between the rains

For weeks, it seems plants have been waiting for the sun.

The jewelweed, usually knee-high or maybe waist-high, is over my head in places - 

but has barely bloomed at all.

Even the stalwart anise hyssop has not been creating its usual sea

of bee-dizzying purple flowers.

And so many blueberries are still green or a bit red,

hanging on, waiting to ripen.

But now...

we've had a bit of sun, and the purple of anise hyssop

and the orange of jewelweed are beginning to appear.

The first few Chelone buds are opening:

Today is the third day in a row that we've had little or no rain, just a light rainfall during the night, or a passing shower in the afternoon.

It's been glorious, and I have been spending the entire day outside, including hours each day spent lounging around in the little screentent that is temporarily set up on the deck of the barn. Listening to audiobooks, markmaking, spending quality time with Moxie and Della, enjoying visits from the goats and the hens, and watching the clouds pass slowly over the treetops in a rare blue sky.

Of course there have been the usual chores throughout the day, plus the "extras" of shifting goats around in various groups so everyone can have peaceful access to the Pocket Paddock - inaccessible during wet weather - where a bittersweet and forsythia browsing opportunity awaits. But I've certainly not been knocking myself out with labor the past few days.

And - full disclosure - I'm alright with that.

~~~~~

update

Future rafters and roof sheathing on Aug 12th:

Same stack today:

(By the way, this is what $420-worth of roughcut pine looks like.)

I was hoping my next post - that is, this one - would include pictures of a barn with a roof. Unfortunately, we've had many, many rainy days and AM has injured his back - not while working here, I'm relieved to say - so there's been zero progress on the barn repair.

AM is not the kind of person who needs to be called and nudged. He's the kind of person who likes to get stuck right into a job at the earliest opportunity. So if I don't see him on a wonderful day of Not Raining, I know he's either still having a tough time with his back - which I very much hope is not the case - or else he's feeling better but trying to catch up on the backlog of work that piled because of his injury.

Either way, there's nothing I can do but wait. Fingers crossed.

Meanwhile, we all know better than to waste the precious days when the sun is shining.

(l-r) Sambucus, Campion, and Violet, in front of one of three 2nd-hand calf hutches purchased as emergency shelters on 6 April)

The forecast here is for a rainless weekend, so I expect to spend most of it outside. I hope your weekend is just as sunny or rainy as you need it to be.

~~~~~

here we go

'Deduccion loable,' from Les douze dames de rhétorique, 1463. 

Cambridge University Library MS. Nn.3.2, fo.36 verso.

drawing august

Drawing August 2024 proceeds apace.

blueberries in fluted glass

There is a special nugget of gratitude in my heart for the creators and encouragers of the annual twitter event that I took a first wobbly crack at in 2014.

Drawing every day for a month did not come naturally; during decades as a photographer I never considered myself a draw-er. But now Drawing August is folded effortlessly into what became, on 1 January 2018, my Daily Markmaking practice. 2024 is my 7th year of continuous Daily Markmaking, and it's been a discipline and a respite and an anchor.

from Petrie's photograph of an alabaster vessel fragment,
tomb of Amenhotep III

And fun. Even the night last week when, just as I reached for the sketchbook, the power went out during yet another storm. On my laptop screen was a photograph I had intended to use as the basis for a line drawing: a salt print of the Temple at Dendur taken in 1851. In situ; way back before the temple ended up in New York City.

When the power went out there was just enough of a glow from the laptop screen that drawing seemed possible, but when I started with my micron pen, I could barely see the lines. So I fumbled around in the dark for my one felt-tip drawing pen and eventually found it in the third of the three bean cans that hold my pencils, pens, and brushes. (In case you think there is one can for each category, I can only say that would make a lot of sense.)

Anyway, the fat line of felt-tip was much more visible, so at least there was something on the paper, even if not the detailed line drawing as planned.

