spring week - and other oddities

this is how spring came over the last few days:

day 1  full cover snowfall
day 2  melting, swollen river
day 3  robin evensong
day 4 peepers loud at dark
day 5 crocuses
day 6 ants in the cat's dish
day 7 bright sun and open windows

the week before, on my way south, security confiscated and destroyed my unopened (forgotten about) raspberry soy yogurt from my carryon.   my penknife was allowed.  the yogurt was deemed more of a threat.

forced remodeling

the van a the neighbors' probably wasn't robbers, or they would have backed into the driveway.  the next day more trucks and people, and something clearly was going on. those neighbors are off in Florida keeping warm during the cold months. and they aren't the type to have someone remodel their house without them there to keep an eye on the doings!

eventually a huge pile of wood, insulation, flooring, grew in their front lawn. the sad story is that their furnace broke, and when their daughter came to check on the house, the pipes had broken, the downstairs flooded, the water froze, and what with the ups and downs of our weather as the sun returns, things even began to get moldy.

let them eat ants

it's been awhile since i shared my kitchen with ants. in florida it was normal.
here it is not.
at first it's "eek ants!"
then efforts at improved housekeeping.
eventually they become pets.

i found a tiny hole where some were coming in, and just as i put a bit of duct tape over it, an ant arrived carrying a really good crumb.
what to do!
let her through?  send her on to her next life as perhaps a great bodhisattva?
karma is too complicated for me.  i did nothing.

where is she now?  roaming the kitchen carrying her crumb, endlessly following the ant trails that get her nowhere until she succumbs.
or did she find another way out?

sometimes i let the ants search the counter -- i haven't figured out what they like.
they have ignored a banana, but seem to like an empty cereal bowl.

we moved the cat's dishes to the back room to get them away from the ants.
the cats dumped their water, tore up the newspaper under the dishes and put bits into the dishes, and dumped the dishes.

we moved it all back to the kitchen -- let them eat ants!

home again

mmmmm so nice to be home and sleep in my own flannel-sheeted bed under my heavy pile of quilts in the land of snow and mud after weeks of sleeping on other people's lumpy sofas and guest beds in the near-tropics.

warning - if you put some beautiful powdery white beach sand in a small zip-lock baggie, your carry-on will be searched and you may be treated as slightly suspicious at first, then dotty afterwards. 

but your cats will enjoy scooping it around in a bowl and tossing it on the floor!

theory of relativity

i've always loved the buddhist teaching tale

about the guy who was so enlightened 

that shit and gold were the same to him.
my sister glimpsed enlightenment 

last week when florida went arctic.

she and her dog went out 

for their evening exercise walk 

on the darkest coldest night.
not in the habit of thinking 'keep warm,'  

she forgot her gloves. 

it wasn't very long before

she realized her hands were freezing 

even in her pocket!
and then she had a happy thought

(picture the lightbulb going on above her head)
..."oh boy, soon i will have a nice warm plastic bag of dog shit in my pocket to warm my hands!"

Killing Mr Watson

after the war - the civil war - indians, settlers, fortune-hunters, mostly folks no longer welcome elsewhere, lived around the thousand islands of southwest florida.  over time they killed off the herons for the plume trade (yes all -- in hideous slaughter) most of the gators, and sometimes each other.  the difficulty of making a living, and finally, the hurricane of 1910, pretty much cleared everyone out.

last spring i went on a swamp walk in southwest florida - (read all about it here) - and then south past everglades city to visit the old trading post, store, post office built on an ancient indian mound (pile of shells) - the orginal building with lots of stuff still in it. fascinating to go through and read the history and imagine it all.

this book - Killing Mr Watson - takes place right where i stood on chokoloskee bay, and i can picture it all! the book is confusing with so many people and places, but as each person tells their story, the insights into life in those days is wonderful! mr watson is a legend in those parts, and this is the story pieced together from written accounts and interviews, and brought to life by peter mattheissen's imagination.

my sister has kayaked and camped this area of the everglades, and she reports first-hand that "There are remains on Watson's Place. There are cisterns, one with a huge alligator in it (alive), and a smaller cistern where you can't see thru the water. Back in the woods there are foundation remains and a big copper kettle. Unfortunately it is too accessible to motor boats so things are being carted off and the small camping spot is being trashed. You can follow the saga of his life as you kayak the Everglades channels."

spring birds and snow birds

yes, my poppet, the birds are back!

remember when we watched flocks of geese flying overhead? now the pretty warblers are back too, and the snowbirds.

what's that? you want to be a bird? 
in this life, someday you can be a snowbird.

oh yes, my dear, the snowbirds can fly.
they love the sun and follow the long days. in the spring they flock together to fly north and spend summer where days are long; but not so far north that they will be very cold!

in winter when days grow short, they fly back south, but not so far south that they will be in strange and dangerous lands.

do we see them fly overhead?
sometimes we do, but mostly they are above the clouds, and in an airplane.

not long ago, i had the great good luck, i will show you a picture dear, to witness a large flock in florida just getting ready to board their plane -- heading north to connecticut!
more than 15 of them had gathered in one flock, in their spring colors, all in a line, ready to fly!

