May Morning

 

   I sit in the back garden with a fragrant cup of something new, green tea with coconut, in a Surround Sound of birdsong, contemplating all the work that needs to be done here.  It's so easy to focus on the weeds, the potatoes by my feet waiting to be planted, the grass that needs to be mowed.  

Plum blossoms against the sky

But today, for maybe an hour, I will try to settle my mind, ignore the "shoulds",  and let in only the perfection of every new baby leaf, every candy-colored feather, every miracle of spring that has slowly lit up the North Country.  It is what I waited for all the long, cold winter, what I longed for when I worked 50 and 60 hour weeks -- time to relax and enjoy the garden.

   

 
  
So come sit with me, in the old wicker chair that has made it through another winter.  It's still a little chilly so you'll need a jacket and a cup of tea to warm your hands.

   An urgent-sounding house wren is checking out the three available housing choices, two of them made by my dad before he died.  Soon he will put a few sticks inside one and set about winning a lady wren, convincing her that this house is indeed the best real estate.

   Blue jays, goldfinches, mourning doves, chickadees, white throated sparrows, house finches, rose- breasted grosbeaks, and a single indigo bunting shuck seeds at the hanging feeders.  

These birds seem willing to take turns and share, but things are competivite at the grape jelly and sugar water feeders. The orchard and northern orioles, catbirds, ruby-throated hummingbirds, and robins shout and dive at each other, driving one another away, leaving the feeders swinging in the air.  

   A white-breasted nuthatch,formally dressed in his dapper blue and gray suit, scurries up and down the bark of the big ash tree searching for bugs, and a woodpecker drums in the distance.  Yellow-rumpled warblers and yellow warblers bounce and weave through the new leaves after the earliest insects.  

Spearmint

A crimson male cardinal feeds his mate sunflower seeds on the rim of the birdbath and as soon as they leave, a robin dives right in for a splashy bath.

   Two squirrels chase each other up and down everything in their path, wrestling each other like my five year old twin grandsons when one catches up to the other, then both take off again in another direction.   One has only the tiniest of tails.  Easily recognizable, he rates a name: Stumpy.  

   

   The wind ruffles the red, orange, and yellow flowers in the big hanging basket my grandsons gave me for Mothers Day.  

Strawberries

The asparagus and rhubarb grow inches overnight, and there will be roasted asparagus and something with rhubarb for dessert tonight. 

You're welcome to stay.