So far there have only been two or three days in August when the weather made outdoor markmaking a good idea. Or even a do-able idea. Those opportunities have not been squandered. I've put a little temporary screen tent "studio" on the deck of the former barn, and of course there are trees in every direction so plenty of inspiration. Some of the trees have been sketched multiple times over the years, from different vantage points. Sometimes I think a person could draw from the same tree every day for a lifetime, and never be finished. Or unchallenged.

massive red oak 

~~~~~

adventures in oatmeal

Since at least last December, my day has started with oatmeal. 

Sometimes it's at 6 or 7 AM. If it's later than 7 when I get on my feet, I'll go out and greet the sky and start chores before breakfast.

Sometimes my day starts at 2 or 3 AM, when I can't get back to sleep due to some sort of discomfort and finally throw in the towel and embrace the morning.

Even at 2 AM, the oatmeal is a cheering start.

Of course there's been some experimentation over the past 8 months or so. At first I owned only one bowl, my favorite handmade ceramic bowl, that was the right size for creating a bowl of porridge instead of a microwave volcano. Eventually an etsy/eBay search for a second bowl began. I was struggling to justify spending thirty dollars plus shipping for another ceramic bowl when I had the great good luck to discover a clear glass bowl that is just the right size and which I genuinely like. At a local dollar store. For $1.25. I now own eight of them. Yes, friends, I am a wealthy woman, shamelessly reveling in an abundance of bowls.

After some playing around with cooking times and added ingredients, the foundation has been: oatmeal, water, and 1/6 cup of cashew pieces. The usual additions are either milk or butter, and brown sugar. When I've got diced ginger left over after making water kefir, I add that and leave out the milk or butter. When I had a jar of Chyawanprash herbal jam from India, I added a little spoonful of that and nothing else.

When I have fresh fruit, I use less sugar:

Had to pretty much go swimming to reach these blueberries.
It was worth it!

You know that phrase people use..."I was today years old when I learned [insert simple/obvious fact here]" ?

Well I was this many oatmeal packets old when I learned that it's much better to add the sugar after cooking, not before.

Each packet held 2 pounds of rolled oats.

Initially I added the sugar before cooking, so it would be distributed throughout all the oats as the water was absorbed. Rational, right? Or did everybody but me know that porridge actually tastes sweeter when the sugar is on the oats, not in the oats? Which makes sense. Now.

Do you have a favorite morning ritual, food or otherwise?

~~~~~

bye july

A view from the deck of the barn as the next downpour began.

If there was a single theme running through the month of July, it may have been sweat. So many thunderstorms and so much excessive heat. And even on the rainless days, and the occasional day of reasonable temps for July, the constant, enveloping, stultifying humidity. Like walking into a sauna. Like breathing through a steaming towel. Every single day, several times each day, sweat would literally run down my face as I walked slowly through the paddocks, drip into my eyes as I leaned to pick up an empty feed pan, and saturate my hair before I returned to the house, threw my wet jeans and shirt into the dryer for a few minutes, and blotted my hair with a towel.

If this sounds like a lot of whining, I'm sorry - I don't feel that way about it. It's just been my reality. And the goats' reality as well. With added mosquitoes. I try to provide a high quality of life for all the animals, and there's no way around it: July has been rough. 

I feel so much concern for the people in other places who are desperate for rain. For people from places that are literally on fire. Again. Situations that are totally beyond our control, and which affect our lives in very real ways.

I think people generally become accustomed to the rhythms and range of weather patterns in a place where they have lived for a long time, and do their best to prepare for expected events and even occasional extreme events - hurricanes in my neck of the woods, for example. Maybe there's an unusually dry summer which raises the threat of fire. Or maybe there's a huge storm that causes local flooding and washes out a road or bridge. But now it seems the extremes and "hundred-year" events just keep coming, on and on, one after another, year after year. Have the extremes become the norm?

Well. When I began writing, I had intended to simply post a few of my Daily Markmaking sketches from July, which was World Watercolor Month. But starting out with that first painting of rain through the trees kind of sent me off on a tangent. Yikes. 

I'll close with a few watercolors of trees without rain:

Here's hoping August will be kind to all of us.

~~~~~

july colors

 

Just a few samples from the palette of July.

~~~~~

first fruits

A few blueberries and raspberries, most days now.

