Atlas Stresses Moi and Mway

June 16, 2010.  Wednesday.

Situation:  This morning Moi wakes me up, distress in her voice as she tells me about her trouble handling the two dogs.  “What would you like me to do?” I ask.  She complains that Mway will not eat with Atlas around and explains that she has to go into town to pick up some paint and would like me to take Mway for a walk when she gets back.  Right now I’m sitting in the office, waiting for her to return; Mway and Squeak are sitting next to me; they’ve been able to claim the upstairs as their exclusive domain; Atlas will not venture up the stairs.  Moi comes home about 10:30, and I take Mway out, while Atlas stays indoors.

State of the Path.  It’s a cool, overcast day; only a little bit of dew remains on the plants at this hour.  In the distance some heavy machine is roaring and periodically beeping (probably Holtzapple or another farmer fertilizing or spraying his field).  I take the side path along the orchard, and think to myself that it would’ve been a good day to bring along the clippers and the weed whacker; one of these days soon I’m going to have to do that, but as I look at the mullein and the touch-me-nots I almost feel hesitant about cutting down any weeds.

State of the Creek:  As I’m eating a few raspberries, I hear Mway splashing around in one of the pools in the creek.  Down the path a ways, a starling flies out of a bush then disappears beyond the trees.

The Fetch:  Mway and I stand in the middle of the clearing and work together at stamping down the goldenrod.  She fetches the “pro-quality” stick a good number of times.  When we get back to the house, I can see Moi behind the kitchen door window, trying to keep Atlas from jumping up against the door and window.  She is shrieking at both dogs, at me, and at her daughter:  “Atlas, stay down!  Mwayla come in!  I’m going to break my wrists!  If I have to do this for two weeks, I’m going to kill myself!”  As Moi finally manages to open the door without Atlas leaping against it, Mway takes off to hide somewhere.  “I was just trying to eat breakfast!  I’m choking on a piece of bread!  Mwayla where are you!”  Moi screams, as Atlas squirms out the door.  “Here,” I say, taking Atlas’s leash from Moi.  “Give him to me, I’ll take him for a walk.”  Moi hands the leash over to me, and, as Atlas pulls against it, I manage to guide him over toward the summer house.  We go crashing down through the day lilies and speeding across the lane (where I manage to glimpse at the daisy-like flowers, which I conclude are oxeye daisies, because they don’t have the fern-like leaves of mayweed), then we go thrashing down through the goldenrod, Atlas gasping as he pulls against the leash.  “Slow down,” I yell at Atlas, as I trip over the anthill before the ridge around bug land.  Atlas keeps lurching forward, at times unable to see the path clearly where it’s choked with weeds, and I think to myself that I better not take him down by the creek because I’m liable to fall over a branch or vine hidden in the grass.  But as we move along, though Atlas keeps choking against his collar, he gets a better sense of how the path goes, and we head toward the creek, floundering through the red willows and stumbling over the board that crosses the swale from bug land.  Along the creek, I worry that Atlas will venture into the water and pull me over the bank, but I manage to keep him away from the edge, and he becomes satisfied with just pulling me along the path.  We turn at the tree stand, go up through bug land and underneath the maples, and in no time we’re back at the house, where Moi is wandering around the yard wondering where Mway is hiding herself.

Sample a Raspberry, Look at Mullein Again, Plus Ragweed, Burdock, Crown Vetch, Atlas, and Unidentifiable Things

June 15, 2010.  Tuesday.

Situation:  Have to work this afternoon, Moi is down at Jazz’s, so the morning walk, along with several other chores, is up to me.  I take Mway out about  11.

State of the Path:  I decide to take the side path along the old orchard; yesterday when I was walking down the main path, I could barely see where the side path joins up with it: so I want to walk this side path as often as possible to keep it trampled down – it would be nice to keep it clear all summer.  The black raspberries are still ripening – I sample the blackest one I see, and it tastes good, but I think in a few days they will be sweeter.  I look at my mullein; definitely pinkish flowers that do not match the moth mullein in Audubon.  I look for the milkweed, but I can’t find it, and I can’t believe this abundantly flowering plant could have disappeared over night.  Then I notice that Moi, I guess, beat down a path to the frame of her new wigwam, just around where I believe the milkweed was: would she have knocked down the milkweed, so beautifully flowering, in the process?  Down by the creek, I sample a few more raspberries; there are blacker ones down there.  More touch-me-nots, especially down by the creek, are coming out; I’m still surprised that they are flowering this early in the season.

