Alexandersmap

    Category: seasons

    • Living Heartily

      “I’m not the river
      that powerful presence.
      And I’m not the black oak tree
      which is patience personified.
      And I’m not redbird
      who is a brief life heartily enjoyed.
      Nor am I mud nor rock nor sand
      which is holding everything together.
      No, I am none of these meaningful things, not yet.      ”
      – Mary Oliver, I’m Not The River

      I walked outside barefoot to a chorus of woodland song early this morning. Robins and cardinals and even those clever rascals the crows were all singing to each other at the edge of the woods where humans begin. Birds don’t give a thought to human worries about COVID-19 or mortgage payments or how many steps show up on your watch. No, they go on living heartily, not thinking about the briefness of the duration but working hard to ensure this particular moment isn’t their last.

      It’s Spring in New England. The world wakes up similarly to the way it woke up yesterday, but there’s a slight shift in attitude. The mild winter and a pandemic cancelling everything normal in life and Mookie Betts dumped for money and Tom Brady moving on all make this Spring feel different from any other in my memory, but walking out into the morning chorus you see it’s all the stories we tell ourselves. We’re all just living this brief moment and trying to live another day. Stoicism offers a guide to living more powerfully.  To accept fate (Amor Fati) and our ultimate fate (Memento Mori), and to apply this knowledge, this understanding of the world, to embrace every moment.

      “It’s time you realized that you have something in you more powerful and miraculous than the things that affect you and make you dance like a puppet.” – Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

      I’m working on things just as we all are. Holding things and people together, working to be patient with this world around me, working on small, daily improvement. Living heartily might seem a challenge right now, but it’s more important than ever. I’d think it was a lot more challenging a hundred or a thousand years ago. No, we live in relative comfort compared to those before us. They’d surely laugh at the things we call hardship. We can hold it all together and get beyond this too. Walking barefoot out to greet this first day of Spring and embrace the chorus seems a good first step. But there’s so much more to do with this day, isn’t there?

    • February Tomatoes

      February is when I really start missing the smell of tomatoes. Ripe tomatoes for sure, but also the smell of the vines as you tie them off on stakes. Market tomatoes have never captured the essence of fresh summer tomatoes. Better than nothing? Sometimes nothing is better. This was all triggered by a Caprese salad, with the basil dominating the senses, the olive oil and balsamic drizzle playing complimentary roles, but the tomato was a silent partner; like white bread it had no soul. Such is February in New England: the senses get shorted.

      A mild winter so far doesn’t translate into the garden. There’s still 3 inches of frozen snow clamped down in the lawn, the garden and the pool, like a hand over the mouth whispering ominously; not yet. Precipitation forecasted for the day includes the “wintry mix” we all hate. Rain or snow? We’ll deal with that. Wintry mix? Make up your mind already!

      But there’s light at the end of the tunnel. The days are longer, there are lawn mowers and seeds on display in hardware stores, and the first day of Spring is four weeks away. February is flying right by, the way the rest of life does. It’s only a matter of time before the soil warms up and unlocks the smells of spring. In the meantime, there’s always a greenhouse or two to explore to get that flower fix. But tomatoes are going to be awhile here in New England. Part of living here, but that doesn’t mean we have to like it.

    • Truck Day

      It hasn’t been a normal winter. Temperatures are milder, early winter snow has largely melted, ponds are at best unsafe to walk on. If Australia is burning, New England is experiencing one of the warmest winters on record. The world is unsettled… but small signs of familiar are out there if you look for them. Even if these too have an odd twist to them.

      Yesterday was Truck Day in Boston. That probably means nothing to most people in the world – and why would it? Truck Day is the first sign of spring on a normally cold and relentless winter, when snow storm after snow storm batters our very souls. And while the winter hasn’t spun into soul-crushing yet (there’s still time), Truck Day still highlights the rite of passage from thinking of winter to Hey! It’s almost Spring!