Perfect with yogurt at the end of the day.

~~~~~

 

june

June 2024: a month of very high heat and frequent rain.

Most days, the first thing I do when I come in from chores is peel off and throw all my wet clothes into the dryer for a few minutes, so I can put them on again for the next round without gritting my teeth. Because knowing that I'll be soaked to the skin again two minutes after stepping out the door doesn't make it easier to put on wet jeans. 

Or maybe I'm just getting soft.

The morning after the evening when I didn't turn the empty feed pan upside down.

But we've also had some June days of bright blue skies and sunshine and - that icing on the cake of a sunny day - a refreshing breeze. I've tried to take a leaf from Betula's book and not waste a moment of those days:

It's raining this afternoon, but it was quite nice this morning. 

The daylilies are blooming:

And the bee balm is just on the brink:

I'm thinking about making a big bowl of cold tahini ramen, and I'm also thinking about making a big kettle of lentil soup. It's that kind of day.

~~~~~

while you wait

There's always something to see while you wait at the bottom of your driveway for a timed delivery that turns out to be "temporarily delayed" after you've already been waiting for 45 minutes in the heat and bugs.

First I saw a butterfly enjoying the Philadelphus flowers.

Then I saw a young girl with a dog on a lead, a cellphone in her hand, and socks on her feet, standing on the pavement by a telephone pole. The dog appeared to be one that was posted as missing back in April, the cellphone was being used to call the number on the Missing Dog poster on the telephone pole, and I don't know about the socks. I'm not going to ask a teenager why she or he is wearing anything, because it doesn't seem all that long ago since people were asking me that question and even then I thought life was too short for such discussions.

Anyway, when the owner on the poster did not answer the phone or respond to the 18 back-to-back voicemails the girl left for him (I don't know why), I called our town Animal Control Officer who I know very well, because the girl seemed reluctant to leave the dog with me (I did offer a couple of times) and she had already called the Animal Control person in the next town over (again, I don't know why) but also did not want to hand the dog over to that person, should that person arrive (see above parentheses for developing trend).

Ah, there were many questions in the air, that hour at the bottom of my driveway.

And there still are, because when my friend the Animal Control Officer for our own town showed up, she had big doubts that this was the "right" dog, from the Missing Dog poster. My gosh, plot twist! But she very kindly took control of the situation, assured the girl that the dog would be happy and comfortable while things got sorted out, and popped the pup into her car and out of the sun and biting bugs.

And I said goodbye to the nice girl from up the road who caught - if not "the" missing dog, at least "a" missing dog - and took the trouble to try to get it back to it's home.

And then I saw the butterfly again.

And eventually my delivery showed up.

The End.

~~~~~

a bit of color

When morning chores are beginning, the spiderworts are usually in the shade and covered in water drops. Rain or dew.

When morning chores are finished, the spiderworts are often still covered in water drops. But where the sun reaches them, the colors light up.

Currently, white and lavender and purple spiderworts (Tradescantia) are providing most of the non-green color in the garden by the barns. Well, the spiderwort and the goutweed, Aegopodium podagraria:

Goutweed is a pretty plant, but I do wish it wasn't so terribly successful at taking over a garden, seemingly forever. I cut and pull out a lot of it every year, but if there's a way to genuinely constrain it, I haven't found it yet. Other plants have to be very quick - and tall - to outgrow the goutweed.

Today I saw the first daylily buds rising above the goutweed, and the bee balm, and the anise hyssop. This one stem is suddenly far taller than it's many daylily cohorts.

More color, coming soon!

~~~~~

wordless tuesday

Glass bottle, Roman Egypt

~~~~~

first of the year

 Always an exciting moment: the first iris began to bloom here this week. One of the little blue or purple ones in the garden between the barns. It's a reminder to keep checking on the big bearded iris plants in the bank garden by the driveway; they start out looking strong but can be overpowered by bittersweet and other creeping, clinging plants if I don't visit frequently with pruners in hand.

~~~~~

wordless tuesday

~~~~~

 

decisions

Did a little walk-around this afternoon with AM, the fellow who has helped me with a lot of work since 4 April; initially removing the tree from the barn, later organizing rental of a dumpster and directing the barn demolition, and amidst other tasks, tackling the priority issue of creating or improving temporary livestock shelters. Funny story: I had contacted him and introduced myself way back in March - remember March? when the barn was in one piece? - asking if he'd be interested in sawing up some fallen branches and boles in my Upper West Side paddock. We got on very well at our first meeting, and ended up walking the property while the conversation ranged into lots of possible projects. When he was leaving, he said, "Just call me when you decide what you want to do first," and I'll bet he was surprised when I called him a couple of weeks later and said, "I'd like to start with removing the tree that has fallen across my barn."

For weeks now I've been going round and round in my mind, wrestling with decisions about next steps. I'm determined to move forward soon, and it was good to walk around the shelters and the barn and the paddocks and have a natter about every option either of us could think of.