State of the Creek:  You have to look closely to see the water trickling between the rocks.  But the many pools, one or two of which Mway regularly seeks out to cool off in, are still brown and robust.  I look for signs of duckweed, as I had seen some growing earlier in the spring.  But I believe the season has been too dry for duckweed to flourish this year.

The Fetch:  I stand just in front of the most trampled area, again to help clear more of the weeds in the clearing, and between me stamping around and Mway spinning about, we’re doing a good job of keeping the goldenrod from overtaking the whole clearing.  On the way back past the sumacs and through the briars, I see one tiny, but very strikingly pink to lavender flower, sticking out of the brambles;  it’s so tiny and so inconspicuous among the brambles that I hold little hope of ever identifying it.

Addendum:  I didn’t expect to take Mway out for an afternoon walk, but when I come back from work about 4:30, Moi is out in the yard with Jazz’s German shepherd, Atlas, who Moi has reluctantly agreed to watch while Jazz and Matt are on their honeymoon (she has also agreed to watch her cats, but is keeping them down at, and making periodic visits to, the kids’ house, because the one cat, Spook, has never been trained to pee or poop in a litter box).   My plans are to mow the lawn, but Moi asks me to take Mway for a walk, and she explains to me that she doesn’t want Atlas to go along or run free because she’s afraid the big dog might wander over to one of our neighbors’ houses.  So I decide to take Mway for just a quick walk to the clearing.  We go down the seldom used path along the summer house, between the day lilies, greeted by a giant ragweed and meeting amidst the lilies five or so burdock plants the size of lawn chairs, then go past the pile of tree trunks and down through a field chocked with goldenrod, with an understory of poison ivy.  Mway is especially diligent about fetching the stick (and I suspect secretly relieved that Atlas has not come along; I hear Atlas, chained up beneath the clothesline, echoing Mwayla’s barks across the field of weeds).  After we come back to the house, I begin to mow the lawn.  One advantage of not getting much rain is that the lawn becomes relatively easy to mow; and I have the patience to look at some of the wild plants that are coming up around the house.  Along the perimeter of the lawn, I see a lot of black raspberries growing, some of the brambles of which arch out into the lawn and get caught in the mower or scrape against me.   Along the lane in front of the house (which was intended to be a shale road but which grass has overtaken and consequently has to be mowed), I recognize, from the research I did on honeysuckles, that the vine growing along the lane and now sporting tubular flowers with long stamen is Japanese honeysuckle.  Along the lane below the summer house, I spot some particularly pretty pink and white flowers with locust-like leaves which I’m later able to identify, to my surprise, as crown vetch (I’m of course familiar with crown vetch from a distance along highways, but I never knew we had it growing here or ever looked at it up close).  Growing out of some shale that has remained bare in the lane is a picture-perfect specimen (I’m well prepared to make the identification) of a moth mullein, complete with its white flowers with its brownish-purple markings, unlike the pink flowers of the who-knows-what-kind of mullein I’ve been seeing down on the path.  Also growing out of the shale, I see some daisy-like flowers, which I will, however, have to check on again, because I’m not sure whether they’re oxeye daisies or mayweed; I also come across a yellow buttercup-like flower, perhaps like the ones I used to see down by the creek, which I’m unable to identify.   When I go in the house for a break and for supper, I learn how stressed out Moi is about having to take care of big undisciplined Atlas.  The dogs have been fighting over food, and when we sit down with our own food in front of the TV, Moi, who has just been screaming at both dogs, finds herself sitting on top of the Audubon wildflower book, which, acting upon her nerves like the proverbial straw on the camel’s back, she picks up and tosses across the room.

Milkweed Flower, Fleabane, and Perplexing Mullein

June 14, 2010.  Monday.

Situation:  I have to work tonight (though it’s what’s called a “freebie”), and I should also try to do some work this afternoon.  So, since Moi didn’t take Mway for a morning walk, I decide to take her for one, to save me some time later today.  It’s about 11:30.  My walking clothes are still damp from last evening, not having dried at the foot of my bed.

