Morning After

Morning After

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On the morning after Congress announced the beginning of impeachment proceedings against the 45th president of the United States, I picked the newspaper up off the driveway as I usually do, knowing, before I opened it, how much there would be inside to read.

I had been glued to the television the night before, uncharacteristically watching news instead of a British soap opera, and yet I had to have more of it this morning. This is the way things are now — that after two and a half years of craziness, there will be even more.

Sometimes I think that we’ve all become addicted to craziness, that we won’t know what to do if we ever again have a bland status quo.

But then again, I don’t think we’ll have to worry about that for a while.

(A blurry Washington, D.C., seen from above and afar. Looks a little like an Impressionist painting, doesn’t it?)

Summer and Fall

Summer and Fall

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On the first day of autumn, I walked outside after dark to get something from the car. I was wearing a white nightgown, not the lightest one I have because after a sweltering 90-plus-degree day, the air conditioning was back on.

My purpose was purely practical, but the night was alive with balmy air and the sound of crickets and katydids. I was suddenly aware that despite the seeming permanence of these summer sounds, they are extremely time-limited. The bugs chirp as if they have months to live when it’s probably more like weeks.

I was sorry to walk back into the quiet of a darkened house, windows closed against the heat and humidity. It’s been a warm summer, and many are longing for a spate of coolness. But I’m not. Say what you will about crisp autumn air, warm wool sweaters and chili simmering on the stove… I wouldn’t mind if we had another month of summer swelter.

Stinkbug Season

Stinkbug Season

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They fly in from who-knows-where, these funny armored bugs — in from fields where they’ve been gorging themselves all summer, I guess. And predictably, on warm days late in the season, they congregate on our windows and doors and, if possible, inside the house, too.

A stinkbug announces itself with a whirring sound and, when disturbed, will emit a cloying aroma that smells a little like cilantro.

But in the old days, I knew they were around when I heard a certain kind of shriek, as this house full of girls reacted, I’m afraid to say, in a most gender-stereotyped way. One especially notable occasion happened late one night when a daughter pulled down her window shades only to find that a bunch of stinkbugs had nested there during the day.

Now the bugs are calmly scooped up and cast out when they’re found. Not without a shiver, though.

(Luckily, these critters are on the outside of the screen.)

Letting Go

Letting Go

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A number of suitcases have been piling up in the basement, suitcases lacking the kind of easy-rolling wheels or with other defects that leave them out of the take-along sweepstakes.

Two of these bags belonged to Mom and Dad. They’re older models, of course. And no one else wanted them when we were going through things a couple years ago. So I used them to pack up books and memorabilia that I was bringing back from Lexington — then, after emptying them, tucked them under the basement stairs, where they stayed for at least two years.

But the bags have recently been unearthed and deemed extraneous, so I just moved them up from the basement to the garage. Next step: the Purple Heart pickup.

They’re in good shape and will come in handy for someone else, I hope. But it’s hard to see them go. I tell myself that things don’t matter, that it’s the intangibles that count. But each time I get rid of something that was Mom and Dad’s, a little bit of them goes, too.

Glory in the Morning

Glory in the Morning

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Behold the morning glory volunteers, their seeds slipped into the soil last year, gifts from the past. Back in June they decided to sprout, and now they’ve grown, twined and, finally, bloomed. I seem to recall their relatives were blue, but no matter, maybe the soil acidity has changed or there’s been a mutation. I like these better anyway.

Morning glories make clear the photosensitivity that all plants share. Sunrise and sunset prompt their openings and closings, which is just the obvious part, because it tempers their leaf color and stem strength, too.  
I feel a kinship with morning glories. Like them I bloom in the early hours; it’s when I get my best brain work done. By afternoon I often feel as closed up as they look.
The Golden Hour

The Golden Hour

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I almost bailed at the last minute. Standing on the platform in Crystal City, worn out from the usual, I almost jumped on the Blue Line train, which would have connected me to the Orange Line and home.

But I stuck to the plan I’d come up with earlier, which was to drain the last drop from the day, to walk around D.C. in the “golden hour,” the one favored by photographers, when light slants low and fetchingly across the landscape.

So I hopped on a Yellow Line train, rode a few stops north into the District, and exited at L’Enfant Plaza. I strolled east down the Mall toward the Capitol, then pivoted and walked west, directly into the setting sun. I missed the bustle of the lunchtime crowd, but the light made up for it.

It created an aurora behind the Monument, dramatic and striking. But I preferred what it did to the red sandstone of the Smithsonian castle, how it warmed and illuminated it, changing it from dour to delightful.

Ambling through the Enid Haupt Garden with its orchids, magnolias and dhobi trees, I felt like I was in some Mediterranean palace. The red stone was terra-cotta and the splash of the fountain was the distant sigh of the sea.

Back in Business

Back in Business

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The Washington Monument took a beating in the 2011 earthquake. Visitors inside the observation deck at the time were jostled and struck by falling mortar, and the temblor cracked the obelisk, displacing old stones. 

The monument was closed, then opened, then closed again.  It’s been three years since anyone was allowed up in it, but it’s back in business today. Coincidentally, I happened by the monument last evening, just in time to snap some shots of our spiffed-up national icon.

Here’s what Robert Winthrop said at dedication of the Washington Monument in 1885:

“The storms of winter must blow and beat upon it … the lightnings of Heaven may scar and blacken it. An earthquake may shake its foundations … but the character which it commemorates and illustrates is secure.”

A Thicket

A Thicket

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Yesterday I heard a peep, bright and insistent. It was a sparrow roosting in the bamboo that flanks the west side of the house. The little bird found a good place to shelter.

Our bamboo grove is a mass of leaves and stems, lush and green, some bending, many still upright. I look into the tight center of it all and remember the joy of hidden places, of climbing under the forsythia when I was young, of entering the cinder trail (below) as recently as last Saturday.
It is the human need for enclosure, for a safe spot from which to peer out at the rest of the world. It’s Robinson Crusoe and his protective hedge, or our Neanderthal ancestors in their secluded cave. We don’t always need it, or always seek it out. But it’s good to know that it’s there. 
Battling Ants

Battling Ants

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For several months, we’ve been engaged in a valiant fight against tiny ants that have taken up residence in the kitchen. Several times they seem to have been vanquished — only to return a few days later with reinforcements.

I have no problem with ants as long as they stay outside. Let them have their ant hills, their cooperative societies, let them lug crumbs around on their little backs. But once they invade my house, I’m going after them.

The problem is, nothing seems to help — no vinegar, diatomaceous earth, no home remedy. Various over-the-counter poisons sideline the critters for a few days … then they come marching back — not two by two, as the song says, but just as resolutely.

I’m always a little loathe to call in the professionals, whose remedies, I fear, may be worse than the problem itself. But on Friday, I’m officially giving in.  This has evolved from a skirmish to a battle. By the end of the week, it will be a war.

(Hoping there’s not something like this under my house.)

September Song

September Song

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Here’s what our recent weather makes me think, and it’s something I think often this time of year in the Mid-Atlantic: that if you’ve been very good and borne up well under summer heat and humidity, September gives you days like these: languid and bright with pleasantly warm noons and lovely cool evenings.

I savor each brief hike, each long, languorous stroll with Copper. I wake to air cooled not by a machine but by night itself, as window fans pull in the loamy coolness and send it swirling around the house.

I know the rains will come, the leaves will tire, turn and fall. But not yet. These golden days are like a love duet between two seasons. They’re a September song.