Friday, April 19, 2024

What Lies Within Us

 


Type, backspace, type, backspace, type, backspace… I might as well go back to bed at this rate.  It’s come to my attention, by me, that I lack that vibrance that sets me apart from six feet under. 

I’m sitting at the deck table after toting the laptop, laptop stand, mouse, foam support with the keyboard, three cushions (Falling backwards and landing on my tailbone – don’t ask 😒), foot stool, reading glasses, one glass of ice water, and cellphone, in case I take a spill, haha.

I’m not looking forward to the hour when I wrap it all up, the hour just before the cockroaches under the deck start eyeing the sliding screen door’s sliver of space as the entrance into Yvonne’s inner sanctum. 

I’ve grown accustom to these little creatures that bring dread to this being when spied - not outside, but inside. 
 

There seems to be plenty of examples lately:  

(1) a cockroach in my kitchen, caught in the act as I flipped on the light switch - drats!  Disappeared, but next morning it appeared to have been a cat toy and was begging for a toilet flush right out of existance. 

(2) opened the knife drawer and both I and that dance-all-over-the-silverware bugger were completely surprised. 

(3) the one upside down in the bathtub taking a siesta was easy-peasy to take down. 

(4) climbing into bed with calming music, and a cockroach on the ceiling over my head enjoying the peacefulness of my bedtime routine.

Let’s just say I’m not a fan of living with tiny things that know no boundaries.

Wow!  That’s quite a mouthful of things.  I hope you didn’t nod off for a quick snooze.  I was going to just say things that know no boundaries, but I live with cats 😏, need I say more. 

Anyway… back to my dilemma.  I’m so afraid of falling down, and for good reason; I seem to have made the four walls of my adobe my prison, and the garden the prison yard.  I so need to change this, but to what?

Okay… change of scenery to this very moment as a frog is croaking loudly by the dogwood tree that was watered earlier in the day due to temperatures in the 80’s F and no rain for a while.  I may hear it, but finding it seems to be impossible this day.

Wind is picking up, lifting the canopy above me, jerking the umbrella back and forth as it announces the weather is changing, with rain in the forecast by morning.  We shall see.

A carpet of last year’s leaves and a handful of freshly plucked weeds from the deck pot of common sage are at my feet as I step out from under the umbrella to view the sky.  It’s the temptation every gardener has when they view work that has not yet been done.  I just couldn’t help myself when I hit a lull in my writing.  A bit of dirt under the nails never hurts any writer.

Last summer my husband saw two opossums, each one on a different segment of the road through the subdivision to our home, hit by a car.  We had no more visits to our feeder, so we assumed they probably were our regular visitors.

We were pleasantly surprised to find near the end of April this year, another opossum has found our feeder.  Isn’t it funny how a little thing as simple as this can make someone so very happy.

Vic has brought dinner from Arby’s, as we aren’t too hungry; then the birdbaths and feeder will be refreshed.  A little red wagon would sure come in handy to cart all this paraphernalia and bric-a-brac back inside to my writing room… the room where thoughts are rarely put to print.

From this little bird who feels like she’s living in a cage tweeting away; life is just days, weeks, months and years slipping away; so I guess Mr. Emerson said it best.

“What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.”

Love You. 




Wildflower hunting during early spring car ride


Not clear enough to be sure what wildflower this is.





Bent tree limbs with dogwood growing underneath.


Fern-leaf Scorpion-weed, Phacelia bipinnatifida 





Mayapples, Podophyllum peltatum














In the garden...



Upper Photo: Blue Jay
Lower Photo: Common Grackles


I scare away any large flocks that roost in the trees 
to feed in the feeder.
We always have a smaller flock that stays during the summer.








North America Wild Hyacinth


Christmas Fern Fronds uncurling 


Redbud Tree





My Trusty Side-kick 😎





Mockingbird with Mourning Dove


Incoming Goldfinch
joining House Finches and Mourning Dove





Female Cardinal


American Robin


Pregnant
She will sit in the feeder for half an hour, eating.