State of the Path:  Day lilies are in bloom in record numbers, in front of the house, around the summer house, by Moi’s garden pond, and across from the pig pen.  (I had a couple spent blossoms in my stir fry this morning.)  Mway turns down the side path, but there is still dew or rain on the weeds, and I march straight ahead on the main path, Mway quickly following.  I look at the mullein, and I note definitively that its flowers are pink; so I think it’s not the moth mullein as pictured in Audubon, but I still believe it’s some species of mullein.  Just down from the mullein, I note another flowering plant; it has pink flowers in a kind of carnation shape, large soft leaves and a thick, perhaps hollow, stem.  I suspect milkweed, and, lo and behold, what I see is very clearly pictured in Audubon under the entry for common milkweed.  (I know milkweed, of course, with its pod, but I’ve never really noticed its flowers before.)  Down by the creek, I realize just how many black raspberries there are along the bank near the deer stand; some of the berries are starting to turn black, but they’re not yet ripe enough for picking.  Today, I also become suddenly cognizant of how much fleabane there is in flower; I see it in places all along the path; I see a rather sizable patch just before the clearing, and I even see a few flowers in the clearing itself.

State of the Creek:  Mway walks into the water in a pool beneath the large locust trees.  Despite the rain, the creek is still not that high; there’s just a little bit of water in the feed channel.

The Fetch:  Toss the “pro-quality” stick, standing a little ways into the goldenrod. The stick whips at the weeds as I wind back for one of the tosses, and Mway’s body whips against them as she dashes after the stick.  The fleabane jiggles as she runs past the flowers.  More fetches today than I care to count.

Manage to Fit in Moi's Birthday

June 13, 2010.  Sunday.

Situation:  Work all day today.  When I get home, Barb Dennehy is at the house, and over a key lime pie, we celebrate Moi’s 60^th birthday.  Barb leaves about 7:30, and I take Mway out for her walk.  Moi comes along.

State of the Path:  While I’m looking at the mulberries on the white mulberry tree, wondering if they’re edible, Moi wanders over to the garden.  I take a step or two further to the plum trees, then wait for Moi to show up.  I point out to her a black walnut tree growing under the plum trees, and to my question about whether she wants that there, she says, “No, anytime you want to cut that down, go ahead.”  I ask Moi if she ever saw a jack-in-the-pulpit fruit, and she says no.  We walk the side path to take a look at some, and she is surprised by how they look, even wondering if they’re edible.  “It’s really getting to be jungle out here,” she says, as we walk through the ever narrowing path, approaching the thick area of goldenrod where the side path rejoins the main path.  “This ragweed is getting ridiculous,” she says, and I have to correct her, pointing out that the main weed where we’re walking is goldenrod.  I look for the moth mullein that I spotted yesterday to point out to Moi, but its flowers are not opened up on this overcast day, so I pass by it without saying anything.  Moi points out one of the flowering elderberry shrubs, and I say, yep, that’s what it is.  She wanders off into the field to look at something while I’m still looking at the mullein plant.  She catches up to me, and down by the creek, she notes the other elberberry shrubs that are flowering down there.  My feet are getting wet because it rained a little today, but my pants are not getting as soaked as they did a few mornings ago.  I tell Moi to watch out for the loopy grape vine, and she steps over it carefully, but a little ways away, she almost trips over some of the locust branches that are hidden in the jewelweed.  Underneath one of the locust trees, a dead branch is hanging down, stuck in some other branches, and when I walk underneath it, the dead branch falls down, thankfully before Moi reaches it.  Moi notices the white flowers on what I’ve been calling the red willows and wonders what kind of shrub it is.  “Red willow,” I tell her, with much uncertainty.  “No,” Moi replies, “They’re probably some kind of honeysuckle,” and I look, with some consternation, at the flowers that do indeed look a little like honeysuckle flowers.  As I walk along, looking carefully where we’re stepping, I see a few flashes of fireflies in the shadows of the weeds.  After we cross the swale to bug land, Moi ventures over to the feed channel to look at her sweet flag.  “I don’t know if these get flowers or not,” she says.  “I think they do get green flowers,” I say, “but maybe they’re too much in the shade of that honeysuckle bush.”  “Maybe,” Moi agrees.  Suddenly it starts raining hard, and we both hustle to get back to the house.  On our way up toward the clearing, though, Moi points to the ground.  “Here are some deer droppings,” she says.  “Oh, are those deer droppings?” I ask, knowing exactly what she’s talking about, and then looking at the droppings that for several days now I thought were rabbit droppings.

