Tuesday - 39th

Tomorrow is Earth Day. You know that, right? April 22nd. The day before it (meaning today) happens to be my birthday. So, celebrate, right? But celebrate what? Surely not the headlines we read in the paper these days. Celebrate reaching 67. Celebrate life!

Life, with all its riches, hurdles and complexities. With its loves and tears and calamities. And flowers and seasons and families and friends. Beautiful, precious life.






It's sunny here, in Wisconsin. I'm not surprised. I was born in the northern hemisphere, and I continue to live "up north," where late April days often have blasts of sunshine. But today it's so sunny that a prudent person might dab on sunscreen if she decided to spend a lot of time outdoors. But that's not me today. I have too much to do and it is a tad too cold. A high of 48F (9C).

Even before breakfast (well, our breakfast), Primrose checks in from Chicago.






She is all sweetness and song and watching her romp and play and listening to her explain her world to me is totally grand.






Okay. Ed! Breakfast time! This morning, I jump into the photo frame. You make allowances for yourself on your birthday. (Crab apple branches from our big crab tree are blooming in the vase!)






The rest of my morning is with Snowdrop and Sparrow at their house.










Birthdays are exciting to kids even when they are not their own special days. They love to give!






And present opening -- this is thrilling to a five year old, if only for the delightful tearing up of paper and rescuing a pretty ribbon.






Oh, the sweet little ones in my life! Facing everything that's fragile bravely and with such enthusiasm!





My daughters always treat me royally on my birthday and I have to admit that this is stupendously wonderful, especially this year. In such a strange and tough time, you feel you do not have permission to be happy. It's not the emotion that rises to the surface easily when there is so much distress in the broader community. Nonetheless, I'm willing to open the door to a feeling of peace. Of appreciation for all that's so very good out there.  I'm still trudging along, my beloved family is fine, my friends are looking for ways to stay close despite it all.


I drive up the farmette road just as Natalie (from Natalie's Greenhouses) is making a delivery of annuals for farmette planting (and baskets for the porch). Such beautiful colors!






I'll put them into their pots, but not today. The running refrain is the same ditty sung again and again, all day long -- too cold, too little time.






In the late afternoon, I visit with Primrose once more. It's her snack time and the little girl worries that I seem to not have had my own strawberries delivered yet, even as she enjoys hers.






(she asks for birthday candles so that we can "blow them out" together...)





The strawberries are coming, little one! Indeed, surprisingly, our weekly food delivery request, put in yesterday, brought up a drop off time today, so I'll be washing groceries soon -- a most unusual birthday activity, don't you think?

Somewhere in the middle of all this, Ed hands me a card. I truly have to smile at this. In past years, he would go to the store with me and agonize over which card to get -- one that was gushy enough to please me, yet succinct enough to represent his true non-emoting self. This year proved to be a challenge. No store trip. I eased it somewhat by giving him a stack of blank cards to choose from. He chose the sheep, wrote his sweet words inside -- done!






Evening. What food for a birthday meal? A lovely slab of salmon from our Alaska fishing crew, some perhaps slightly wilted asparagus, and Minnesotan wild rice. And wine and leftover cake and the one saved chocolate from the box Ed purchased for me, for us, back on Valentine's Day.









Such different times they were! But really, the essentials are the same: the love you feel from those who care about you, the beauty of this planet, that glorious sunshine, and added to it -- the spring flowers, the sweet voices of children singing happy birthday to you...

Celebrate life!

With so much love.

Monday - 38th

A string is a string and I foretold you that we would have a string of three: glorious sunny days, wonderfully brilliant days, ones that give meaning and luster to outdoor work.

I start off with animal care. This is only hard in the winter. Right now, a run back and forth between the barn, sheep shed and farmhouse is actually thrilling. It offers an opportunity to take it all in! All that spring stuff!






And I actually do that run several times, because we decided that the spinach, planted a while back, desperately needs water. I lug a watering can from farmhouse hose to the veggie patch, back and forth, several times. It's good, happy work.

