The beginning of wisdom, as the Chinese say, is calling things by their right names. (E. O. Wilson, as cited by Elizabeth J. Rosenthal, Birdwatcher: The Life of Roger Tory Peterson)

Saturday, December 10, 2011

A Few Honeysuckles Hang onto a Few Leaves

December 10, 2010.  Friday.
Situation:  When I wake up, Mway is on the floor next to my bed – I left the door open last night so heat would waft into the room.  Moi’s not downstairs, which means she went hunting today.  I feel tired, I think because with my bedroom door open last night Squeak was able to come in and walk all over me a couple times during the night, disturbing my sleep.  I let Mway out, but a couple minutes later, she barks to be let back in.  I’m mentally steeling myself against the cold – I really don’t feel like taking Mway for a walk right now.
State of the Path:  I have to take the chicken’s water dish out, which Moi emailed me about.   Actually the air is refreshing – my first thought is I’m happy to be outside, like taking a swim on a hot day.  The path has that same faded look, with dead leaves and browning grass receding into the ground.  On the side path, a few honeysuckle shrubs are still hanging onto a few yellowed tattered leaves.  The gill-of-the-ground remains shriveled and frozen.  I come across a large circle of goldenrod that has been flattened – I wonder if deer have been bedding down here, or if the area just collapsed from the cold weather.  I walk along at a brisk pace – again I’m somewhat in a hurry because I have work to do today, and also I have to call the dentist because I lost a large filling last night.
State of the Creek:  The water is flowing brown and gentle, but in most of the pools a soupy film of ice has formed, which I stir up with my walking stick.  I look at Moi’s green water plants and wonder when they’ll disappear completely.  I see the underwater green plants still floating in the brown water and wonder how long they’ll last too.  I cross the plank to the skating pond crest, and when I duck down under the branches of the pin oak, I realize I don’t come this way sometimes because ducking down under these branches is hard on my joints and muscles.  When I return through the “chokeberries,” I expect to be struck in the eye by the ball of sun over the marshy spot near the ridge – but it doesn’t happen.  I look up in the gray sky, and there’s no ball of sun anywhere to be seen.
The Fetch:  I make the circle, Mway a couple times having to search hard for the stick.  We make a full round, then before we complete it a second time, Mway comes running back with the stick without dropping it, and I tell her “that’s good enough.”  Back in the house I don’t know whether to feed her or not – Moi didn’t leave any note about whether or not she did earlier.  I decide to feed her: better she have two breakfasts, I guess, than none at all.
Addendum:  When I get home from work, about 4:30, Moi’s not home – she had come back from hunting before I left for work, and I expected her to be home; I assume she went hunting again, so that means I have to take Mway out again in the afternoon. Moi had told me, by the way, that she had fed Mway earlier today, so that means Mway did have two breakfasts this morning.  Since it’s getting dark and I already took Mway for one walk today, I figure I’ll just take her in the back yard to fetch stick.  During the afternoon it has snowed, and there’s a half inch to an inch of coating on the ground.  I go out to the back yard, but Mway runs past the outbuilding onto the path.  I call her once, but she doesn’t come, so I figure I’ll fetch stick with her out in the clearing. I find Mway traipsing through the shrubs around the pig pen.  As I shuffle through the snow, my feet feel cold because I’m only wearing my street clothes – no wool socks – beneath my snow suit.  In the path through the sumacs much of the goldenrod is bent over into the path, not just from being dead, but from the weight of the caps of snow on top of their fuzzy spikes.  Mway follows me to the clearing.  I make the circle once, both the stick and Mway splattering snow off the goldenrod.  We only make the round once, though – about five fetches -- when she comes running back without dropping the stick.  I start to head back down the path, but Mway’s looking up at me, and I think what the hell – I shout “put it down.”  She drops the stick, and I throw it again, this time toward the electric pole, Mway bounding down the path toward the strawberry patch.  When the goldenrod swishes as the stick lands, she realizes her mistake, skids around, and zips up toward the sound, but she ends up sniffing around in the faint light, unable to find the stick.  I have to trudge over to find it myself.  I spot it right away, right in front of where she’s standing all bewildered.  When I bend over to pick it up, she suddenly catches sight of it and snatches it before I can reach it.   As she runs off, I walk back toward the path, telling her “okay, that’s it.”

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

A for Heeler cont. – MM

Chapter 12

Lumbering laborers lift loads, lug lugnuts, lay lumber lengthwise, lock limestone longitudinally. Loudspeaker lawspeaks loudly. Lamplights lower. Lingiarri lays lunchbox leftwise, lifts long limbbore lipwards. Lugubrious lithesome lyricnotes lowmoan like Louis’ larynx. Loverman, lightningstruck, listens.
“Lemme. Lemme. Lemme.”
Lingiarri lends loverman limbbore.
Leaves loll leewardly. Lizards lull lazily. Lepidoptera lie limp.
“Let lips loose. Lungs light. Like lyrebird.”
Learning, loverman lets loose lewd lonesome loinshaking lownote.
Lingiarri laughs. Loverman leans lustfully.
“Like licking lady’s labia.”
Loverman lets loose lush lambent largo lullaby, lanky Lucky, lackadaisically lounging, listening lachrymosely.
Loudspeaker lawspeaks loudlier. Laborers lower lunchbox lids, light lamps, lumber locksteppedly limekilnward. Lingiarri, listlessly looking loudspeakerward, lifts lone ligula. Loudspeaker lawspeaks loudliest. Landlord, leafing ledger, learns lawbreakers loose, loafer loitering, leers, lubricates Luger.
“Lingerer! Like lost lamb!”
Lancecorporals, lieutenant landlords, lashing lariats, lasso Lingiarri, lacerate limbbore latently lumber, loverman, Lucky, luckily leaving like lightning, latter launching logorrheic logogriph.
“Logocentrically Liptschitz likewise linguistically Lickdick likewise logarithmically Lickmyarse la la la la li-ooral li-ay….”