Fakahatchee Strand swamp walk

11 of us stepped off the shell-white dirt road, one at a time single file, into the cool water. I felt my chinos clinging to my legs and my sneakers fill with the coolness as my foot settled into the muck under the dark water. Eeeeeeewwww I whispered involuntarily. We were nervous, feeling cautiously for footing among roots vines and fallen limbs we could not see. Each of us was required to carry a stick, for balance and for...other things, and had been told to wear well fitting shoes that laced tightly. 

With each step the muck tried to suck a shoe off my foot. This soon came to feel ok if not normal, and I could look around at the astonishing creepy-weird beauty, the silence, the watery jungle, closed in now all around me. We were lost in a wild maze, except for our naturalist/ranger/guide, John. Even our other guide, Bill, said at one point when we seemed to really be lost "you're the only one who knows the way out of here, John!" 

We got lost when John herded us away from a very large 'gator, who looked asleep at first but then started to move silently in our direction. When John said "everyone get behind me quick" we moved as fast as one could in thigh deep water, pants and shoes sodden, over hidden limbs and vines. No one fell! I wonder if I was the only one who thought of Avatar -- a primordial natural world, nothing here of humankind -- Avatar with water, which on Gaia would be blue instead of coffee and tea colored. 

Two people ahead of me discussed the book The Orchid Thief, for indeed we were in that world of orchids, the Florida Everglades, a part of it that is densely tropical due to a few centimeters drop in the land. Epiphytes and bromeliads were everywhere! Our guides were orchid experts and pointed out the occasional rare or hard to see of the orchid plants. 

We saw no blooms, but we did see plants of the famous ghost orchid, and another so rare John said there were only 4 known to exist. This was in April; their bloom time is November and December, not Spring. However, Spring is alligator mating season, another reason we had to be especially cautious. Unusually high water and hormones makes them a bit more troublesome. On the drive out we'd had to stop for a big one in the road. Eventually John got behind it and kicked its tail. "Don't lean out of the truck, they can really jump!" he yelled to us as it ran by the truck heading for the water.

After we parked and got out of the troop transport truck (a story in itself) he and Bill gave us our instructions for gators. Don't get to their side, stay behind or directly in front. If the tail is curled and one shoulder hunched, get out of there fast. If one swims a bee-line toward you, get out fast, don't zig-zag or go to the side. Then they told us some stories of their encounters with alligators, as they encouraged another big guy to leave the road near our water entry point. This world is John's daily workplace, and Bill's home, where they try to monitor and preserve the health and well being of this vast shallow river, which flows about a mile a day. The gators are just a part of it. As for the cobras, pythons, cotton mouths, just keep your eyes open they said. And we did!

Meanwhile, back in the water, we waited among some cyprus trees for the all-clear on the big swimming gator. Still thigh deep in water, we sat on some sodden squishy fallen trees and ate our sandwiches and granola bars. Everyone broke out some lunch, and cookies and chocolate were shared. Eventually we started off again, but we were a bit off the trail. John scouted ahead for trail markers, and perhaps other things. The vegetation became denser, and suddenly, after 5 hours in the swamp, we climbed up into the glare of the sun and the white road again! There were times on the hike when I asked myself why why why I ever thought this would be a good idea, but I think I would do it again, especially in orchid blooming time!

I didn't take my camera, didn't want to risk dropping it or falling in with it! But lots of folks have gone on this walk and here's a glimpse from Youtube by someone who went a bloom time!

the sea was wet as wet could be

there's still a bit of the old beach left in the town where i grew up.  now there is a broadwalk you can bike or skate all the way to the port everglades entrance! north of the entrance you can watch the world's biggest cruise ships go in and out. (this one is the oasis of the seas, i think it is the world's largest - click picture to enlarge)

sand in my shoes

sleeping in florida, window open, takes my mind back to my mother's old house. there, nights were restless, palms clacking, trees whisper, water lapping, an animal sound, bird or frog?, sounds just once.
the sounds bring you halfway out of slumber and the tropical air lulls you back under. then finally in the blackest time, all is still -- until the quiet sound of a motor, low wake hitting the seawall, diesel, the smell of coffee and maybe a cigarette and the soft murmur of voices as the first fishing folk head out.
my dreaming mind can follow their path to the end of the canal, out into new river, and then the intracoastal waterway. just one bridge then, which probably won't need to open for them. and into port everglades, tiny as a flea beside the world's largest cruise ships, and on out thru the chop -- watch the coffee! -- thru the churning passage into the atlantic!
then where? to find the turqouise gulfstream? out of sight of land? but now it is a hot dawn and the parrots have shouted me out of bed.