Mental health with feathers

Woodpecker

Hope is the thing with feathers, according to Emily Dickinson.  A good walk with birds is the thing for my mental outlook. So much to do at home, but the dark rainy morning had changed to a gorgeous sunny afternoon. The sunshine grasped me in her talons and dragged me through the bright blue sky to the trailhead at Renner Road and US 75.

Mockingbird, juvenile.

Greeted by a woodpecker. Under the watch of a kestrel. A red tail hawk circled overhead. A mockingbird posed. Mallards bickered and bullied in Spring Creek under the highway.

Bad boy mallards

Kestrel photo good enough for an ID.

Odd, loud, buzzy, rattled bird calls tantalized me as I got closer to the US 75/190 George Bush tollway interchange.

Kingfishers avoid paparazzi

The buzzy calls led to a pair of kingfishers on a telephone wire above the creek, but under the highways. No mistaking the shape of the kingfishers, or the glorious blue when they swooped along the creek declining to be photographed by the paparazzi.

Teeny brown birds in a budding tree consented to photos but declined to be identified. On the way back I spotted a heron looking scruffy near a heap of trashed grocery carts.




Something was bothering me earlier.  I wonder what it was... besides the ugly grocery carts.




© 2013 Nancy L. Ruder

A closer walk with chickadees and Thee

I can't see the forest for the trees. I can't see the forest as a static entity. The whole forest is in a continuous loop of growth and decay.  The fallen tree is not dead; it is becoming. Can you hear it?

If the tree falls, who hears it?  Who sees it? Who dismantles it, reuses it, recycles it, rechoreographs all the creatures whose existence is entwined with that tree?

There are so many fallen trees in various stages of decay and rebecoming.  As I walk the trail my sense is the tall standing trees contain matter and energy almost equal to the matter and energy in the fallen trees, branches, and leaves.

Is God in the hairy woodpecker, the ruby-crowned kinglet, the chickadee?  Is God's intent in the throwing of a football between two kids missing their front teeth? Or in the smooching of the teenagers in charge of the football kids?

Attended an evangelical funeral recently, and was scolded.  Only those who proclaimed Jesus as their personal savior would skip down the gold-paved streets of heaven. This was a horribly sad time for the family and friends of the deceased. The preaching was so far from my understanding of God, of love and death, of birth and decay, of humility and grace, that I could not hit the trail at the nature preserve fast enough. I needed to trample out some vintage.

Where is the line between the sacred and the smug?  What does God see through a microscope?  A telescope? Does God cherish the lichen with its surprising colors and forms. Does God chuckle when the chickadee hangs upside down on the branch? Does God accept those who wonder, or just those secure in their answers?

© 2013 Nancy L. Ruder

Zooming in on the small grey-green bird

Home today. I almost made it to the three-day weekend before coming down with a snozzfest headcold. Adding to the sinus pain is an eye twitch. Herbert Lom's Chief Inspector Dreyfus had Clouseau. Like many teachers, I could name my eye twitch after a certain student, but I won't do that publicly! I could name the likely suspects who shared this headcold, too, but again, a bad idea.

In between naps I sat in a sunny spot and stared out the window. To my great joy, a small grey-green bird was hopping about the soapberry tree on the neighbor's patio. It only took fifty photos, three field guides, four checklists, and two websites to get a partial ID.  My feathered insect-eating friend seems to be a warbler. Maybe a prairie warbler. Feel free to jump in with a better suggestion. Its tummy and rump shone yellow in the bright sunshinne.

Been writing about winter visits by the small grey-green bird since shortly after my mother died. I've never gotten a good identification, but this guest always cheers me up.

 

The day warmed up to near sixty degrees, so perhaps insects became active. I watched a red admiral butterfly materialize from nowhere to circle the patio.  Two anole lizards were out back, too.

The next two days should be warm. My camera and bird books are waiting by the window with the box of tissues.



© 2013 Nancy L. Ruder

Cocoa, Cinque Terre, and the Corner Bakery combo

Again this year I did not kiss Billy Crystal at midnight, although I'm sad that Nora Ephron left us in 2012. Instead I piled on the quilts, drank cocoa, and stayed up late reading Jess Walter's Beautiful Ruins, way past eight p.m.  I drifted away in a happy dream where iridescent hummingbirds towed congressional representatives and senators to happy rainbow compromise with pink satin ribbons.  It seemed so real!

Jess Walter's Beautiful Ruins also seems so real and wonderful. I loved being sucked into all the story lines and movie pitches. And when the iridescent hummingbirds bring me a Very Big Check, I will go to Cinque Terre to hike and write my memoirs. I will stay at the Hotel Adequate View for sure.

