August Started Early, Looks to Stay Late

    August seemed to arrive about the end of May, and it shows no sign of departing anytime soon.
    The herbs and flowers that Adelaide so hopefully planted in what was supposed to be spring have long since given up and turned brown. Even regular watering didn't give them the will to see the summer through. Even some of the native plants, particularly azaleas and hydrangeas, are looking particularly stressed. We lost some during the last drought, and I expect that we will lose some more.
    We have lost several small trees, and I worry  about the red oak right beside the front deck and the white oak by the patio. Both of them show dead limbs, occasionally dropping one. Their demise would deprive us of much needed shade -- and having them removed would cost a princely sum, because both would have to be taken down in pieces and carried away by hand.
    I was making good progress of my list of outdoor home improvement projects until I nearly amputated my left thumb with a table saw. That put paid to the outdoor projects. Realistically, I would have postponed many of them anyway because of the heat.
    Since I am a left hander, the injured thumb also meant postponing a good many indoor projects, too. For a while, even trying to type was slow and painful, but within the past few weeks I have been able to apply at least nine fingers to the keyboard.
    I have managed to keep the bird feeder filled. It hangs from an oak limb just outside the dining room window, and watching nature through double-glazed windows has provided more entertainment than television. The grandchildren have found the nuthatches a particular treat, marveling as they watch them walk up the tree trunk and then walk back down, always facing the direction of their travel, sometimes hanging upside down on the limb by the feeder. We had an abundance of goal finches early in the spring, but now a solitary brightly colored bird makes occasional trips to the feeder.
    The red bellied woodpecker has returned to the feeder after an unexplained absence. When he cruises in to the feeder, the smaller birds scatter like destroyers making way for a battleship. Even the squirrel casing the feeder from a nearby maple branch doesn't want to cross him.
    The fireflies which were so profuse during the spring have disappeared, but the August night brings its own interested creatures. We were sitting on the front deck one recent evening when Adelaide noticed the bird feeder moving. I had already noticed that on many mornings a feeder that was full at sundown was considerably less so by sunup. We flipped on the spotlights at the corner of the house and we could see the shadow of a creature clinging to the feeder A flashlight provided more illumination, and my suspicions were confirmed: we once again had a flying squirrel as a nighttime diner. It was unphased by all of the attention.
    I walked down the steps to the base of the tree that the feeder hangs from.The feeder is about 20 feet overhead from that vantage point. From the base of the tree, there is a line that leads up to a pulley, which provides a way to lower the feeder for filling.
    I gave the line a quick tug, and the squirrel glided down, passed just over my shoulder and disappeared into the darkness.
    I'd be happy if August followed him.

Contact the writer at billatthelake@gmail.com

Spring is Really Here, Sniff, Sniff

Letter to a friend in Minnesota:
Fortner:
    Funny you should write today that you love the Master’s because of the azaleas. I’ve been mentally composing a note letting you know that after several false starts, Spring arrived here in earnest over the Easter weekend.
    One day it was winter, and the trees were forlorn, almost lifeless; the next day, the dogwoods were in blossom, and the native azaleas couldn’t be outdone. Even the oak-leaf hydrangeas put out tender green leaves. (Our cultivated azaleas have buds that will open up any day now).
    Along the roadsides, red bud trees are showing off, and on my walk the other day, I noticed that the violets have come out.
    Perhaps the surest sign of spring was the snake I saw slithering across the highway just south of Walnut Hill the other day. And the carpenter bees. There has been a super-abundance of them. A friend gave me some desiccant powder that is supposed to kill the larvae, if I can find all the holes the bees have made and pump the powder into them. Meanwhile, I’ve been swinging away at the bees with an old tennis racket. I don’t know whether I’m getting better or the bees are getting dumber. Either way, I’m doing in a bumper crop.
    I don’t know whether it has anything to do with Spring, but a mature bald eagle sat in the white oak tree just outside our bedroom window for five or six minutes one day last week. We have several nesting pairs on the lake, but that’s the closest that I have every been to one. And since our bedroom is on the second floor, we were at eye level, so to speak. It was a most impressive sight. Meanwhile, the gold finches, which had been packing away the bird seed at a prodigious rate, seem to have disappeared.
    The blooming things include the pine trees, with their pollen that covers every surface with gold dust. It is amazing how the pollen can find its way into the most remote parts of the car. I have to hose off the windshield every day so I can see to drive, There is no point in giving the cars a thorough washing until the pollen stops falling.
    There has been pollen floating in the lake, and rain today washed more of it in, and the wind formed it into windrows.
    The oaks are putting out pollen, too. You don’t really see it, but it’s the kind that works its way into your sinuses and lungs. I’ve been snuffly for the past couple of days, and it's small comfort that the TV news reported tonight that it is an unusually heavy pollen season. Soon, the trees will begin dropping catkins, and it will be time to haul the blower out again.
    I have been madly trying to get the place looking presentable. I’ve replaced some rotted cedar, and cleaned some of the decks and the flagstone on the landing and steps that lead down to the dock. The decks have just gotten a power washing the past few years, but every now and then they need a thorough cleaning. That means, in some places, tackling the ground in dirt with a bucked of TSP solution and a brush. Fortunately, we’re having the place painted this year, so the painting contractor will clean the mildew from the siding and soffits.
    While I was scrubbing, the temperature was in the 80s, more like July than April. Today’s rain, though, was the harbinger of a cool front, and when I went down to the lake side to watch the sunset, it was considerably cooler than a day earlier.
    I watched the first round of the Master's, too, and thought about our trip with you and Jerilyn to Callaway Gardens. You'll be envious to know that Adelaide's church group is talking about making a trip to Callaway soon. You just need to come for another spring.
Regards,
Brown