State of the Creek:  I see some water striders in the pool behind the log jam, and then, just as I think I see something rather lizardlike scooting across the water, Moi points out Mway’s gray body wiggling around in the weeds across the creek.  “I thought for a minute that was a wild animal over there,” she says.

The Fetch:   Although it’s starting to rain, I still stop at the clearing to toss the “pro-quality” stick for Mway.  I stand just a little ways into the goldenrod, so that she will trample a greater area of the clearing while she’s spinning around, and I see that the goldenrod stems do bend and are crushed under her paws.  Mway fetches the stick more times than I care to count, but gratefully, since it’s raining, not for too long.

Day Lilies, Red Black Raspberries, and a Mullein

June 12, 2010.  Saturday.

Situation:  Moi and I both work tonight, but at separate places.  I could’ve taken Mway out again this morning, for when I came down into the kitchen she was ready for one, but since I didn’t work this afternoon, I postpone it until now, around 3:45.  I have to arouse her from her nap with Moi.  When I open the door, Mway is standing behind it, ready to play the game where she pounces at the doorknob, knocking the door shut, then leaps at the transom window, a game the Boy and I unfortunately taught her to play many years ago (unfortunate because one time she bit the Boy in the nose) and have been unable to train her not to do it anymore.

State of the Path:   One rabbit runs across the lawn beyond the corn crib, another dashes down the path.  Mway misses them both, instead crouching in front of the garden pond to try to poop, but unable to do so if she thinks I’m too close behind her, so that she runs a little farther ahead to try again.  She succeeds by the time we get near the pig pen.  The day lilies just opposite the pig pen are in bloom.  A squirrel scrambles up the branch of a young black walnut tree, bending the branch considerably and making a lot of racket.  The black raspberries are now red along the old orchard; the blackberries out farther in the field are still green.  The goldenrod at the end of the side path is now chin high.  Just before the maples, I see a new wildflower; it’s weirdly shaped like a narrow pyramid, with white flowers on top.  For some reason, I think “mullein,” and when I look in Audubon, although it’s not common mullein, it looks damn close to moth mullein, although the photo doesn’t show its leaves and erect stem for me to be a hundred percent positive about this identification.  (Audubon describes the flowers as having a brown-purplish mark; I recall a pinkish mark, but brown-purplish sounds good enough to me.)  Down by the creek, there seem to be a lot of what I think are starlings, flying low through the bushes and trees, and scolding me nastily.

State of the Creek:  Mway wades into one of the pools in the creek; it’s deep enough that the water pretty much reaches to the top of her legs.

The Fetch:  Up at the clearing, I take my stance just in front of where it’s trampled down a lot, so that Mway, in spinning around, will help keep more of the goldenrod down.  She fetches the “pro-quality” stick more times than I care to count, but probably not as many times as she did yesterday.  When I get back to the house, I’m hot and sweaty.  The neighbor’s kids are in their McPool (which, however, I’m sure is bigger than mine, though I’ve never taken a close look at it), and I could hear their McScreams and McLaughter the whole time on my walk.  Moi tells me that I better hurry to get into our pool, for there are storms in the west of the county.

Take a Closer Look at the Plants I Pee On Again

June 11, 2010.  Friday.

Situation:  My work day looks pretty much like it did yesterday: I have to work tonight, but I also have some work I should do this afternoon.  So I decide again to take Mway for her morning walk.  It’s about 10:30.  I don’t know if Moi this time of year walks the whole path down to the creek like I do; she doesn’t outfit her walk with special walking clothes, so she doesn’t have the best protection against the vegetation.  I suspect that her walks are rather infrequent, which means that the path doesn’t get as trampled down as much as it could.