Bird Watching


Is there an end in site?


Nope!


Above Photo
Celandine Poppy, Stylophorum diphyllum
Below Photo
"My Mary' Azalea











These Trilliums were rescued from a garden being destroyed,
so I think a Prairie Trillium, Trillium recurvatum


Large flower Bellwort, Uvularia grandiflora








Pallids Dalmatica Iris
Grape candy fragrance





Lonicera sempervirens Honeysuckle


Fothergilla Gardenii





Eastern Columbine


I think this is Little Sweet Betsy, Trillium cuneatum,
also rescued from a garden being destroyed.


Layers of Flowers


Type of wild geranium





Blackhaw Viburnium flower petals fallen into the bird bath.


Monarda bradburianaBeebalm-Eastern, Bergamot
Grown in tall double-walled pots.











After flowering, 
the leaves will hang down the sides of the pots as they grow.


Convergent Lady Beetle, Hippodamia convergens












This Post is Linked to:



I know these photos are out of focus,
but does anyone know what this bird is?
It appeared to be larger than a Robin.




28 comments:

  1. Hi Yvonne, beautiful flowers, birds and squirrel in your garden. I like the blue jay. Have a nice weekend ! Greetings Caroline

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    1. Hi Caroline, the Blue Jay is a favorite of mine, also. I just checked out your blog and found another lovely video. It is so relaxing watching the birds with a background of waves.

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  2. Always a sheer volume of nature photos to go through. Great post

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    1. I can't help myself :) I'm glad you enjoyed it all.

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  3. ...this is a fabulous spring journey, but being a woody plant guy, the Fothergilla Gardenii is my favorite.

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    1. She is a beauty, and the fall color is so radiant in the garden.

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  4. Hello,
    You have a nice variety of birds in your garden. Beautiful flowers too.
    I think your mystery bird is a Brown-headed Cowbird. Great photos. Take care, have a wonderful day and a happy weekend.

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    1. You are right, as I looked it up and it is the female. I've never seen one before. She flew off, so who knows if I will see her again. Thank you, and I'm wishing you a wonderful weekend also.

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  5. Thanks for the marvelous photos! I hope you find an answer to your dilemma.

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    1. I hope so too. Thank you for stopping by. I'm glad you enjoyed the photos.

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  6. It's lovely to see nature hit hard with the beauty after winter (which usually isn't all that lovely!). Gorgeous photos of the birds and of the beautiful blooms. You clearly have more gardening talent and dedication than I. I had to laugh at your cockroach story. Your uninvited guests are bugs. Mine is Stuart Little. I've never seen him -- just the calling cards he leaves behind, usually by Lizzie's food dish. I'm glad you have an opossum friend! Happy weekend!

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  7. Your mystery bird at the end is a female Brown-headed Cowbird. As for the Common Grackles shown earlier, they are very handsome, underrated and under-appreciated.

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  8. Beautiful quote by Emerson! I might go for some wildflower spotting this weekend. Thank you for the reminder. The blue on the Grackles head is gorgeous. I wonder if I can find that in my paint palette.

    -Soma

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  9. Wow, Yvonne! You weren't kidding about a mouthful! It sounds like you have a lot going on - the fear of falling, the frustration with the cockroaches, the love of nature. But you also have a beautiful garden and a supportive husband. Emerson's quote is a great one - maybe focusing on what you find joy in within yourself, like your garden or birdwatching, can help you break free from your self-imposed prison.

    Those pictures are fantastic, by the way!

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  10. but you put this to print, you deserve a pat on the back for that!! we have seen many opossum in our yard, they are quite a nuisance i find!! your images are really beautiful both the birds and the flowers!! emerson's quote is quite a fabulous one...take care and try to have a good weekend!!

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  11. Getting to sit outside can really revive us and give us those good feelings we can only get from the great outdoors. I hope you enjoy your time outside and have a good weekend!