Contact the writer at billatthelake@gmail.com

I Don't Think Hendry Is Coming Back

    It has been four weeks since Hendry went missing, and I am gradually acknowledging that she is not coming back.
    Still, every morning when I come downstairs, I look out the door to the side deck, half expecting her to be sitting there waiting for me to let her in and ready to give me a scolding for leaving her outside so long.
    When I am dressing in the morning, I automatically reach out to the small step ladder I use for getting things down from the closet shelf as though she had hopped up to the top step and was waiting for me to scratch her ears.
    When I sit down on the stair to put on my shoes, I expect her to come sit by my right side, always the right side, and to butt my hand with her head until I stop and give her the attention she craves.
    Although Hendry technically is not our cat, we have been her people long enough for her to be a part of our daily lives. In theory, Hendry belongs to our son’s family, but even as their cat, Hendry showed an independent streak that led our oldest granddaughter, Nora, then eight years old, to proclaim, “Hendry belongs to the world.”
    It was Nora who gave Hendry her name. Her family adopted a small kitten when Nora was four. They thought it was a male, and they named it Henry. When Nora tried to say the name, though, it came out Hendry. So Hendry it became, and the name stuck, even after it turned out that Hendry was a she.
    Our son’s family lived next door to us in Montgomery then, and although Hendry spent a good deal of time outdoors, she never displayed any particular interest in us.
    But a few weeks after our son’s family moved several miles away, Hendry showed up at our house. Our son, who happened to visiting us at the time, took Hendry home, and they kept her inside for several more weeks.
          Hendry kept coming back, crossing several busy thoroughfares en route. So, even though we had decided not to have any more pets after Lightnin’, our little Manx cat, disappeared, we took Hendry in, reasoning that sooner or later she was going to get hit by a car as she crossed one of those streets.
    When we moved fulltime to the lake, we brought Hendry with us. We kept her inside for months, fearing she’d undertake a long trek back to her old neighborhood. She made no such effort; she was as content with the peace and quiet of the lake as we are.
    Hendry craved attention only on her terms, and most of the time she was content simply to be in whatever room we were occupying. She would curl up on the couch in the living room, or sprawl on the floor in our bedroom as we slept. If we walked down to the dock, she followed along, although after having taken an unhappy ride on the pontoon boat she kept out of reach.
    One of the times that she did demand attention was right after dinner. She seemed to sense when I had finished eating, and when I pushed away from the table, she would come sit by my chair until I made room for her to jump up beside me and have her ears scratched. When she’d had enough, she would jump down.
    After the Yellow Cat died, Hendry began spending more time outdoors, but she was mostly an indoor cat. She often wanted to go out in the evening. When we were ready to go upstairs at bedtime, I would go to the door. She was usually waiting to come in or sitting on the stoop or the railing contemplating the evening.
    So when she was eager to go outside on a Wednesday evening, I opened the door and she scampered out. A couple of hours later we were ready to go up for the evening and I went to the door to let her in. She wasn’t at the door or on the steps or on the railing. Nor was she on the hood of the car, another of her favorite perches.
    She did not come when I called, which was not unusual. Dogs come when you call them; cats respond with studied indifference.
    I expected that she would be waiting at the door the next morning, as she had been several times before, complaining loudly about being left out all night. But she was not there. We checked around the property; no sign of her or of a fight of any kind. The neighbors said they had not seen her. I checked along the roads near the house; no sign of a dead animal.
    I had not wanted another pet, but with cats, you are chosen about as often as you choose.
    But this time, like Sherman, if elected I will not serve.
    Still, every morning when I come downstairs, the first thing I do is look to the door.


Contract the writer at billatthelake@gmail.com

Watching Another Morning Arrive

    Without any particular effort or desire on my part, I have become a morning person.
    It is a far cry from my younger years, when I worked at night by choice. On a Saturday or Sunday could easily sleep until noon.
    Now, at a time when I rarely have any need to set an alarm or get up at a certain time, I awaken, lie for a while considering whether it is possible that I will go back to sleep,and then get up to greet another day.
    Our house is perched on hillside overlooking the lake, and the bedroom is on the second floor. Next to the bedroom is a small room with two chairs separated by an old children’s school desk and a floor lamp.
    We call it the reading room, but in the mornings it is where I sit nursing a cup of coffee and letting my mind wander as a new day takes shape. My wife usually is still asleep, and I sit quietly to try to avoid awakening her.
    Everything is quiet. Not even the birds are stirring, and at this time of year, it is light well before the school bus runs.
    The view from the reading room is of the upper part of the trees that grow in front of the house, the water, and the land on the far side of the slough.
    The morning sort of sneaks up on me, even while I am looking. Perhaps that’s a metaphor for life in general.
    At first light, the world in monochromatic. The trees, those just outside the window and those across the slough, a simply silhouettes. The open water and the sky are the color of tarnished silver. There are patches of water that reflect the trees along the shore, and it is difficult in the half-light to determine what are trees and what are reflections.
    Across the way, at the end of a slough, a light blinks on, blinks off briefly, then on again in a night-long ritual. I know from having paddled past it that the light comes from a miniature lighthouse painted in the orange and blue colors of Auburn University.
    A hummingbird levitates almost as high as the white oak tree in front of the house and then darts sharply away. Three ducks fly by in a hurry to get to somewhere.
    Gradually, almost imperceptibly, colors emerge, the greens of the leaves, the colors of the house across the slough.
    The sun rises behind our house, so we don’t see it appear over the horizon. What we see is the sun’s work. The sky overhead slowly turns blue; if there are any clouds, they are painted a tropical pink.
    Soon enough the creation of a new day is completed; I am glad for having seen it.

The writer can be contacted at billatthelake@gmail.com