Had lunch with long-time friends at Corner Bakery.  My walking buddy claims this is our annual New Year's tradition.  I'm embarrassed to admit if it is our tradition I don't recall. Read back through my blog entries from a year ago, and found no Corner Bakery New Year's.

There's something profoundly anchoring about a tradition so unblogworthy. I rely heavily on that friendship, that comfort of the known, that hesitationless panini combo. The routine is so consistent that the only decision is whether to start walking from her home or mine.

Two years ago my sister and I brought Dad to live out his days in Plano, Texas. One year ago, Dad was entering his final downhill slide. Eight years ago my mother was being transported to Mayo Clinic. I did not know I'd just seen her for the last time.

January is a tough month.  I look to the ceiling and see cobwebs that date back to the dawn of the modern era. The hummingbirds fly in with ribbons, not cobwebs.

There was about a year and a half after Mom died when Dad still had most of his wits.  He followed my interests in photography and hummingbirds and spiders.  He could still connect those interests with our family tradition of exchanging Christmas tree ornaments. He was not yet in the toddler self-centered dementia. He could still plan ahead.

I cherish the cloisonne hummingbird ornaments he ordered from a museum catalog that year knowing how much I would like them.  The wonderful spider pin he gave me has a broken clasp, but there's a silken web leading to an alert mind and a man with whom I'd shared every birthday.

Yes, January is a rough month. Good friends are the ribbons and webs that keep me together. And I recommend the poblano fresco sandwich with roast beef.


© 2012 Nancy L. Ruder

Bipartisan spirit at the fiscal cliff birdfeeder

Don't know about you,

but I'm feeling like

the tiny gray

junco

standing on the icy

patio way beneath the feeder.

© 2012 Nancy L. Ruder

Losing my mind? No just my brisket!

To thaw or not to thaw? That is the question for GrillMama, or whether it would be nobler to finish the brisket and black beans I made in the crockpot before I try to make teriyaki pork chops.

Now where did I put that brisket?  I took it out of the crockpot Saturday and put it in some Tupperware and it should be right--  No!

• Is it behind the lettuce or that darn honeydew melon that makes me sneeze?  No.  
• You gotta be kidding.  Did I stick it in the freezer?  No.  
• In the veggie crispers or the cheese drawer?  No.  This is getting weird.  
• Check the trash.  
• Check the cupboards for canned goods, Tupperware, crackers, First Aid. No! 
• Laundry room. No. 
• Recycling bin. No. 
• Car trunk?  Well I once did forget a bag of groceries with a nice rump roast in the trunk of the Skylark. It took awhile to get rid of the smell. 
• Repeat searches except for the car trunk. 
• Check the cupboard of doom that holds a weird mix of parmesan, cottage cheese, hummus, and yogurt containers. No.  

Oh! There wasn't any Tupperware that fit the leftover brisket so I put it in the vanilla yogurt container. Phew. Glad I didn't buy any blackberries to go with that vanilla yogurt. Let's just put the honeydew in the dumpster and not have an allergic reaction that might cause further memory loss because we've got bigger questions.

Wonderful visit with good friends sitting around at Cafe Brazil. [My daughter-in-law makes better empanadas, though.] Then a noon-ish walk at Arbor Hills Nature Center. Good to see so much water in the mossy pond, and look, there's a blue heron, and another!  Put the camera on zoom. One has a blue bill. One is short. Wait one has a black and white mask with goofy head plumes. One is writing words in the mossy surface of the pond. It's spelling:

   K I S S  T H E  R E S T  O F  Y O U R  A F T E R N O O N 

B Y E  A N D  G E T  O U T  Y O U R  F I E L D  G U I D E S 

Who knew herons could write and predict the future?

• Field guides out. Check.
• Enlarging photos. Check.
• Online sources bookmarked. Check.
• Afternoon shot. Check.

The heron with the blue bill seems to be an adult Little Blue Heron, possibly with brighter breeding season colors.

The short blue heron with yellow legs, blue body, and purple throat is illogically a Green Heron.

The heron on the other side of the fallen tree that I didn't even see at the beginning is not either of those two.  It is a Yellow-crowned Night Heron, only the second one I've ever seen.

That's all the mysteries I can handle for one day, even if I'm on vacation from school. Maybe a nap now and some leftover brisket later!

