do you suppose the caffeine in the coffee may negate the effects of the tryptophan in the turkey sandwich? because i have consumed so much leftover cold turkey lately that i've been in a state of perpetual drowsiness for days and days.
found in the garden, long after it was cut back and put to bed for the winter, these tiny cranesbill leaves turn shades of gold and crimson, just as the trees that overshadow them did weeks before.
this morning early i turned at a bend in the road and came upon the biggest flock of turkeys i think i've ever seen, calmly pecking away at the side of the road. and on thanksgiving day, yet - how serenditpitous is that? did i have my camera? sadly, no. so you will have to be satisfied with this, the centerpiece on the table after the day's festivities were complete. i hope you all had a blessed thanksgiving.
look at that baking powder container. round, so spoons fit in, with a piece of metal so you can level your half teaspoonfuls, even a plastic disc lid so it shuts up tight when not in use. and then there's the baking soda. cardboard box. perforated lid that never opens well and certainly does not shut. and if you try to use the inside section of the lid as a leveler, the surface of the teaspoon never comes out even. i wonder why the baking soda people don't come up with a container that at least rivals that of its counterpart?
one of my sisters emails us all - does anyone have our mother's cheesecake recipe? i am the keeper of her recipes, the one with the ancient, stained good housekeeping cookbook and the blue plastic recipe box. i retrieve them both, and search through the meals of our childhood, recipes written in my mother's elegant hand or carefully typed with the old script typewriter from the 60s. scalloped potatoes, meat loaf, oven baked chicken, old fashioned apple pie. tucked into the pages of the coverless cookbook i find yellowed clippings of recipes from the long gone "women's" section of the sunday paper. jordan marsh blueberry muffins, lazy beef casserole, split pea soup, the best ever chocolate cake. turning pages that she turned as a young mother, fingering the white lined index cards she painstakingly copied. smiling at long forgotten recipes, surprised at ones she saved from me. i locate the cheesecake recipe and send it off to everyone. i hold out the card for cranberry fruit nut bread to make for my family, a fitting remembrance of my mother at our thanksgiving table.
photographed at the edge of the road. is it a golf hole flag? a wind sock? no, it's a handy marker to designate the edge of the road when it's obliterated by piles of snow. long branches forced upright into the ground by plow crews line the roadways and mark the corners. plain folk who want to remember in winter the boundaries of their driveways use them too. some markers have a florescent banner at the top but most do not. come january, when the snow is deep, they'll all stand rigid and tall over the snowbanks. as long as we don't get too much snow, that is. or as long as a plow doesn't come along and knock them down.
foliage is long gone by now and all that remains are the steadfast oak leaves. great gusts of wind rip them from their branches, tossing them skyward, then swirling them down and around, a drab maelstrom in the chill november air.
i'm not sure what's going on in the atmosphere but it was another amazing cloud formation this evening as i left my other school. this is from the cheesy little camera. i sure do wish i'd had the good one with me.
another fitful night of sleep, the result of too much on the mind mingling with too much on the plate. good thing my latest toy flashes colors and lights up in the dark.
what a fine day to work outside, even if it is on coursework. at this point in the year, there won't be many more glorious days like this one.
found during yard clean-up, tucked into a half-dead hanging plant, this wee nest. never this summer did i see birds swooping into it, not to incubate eggs, not to feed chicks, not to urge younglings to fly. i'm distressed to have missed it all, particularly since everything happened right outside my back door. as poor consolation, i'll shelter the nest outside until after frost and freeze, then bring it into the house as a winter reminder of the spring to come.
how can these strangers know me so well? they send me a seven page, 96-item survey, knowing full well that, even though i have better things to do, i'll fill it out. because look - they've already paid me a crisp new one dollar bill to do it! they also must know i work ridiculously cheap.
a sure sign it's november is seeing these banners on local stores. happy hunting and from a beer company, yet. time to wear blaze orange in the backyard. time to pull shades on windows facing the woods. and time to bless the herd. run fast, my deer.
here's the reason why many don't bother growing mums in northern new england. it's late october and finally, this plant has blossoms. but it's grown so tall and leggy that it's falling over on itself. will these flowers grow much bigger? probably not. will they materialize before a fall snowstorm does? not likely. easier then to buy fall plants in pots to compost in november after a hard frost, leaving the garden space for daisies and lilies and plants that look pleasing for a good length of time.
yes, indeedy, i am blogging a faucet. because what better thing to do on a cold rainy october weekend than collect up a screwdriver and an old toothbrush to dismantle the bathroom faucet and scrub years of accumulated sludge and slime from the valves within? yeckkk! but truly, the reason for the picture was to help name those snap-in things that cover the screws recessed in the handles. index buttons, they're called and they can be bought online to replace the 20+ year old ones that are so disfigured you're never quite certain anymore which is h and which is c. upon downloading the photo, i immediately saw a moose (see?) and am now thinking about posting this to the "faces in places" blog. and finally, the photographer is reflected on the chrome within - twice, in fact, due to the close proximity of the also sparkling bathroom mirror.
the center of a tiny white chrysanthemum, one of hundreds on the plant. once again, this looked pretty plain and uninteresting in the viewfinder when i shot it. but i love the detail in the photo, especially the variations in color and the veining on the petals.
begins at the farmers' market with macoun apples, homemade rolls, and beautiful freshly dug carrots for a dollar a bunch. continues at home with the little girl opening dried bean pods, plunking the seeds in a bowl to save for spring planting. smelling each sad herb plant one final time before heaving them all into the compost. raking piles of leaves to leap into and roll about in, shrieking with laughter, as the girl films for posterity. ends in the sitting spot, quiet and alone, with a cup of tea, a grateful heart, and leaves in my hair.
in hindsight, i suppose i should have blogged months ago about the serendipitousness of finding a limited edition bag of tootsie pops containing all chocolate, rather than writing now about the sad occasion of indulging in the last remaining confection.
cold enough tonight for the first fire of the season. it seems so early. hope it's not an indication of things to come...
this picture is probably bad from a technical standpoint. but i find it kind of fascinating in a bizarre way. it was taken in the yard with the macro. the pink blur in the corner is the little girl who had just seconds before scooped up an armful of leaves and tossed them high. and there they are, suspended. sort of.
the girl has a pear tree in her yard and it's loaded with fruit. she shared and here they are. not sure what to do with them all. pear sauce? pear crisp? pear pie? maybe i'll just eat them. and because they're so small, i'll do it a pair at a time.
if it's columbus day weekend, can christmas be far behind? i purchased these at the post office this morning when i went in to buy forever stamps. the clerk told me holiday stamps were flying off the shelves and if i waited too much longer i might not be able to find any when it was time to send christmas cards. jeez.
at the restaurant with the little girl we color as we wait for our dinners. she giggles with glee each time i color in one the characters' eyes or nose, then grabs the red and scribbles in great round strokes. when the food comes, she helps herself to the side order of rice, spooning it onto her plate with great tenacity and care. later we go home, put on pajamas and socks and snuggle on the couch with books. friday evening is for babysitting - because i want to. the anticipation sometimes gets me through the week.
when you push down on this little guy's flame colored head, he emits this belly laugh sound that resonates to the far corners of your desk and is guaranteed to make you at least smile. i wrangled this away from a salesman who was pitching his wares to kids - laughing pen included. when i asked him how i could get one because i really needed a good laugh, he handed it to me and told me to keep it - saying everyone needs a good laugh now and again. but i don't think he really understands how wonderful it is to laugh right now - even if it is over a silly little pen with hair.
time for a new toy. not sure what's inside this plastic ball but whateveritis glows and shimmers and reflects all manner of light source. i can't wait to bring it into school and put it on a windowsill and watch it shine all winter long. i just hope no little kid decides to lob it through a window.
inspiration has been difficult to come by these weeks. but yesterday i noticed all around me that autumn was well under way. so this morning i ventured out with the camera once again. these are asters, native to new england this time of year. in all the reds, oranges, russets, and golds, i love the purple.
just when i am at my lowest point of the week, just when i am missing my mother so much it fairly hurts, just when i think this is what grief will be for a long time, i get a lovely message of condolence from an old student. now grown, he graciously tells me he knows how i am feeling since he and his wife have recently lost a daughter. a child, in the midst of her life. amazing how another's tragedy, far, far worse than any i can comprehend, can jar one back into some semblance of what is normal and accepted. incredible how brave some people must be.
with the events of this past week, i have become keenly aware of the frequent use of this phrase or one similar - have a good day, have a nice night, have a good weekend... i was counting the continual utterances, anticipating them even, when i finally gave up early on at number thirteen: have a good afternoon from the clerk at the florist's. i want to nose right up to those greeters and quietly reply that my mother has just passed away and to have a good day seems an impossible request just now, thank you very much. maybe private grief is not such a good thing. perhaps those folks with the black armbands were onto something.
the services are over, the family has dispersed, and now comes the business of returning to life-as-usual, even if things can never be the same again.
when i think back on this summer, the night of this board game will be the memory that i'll hold most dear. i was together with people i love. we laughed and had fun. it was a bittersweet time and i will always be glad of having it.
the sun shines, the air is cool, the sky a brilliant blue. work is simple, strangers are kind, and the glass is clearly half full. 
always, i am astonished by medical technology. then, maybe it just doesn't take much to impress me. here's my knee, in what appears to be not-too-bad shape. how cool is it that doctors can see inside our bodies? that i can see inside me? and now you can too?
on my way to school this weekend, i saw this amazing bird (a cormorant, maybe?) sitting in a tree over a pond with wings fully extended. he stayed like that for a long, long time. perhaps he was drying his wings or showing off for the other birds. i have been trying for naught to come up with a catchy caption for this picture for my students, something inspirational that deals with the new school year. i think i'll just ask them to caption it. maybe they will be more creative tomorrow than i have been tonight.
this is my computer, sitting on the tiny pine desk next to the tiny bobbin lamp by the window over looking the garden and the woods beyond. this is where i do most of my reading, writing, learning, collaborating, experimenting, dreaming, and general messing about with new tech ideas and web tools. it's where i have spent most mornings this summer, including today, with cups of coffee or tea and sometimes music from itunes or pandora or birdsong outside. this is also where, late this morning, i watched my computer screen grow faint vertical lines that slowly swelled to thick dark ones, as my word document behind them faded more and more until it was eventually just - poof! gone. friends in the know tell me this is serious. sigh. how serendipitous is it that my computer would pick today to die, the last day of summer vacation, the last time i had to enjoy the type of morning i have just loved?
a prolonged shower with driving rain soaked everything in the yard and produced shallow puddles in the walk and grass. but they were just big enough for a little girl to splash around in, sit in, and get good and wet in!
a crow feather found this morning, standing black and straight in the grass under the pines. i'll add it to the others in the grapevine wreath by the side door. another serendipitous bird encounter tonight: as i sit here composing this post in the dark at my open window, i am serenaded by two owls up in the woods, hooting and calling to each other in the black of night.