(picking fallen daffodils along the way)






Breakfast.






The kids are here once more. It is still a little cool outside, but I coax them to at least try out my new path in the Big Bed.






I'll say this -- Snowdrop appreciates the daintiness of stepping from one flat wooden disc to the next. Sparrow doesn't quite see the point. Why not just wander around the bed itself?






Careful, little guy! Maybe we should venture out to more open spaces!






Inside, we read, then the kids draw.












And pretty quickly, it's lunchtime. (Snowdrop demonstrates blowing to her brother. He appreciates the attention if not, perhaps, the cool bursts of wind in his face.)






After the kids leave, I again dabble in the garden. Not much new stuff to plant yet. My Flower Factory purchases wont be picked and boxed for curbside buying until next weekend. Other stuff, too, appears on hold. Somewhat desperate to move things along, I call one of my favorite day lily growers (Oakes, out in Tennessee) asking them if my lilies are on the way (I had requested a mid April delivery). The salesperson speaks to me (with an exquisitely southern speech pattern) sympathetically -- why, you're in Wisconsin, aren't you?
I am...
Well now, it's cold up there! We wouldn't want to ship so far north until your freezing weather is done!

People have such funny ideas about our state.

I assure her I'm ready for her lilies.
Alright then. Maybe next week.
I want to tell her by then our growing season may be nearing an end (haha)! Ah well. A grower needs to be patient.


Evening. Last moments of being 66. Usually, one is tempted to reflect on the year gone by. I resist it this time around. The fact is, I consider myself to have been immensely lucky. There is a global crisis in place right now, yet my family is doing okay: no one is sick. I am on the same retired person's income as before. Ed and I have cheepers that lay eggs and flower beds that deliver a riot of color each year. All that is so good! 

We eat a supper of leftovers, feeling grateful. For all that has not gone awry. And so very very grateful to those who under the most difficult and stressful conditions continue to work hard to keep us all healthy and well fed.

With love.

Sunday - 37th

There's no question -- a day like this one deserves star billing. Brilliant sunshine, maybe a little cool (56F, or 13C), but you don't really need a jacket to go outside (so long as you keep moving about). And you can almost see the push from the plants and flowers: a week ago, they were mere stubs in the ground. Right now, they're splendid and strong!






(Happy, chasing a hen onto the picnic table. He really does have the majestic tail!)





So it's a given that this will be a gorgeous spring day. But there's more: it happens to be the beginning of a birthday celebration.

Initially, I was thinking that this coming birthday of mine should pass by quietly, without fuss and without much attention. Ed was okay with that! But my daughters protested. And so I reconsidered. Okay: let's do something small. Maybe a toast to happiness on the day itself (later in the week) and on this Sunday, so long as the young family is coming to dinner, let's do a cake! Ed, how are your baking skills?

After breakfast...






... I clean the farmhouse, he bakes. (He got some direction from Snowdrop as to what flavors should dominate: citrus! The recipe? As usual for him, something from somewhere on the internet, modified by his own views on how to do this efficiently. He's a "put it all in one bowl" kind of baker.)






I do help butter the bundt pan. I've used this baby long enough to know that if you don't reach the crevices exactly so, your cake will stick. But the rest -- it's all Ed. Orange, with lemon glaze.






Cake ready. We go outside.






I have a packet of dianthus seeds that can go into a pot, but otherwise, I haven't anything new to add today. So I continue to weed, chip and prepare. All the pots are now ready for new arrivals. Most of the beds are pretty well tended and ready as well. Things are looking good out there. And the sky! Oh, that great big beautiful sky, showcasing the new growth on the willows, the crab apple...





Evening. We cleaned up and fixed some trouble spots on the porch, but it really is too cool to eat dinner there. It'll be May before we can take our food outside. So, dinner, with the young family, is indoors. But bathed in sunshine! So much so that I have to cover the west facing window, so that the kids and their mom aren't blinded by the light.





The cake! Snowdrop puts in the candles, Ed lights them...






Wait, what's missing?