Crockpot Brisket with Black Beans
(Because you've got bigger mysteries to solve):

• Dump a bag of black beans in 3 cups boiling water. Turn off heat, cover, leave overnight. Drain. 
• Put an eight-dollar beef brisket, trimmed of most fat, in a big crockpot. (Packaging removed, but then I don't have to tell you that!)
• Might be smart to plug in the crockpot
• Add 2 stalks chopped celery, 2 cloves smashed and chopped garlic, 1 can of beer, 1 chunk of pineapple from a teacher appreciation edible bouquet (At this point eat the grapes, raspberries, and strawberries from the bouquet and write a thank you note)
• Juice of one lime or not.
• Lots of chopped cilantro since what are you going to do with it otherwise?
• A peeled and diced potato
• Maybe an onion, chopped
• Three sliced mini sweet peppers or one-half sliced bell pepper
• Maybe another can of beer
• The rest of that can of Rotel and half a can of diced Hatch chiles (Hot).
• What the heck, peel and chop that last carrot. 
• Add 2 cups water
• Dried parsley--Note: Is shaker lid securely on parsley jar? Oops. Not a problem, just fish out the plastic lid
• Tablespoon of molasses
• Add water to fill the last of the bottle of Sweet Baby Ray's Honey Barbecue Sauce. Shake. Stir in

Set crockpot (already plugged in) on Low overnight, then on High when you wake up. Try some over a flour tortilla, but it's not just for breakfast anymore. Add more Sweet Baby Ray's if you've got it. Turn crockpot to Warm. It kind of perfumes the whole house, and smells lots better than potpourri.  

© 2012 Nancy L. Ruder

Woodpecking order

Good day creating woodpecker art with the kids. Sound effects were not as funny as the youngest children pretending to be woodpeckers.  Imagine you have your wings behind your back.   Hold on to the tree with your toes.  Now tap-ta-tap with your long, strong beak.  "Whoa!  It's hard being a woodpecker!," a four year-old exclaims.

Student drew pileated woodpeckers.  

(Pileated  adj \ˈpī-lē-ˌā-təd, ˈpi-\ having a crest covering the pileum)

Fallen tree at Oak Point Nature Preserve

Woodpecker & 5 baby woodpeckers, by 5 year old

I love the look on the small bird's face!

After work enjoyed a long walk at Oak Point with lots of birds celebrating Leap Year.  White flowers everywhere.  Downed trees with woodpecker evidence.  And now the opportunity to present the Golden Pond Scum award for this unexpected gem:

Alas, no ivory-billed woodpecker, at least not this time....

Today my sister will teach all her choral students how to do the Monkees walk.  And now a little bit of fun with Davy Jones.


© 2012 Nancy L. Ruder

Holes in my head

Woodpecker art class today.  Worked last evening finding images and sounds at www.freesound.org.  Peck peck peck peck peck, with other bird calls mixed in and even a thunderstorm.  Burned the sounds onto my last cd, but must not have formatted it correctly.  The cd won't play.

I will just have to do my own sound effects in class today.  The kids will help, no doubt!

© 2012 Nancy L. Ruder

Bourbon applesauce cake, bubonic plague, and buddies

My blogging friend Kathleen at Wait! I Have a Blog?! is always showing fabulous food art.  My blog buddy Kim at Hummus Anonymous is on the lookout for recipes.  I am on the lookout for rats, alas.

This photo shows the gorgeous bourbon applesauce cake sent me in lieu of tea and sympathy by my college friend Mary of Ohio. Yikes. Mary and I have been friends for thirty-seven years which is totally impossible!

The cake arrived today, but I'm a bit afraid to dive into it. Mary used my old recipe and I am not an elephant. Bourbon applesauce one-bowl cake is something I used to make as a newlywed. I remember enormous men eating a piece and then saying slowly, "That didn't just have applesauce in it, did it?"  Then they would fall to the floor like elephants shot with tranquilizer guns.

D.U.E. first offense

The cake smells so earthy and wholesome, what with the wheat germ.  I'll have an observer in my art classes tomorrow while we are doing printmaking.  The observer is a parent of a student as well as a student teacher, so it would be a VBT if I fell over on the floor.



The bubonic plague will kill me first. The squirrel sat on the patio fence trying to use ESP to convince me to refill the bird-feeder. When the squirrel took a break, the ring-necked dove stood in the same place on the fence trying to guilt-trip me. I ignored them, so they called in the big guns.

Yes, the begging, pleading, cute-as-a-button junco!  I am no match for the CAABJ.  Your very wish is my command!

So I fill up the bird-feeder and the junco collects a paycheck.  The ring-neck dove pigs out.  Then the squirrel.  Then, alas, the rat.

By refilling the feeder I resumed my enabling behavior.  No little pink ears or tiny toes will make me feel better. Being a rat is a bad job, but I don't want to make it easier. Being a squirrel is just diurnal rat-being.

How are members of Congress and Presidential candidates any different than my fence-beggers?  I'm just asking...

This is the recipe for Knock Over Elephants Bourbon Applesauce Cake aka KOEBAC (and I will eat some tomorrow, Mary!):

© 2012 Nancy L. Ruder

Will there be treats?

Yes.  The world is full of treats.

Friday this little woodpecker put on a fabulous show for the children at recess and didn't even mind when small groups went closer with a teacher.  The kids were in awe. Some had heard a woodpecker before, but never seen one. Some wanted a woodpecker for their very own yard!

