulched.  There are brush piles to be burned, wood to be split, gardens to be spruced up.  I need to check into what I have for seed potatoes and get some onion sets.  The Ball jars need to be inventoried.  Just the beginning of the busiest time of the year – now until October.  Always too much to do and just enough.  I love having an outdoor to do list.  There’s always an excuse to be out there.

So even though I will be working I will also be alone with the heavens, nature and God.  I will return to my work week renewed and refreshed.

Running in the Grass with Your Bare Feet

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Sophie Zooming

If you watch any media at all you are bombarded by negativity, death, destruction, fear, fear, fear.  I’m not sure what purpose all of it serves but I do know that I am capable of turning most of it off and tuning it out.  I have to admit that I do keep up with current events and can get caught up in many things political.  This past weekend I turned it off.  I cooked, baked, cleaned, kept busy all the way around.

It sometimes feels as if the world around me has really gone off of the tracks.  If you listen to the media or Facebook or Twitter you begin to imagine that the horrors of any particular news cycle are happening in your back yard.  Sometimes you have to say enough.

I have a theory that one of the reasons there is so much absurd craziness is that people have become too disconnected from the natural world. They have lost that reverent respect for life of all kinds.  I believe we are effected by everything surrounding us.  Years ago I lived in a medium size city on the north shore of Massachusetts.  I was surrounded by concrete and pavement.  There were a few large maples on my street but they were surrounded by concrete as well.  I would watch the children playing outside on the street or their paved driveways and was always struck by the fact that they never touched the earth, no playing in the dirt.  I would then walk a mile or so to the end of my street where there was a huge, old cemetery, it was like a big, beautiful park.  I would take off my shoes and walk in the grass.

I think everyone needs to be grounded to the earth.  As crazy as this sounds I believe we attain some sort of energy from the earth itself whether we are walking barefoot in the grass, planting a garden or swimming in a lake.  I think we take something with us every time we do, like charging a battery.  I think the disconnect is growing.  The calmest, most sane people I know have some connection to the earth and understand that even in a subconscious way.

I think we should all spend some time running in the grass in our bare feet.

The Reclamation Project

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For the past five years we have been working to reclaim some of what was once pasture in the back of the house.  My father always referred to it as the back forty and the name has stuck.  The above photo is a panoramic taken last year at the end of burn season.  We have been picking a spot to clear and burn every winter and work towards that when there isn’t a lot of snow.

This photo is directed towards the back forty and was taken in 2007.  It was completely overgrown with ash, cherry and grapevines.  With the help of family and friends we have been working on restoring a view from the lawn.

In 2009 we achieved an opening and I was thrilled to sit in the adirondack chairs and get a glimpse of the back pasture.  We continued to clear and burn.  Finally in 2011 this was the view we had.

The project continues.  We have reached the stone wall to the south and also to the north although they need to be cleared of smaller trees and bittersweet, a project in itself, as well as freshening up the stonewalls where the stones have fallen to the ground.  At some point we would like to see Adams Mountain again as they once could.

View of Adams Mountain from the back forty taken about 1885.