Delights of May

The air has been perfect for the last few days -- not to warm, not too cool, lightly scented with pine and young grass and sweet flowers. The mulberry tree has enough leaves to produce a brocade of light and shadow. Though winds have been blowing in the valley, here it is all wooded stillness, broken only by the afternoon buzzing of bees and the evening songs of crickets, and the occasional chirping of birds. Cats laze in sunny spots, setting the tone for the whole drowsing town. An afternoon walk brought me to the bright green field along the rapidly diminishing creek where, in reedy pools, frogs croaked. The edge of the wood is lit with the yellow blossoms of Scottish broom. Pale blue-green leaves of manzanita are now sharing their space with the plant's shiny berries, green streaked with red. For the moment, it is as though spring had not been delayed. These few mild days which pass with such stately calm, before the rising heat of summer browns the fields and wilts the flowers, are those in which I like to linger, leaving all but essential tasks undone. When nature is at its most profuse, it is good to simplify all else. The bees will make their honey regardless of what I do. I will sit and watch the bees.

At a Loss

Moon halfway across the sky, and the songbirds about to wake. Little more than a month remains of spring, which leaves me feeling a bit displaced. This odd year is almost half gone. At the moment, I feel like grasping it by its midsection and shaking it into some semblance of normality. Well.

As Juno continues to withhold LJ notifications from my inbox, I shall spend some time this afternoon crafting an irate e-mail to them. I've been pondering just how irate it ought to be. Since this is merely the first letter (see how pessimistic I am -- I'm assuming one will be insufficient), perhaps I should be merely irked. Save the righteous indignation for some later missive. Then on to fuming outrage. Yes, that would probably be best.

Again, as I continue to be at a loss for my traditional word jewelery, I post another picture from last month. This one is merely a hillside with a bunch of trees on it. Soon, most likely, it will be covered by a house. Many vacant lots in the area are currently being graded in preparation for new construction. The empty hills are rapidly vanishing, so it is appropriate that I memorialize one here.

( Rise )

Hotter

This evening, I got my first mosquito bite of the year. It's on my left wrist bone, so it looks almost as large as it feels. It is terribly itchy, and heated. I didn't even hear the mosquito. All of a sudden, there was an itchy red welt. At least it wasn't a bee sting. I manage to avoid those most years, but the mosquito bites have plagued me for as long as I can remember. I seldom get through the season without several dozen of them. That's one of the reasons I'm fond of frogs and bats. Anything that eats mosquitoes is good.

While there is no shortage of mosquitoes, I have yet to see a single butterfly this year. Moths are beginning to congregate around the porch light at night, but their bright, sun-loving lepidoptrian cousins are conspicuous by their absence. I miss them. True, this was the first day of the season which could be called hot, so there is yet time for the butterflies to appear, but I'm beginning to worry about them.

Still not getting LJ confirmations from Juno, and LJ itself is still making me wonder who I have to blow to get a page to open around here. Between that, and Sluggo's heat-related conniptions, I'm not getting much done here. Well, I'll leave my windows open to the cool night, and sometime after midnight Sluggo ought to be cool enough for me to catch up.