My condo neighbors managed to fix my mailbox, at least for the present. That was a treat to find when I got home. My computer still has mysterious issues.

We have been so busy celebrating the one hundredth day of school in the preschool classroom that we forgot to get ready for Valentine's Day. I was trying to explain XOXOX to the kids, along with the procedure for the Valentine exchange. The whole Valentine phenomenon is a mystery for many of our international families.

Arriving at my Saturday library job I was delighted to find this Lincoln Continental parked in the drive of a McMansion under construction.

What was the message here? 

Baby, you can drive my car?

A Mafia body in the trunk? 

 
A flashback to great autos I have loved? My next door neighbor in the early Sixties had a pink Continental like this, and I got to ride in it a few times, feeling like Cinderella. 

Maybe the message is just Xs and Os.

© 2012 Nancy L. Ruder

Today a different pink

I would go get some Pepto Bismal but it seems like way too much trouble. The preschoolers have shared their stomach virus, so here I am under two sweatshirts and six blankets waiting to see how the slice of toast and warm tea will sit.

Yesterday before the arrival of the intestinal insurrection, I began reading Stephen Glain's State Vs. Defense : The Battle To Define America's Empire. If I can make it through it may be as upsetting and eye-opening as The Omnivore's Dilemma.


My mom seems close. There is a busy junco out on the patio looking for soggy treats between the potted plants. The sun is finally out. Oh, now there are three juncos. It won't take many more than that to lift  Dad and fly him away.

A nurse called to tell me the skin on Dad's heels is breaking down. Hospice says this is part of the process.


© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Skinny as a rail

I should be happy as a clam. Nearly all my field guides and bird checklists are strewn on top of an open atlas.  I am reference geek girl, and I have the cape to prove it. If only my big red dictionary could join the party!

Last Thursday after a truly restoring walk near the creek at MY nature preserve, I startled a critter in the trees.  Expecting a glimpse of a quickly departing cottontail, I was surprised to gradually focus on a long-necked and slender brown bird mincing around in the underbrush.  It held its funny, short yellow tail up as it walked like the handle on a gravy boat

My photos of the mysterious bird were miserably unenlightening. No amount of zooming in or fussing with the contrast could reveal the bird's ID.  Pouring over my field guides, the bird looked like a rail, Virginia or Clapper. Scrolling the bird checklists, any rail is an unlikely visitor.  I know my kildeer and plovers, and this isn't one.  A sora?  Maybe.  Not a woodcock, I think. It does not work for Mr. E. H. Harriman of the Union Pacific Railroad.  Butch and Sundance are not dynamiting his train car.

This is my grandma, Halma Fern Burkhead Mastalir.  Skinny, but not "as a rail".  She was not a bag of bones, as she had way too much spark.  She was so skinny she was nicknamed "Slats".

Do you think E. H. Harriman would get himself killed for you - Woodcock?" To get at the safe and its money, an explosive dynamite charge blows a large hole in the wall of the railroad car, injuring Woodcock. Concerned, Butch revives the bloodied agent on the floor of the car: "Woodcock, you alright? Hey! Whatever Harriman's payin' ya, it ain't enough. 

This may be a combination of "skinny as a rake" and "thin as a rail".

© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Aerial Zucchini Circus

Of course he won't mind
When he finds that he has
A big circus behind.*

Ms. Sneelock reporting in on my big circus behind.

Okay, not that big of a behind, and a pig is not really a circus performer. The circus out back is more of a high wire act with leaping lizards and dueling hummingbirds. It's a Barnum and Bailey backyard.

Thank heaven for the three ring diversion.  This circus puts on a show every evening when I get home after work and spoon-feeding my father's supper.  Dad's decline is slow, variable,  insistent.

Life in the patio circus is speeding-bullet fast.  I transition from letting go at a snail's pace to grabbing on like lightning.

A single zucchini seed sprouted in an old Rubbermaid tub filled with good dirt.  With amazing speed the vine climbed the tomato cage nearby and began its aerial feats.

Moving past the tomato cage, it climbed a pepper plant, but kept reaching further.  I plunked a garden stake in a pot of basil.  The zucchini tendrils grabbed on.  Another stake in the marigold pot, and more tendrils grabbed for the glory.  Nearly every day, I move a pot into position, add a stake or two, and before I can say, "Ringling Brothers," the tendrils have twined around the stakes.  One of these evenings I'll surely spot a trapeze act between the stakes and vines.

In the meantime, there's a cute little insect who thinks he's a mountain goat yodeling around the zucchini blossoms. AND, the lizards are leaping! There may even be a baby zucchini in the future.

 

*If I Ran the Circus, by Dr. Seuss.








© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder