fishing in a river of prospects

It's like someone threw out a line, onto new waters, to see what the catch might be there. New species, new territory. So tempting to stay there, in uncharted waters! The new day starts now! That's what it felt like to consider retirement.

But of course, I had to allow myself to be reeled in a little. After all, it's odd for a person who basically likes her work to be imagining a new world of no work.

True, I also like things that lie beyond the world of work and so here I face this eternal struggle of trying to find time to do it all and failing and wanting, therefore, to release something big -- retirement --  just so I can regain something small -- like reading a book before it's due back, unread, at the library.

All day I struggle with this, trying at the same time to be the careful grader that I like to be, trying, too, not to be tempted by the outdoors where I still have plants to plant, seeds to sow.


The new face of Flickr (my photo storage place on the web) puts today's breakfast photo right next to yesterday's breakfast photo...



(here's today's)


...and I can see that they are almost identical: too cold to eat outside, same this, same that, except today Ed hasn't quite arrived yet and isn't that just so appropriate because you could say that the entire flight of retirement fancy is just a little too sudden and strange for him to consider. He's not yet ready to view me in a world of non work. I can't be surprised. Ed is a man who takes four weeks to decide which mower to buy for our overgrown quack grass which is threatening to basically rule the farmette if we don't crash it down soon. 


I force myself to stay indoors this morning. If I go out, I'll start planting again and I'll fall further behind my grading goals. So I stay inside and I brood in between exams and I make an appointment with a retirement counselor at the university which is tantamount to admitting that I need professional help to sort this stuff out.

I talk to my daughter and I throw out the idea of retirement to her and I think she is not surprised that I should throw out draconian ideas so suddenly, without lead up, without due consideration. She knows me for too long.

She reminds me that I could, for example, mull over this idea for another year. Still, I pout at that. I'm not good at wait and see. Even as I understand that this would be the sane approach.

A friend who is a former student and also happens to be prompt with email gets to hear the retirement frenzy. She suggests that I go down a bit in work rather than go out totally and be done with it with no turning back.

I consider it but I know I'm not giving it a full consideration. It's a rational and sane idea, except that it's not how I proceed in life. When I'm in my teaching zone, I am completely wrapped up in that world, devoted to it -- it rules my existence and steers my days. I wasn't (it turns out) great at splitting my devotion between raising kids and promoting my career (I'll let you guess which world dominated my waking hours when the girls were small) and I would not be good at splitting time between being a retired person and being a prof. One or the other, not both.

Still, I put on the brakes just a little. For one thing, it's distracting me from getting my work done now.


In the late afternoon, I finally need that pause from grading. I need the smell of May air and so I walk the farmette land and admire the new blooms...






...and it's lovely to admire new blooms because despite the utter plushness of the yard...






...we are at that inbetween season when not too many things are blooming just yet. Early spring is over, late spring and summer have not yet begun. Irises are the bridges between the two and my bridges are budding and exploding right about now.


In the early evening we ride down to the Farmer's Market. Past the fields of Farmer Lee, where everything is just so orderly and precise -- so different than our own wacky world of random plantings and spontaneous garden sprawl.





At the market we pick up the usual breads and cheeses and spring asparagus...






They are the foods that set supper for tonight. We eat it late because -- would you believe it -- the temps are heading back down into the thirties again! No frost, but cold enough to be another hard blow to our struggling tomatoes. We cover them somewhat, but I think we are reconciled to the possibility of having to start afresh next week. Our seedlings look like they would very much like to give up the ship if we would just admit to failure and move on. Maybe. We'll decide that one over the weekend. Unlike retirement, replanting decisions require very careful thought and deliberation.





After supper, Ed dozes and I wish I could just do the same except I'm on a schedule: I post now so that I can pick up on work early tomorrow, with a pause to grocery shop for the week and, if I'm on schedule, to plant and weed, and then the day will disappear quickly, and that's not a bad thing, no not at all, except I am at a point in life when I do not want days to disappear quickly anymore.

the yards of others, continued

My plan was to front load all of last semester's work, so that I could take a June break, before starting the preparation for next semester's stuff shortly after.

The plan's not working. May is the planting season. I cannot abandon the garden now. And, too, after an excellent start to grading, I stalled. Became contemplative. Wondered why I was killing myself in this way. Thought maybe I should retire.

All in the space of one day.

And there was more: my office neighbors (holding a variety of law school responsibilities -- administration, teaching, public relations) took me out for a birthday lunch. These are my buddies in the true sense of the word. They are the people to whom I bring day-to-day stories. If I would crash on rosie or go to class with a shirt unbuttoned (by accident), they would know. And now here we are, eating lunch, recounting the drama of life and it strikes me then and there -- I should retire soon.

There are no photos to commemorate this kind of a day.

Oh sure, for the sake of balance, there is breakfast. Inside. It rained and it was cool-ish and it was just easier that way.





Then, the lunch, more slow moving contemplative work at home and finally, long after daylight became a muted faded thing, I planted. Odd plants acquired from another person's yard today. Spindly clumped balls of not much, but the seller was so earnest and the price so low, that I offered to take home one clump and got (saddled with) five instead.

regifting

These days I never get things I don't need or love. My family is small, my gift giving circle of friends is small too and if the rare gift is given, it's with thought and understanding. One of the more recent gifts that came my way was with a message -- if you don't like it or have it already, regift it.

I thought about this tonight as Ed and I got in the car to raid another garden. This one, just north of Madison boasted (on Craigs list) over a hundred perennials dug up from the owner's yard and the prices were minimal. It's as if making money is not the point.

Ed asks often -- why don't you just divide your own old plants, instead of looking for new ones? I do divide! But as long as we expand gardening space at the rate that we do, there will be room for even more.

Our evening ride to pick out bits and pieces of perennials from the yard of Joel (thank you, Joel!) is beautiful: the colors are warm, the air is perfect.





The day was to bring storms, but it didn't do that. It brought calm. A guilty calm, because we know that others do not share in it.

But if it is that -- a guilty calm -- then it comes with an obligation: to share, to regift, as it were -- out of the abundance that will soon flood our gardens.


In other news -- well, the non news of breakfast on the porch...






... a walk to the new orchard, to inspect the young trees and to be rewarded with a bloom on one of them...






...and then, back on the porch for exam grading...






...with an occasional break to plant a flower...





...and finally the evening ride for the plants, and the return, home again, in the honey glow of a late spring evening.

Monday

We did not have the horrific storms that whipped through the states to the south of us. Still, it was a strange night of calm, then high winds and hail, thunder, more hail, then calm again. How does this even make sense? How can the winds rage then calm down so quickly, only to rage again? Or, is it that I've forgotten how irregular and unpredictable a day can be?

Even as at the farmette, routines do not vary much.

I like it that way.

Morning: porch.





(I'm not eating much: I have a breakfast date downtown.)

Then I take a few minutes to chop down rhubarb for my urban girl and her fiance -- they're returning to Chicago today and rhubarb from the farmette is a good thing to stick in the back seat of their car.





How well I remember the days when my grandma wrapped foods and lilac blooms in newspaper and handed them to us as we were getting ready to pull out of the village yard at the end of the weekend... A sack of farmette rhubarb hardly compares to the baked goods and farm foods my grandma had ready for us. But the sentiment is the same. Take this. Take part of my world with you...

My girls, their guys and I meet downtown for a quick meal.











The words rise and swirl around the table and I'm thinking -- if they only knew how different the orbit of a younger person is from that of a... senior! How at some point, you no longer lead, you scramble to keep up. I see it in the way that they move from one topic to the next. They're not surprised that usually, I find myself just listening.  Learning from each other is quite different at this age: they learn from those who are older in quiet ways, whereas I learn from them overtly. In your face learning: Show me how you use your iPhone map function... What do you mean by [insert new to me term of art here]?

Before they take off for wherever it is that they're heading next, we make a detour to a garden center. The urban couple is picking out a few plants for their apartment deck. Here, finally, I can be of help. That needs sun. Mix this soil with what you have. This one will bloom abundantly, all summer long!

And still, I leave them alone to make their own selections. It's funner sometimes to proceed without all relevant information.





And then they're off.

And I'm off too. Rosie and I twist our way on the back roads until we are at the farmette again. There, I read exactly one exam before Ed, the person who knows too well how best  to distract me, reads out loud about hosta plants on Craigs list. Are you interested? -- he asks, as if he didn't know the answer.

We drive up to south Madison where a guy, in his retirement, grows and sells hostas. It is an impressive collection!





We linger and compare growing stories and talk hostas and mulches and all that stuff that people who get their hands dirty with soil like to review with others.

We pick out some -- the cheapest possible -- and we return home. And now I have more planting and moving and dividing to do. I plunge right into it and before I know it, day is done, gone the sun...





Supper is my usual plates of leftovers.

Most likely, you're thinking this is it. The sun has set, the air is pleasantly cooler. They say storms are in the forecast again, but they can't mean it (can they?). No, the work is not done after all. Ed and I go outside. A truckload of wood chips is to arrive at dawn (we are the go-to dumping ground for several companies that look for ways to dispose of shredded trees). We make room for them. And, too, I plant a few hostas.

As we walk back to the farmhouse, I tell Ed about the next big project we should undertake... and the one after that...

May promises

My sister, in Poland right now, writes and tells me what's blooming at the moment. Her list of the most prolific flowering stuff is not unlike my list. Until she mentions the flowering trees: acacia, linden... Yes, I remember the scents from my childhood. But I see neither tree on this side of the ocean.

Though who could complain! The world outside is full of heady scents right now! And the perennials! Scented or otherwise, surely they're coming into their period of full glory!

So, do you mind? A post emphasizing the blooms of the second half of May. But first -- breakfast. And yes, today it's the two of us. On the porch.







Now, swing the screen door open -- never mind the squeak, it's part of the charm! -- and step outside.

There is the shade garden by the brick path. In it, the ever dainty yet hardy as anything aquilegia (columbine) is now coming into its peak blooming time.






And in the front border -- one that I wold call sunny, even though it has its hours of partial shade -- the coreopsis is starting its season (some people call it tickseed). I have many many variations on the coreopsis theme in various parts of the yard. This one happened to be the first to bloom.






Okay, that's fine and pretty, but can the most intensely aromatic flower please take a bow? Come on lilac -- you know you're the star right now!






We're saying good bye to the daffodils. Most are spent already, but occasionally, a hidden gem shows her face -- this one, among the ferns.






Back to my shade garden: not blooming yet, but still, I would say at their most beautiful form are the emerging hostas.






And yes, they're wet because we had quite the stormy downpour this afternoon. But before I get to that, I have to give a nod to the flowers in the pots, because surely, right now -- the pansies need a quick admiring glance.






So back to the weather details: first, it snowed a May snow. (Of petals, silly reader. We are done with the cold stuff!)  This may well be my favorite canvas depicting the sheep shed path, so do stare at it for a while, okay?





I took maybe a dozen shots of this very same spot today and truly, there isn't much difference between any of the photos -- a reassuring confirmation that I wanted to depict just this small little piece of heaven, nothing else.


What did we work on today, Ed and I? We trenched the hose, leading it toward the orchard. I would have pressed us to finish the whole task this afternoon, because the young fruit trees, the tomatoes, the grape vines -- they all needed water, but then the storms came and we stopped trenching and I thought -- isn't it great when nature intervenes and does the job for us every once in a while...

Other tasks? I graded. 'Nuf said.


In the evening, my older girl and her husband came over for supper...


 


... and it was our first supper outdoors on the porch and it was about as perfect as you could have it, what with the fading sunlight, the heady lilacs and all those other elements of the good month, the kind month, the month of promise.






Promise... of what?  -- you could ask. Of good and kind moments. Of beauty during periods of unexpected drama. Of pleasure -- sensual pleasure. That's a May promise. She always, without failure, delivers. It's what we look forward to every year. It's what keeps us going.

mother's day

This morning, if you were to look outside from the porch, you'd see this:





And from the other end, were you to stand on the sheep shed path and look toward the porch, you'd see this:





I put these two photos up for several reasons, though not at all because either of us so much as sat down for a second on the porch today. Mainly, I want to say that to me, this is what hope looks like. I mean, remember Ocean photos from a month ago? I did not think spring would ever come. And now, it's as if those cold, flowerless, leafless months belong to another epoch. So much good can come in the space of one month. We should remember that during the drab cold days of prespring (or pre anything).


Another reason for posting many many photos of the farmhouse now is that I always think building structures set in a flowering landscape look their finest in May. The light's good, the greens are warm and not yet dusty. This is the time to go nuts with the camera. May is a very photogenic month! So much so that I have to say, it's almost unfair how ravishing the landscape is right now. I mean, come on, May -- wouldn't you like to spread your wealth onto the other months?


It's Mother's Day for me today. My little one and her fiance are here from Chicago and we're all to go out to brunch. But before we set out (and while the young ones are still sleeping) Ed and I head down to the new orchard. Now's the time to finish planting the grape vines.


 


A few hours later, we're done. The young orchard gets a proper vote of approval from the visiting urban pair. They walk the farmette land with me and we talk about future plans -- theirs, mine...






And now we're downtown at El Dorado -- the younger pair, along with my older girl and her husband...


 


... and the ever impish Ed...





And yes, there are presents (any time I dress decently, you can assume that what  I'm wearing is a a gift from daughters) and good foods and best of all, there's laughter. If I passed on anything to my girls it is the joy of sitting down together for a meal. As often as possible.


Afternoon. The kids have their various activities and Ed and I return to the farmette. I have the post-rain weeding to do and, too, we finish putting tomatoes in place.

Evening comes. Ed and I take stock.





We had started trenching a hose for the new orchard. That project needs to be completed. And, too, I still have seeds of annuals to throw on the new flower bed. Tomorrow. Or the next day. We check off one item from the list but add two new ones. The thing about living at the farmette is that the list can never be entirely without items on it. Even as the landscape is glorious now, at this very moment -- so very lush and abundant in that blush of full spring -- we cannot ever sit back and let it be. There will always be jobs to be done, improvements to be made, plants needing our attention.