      Truck Day is when the Boston Red Sox roll their trucks full of baseballs and uniforms and God knows what from Fenway Park to Fort Myers, Florida to be unloaded and ready for Spring Training. It’s a light at the end of the tunnel, hope for better days ahead. Dreams of green in a brown, monochrome world. But even Truck Day feels different this year. The Red Sox fired their Manager in the midst of a cheating scandal, there’s talk of trading star players instead of excitement about the pitching rotation and the outfielders. No, it’s an unsettled winter on Causeway Street, which makes Truck Day just like everything else this winter; a bit off. Like waking up the first day you have symptoms of the flu off. And this winter, of all winters, comparing an event you normally look forward to to the flu isn’t the kind of light at the end of the tunnel that you want to see. It might just be that speeding train barreling towards you.

      But that’s pessimistic talk, and Truck Day, even with the chaos in the world and on the Red Sox, is a good sign. Maybe this will once again be their year. If they can find a Manager anyway. And then it hit me, this is how we used to think before the Red Sox started winning World Series. Jaded optimism disguised as pessimism after getting beaten down year-after-year by the Yankees or (going way back) the Orioles. Yeah, that’s the feeling I was trying to place, the feeling of dread hiding behind hope, as another season begins for The Olde Town Team. Buckle up everyone.

    • Fading Tracks Across Time

      Yesterday morning I stood outside, barefoot, on the deck scanning the woods.  A dozen deer were moving silently through, silhouetted by the sun reflecting off the rapidly melting snow.  Unusually warm weather has created this opportunity to stand barefoot for me, and given the deer access to acorns and other edibles that should be locked into a frozen vault for a couple more months.  The deer don’t worry about climate change, only food and safety, and they graze uninterrupted as I walked back inside.

      Late morning we met friends for a walk on the Windham Rail Trail.  The trail changes every day, and today brought slush mixed with large bare spots.  We discussed using micro-spikes, but they would’ve been overkill on most of the trail, with just one section of about 100 meters testing our decision to leave them in the car.  No, this was a day for water-resistant footwear, good socks and focus on where you stepped next.    The week ahead brings more mild temperatures, and it’s likely this trail will be all pavement by next weekend.

      As usual on this trail, there were many animal tracks crossing this way and that.  Wildlife has their own trail system, but crossing paths with human roads and trails is inevitable.  Deer tracks mixed with turkey, squirrels and the other regulars.  But one set of tracks stood out from the rest; like a small child doing handstands across the snow, beaver tracks punctuated the softening snow.  Their front paws are very defined and human-life.  The back paws are more like a ducks.  The combination convinced me it wasn’t a racoon’s tracks we were looking at.  Beaver don’t hibernate, but they usually aren’t moving about that much this time of year.  Looking around there was no apparent evidence of tree damage from beaver, but we were right next to a pond.  Beaver store their winter food underwater near their nest.  Nest building isn’t a winter activity.  So I wondered what the beaver was traveling through here for.  Visiting friends?  Booty call? Or like me earlier just stepping outside to see what was new in the world?

      Yesterday was a big news day with the death of Kobe Bryant.  Social media and traditional media alike erupted in a flurry of reaction.  It’s a jolt when someone so young and vibrant is killed so abruptly.  Stoicism points out that it could happen to any of us at any moment, so live this moment fully.  So many forget that until a famous person or a loved one shocks the system with a reminder.  Living this moment starts with awareness of everything around you, feeling the changes in the air, seeing the deer moving through the woods, seeing the tracks in the snow, and having an extended conversation with people you care about while you navigate a slushy trail.  Life is now, today, whether it’s a Monday morning or a Friday night.  Bryant, and the other people on that helicopter were taken unexpectedly, tragically, but they were living a full life.  If you aren’t fully alive in this moment, fully aware of the magic around you, are you really living?

      As we left the trail yesterday, our own tracks marched along for 3 1/2 miles in one direction  and back again, covering seven full miles of conversation, observation, exercise and being alive.  Many of those tracks were turning to slushy mush even as we took them, and disappeared with the thousands of other tracks that have walked this path over the years.  Our time here is limited, the memories are made now, so what shall we do with this day before it too disappears?

       

    • Crunchy Meditation

      There’s nothing like a long walk to sort things out and help you forget about the madness in the world.  Last week New Hampshire received a few inches of heavy, wet snow. Once walked upon, slushy snow becomes a clutter of footprints.  Let it freeze and that snow becomes a crunchy, treacherous mine field.  And such was the state of the Windham Rail Trail on my Sunday walk.  Micro spikes over hiking boots answered most of the challenge, and a little care on where you stepped solved the rest.  A long walk alone became crunchy meditation, with a good workout as a bonus.

