Category Archives: Home & Garden

Me not gardening

Dig up all the yellow invasives, front and side. Pick up catalpa pods. Cut back ornaments grasses to make room for new growth.

Shop for plants to bring back structure to front bed: iris, peonies, and euphorbia (because there was no ligularia). Don’t bother with shrubs because dryer vent in foundation kills them all.

Rake front bed, half of south bed, dethatch parts of lawn. Pick up catalpa pods.

Pull out dead blades from spider plants. Remove desiccated leftovers from around the hostas. Fill two bird baths — one new one, a pretty copper bowl! Pick up catalpa pods.

Remove dried stalks from sedum — carefully! —remembering the time you got three nasty splinters in your thumb doing just that and that asswipe doctor didn’t believe you and kept asking you if you bite your cuticles.

Scoop up and remove some sunflower hulls. Pick up catalpa pods. Fill the porch planter with pansies, petunias, and allium. Brace yourself to begin removing echinacea from the front bed.

Talk to Scott about chipmunks. Shop for a second umbrella. Unwrap patio furniture.

And now, I’m pooped. Have stock on the stove for butternut ginger soup for dinner. Easy peasy.

I can hardly wait til tomorrow for the new Perry Mason. May go back and watch episodes four and five again. The plot is densely woven (in a good way).

Tuesday. It’s Tuesday.

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In thinking about how my snapshot of days through haiku differs from my usual blog posts, I realized that the short form doesn’t allow room for complaint or self-denigration. I might do too much of both as a rule.

So here’s to a fresher, more immediate style of blog posting.

With K at the office today, I can watch Kimmel at lunch without restraint.

I made too many lentils for last night’s linguine/lentil dish, so I may be on the hunt for a good lentil burger recipe this afternoon.

Finn did not bark at Winnie today. Winnie did not bark at Finn.

I don’t know why but watching a squirrel cross the sidewalk with an apple core in her mouth this morning filled me with gladness.

Trout lily’s up. Solomon seal is not. Will I or won’t I see a jack-in-the-pulpit this year? The suspense. Virginia bluebells have spread — how nice!

Going to California for three weeks next month and early June. Given that it was 27 degrees here yesterday and that the weather in LA seems to have calmed down, I can’t wait.

Of course, it’s not about the weather.

Finished round 8 or 10 or who’s counting anymore of my novel. Cut around 5,000 words. But not enough. So later today I will copy the file, rename it “shorter Weight of Cloth” and delete five chapters. I have a pretty good idea which ones.

Maybe I’ll publish those orphans here?

Spring is near

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The rake is cold in my hands, the absence of gloves testament to how often a gardening task happens without forethought.

I hear my oft-repeated assertions of the last several weeks: “I’m not gardening this year. I’m just not.” If there was a sound track for a husband’s eye rolling, I’d insert it here.

Every year, the satisfactions make themselves known and why do I forget? — the soothing rhythm of movement, the visible results, the smell of dirt.

Yes, lots of plants have suffered lately, particularly newly planted shrubs, making investments rather less than ideal. Will it be mind-meltingly hot again this year? Will the body find itself pleading with the heavens for rain?

I could spend an entire summer caring for what’s here and filling a few containers with annuals. I think that’s what I mean by “not gardening.”

We’re supposed to get some more snow, a right nor’easter heading toward the Cape, heavy accumulation predicted for west and south of here. So after I cleared the sedum of dead leaves, I thought the better of it and slid back a protective layer. They’re hardy buggers, but still.

I think Finn can smell the storm coming.

The sky already wears its snowstorm grey.

And we have snowstorm-worthy leftovers for today.

Finn barks. The day calls.

Shadows and poems

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Muscular and assertive shadows with claims to the olden days. Wisteria.

Shadows that process.

A delicate shadow that refuses your judgment.

Shadows warmed by wood.

A shadow with secrets.

A bevy of shadows? Or perhaps a parliament. No, a convocation!

Happy Monday all! We walked out with Finn this morning, flexible in our gear. Hats on, hats off, gloves on, gloves off. Langley windy, as usual. Warmed up by the bottom of the Cypress slope, as usual. We feel spring arrive through the lens of habit and garments. Finn sleeps now. Pooped.

Drought in New England

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When I tried to type “drought” in the title just now, it auto-corrected to “fright.” Exactly!

We are finally getting some rain, but it’s been bad, really bad — super hot and dry. Even that hardiest of perennials, the hosta, has struggled. I’ve dug up four shrubs and will likely have to dig up two more. Ferns have crisped and collapsed. Astilbe try valiantly, but barely make it despite daily watering. I’ve even been watering well-established trees for fear of losing them (NB: our reservoir, the Quabbin, has high levels right now).

It’s been a close-to-home wake up call for an area relatively immune to the drastic effects of climate change. Hurricanes are rare here. Tornados happen now again, but usually out by Worcester or Springfield. We don’t get flooding or wildfires and until now, drought was something that happened out West.