And that's a good thing.

bounce around

There's been a bit of a wild spin to this year, don't you think? I can't say that I'm used to linear progressions, but the recent months have had somewhat of a crazy run. Weather, family, work and anything else I deem important, have not stayed on the calm side of the equation.

So according to that formula, if yesterday was hot and physically grueling, today should be cool and more cerebral and stationary. And it was. All of that.

Breakfast -- you're thinking maybe that it was lovely? No, it was rather disjointed. We had had a number of significant distractions in the early morning and neither of us paid attention to the time and suddenly it was late. Ed ate hurriedly...





...then I ate, somewhat pensively...





...and then it was just a question of getting things done -- working, cleaning, weekly grocery restocking, etc etc and then getting myself over to the graduation ceremonies for out law students.





Watching these "kids" sail forth is always significantly moving for me. Most of my students will disappear from my radar screen pretty quickly. Every now and then, one will morph into being a good friend. I thought of all that today as I attended the celebrations. I smiled along with all those who came to applaud the graduates' successes.





And the winds howled and the temperatures dropped some twenty degrees and I can't say that I was surprised anymore.






At home, I finished cleaning inside and I clipped some flowers -- lilacs for the kitchen table and a small bouquet of lilies of the valley. The photo of this little bunch is for my friend, a former student, yes, but definitely a friend now. Something tells me she could use a whiff of sweetness now. For you, pal.

trees and vines

Breakfast on the porch? 
Maybe we should finish working with the tomatoes first. Such a beautiful morning... Ed opens the front door. What's this? On the brick pathway, someone made an early morning delivery: the last batch of orchard trees. And a set of grape vines.

So it'll be another planting day. Good timing! I'm between grading two sets of exams. We have wood chips stacked high under the willow (we use them for weed and moisute control). The weather is brilliant. A confluence of good factors.

And yet, we're slow in getting started. We spend a lot of time looking at the magnificent burst of flowers on the old trees lining the sheep shed path. We look carefully to see if there are bees working the fruit blossoms.





I need to look for newly flowering perennials.





Then, Ed is distracted by tractor photos on the Internet (he's looking for a zero turn for mowing). And I see that the daffodils need deadheading.





So now he's ready but I'm not. And then I'm ready but he's not. By the time we set out with our fruit trees, vines and shovels, the sun is more than just a pleasant caress of warm air. It is a hot slap on the back. You want summer? Happy to oblige! By early afternoon it'll be in the mid eighties, but when you're digging clay soil, it feels like it's in the nineties from the get go.

Not that we are yet digging. Walking to the new orchard, I point out how many limbs of our second giant willow are brittle. They will eventually fall to the ground, but in the meantime, they are not pretty and you could argue that they pose some hazard to anyone passing through (does anyone actually pass through here?). Ed takes out the pole with the saw and we go at it. Trimming off one branch turns into trimming off all the ones within reach. Aided now by a power saw...






 ...and then again by the pole saw.





The willow looks better, but now we need a break and that's before even one new fruit tree has been planted in the ground.

For the rest of the hot hours of the day though, we do work on the planting of our orchard. We have five new trees to put in and -- this is a new one for us -- eight grapes. No, no. Not for wine! Leave that effort to people who know what they're doing. These are going to yield munching grapes. But I do have images of a beautiful row of vines, pruned and trained, climbing artistically along a trellis...

For now, it's grueling work. The grapes, which we save 'til the end, are even worse than the baby trees because the vine roots are larger, longer, requiring bigger holes and spaces of cultivated soil. We dig, break up clumps of soil, pull out quack grass...





...and in the end, we cannot finish the job.

It's getting late and we still have pressing errands to run and our local market to visit. Ah well,  the last three grapes will have to wait.

(At the local farmers' market,  for us, it's all about the cheese curds and the asparagus...)





Alright, day is almost done. The last hours are devoted to the terribly unphotogenic run to Farm and Fleet for work gloves, hose pieces, and a broom. And Menards for more hose pieces (Ed will be running a water source toward the orchard and veggie patch -- a great relief, as right now, we have to lug buckets of water to tide things over when the rains don't come). Both of these stores are places where Ed feels at home. At Farm and Fleet he remembers that he needs a new belt and oil for his motorcycle (I can't think of another store where you can pick up at once hose parts, car oil, and a new belt for your pants). At Menrads, we spend a great deal of time staring at PVC fittings.

And so we get home rather on the late side. Past any decent hour to cook a good meal. Oh, but wait -- we have the curds, the asparagus and a baguette from the market. And chives from the garden. An easy and perfect supper. After a hard and yet perfect as well day.