      About three miles into the walk I came across a column of deer tracks crossing perpendicular to the rail trail.  Nothing surprising in that; this is deer country here in Southern New Hampshire after all.  But I found the tracks fascinating anyway.  The deer walked in a line like Native American warriors or Roger’s Rangers would have done when this area was contested frontier.  In the case of warriors and rangers it masks the numbers from the adversary.  I wondered if the deer instinctively mask their numbers or just follow the leader to minimize the calorie burn of moving through snow.  The latter makes sense, doesn’t it? In winter where calories equal survival efficiency in movement means everything.

      For me the goal was just the opposite of the deer: burn as many calories as possible in two hours of walking and be outdoors as an active participant in winter. Mix in a visually interesting trek on rough terrain and this afternoon’s 10,000 (+!) steps scored a high bliss rating. And who doesn’t need more bliss in the short, dark days of January?

    • Get To It

      Standing out on the jetty thirty feet out in Buzzards Bay earlier this morning looking for that familiar glimmer of sunrise, I realized that the show was going to be too far into the trees over land. It seems Earth’s obliquity, or axial tilt, is so far along that the sunrise is 30 degrees past where I’m used to seeing it. According to timeanddate.com, we’re at 23.43668° or 23°26’12.0″ today. Numbers really, until you see how far over the sunrise is or how short the days are. And let’s face it, the days are short in the Northern Hemisphere on January 1.

      All of this axial tilt stuff aside, it’s a new day, a new year, and a new decade. What will we make of it? Improvement seems to be the objective. Better choices in how we spend our time. What we eat, how much we move, where we go and what we produce. In short, who we become. That makes this morning like every other morning in the question that comes to mind, the question Mary Oliver asked so eloquently:

      “Tell me, what is it you plan to do

      With your one wild and precious life?”

      We think of New Year’s Day as a beginning, but it’s really a continuation of our journey. A bit like that crest on the trail where you pause for a rest and some water, to take a look around and a glance at the map to see where you are and where you’re going next. So where are you? Where are you going next? There’s no telling the future, really, but we can get back up and start climbing again. And that’s my plan. To get back at it working on the person I want to become, one step at a time on this journey; this one wild and precious life. So let’s get to it.

    • The Sound of Sleet

      Dark and quiet street, with sleet falling lightly, providing a soundtrack for only me. This isn’t dent your car sleet, rather it’s the granular bits of ice that tickle your nose as they bounce off it kind. The granules gently ricochet off every surface until finding a resting place. The sleet makes different sounds based on what it makes impact on. Dead oak leaves that refuse to let go their grip on the tree they sprouted from offer a snare drum, while other hard surfaces give a chorus of thousands of tinny taps. My feet make short work of the ice granules with their own steady beat; “crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch...” and on it went until I retired to the house. The sound of sleet followed me inside. It was just what I needed to hear.

    • Restlessness Met Sadness And They Both Smiled In Recognition

      Life is like the 55 meter indoor hurdles run by klutzes for its briefness and the lack of elegance with which we all get through it.  Family gatherings during the holidays offer the opportunity to take stock.  How have you been and what are you dancing with now?  Jamming multiple family events into one day means not spending enough time with any one person, but instead getting quick downloads between eating too much and taking pictures for posterity and InstaGram.  The latter offers immediate notification of what you’ve been up to for your followers (some of whom are in the picture), the former is the path highlighted for you years later when everything has changed.

      In the last family event of the night, after all the caloric intake and the unwrapping of gifts and the catching up on what you’ve been up to, I realized I was way too warm and needed a walk outside in the cool air.  Looking at my watch I calculated how realistic it was to hit 10,000 steps and weighed it against the limited time I have with these people in my life.  I settled on a quick walk around the block and resigned myself to getting the rest done in the shrinking time left in the evening.  I’d get over the mark eventually, with an hour to spare in the day.  Should’ve knocked it off first thing in the morning but such are the holidays.