State of the Path:  I take a whiz on the same bunch of weeds by the walled garden that I did the other day, and I notice now that they are in flower, or nearly so: a cluster of white buds.  I take note that the stems of the weeds are purple and that the compound leaves that grow staggardly from the stems are shiny and smooth.  I think to myself that I should be able to identify these things; but a look through Audubon just now has revealed nothing.  I go down the side path along the old orchard; it’s amazing the difference an hour makes: although my boots are getting wet a little bit, there’s no longer any dew splattering against my pants.  I whack back a couple blackberry brambles that lean over on the path.  The honeysuckles that I clipped back a few days ago seem to have grown back to where they were before.  Just before the maples, I see a touch-me-not that has flowered; I’m surprised at this because  I think of the jewelweed as flowering late in August – I don’t see any others though, just this one.  The grasses down at the seeps of bug land have dried and bounced back, and I can again see the ground here.  I trip over the loopy grape vine again.  Coming up to the clearing, I see one little weed that has white flowers and kind of fuzzy little leaves; I have no idea what this is either.  Then looking up toward the clearing, I see a shrub that I never saw before that looks like it’s bearing brilliant white flowers; when I get close to it, though, I see that it’s a grape vine, whose reddish leaves were shining in the sun.  I wonder why a grape vine should be growing here, in the middle of goldenrod and poison ivy.

State of the Creek:  The water is lower again: hard to see barely a trickle through the rocks.  A frog leaps into the water as I’m walking along, and I think I hear a frog croaking by the crest of the skating pond; but last year as I walked along the creek, I’d see or hear a dozen frogs plop into the water, an indication of how dry this spring has been.   The feed channel is dry again; a cob web collapses into my face as I step across it.  I decide to check to see if there’s any water in the pond between the ridges.  I have to step a ways into the weeds; when I get to where the pond is, I see that it too is dry.

The Fetch:   Mway fetches the “pro-quality” stick more times than I care to count.  I note that the weeds in the clearing are most trampled down where Mway spins around waiting for my next toss, and where I’m also stamping around with my feet.   As Mway fetches the stick, I try to move my position forward more into the weeds to extend the area where they’re trampled down.  Mway helps me out with this, since she doesn’t always bring the stick all the way back, and I usually have to take a step forward to pick it up.

Snagging Briars, Dew-Splattering Weeds, and a Vine that Trips Me

June 10, 2010.  Thursday.

Situation:   Today I have to work most of the day, as well as tonight, so I’ve decided to take Mway for a walk this morning.  Moi hasn’t taken her out, because, as she says, it’s too wet in the morning; I’m braced for getting wet: after the walk I will change my clothes and take a shower.  Yesterday it rained steadily most of the day, and I’m curious to see what the creek looks like.  Outside my office window, I see more flowers on the day lilies by the summer house, but they haven’t yet completely opened up.  It’s now 9:14.

State of the Path:   Beyond the walled garden I’m immediately confronted by a path clogged with weeds bent over from rain.  A few of the weeds I notice are some of the remaining hedge garlic, but most of the weeds that clog the path are the tall grasses, let’s call them, the red grass.  I can see beads of water on their stems, perhaps rain from last night, but more likely dew from this morning.  My pants and socks immediately start taking in water, and as I brush past bushes, my shirt does so as well.  Although Mway starts down the side path by the old orchard, I just head straight toward the creek, my shirt catching on the frequent blackberry briars.  When I get down to the seeps in bug land, I’m suddenly faced with a path totally obliterated by flattened red grass.  I no longer can see the ground, and I can do nothing but wade through the sea of grass, guessing where the path might be from memory of past walks.  By the time I get to the creek my pants and socks are soaked.

State of the Creek:  The water again is visibly trickling through the rocks.  At places the sun shines down through the trees, causing the stationary pools to sparkle.  I trip over the loopy grape vine, hidden now in weeds.  There’s no water in the swale from bug land, which is now clogged with weeds and red willows, but there is water again in the feed channel, making me hesitant to cross it, but I do.  All along I hear birds chirping like a radio and scolding me, but I can see nothing flying but white butterflies, some of which I’m sure must be cabbage butterflies.  Coming along the ridge along bug land, I take note that some of the red grass here indeed has spikelets that are red.

The Fetch:  Mway fetches the “pro-quality” stick more times than I care to count; we play “Put it down” once, and she might have played it a second time, but I’m eager to get back to the house.  Walking along the path through the briars, I suddenly see a yellow bird fly into the sumacs.  I don’t get a long look at it – could it be a gold finch, like the ones I used to see along the back hedgerow?   Just before the walled garden, I catch sight of some day lilies (I knew a patch of them grew here, but I had forgotten about them), their orange petals opened for the day.   When I get back to the house, I decide to hang my wet pants, shirt, and socks on the clothesline; they will dry here better than they would on a heap at the foot of my bed.