~~~~~

80s in the shade

 

which bothers some of us more than others

~~~~~

extremely green

We've reached the point where most of the trees' leaves are past the soft stage, and many are now deeper shades of green than they were even a week ago. Every window in my house looks into a sea of greens. And outside, my main chaise view is up into layer after layer of beech, maple, oak, and hemlock branches. Very many very greens.

It's a nice way to start the month of June. Gazing into green.

~~~~~

first things first

My camera has been missing for over a month. No rhyme nor reason - one morning I was using it and in the afternoon it was nowhere to be found. Since that day, the house has been turned upside down repeatedly, without success.

Yesterday the camera resurfaced. It was balanced in a little gap that mysteriously appeared between the cats' suitcase (a large and heavily weighted upright suitcase dedicated to claw sharpening) and the cedar wardrobe the suitcase is usually jammed right up against. I walk by this spot at least 20 times every day, and the camera has certainly not been there. Nor has there been a gap, since the suitcase doesn't move; it takes all my strength to drag it even a few inches. The whole thing is incomprehensible but the important thing is: the camera is back.

For me, the process of writing anything always starts with images rather than the other way around. With the ability to share images again, I expect blogging to resume shortly.

I've missed you, blog pals. Things have been a bit challenging here every single day since the upheaval beginning on April 4th. Challenging and exhausting. Time has seemed to stand still while simultaneously zipping by. There has been no time for writing or even reading. The only "extra" has been Daily Markmaking, and it's been a little moment of sanity every day.

So...it will probably take a while to catch up with you all, and I'm looking forward to it.

~~~~~

no one was hurt

Well, this has happened: 

the neighbor's tree came down across my barn.

There must have been an almighty crash, but the wind was roaring every time I woke up in the night, so I doubt I'd have heard it even if I'd been looking right at the barn when the tree came down. Based on the last time I checked the barncams, I think it was between 3 and 6 AM.

At least seven goats were in the barn at the time, either in the original stalls opening on the north side or in the Peace Pavilion on the south side. There may have as many as 10 goats sharing, because in unsettled weather the goats who claim the little duplex shelter on the Upper West Side will sometimes come up and bunk with the barn group.

The west half of the barn is a shambles. Everything that had been stored in the loft area is in a tangle on the floor. The roof is in pieces, part of it is completely gone. Doors are hanging, or snapped off. I won't even try to get into this part of the barn until a second person is here, just in case something else should snap or crumble or collapse.

At first glance I'd hoped the east end of the barn (on the left in the picture below) might be safe enough to continue using temporarily, but it is not. Rafters are snapped, jagged ends hanging. The sooner everything is out of there, the better. Right now the hens are still in the last stall on the east, with access to their pen, because there is simply nowhere else to contain them today.

The Peace Pavilion (on the left in the picture above) initially looked like it fared better. Upon closer inspection, I think the structural integrity is compromised. It looks better because it was better built. Some of the materials may be salvageable.

The insurance adjustor is coming tomorrow morning. My agent informed me that MY insurance will have to cover this, even though the tree demonstrably fell from my neighbor's property. I asked the agent to repeat this, because I thought I must have misunderstood. I'll have to hear it from the adjustor as well.

Do you remember when I had this barn built? It was the 6th of May, 2014. I told LeShodu it was a present for her 10th birthday, which was May 7th, 2014. I wrote about the construction day here. As time went on and I added dividers and benches, making the barn as functional as possible, I wrote about each improvement and experiment. As goats were born and raised and combed in this barn, I wrote about them. You have probably vicariously spent more time in this barn than in any other, unless you actually have one of your own. I can't imagine how many hours I've spent, day in and day out. And of course, when I finally added the long-awaited Peace Pavilion only a couple of years ago, it became one of my most satisfying projects ever.

Oh dear.

I'm not going to get sentimental about this. In fact, just wondering how on earth to deal with dismantling what's left of the barn is giving me such a sharp pain between my eyebrows, that sentimentality won't have a chance to get a foot in the door.

And I just keep repeating to myself...

"no one was hurt."

~~~~~