October 6 through 10

wild geese come as guests

I am waiting for "Pillow Book" to arrive.
I went back to "East Wind Melts The Ice".

When I reread this week's entry I was moved.
Liza Dalby does not use emotionally charged language, yet her experience with a Monarch butterfly moved me to tears.
I had considered bringing in a Tiger Swallowtail for the winter. I thought it would be nice to have a butterfly in my house when the snow was falling outside. I had rationalized how I would be extending the butterfly's life.
Bringing a butterfly into the house was all about me and not about the butterfly.

I have been watching the Monarchs. In my gardens many are just emerging from their cocoons. They are deeply colored and appear to be made of velvet. They are hungry too and will feed in the zinnias for hours. After a couple of days of feeding they take off.
I have watched the Monarchs fly over parking lots and highways as I go about on errands. Once in awhile a faded traveler will be in the zinnias. These Monarchs are faded and pale in color and some what tattered. I wonder how far the Monarch has come and far will he be able to go. The Autumn migration of the Monarch butterfly is amazing.

I have decided not to bring butterflies into the house. If I want to see butterflies in January I can travel to where they are.

Walled up and closed

I am almost finished reading
East Wind Melts The Ice.
I have enjoyed each essay and the way this almanac has changed me.
This essay is for December 1 through 5. It would winter.

The full force of summer is at my house. The temperatures are flirting with triple digits. The humidity is high. The night time lows are in the 8o's. It is hot.

Liza Dalby writes about citrus in this essay. I happen to have a Kumquat tree. It grows in a large pot on the deck until the danger of frost. My husband will then carry it into the living room for winter. It is an old tree, a large tree. It blooms and sets fruit and come January the fruit will be ripe inside the house. Last summer we had 6 inches of rain in two days. The Kumquat tree drowned. It lost half of its leaves. Yet still the fruit set and ripened. I let some of the fruit rot and go to seed. I planted the seeds in the pot and they sprouted. This summer the seedlings have grown tall and they bloomed. The little trees are producing tiny green fruit. They are blooming again
in the heat. I had thought I would let the Kumquat go. The living room is small and taking care of the tree all winter is time consuming. After reading her essay I decided the Kumquat can come in again this year. I will move out a chair. I will transplant the seedlings and have many Kumquat trees. I will have a grove some day in the living room in the winter.

I am saving the last few essays for September.
I will be on holiday until than.

Surprise Lilies

August 6 through 10

In my gardens I call the passionate pink lilies that seemingly shoot up and bloom over night, "Surprise Lilies". Liza Dalby knows them as Naked Ladies. Also called "Belladonna lilies, Resurrection lilies, Joker lilies" and I am sure if I sought out all the regional names there would be many.
Lycoris squamigera is their botanical name.

I have always thought of the Surprise Lily as an August flower. They shoot up when it is hot and dry in my gardens. I was very surprised this year to see them in bloom the second week of July.
Dalby writes of the equinox flower.
I do not know anything about this cousin of the Surprise Lily.

So often when I read an essay I am inspired to learn more. I do research.
Thank goodness for the internet.

I keep a little note pad near by when I am reading this book. I write myself little reminders and write down the inspirations that come while reading.

I have noticed Dalby mentions "Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon" often. I looked in the index and counted eight times she has referred to this classic.
I have never read it.

I did a bit of research and found a new translation is being published by Penguin Classics. It's release date is October, 2007. I want to read this book.
My daughter told me it is often used as a jumping off point for writing exercises.
That sounds fun.

I would like to begin this "Pillow Book" in November. Our book two. I think it also will be a book that inspires. It inspired Liza Dalby.

What do think?

Rotted weeds turn into fireflies

July 21 through 25

I have read this essay many times.
Lightning bugs do seem to appear from decomposing grasses.

I did not know fireflies are not west of the Rocky Mountains.
It surprised me.
I would have thought at least a pair would have traveled over in a covered wagon.
Vacationers could easily have a few in their picnic basket.

I watch the fireflies every evening. Often I walk at dusk and watch the fireflies light up through out the neighborhood. I remember when I was a child the neighborhood boys would catch them and put them in jars. Some would wear the lights as rings.

I keep going back to this essay because I feel so connected to the Japanese and Liza Dalby. Something so simple as a firefly can bring that oneness.

Crickets come into the walls

July 11 through 15

I have a set of brass crickets that come out in July.
They sit on the hearth with the drying camomile.
I have crickets in the gardens.

The boot cricket is old.
It sits by the front porch.

I found a reader's Journal.
It has a place to write about the books I read.
I wrote a bit about East Wind Melts the Ice.
I have been inspired by this book.
Each essay has me thinking about my natural surroundings.

It seems to me the creatures in the natural world have a purpose.
Each leaf, each bug has a purpose.
They already are masters of themselves.

June 21 through 25

"The rituals surrounding the summer solstice,
however, are somewhat ambivalent."
I have none.
It was after I became a gardener that I became aware of length of day.
I have begun to make up my own.

"Now it is summer at its most robust."
"Now the garden needs my intervention again because it is choking on its own abundance."

I looked about my gardens.
The bamboo is robust.
Both stands broke through the barriers we installed.
We will need a bamboo harvest soon.
Perhaps it could be solstice ritual.

I wonder if in the Chinese almanac they have a time of Ripening Bamboo.
I wonder when the Bamboo harvest is.
It best be soon here or we will have
"Bamboo sacrifices Forsythia"

the mockingbird loses its song

June 16 through 20

Liza Dalby's essay 27 brought an awareness to me.
A pair of Mockingbirds live in our backyard. They have two youngsters that are always wanting food. The parents are constantly feeding these two hungry mouths.
Mockingbird has lost his song.

Other birds also seem to be singing less. As we move closer to solstice I am wondering if the birds are molting. Perhaps nesting and feeding the young has exhausted them. Maybe as the summer heat comes on they are just wanting a cool bath.
The fireflies are out at dusk and the insects have begun to sing. Maybe that is enough singing.

In my gardens the tomatoes are blooming.