Monday, August 9, 2010

Gulping Glory


Well, it's day five of Operation Dogs Live On The Porch. They have quit barking. Mostly. All three of the small dogs are now having to spend their days on the porch and they are not happy about it, being used to the good life, as they are, where they get to stay inside all day, merrily peeing and pooping wherever they feel like it, wherever the spirit takes them, which means I spend all day with paper towels or old rags and a bottle of Fabuloso in the spray form and doing laundry because they never met a bedspread or quilt they didn't want to pee on.
They pee and poop on the porch because they're too fucking lazy to walk down the steps and do it outside but I can deal with that. Not happily, but I can.
Pearl, my old boxer dog who is about ten thousand and seven years old in human time, is allowed to come into the house whenever she wants. She is not going to live forever (I guess) and it's too stressful for her to be out in the heat all day.


The rest of them can die of heat-exhaustion for all I care but they don't seem to be suffering too much. They sleep well at night, I'll tell you that.

So it's Monday and I've had my walk. I passed some folks digging worms for use as bait and I asked one man if he was going to catch his dinner. "And my supper too!" he said, with a big old smile on his face.
Sometimes I do love the south and especially my little corner of it.

Someone has moved into the trailer which I pass on my walk and that makes me so sad. It's nothing more than a big tin can and I can't imagine what life inside of it is like. The rent can't be more than one hundred dollars a month and even that's a huge rip-off. At least I haven't seen evidence of children at this point. Why the county hasn't condemned that piece of shit is beyond me.

I took my camera outside this morning and got a few pictures. Here's a flower which I don't know the name of and shame on me. It was here when I moved here and it's thriving although it doesn't get enough sun.

I suppose it's a sort of cone flower.

The sky vine is finally starting to bloom. If I were a bee I would dance in its throat, twirling like a ballerina.

The color of the blossom does remind me of a tiny patch of sky. It is well-named.

The biggest wisteria vine I have ever seen finally rotted and fell from our big oak in the front yard. I have used a lot of it as a border in various beds and this morning I found these mushrooms making a home on a piece of it.

Even in its death, this piece of once-living thing is giving life.

The pine cone lilies in the bed that piece of vine is bordering are sending up their crazy blossoms.

The pine cone thing will swell and turn red and fill with water. I love to pick them and bring them in and put them in vases when they do. They have long, sturdy stalks and I think they are beautiful in all of their stages of growth. It seems like just yesterday I was taking pictures of them but no, it was a year ago. Time goes so fast these days for me. The cycles of blooming and dying and blooming again seem to happen in the span of a week or a day, not the proper year which is the real measure of them.

It all serves to make me feel old, somehow, but then I look up and see the branches of the hundreds-of-years-old oaks and their beards of moss and I realize that everything has a life-span and yes, mine is longer than a boxer's and much shorter than an oak's, and that is as it should be.

There is a certain perspective to it all and I am grateful to be reminded of it. The rebirth of the blooms every year in their own time remind me that the seasons change and that to everything there IS a season, of the heat and the cold, the light and the dark, the sleeping and the awakening, the opening and the shutting down.

The death of things and their usefulness, even in their dying, reminds me that life is, in some ways that are very observable, quite eternal and that is more comforting to me than any promise of a future heaven.

And the oaks, spreading their branches across my patch of sky to collect the energy of the sun and spreading their roots so deep beneath me where I cannot see them to collect the water and nutrients of the earth, remind me that there is a sort of perfection and glory which, if I just take the time and remember to look up, is there for me to gulp with great swallows of awareness that there is life around me all of the time and that my own life, right here beside and over and under it, is a part of it all, for now at least.

I am neither the least of it nor the greatest of it by any means, but part of the wholeness of it. And in those moments, on those days in which I have the time to notice, to really take note of it all, not just in glancing but in true observation, I am happiest and the most at peace with my place here in it, the life and the death, the blooms and the branches, the shining light and the dark shadows of night when I go to close the door of the hen house and the chickens croon me goodnight as I reach into to stroke their soft feathers.

We all have our places, and I am so fortunate to have found mine and to find it so beautiful and such a sheltering and gracious place. Which I share with my husband, my grandson, and the dogs. On the porch. Where they belong.

16 comments:

  1. Those dogs. I am all in favor of them living on the porch. Good for you!

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  2. Life and its seasons...I do truly believe it goes faster some weeks and really do try to appreciate it. This stage of life I love to do as you do...look down and see the beauty in a flower or even what can be observed under a rock or a dead branch...life still is there! Yesterday at breakfast with my aging in-laws we watched a young bird fresh from the nest attempt his BIG flight. He stayed on our deck rail forever...daddy bird came and chattered at him and then mommy came and did the same. Finally he got the gumption to do it and flew! We all cheered!

    And doggies and pee/poo...yep outside they go....you have to take charge and let them know your home is not the kennel run. Good for you Ms. Moon!

    Always love your photos...

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  3. DTG- It's certainly working for ME!

    Ellen- I love watching the baby birds take that first brave flight. Some zoom right into the air and others require so much encouragement from the parents. Just like our own babies...

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  4. I find mushrooms necessary, but so very, very creepy. I do.

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  5. Wow, the sky vine is gorgeous!

    I love the South, too, and your story makes me miss it.

    But mainly I have to say PEARL!!!!! And thank you very kindly for not making that poor old dear stay outside. You are a good sweet lady and I heart you.

    SB

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  6. Nancy C- Mmmm. So you don't want to eat anything I find growing in cowshit? Ha!

    Ms. Bastard-Beloved- I posted the picture of Pearl for you.

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  7. Agreed --those dogs definitely belong on the porch.

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  8. Good for you! I can't believe they would pee on your damn beds! That is just rude, even for a dog!

    I'm very happy for you!! You're quality of life should improve immensely!
    xo

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  9. Home is where the heart is. Wonderful photos.

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  10. Big decision! We did it to the cats - they only get to be in the garden and the (warmed in winter) utility room. I got fed up with them throwing up in our last house. They seem happy enough.

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  11. Ms.Moon.....your imagery and poetry are gorgeous...

    .."if I were a bee I would dance in its throat twirling like a ballerina"...

    Marvelous! I love you.

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  12. Ms. Bastard-Beloved- I can't wait for you to meet Pearl and you better hurry up!

    SJ- Or in the backyard. They are picky, finicky dogs who do not trust their asses to dirt. Damn them.

    Ms. Fleur- They don't generally pee on top of the bedspreads or quilts, just the parts that hang down which they can raise their legs against. ERRGGGHHH!

    Syd- I wish my pictures were better. I do.

    Mwa- They are ANIMALS!

    Lo- Every time you stop by and leave a comment I feel so humbled. I love you too.

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  13. I know that about your dogs :) Porch is a good transition spot to the big scary dirty yard.

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  14. Pearl? Nos shit? She's still alive and kicking a Chez Moon? This does my heart good.

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  15. SJ- The yard is actually cleaner than the porch at this point. I did mop it last night. But boy, I just HAD to.

    Omgrrrl- Yep. She even still frisks now and then. I think Owen is keeping her alive. She has a baby! Finally!

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Tell me, sweeties. Tell me what you think.