We had our first frost the night before last, so yesterday we woke to a frost covered yard. The rest of the day was clear and sunny, so mid-afternoon I wandered over to the prairie plantings on campus to see how things were doing. There is quite a mix of flowers gone to seed and flowers still opening blooms. I was examining some seed heads when two grade school children from a nearby house waded through the plantings to see what I was doing. They were friendly and curious, so we talked about the prairie plants for awhile before the brother headed back to their swing set.
His sister stayed and watched. I was trying to get a photo of a big brown grasshopper, but it kept leaping away. She tried to catch it for me and told me about finding little green grasshoppers in the field earlier. I told her that this one might be one of those -- that they get bigger and browner as they get older. She nodded and thought about the way things change color as they get older. "Like grandmas!" she said, looking at my white hair with a big smile. "Like grandmas," I agreed, though I'm not one yet. Grandmas and grasshoppers and all things grow and change. This past week we slipped from summer into autumn, and the trees are beginning to turn vibrant colors, and the smaller plants are turning brown. Or white, like grandmas. Either way, there is an abundance of seeds, so the cycle of growth and change will continue. To everything .....turn, turn, turn...... There is a season.....turn, turn, turn.... And a time to every purpose, under heaven.
0 Comments
Thistledown is such a fun word. I just double-checked the names of the fairies in Midsummer Night's Dream, thinking that surely Shakespeare used it. But no -- Peaseblossom, Moth, Cobweb, Mustardseed, and of course Puck, but nary a Thistledown. I can just see her though, with a spiky purple cap and an intricate, airy white gown.
And this thistledown along the millrace was catching the light a few days ago. A goldfinch landed on the one above, loosing a cascade of fluff, but flew off again immediately. I've just been reading that finches like to line their nests with the down. (I also read that finches don't like their feeders to be too close to other types of birdfeeders -- maybe this explains why the finch feeder hanging near the sunflower tube and the hummingbird feeder has not gotten much attention from finches this summer.) I biked down the millrace path this afternoon, to see what I could see. I found a profusion of plants at a profusion of life stages -- buds and full blossoms, green seed pods and dried seed heads ready to send seeds flying with the next strong breeze.
A few weeks ago, when we drove into town after a couple of weeks away at family reunions and weddings, we found scorched, tawny lawns and parched fields. Weeks without rain and temperatures over 100 degrees had sent the area into serious drought. The past few weeks, we've been blessed with rain -- over five inches. It was too late for the corn crop, and the experts tell us we're still in drought conditions, but it is amazing what a little rain can do to resurrect lawns and plants. The grass has started growing again, and though our lawn is looking patchy and has some thriving crabgrass colonies, it is looking more green than tan. And the bee balm above, which was nothing but dried seed heads a week ago, has suddenly put out more petals, and is attracting hummingbirds. The ground cover in our front window bed, which had turned into a brown, dead mat that I thought we'd have to live with until next spring, not only put out new shoots, it has put them out with such vigor that the bed is looking golden-green again. I meant to take a photo a day or two ago when the new shoots were just starting, but I missed my chance. Some things won't recover. I think we've lost the globe arborvitae by our garage. Around town, I see plenty of bushes and trees that have died. And the experts warn us that others are at risk. We need to keep watering the trees and bushes to catch up, even if the rains continue.
It all provides some vivid images for verses like Jeremiah 17:7-8. Blessed are those who trust in the LORD, whose trust is the LORD. They shall be like a tree planted by water, sending out its roots by the stream. It shall not fear when heat comes, and its leaves shall stay green; in the year of drought it is not anxious, and it does not cease to bear fruit. Am I planted by water? Do I need to be watering my roots? Where are timely rains bringing new growth? Thoughts to ponder. More pictures from my time at the Hermitage. The labyrinth is looking a bit flattened by the winter, but the seasons cycle and it will soon be green. Two years ago I walked it in late spring, finding a multitude of wildflowers and grasses bordering the path.
The seasons cycle and now is an in-between time, and the dried milkweed pods in the fields capture that well -- some bare husks, others still with seeds waiting to be carried by the wind, all making intriguing sculptural shapes. Winter solstice -- last night was the longest night, so we're beginning the slow climb of gradually longer days and the sun's return, and this sun on my sister's porch, with its messages of believe, relax, life, warmth, grow, plant, breathe, daydream, love, feel, create, and laugh seems like a good way to celebrate. I went out midday in search of glory. In The Book of Creation, Philip Newell quotes George MacLeod as saying in one of his prayers, "Show to us the glory in the grey." He describes this as looking for the light of God in the most ordinary, and even dullest, of contexts. I decided that an overcast northern Indiana winter day, without snow, qualified. And this water retention area on the edge of campus, with the industrial park in the background, full of dead and dry plants, seemed like a prime candidate for the ordinary in the midst of everyday life. And there were intriguing shapes and bursts of light, in the midst of the grey and papery brown. And even in the midst of dried stems and grasses, there was new life and color, growing greenly on a south-facing slope. The kids are home for Thanksgiving and this afternoon we went for a walk to enjoy the surprisingly warm weather. Plenty of late afternoon sunshine lighting up dried plants, fences, and mushrooms
|
My approach to contemplative photography --
"Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it." Mary Oliver in "Sometimes" Archives
August 2020
Categories
All
|