      When I have a goal in mind I get restless, and sitting in a chair for hours isn’t going to cut it for me, so it wasn’t long before I needed to walk around the house a bit.  So I left the crowded room to walk around the kitchen and into the formal living room, built for showing furniture that people don’t sit on.  There standing by the door was the oldest aunt of my wife, waiting for a ride home that wouldn’t come for awhile as my father-in-law chatted in the other room with my kids.  In that moment she looked like a teenager, though she is dancing with 90, waiting by the door to go.  We talked about sports she used to play, for she was a very active in tennis and skiing for much of her life, and her eyes welled up as she talked about not doing those things anymore.  We smiled and talked and eventually it was time to go and we opted to bring her back to her apartment and chatted more with her as we drove.

      My restlessness met her sadness and they recognized each other.  The sadness was rooted in her own frustrated restlessness, doomed to an older body and an aging mind battling dementia.  She missed Thanksgiving on a bad day, but on Christmas she was lucid and sharp, seeking out conversation and connection.  And we connected and smiled at stories of past glories, recent small victories and setbacks overcome.  And I thought about my own restlessness and wondered when it would meet sadness again.  We all look in the mirror and see our story.  If I’m lucky enough to get there I want the sadness in my old age to be for the things I can no longer do, not the things I never did.

    • Looking Out The Window On The Day After The Shortest Day

      I wonder what the Mourning Dove says to the squirrel as they both dine at the seed buffet dropped from the feeders to their feet.  They both look around timidly, ready to dart to safety from threats real and imagined.  But they’ve learned to coexist with each other, knowing deep inside that this other species isn’t a threat to me.  Other birds – Chickadees, Jays, Cardinals – drop seeds to the ground as they sift for that special treat for themselves (or maybe as a nod to those below), and the ground feeders take over from there.  They seem to take care of each other even as they compete for the same food.  But they don’t look at each other as food and maybe when you’re both on the same link in the food chain that’s enough.

      The coating of snow offers little in the way of camouflage for the parade of animals that move through the woods behind the house.  Protected land close to a stream is a refuge during hunting season, and a bridge between wild places the rest of the year.  Standing in front of the window, invisible to wildlife, that snow offers a spotlight on the animals that move through the woods.  This morning three deer moved quietly by, nuzzling the snow aside in search of acorns.  They’ve come to the right place and find plenty to nibble on before quietly moving on in a pattern of walk, nuzzle, eat, pop head up searching for threats, repeat.  A month ago there were ten deer walking this route, and I wonder if the cold or the hunters got the rest, or if these are just other transients moving down the wooded safe route.

      The other day I watched fourteen turkey walk through the woods in a tactical formation the Marines would be proud of, each assessing threats, stopping to see what was available to eat, moving forward with precision.  I wondered how long it would be before they found the feeders, and of course I should have known they already knew about them, they were just approaching with full situational awareness.  In a few minutes the turkeys running point were scratching the snow and nibbling seed, soon others joined them, but never more than a half dozen at a time in one spot.  The rest occupied the perimeter, with a couple rotating in now and then.  Turkey pecking order was on display, and I wished I’d had a better camera with me than my iPhone offered. But there’s no coexisting with turkeys, and the squirrels and Mourning Doves steered clear until the turkeys moved on.

      This is my version of New Hampshire, at the edge of the woods on the day after the shortest day of the year, as viewed from behind the window pane. The days are getting longer now, and I look forward to getting back outside on warm days, observing this world from outside. But I know it would be different when I’m out there, as some wildlife avoid humans. So this view offers something you don’t get outside, and today I appreciate the difference.

    • Kimono Car Seeker

      I was walking into a store to pick up a gift card (‘it’s the season for gift cards), enjoying the warming sunshine and relative tranquility offered on a quiet morning in a mall parking lot the week before Christmas in America, when my moment of bliss was turned upside down by a car alarm beeping urgently nearby. Properly encroached upon, I looked at the car, and as expected saw no burglars backing away. I looked up at the store I was walking towards and saw a tall woman in a kimono (I’m no expert on such things but I’m going with kimono) holding keys up and looking around. She determined the direction of her car and clicked the fob to turn off the alarm, felt unsatisfied with her new compass heading and clicked the fob to activate the alarm again. I walked past her and smiled, content in knowing she had figured out where her car was, and we separated as forever strangers, sharing this one brief moment on our trip around the sun. I started to wonder why you’d where a kimono to a liquor store, thought the better of it, and just let it be. Some of life’s mysteries are better left unanswered.