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An Encounter

An Encounter

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An early walk this morning, sun smoldering orange on the horizon, first birds clearing their throats, air soft on my skin. Back home, I bounce and stretch on the trampoline. When the fox spots me, I’m doing the bird dog exercise, so I’m on all fours just as she is. We are maybe 20 feet apart. 

A fox’s face is doglike, though the eyes are more wary than soulful. The animal takes my measure just as I take hers. 

I wish we could hold the gaze longer than we do, but she’s smart. She knows better than to linger long with someone 10 times her size. So she scampers off to try an alternative route to her prey. And I go back to my exercise. Just another morning in the suburbs. 

Table for Four

Table for Four

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When I drove there Saturday in the pouring rain, it seemed as if the place was an extension of Washington’s Rock Creek Park. And in a way it is. Hillwood, the home of Marjorie Merriweather Post, is perched on a hilltop in the Forest Hills section of northwest D.C. It might as well be in England or France, though, with the formal gardens and the extensive collection of European art, furnishings and tapestries. 

By the time my friend and I finished lunch, the rain had stopped, the sky was blue and the just-dowsed hyacinths scented the walk we took around the garden. Inside the house were treasures from Post’s collection, including Faberge eggs and a large collection of Russian art. 

And then there was this breakfast room. Post’s table was always set for four, even if she dined alone. It’s a big waste of plates and silverware, of course, but I kind of like the idea. 

The Happy Key

The Happy Key

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The wind chimes languished when they hung from the deck railing. They were close to home but blocked from the breeze that would make them sing. 

For a while now, though, they’ve dangled from a low limb of the witch hazel tree, far enough out in the yard that the wind catches them, moves their string and clapper. When I’m out in the yard weeding or picking up sticks I hear their song. 

The chimes have been restrung and refurbished several times, but I still remember unwrapping them, the little note that explained they were in the “happy key of D Major.”

Is D Major a happy key? I’ve never minded it. Only two sharps. Not as easy as G Major (one sharp) or C Major (all white keys) but easier than A (three sharps) and E (four). 

I did a bit of googling, learned that Franz Schubert called D Major the key of triumph and hallelujahs. That’s good enough for me. 

The Volunteer

The Volunteer

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Loveliest of trees, the cherry now

Is hung with bloom along the bough.

I don’t have many lines of poetry at my fingertips, but for some reason, I have these by A. E. Housman. Today, I’m thinking about — and looking at — the pale pink weeping cherry in the backyard.

It wasn’t planted, and I wasn’t even aware of it until we almost lost it in the great tree debacle of 2018. But it must have been there, growing slowly and a bit crookedly, trying to reach the light through a thick canopy.  

But now the yard is open, tree coverage is sparse, and the delicate plants, including this earnest volunteer, have a chance to shine. 

Such is the life cycle of a forest, even when the forest is in a backyard.

(This volunteer may be kin to another I wrote about several years ago.)

Familiarity

Familiarity

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Some light rain, the sky a washed-out gray, tree limbs a study in contrast. I look outside as if at another world. The days have turned inward for me, as our dear dog Copper is ailing. 

It’s a comfort to glimpse the sparse azaleas, the ragged hollies. Even the open space where the tall oak stood is familiar now.

I know these places, these absences. My eyes rest easily on them, until I look inside again. 

Too Soon!

Too Soon!

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Warm winters are always a treat, and so far we seem to be in for one. But I worry when I spot green shoots pushing through the soil or spy the creamy center of a Lenten rose already taking shape amidst the brown leaves from last fall’s raking. 

Lenten roses are some of the earliest plants in the garden. But January 12th? 

Go back to sleep, I tell the plant, treating it like a still-drowsy baby rising too soon from a nap. Slumber on for a few more weeks, until we know the world is safe for you. 

The Annuals

The Annuals

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They lasted almost till Thanksgiving, but last night finished them off. I’m talking about the summer flowers, the impatiens I transplanted after a deer took them down and the begonias that took their place. 

I snapped a photo of these plants the other night, after I realized how cold it would be. I may have snapped a shot of them earlier, but I was taking no chances. I wanted to preserve their bounty in some way. 

Surely the begonias by the front door were princes of plants, their lift and height, their regal presence. And another begonia on the deck, the one pictured above, already wilting a bit, was resplendent in its youth, a gift from a green-thumbed friend, which  apparently imbibed some of her plant goodness at the start.

Annuals are the victims of seasonal change. They lack the immortality of the perennial. For that reason, they draw our attention to the fleetingness of life. And for that reason, among others, I honor them. 

A Glow from Within

A Glow from Within

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The most vivid tree in our yard is one we never planted. It’s a volunteer, little more than a weed for years and now coming fully into its own. 

Especially at this time of year, when it seems to glow from within.

The poplars and oaks are bare now, even the Kwanzan cherry has dropped its golden leaves. 

But the Japanese maple flames on…

Ignoring the Roses

Ignoring the Roses

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It’s nothing personal, but sometimes I ignore the second bloom. Roses seem out of place this time of year — even a tease. 

Their petals are so smooth and soft, not fluted and dry like the chrysanthemum.They belong to spring, to longer days and shorter nights.

But here they are, a final benediction, a farewell to summer. So I try to take them philosophically, to see in their freshness a promise of spring.

Artist at Work

Artist at Work

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Today the tree guys arrive to remove yet another giant oak. This one is in the back of the yard, alongside the fence. It’s not as dead as the two specimens felled last week, but is the most precarious of the bunch because it hangs over the neighbor’s property and threatens his shed.

Carman heads this crew. To watch him climb and cut is to observe an artist at work. His art is destruction, true, but it’s done with a flourish and a derring-do that puts even circus aerialists to shame. 

High in the treetops Carman manages rope and chain saw, deftly lassoing a 10-foot section of trunk, then sawing it off and (with assistance from the ground) lowering it down. To be hanging from the tree you’re cutting down seems an impossibility, but I watched him do it last week, watched him calmly and methodically take down the oak section by section by section … until it was gone.