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  12. Hello Yvonne :=)
    Because of our mutual love of nature, and our confined way of living due to our pain, our fear of falling, and our frustration caused at not being able to garden I understand you more than you can imagine. I don't get cockroaches in my home, but I do get Centipedes which are intrusive in Spring and they make the hairs on my arms stand up and my heart beat faster with a deep dislike of these long legged fast running arthropods. Your garden visitors at your feeders are a joy to see, and you get a great variety of lovely birds. There are no opossums in Portugal, but I know what they look like, and it must be great to see one in your garden. It is the little things which give us the most pleasure Yvonne, and the best things in life are free. Your garden flowers are all beautiful. What lies within us is love, lots of love, which you have in abundance
    All the best
    Sonjia.

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  13. Dearest Yvonne,
    did I understand correctly that you are not only afraid of falling, but that you actually fell on your tailbone? This hurts like hell, I really hope you feel better soon. You're in enough pain as it is.
    Oh dear, cockroaches, they are a nuisance. We have had an invasion of rice bugs here since last year ( https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gr%C3%BCne_Reiswanze ) that wanted to overwinter in our house... Since they are agricultural and garden pests, they are in the toilet drowned by us.

    I just learned something new: I wanted to tell you that I have never seen (livings) opossums in the wild and that I only knew the (now deceased) cross-eyed opossum Heidi from the Internet ( https://strongacct.blogspot.com/2011/01/heidi-cross- eyed-opossum.html ), but that unfortunately I saw opossums that had been killed in Australia by cars. To be on the safe side, I looked online to see if opossums occur naturally in Australia or were introduced there - and learned that "Australian possums" (z.B. Kusus) are not the same species as US opossums (Didelphis)...
    I'm glad you're interested in my travel report. As for our route - we saw the Colorado River several times, but we didn't drive through Colorado. Just through parts of California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah - and then by plane to New York...
    Hugs and all the best, Traude
    https://rostrose.blogspot.com/2024/04/weltreise-2024-1-station-singapur.html
    PS: Beautiful nature photos. I'm particularly excited about your photo of the Blue Jay!

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  14. I’m content with all the flowers, greens, and birds captured so nicely by you. Nature has the power to help our soul be set free.

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  15. Yvonne,

    Your post paints a vivid picture of your daily life and surroundings—it's quite the tableau of personal reflections mixed with the minutiae of everyday existence! The struggle with the mundane, the encounter with nature (and the not-so-welcome nature in the form of cockroaches), alongside the simplicity of enjoying moments like spotting a new visitor at your feeder, all weave into the rich tapestry of life’s experience. Your posts are a great read and your photos are a joy. Thanks for sharing and for your kind comments on my blog.

    John

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  16. What beautiful photos these are.
    I love the Blue Jay and the Common Grackles.
    Your bird feeder is also very nice, they will thank you for it, but the squirrel knows where to find it too.
    Falling on your tailbone is really terrible, I can talk about it, 48 years ago I had an accident in which my tailbone was torn and I still suffer from it.
    Greetings Irma

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  17. Marvelous captures of our feathered friends and the flora! Interesting note at the outset.

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  18. Your garden is a sanctuary filled with beautiful flowers and birds, Yvonne.
    I couldn't help but chuckle at your encounter with cockroaches. I have a phobia of them - nasty little buggers!

    Amazing photos as always, Yvonne!

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  19. Blue Jays are regular visitors at our yards.... love their sounds.
    Thank you for sharing series of beautiful photos.

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  20. Wow! Wonderful series of nature blooming photos ~ you have quite a photographic eye ~ thanks

    Wishing you good health, laughter and love in your days,
    A ShutterBug Explores,
    aka (A Creative Harbor)

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  21. You are exactly spot on with your lovely words, and thoughts, and the forest photos and brightly yellow blossoms sure speaks volumes to it all! Every photo is priceless. Thank you for sharing.

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