As I
lounged this morning in the green chair and took in another Arctic
morning at the Acres, for some reason, my thoughts turned to the pond.
The Homesteader is trying valiantly to cat nap in my lap and ignore the
bird population feasting outside the front doorwindows, but she doesn't
do very well. Too much cat. The tail starts to swish, and I know
she'll be gone in a moment, jumping up on the
glass, smug in her ability to make the entire flock panic and head for
the bushes. How is it that they always seem to take off as one entity?
Pounce, whirr, empty patio--all in an instant. Then, they return,
piecemeal, never as the flock that fled but one at a time. Then, it's
back to my lap for the white dish rag, the stretch, tail swish, pounce.
History in the making this morning at Iten's Acres--doomed to repeat
itself all morning.
But where was I? Oh, yeah, the pond. I think
it was Bonnie, the Queen of the now defunct Outlaws, that triggered my
thoughts. (Usually, it's the squirrels that trigger my thoughts, but
that's another rabbit trail.) The black and white beauty was out early
this morning, frolicking, headed to visit her home-bound friend Gus and
the little beagle. If the mutt can't come to the Queen, the Queen will
go to visit the mutt. Usually, she meanders around the pond on her way
to visit her subjects, but today she took advantage of the weather and
gingerly slid her way across the frozen pond. Shortcut. And so the
seemingly irrelevant journey of my lovely furry friend started my old
brain musing about the pond at Iten's Acres.
It's actually not much
of a pond. Lots of cattails. The monstrous limbs that have fallen off
The Sentinel rise out of the water near the edge farthest from the
house. It's surrounded by tall grass and a few trees--four white crab
apples, a river birch, a weeping willow, a pussy willow, a couple of
pines, a couple of redbuds, an elderberry, four rose of Sharon, and some
things I can't name. In the spring it will have a serious case of
daffodil ring around the collar. Can't hurt to imagine spring's beauty
on a day like today, can it? Think early March--imagine: hundreds of
white and yellow daffodils, the cloud of silver that is the pussy
willow, the deep lilac that is the redbud, the white mounds of crab
apple blossoms, the flashes of black and red that are the red-winged
blackbirds searching out home sites for the females that will be coming
later, all mingling with the greens of the pines and the new leaves on
the weeping willow and river birch. Hmm. How long is it until spring?
Anyway, what I was actually thinking about was the wild life that
inhabits the pond. The place is always full of peepers and bull frogs
and tadpoles. How will they survive such a frozen winter? Normally,
they are safe burrowed into the mud at the bottom of the pond, but what
if the cold has been so severe that the pond froze all the way to the
bottom? And what about the water snake that haunts the place? Where
does he spend the winter? And the turtles that love so much to sit on
The Sentinel's benches and sun themselves--how are they doing? I hope
they are all well. A pond--even if it is more of a mud hole--needs its
denizens.
And as I have bemoaned many times, there are no
fish--not even minnows. Some day--I know, I say that every year--I will
have to change that. I remember growing up in St. Louis the time that
my friends the Curralls had purchased a farm, and we went into
"business" as pond stockers. We walked to Forrest Park and slipped down
into their sluice ways and caught baby fish by the "tons" that were
washed over the small dams. Filled up our buckets, walked back home,
Rich and Gary took the buckets to their farm, and presto, stocked ponds.
Maybe I'll have to sneak back into St. Louis some dark and stormy
night, bring some buckets, slide into the sluice ways, and bring some
fish back to Ohio. I don't think I'll walk though. I suppose there's
an easier way. I'll have to meditate on it. But my pond and the Acres
just don't feel complete with no fish in the old water hole. I mean
someone has to feed the blue heron?
Anyway, that's my musings for
this cold day at the Acres. I haven't taken a walk yet Joy, but I will.
I can handle a warm Arctic day I think. Just not those minus 20 ones.
Hey, I am an old man! Be kind.
Backroads of Morrow County Update:
There is a beauty to a ride in the darkness on the wintery roads in the country. The wind glides across the open fields flinging snow clouds in the air and painting swaths of white on the gray roads. Ever changing swaths of white. The swamp--frozen and white--shines even on this cloudy night. The trees there--gnarled by their constant struggle to survive their murky existence--raise their limbs into the gray darkness as if pleading for a rescue. Are the moaning, howling winds their voices? I wonder . . . Hay bales--still in the field--look like monstrous snowballs left over from some giants' snowball fight. Or maybe they were getting ready to build a snowman, giant size. Not much traffic--when you come upon another traveler, a quick game of "dim the bright lights" ensues. And then, the blackness returns as if the fellow nomad was a mirage in a graywhite desert. Tonight I encountered a deer. Like a circus performer dancing in the spotlight, he hesitated, whirled one direction, turned back, glared at the intruder, and slipped into the fields. He was soon swallowed up in the snow mist. I creep by the usual sights--old majestic barns--sanctuaries for some creatures, I'm sure, tiny country churches with their white steeples and cemetery back yards, houses--some asleep, some awake, country ponds frozen and still, fields without boundaries, or so it seems--endless white and darkness stretching into emptiness. Groundless, too, it seems. If I stopped and walked on them would I disappear into forever? I suppose I should be considered strange to wander the backroads on a frigid, windy, winter's night going nowhere in particular. I'm just on a solitary--but not lonely--hunt for beauty.
Found it my friends.
Glorious.
There is a beauty to a ride in the darkness on the wintery roads in the country. The wind glides across the open fields flinging snow clouds in the air and painting swaths of white on the gray roads. Ever changing swaths of white. The swamp--frozen and white--shines even on this cloudy night. The trees there--gnarled by their constant struggle to survive their murky existence--raise their limbs into the gray darkness as if pleading for a rescue. Are the moaning, howling winds their voices? I wonder . . . Hay bales--still in the field--look like monstrous snowballs left over from some giants' snowball fight. Or maybe they were getting ready to build a snowman, giant size. Not much traffic--when you come upon another traveler, a quick game of "dim the bright lights" ensues. And then, the blackness returns as if the fellow nomad was a mirage in a graywhite desert. Tonight I encountered a deer. Like a circus performer dancing in the spotlight, he hesitated, whirled one direction, turned back, glared at the intruder, and slipped into the fields. He was soon swallowed up in the snow mist. I creep by the usual sights--old majestic barns--sanctuaries for some creatures, I'm sure, tiny country churches with their white steeples and cemetery back yards, houses--some asleep, some awake, country ponds frozen and still, fields without boundaries, or so it seems--endless white and darkness stretching into emptiness. Groundless, too, it seems. If I stopped and walked on them would I disappear into forever? I suppose I should be considered strange to wander the backroads on a frigid, windy, winter's night going nowhere in particular. I'm just on a solitary--but not lonely--hunt for beauty.
Found it my friends.
Glorious.