There, that's better, but not perfect yet... Oh, there we go!  (via FaceTime...)





Beautiful indeed!

With thanks to all the people whose tireless work makes these days possible for those of us who are staying home.

With love.

Saturday - 36th

The sun is with us today and tomorrow and perhaps even the next day. I call that a gardener's obligation to step out and get going.

But with what? I have heaps of compost and soil at the edge of the roadside flower bed, waiting for new arrivals that haven't arrived. Understandably, things are moving slowly this year.  I've put in the path for the big flower bed and I need to plant the flowers that will spill over onto the wooden walkway. Once I have the flowers. I have a bunch of annual seeds waiting for a promise of frost free nights. Ed asks -- so what will you be working on today?
I answer -- Good question! I don't know...

In the past, we'd be driving to the nurseries to take a look, perhaps adding some stuff, perhaps selecting flower baskets for the porch. That was then. Now I spend the sunny morning poring over websites, trying to shop from the same nurseries, but with the aid of the internet. Believe me, it's not the same. There was great joy in walking along aisles of potted plants. You have to work up a different sense of contentment as you browse online. Too, you're not the only shopper. I see that if I place an order at Flower Factory, our beloved perennial growers, pick-up wont be available until next weekend. Understandable. But it doesn't help us in our work during these three good weather days.

Okay, pause for breakfast. Note the tulips. I splurged and spent the $6 to add a bunch to yesterday's grocery order. I love spring tulips on the kitchen table and I wanted at least this week to have their bright faces join us for the morning meal.






True, I would not have picked pale lilac. But they're fine, really fine! Lovely in fact, by virtue of their preciousness right now.

By late morning, I put away the laptop and head outside. I have five bare-root plants that did arrive last week. In they go. Anything else? Bed maintenance! This can easily fill a day. Or two. Or three. Dig out the spreading Monarda. Pull out creeping charlie where it has crept too far. Find the quack grass strands and wack that quack! All on a spring-like sunny day.






The wind is strong. I like that! It defogs the brain and cleans the soul. I almost forget we're living in weird times.

(The daffodils that can't brace themselves against the wind come inside.)






(Dark Blue Tuxedo, taking in this fiery day...)











Evening. Snowdrop calls. Gaga, I miss trips. I miss airplanes. I miss the excitement.
I almost want to tell her -- oh, we'll all be traveling again in no time! Time for a five year old is a mysterious combination of hours and months. It's intractable. You can make it up for a child because she wont know herself how to measure it. But I don't say that. It seems to me that we need to teach ourselves to build happiness afresh, out of this new reality. To find elements of  goodness in our everyday, because there is too much uncertainty to bank on something that comes after. And indeed, so long as we are healthy, and we have food and shelter and love -- the ingredients are all present. We need look no further than that.

Supper? I take out chicken brats and frozen broccoli and I cook them up in a way that it seems like  it's a regular old supper on a Saturday night.

Goodnight, with love.

Friday - 35th

Spring is struggling. We haven't had that string of days that is radiantly beautiful. Instead, we've had one here, another there, the rest -- cold. Even Ed is wearing his jacket outdoors. (He has two defaults: t-shirt with jacket, or t-shirt without jacket. One jacket, two options. There is no middle ground.)

It's a stay inside day. It just has to be. The garden will wait. It's not ready for me and I'm not ready for it.






Breakfast. In the kitchen. Someday it will be on the porch again. Looking ahead at the forecast, I can tell that it wont be out there in April.






And so I continue to be in my "planning mode." As if it were January or February. I weigh options, I think about what to do with flower bed trouble spots. Call it low-energy pregardening. Like treading water before the big swim, only it's an awfully long period of not moving forward.


Snowdrop is here in the afternoon. It's interesting to watch her now, on these Fridays at the farmhouse. Typically she has had her fill of school by the end of the week. Coming home (or to the farmhouse) slows her down. But now, being home is a constant. Home, with a bit of grandma's. And she is the lucky one, because she has that change of pace that's missing in so many kids' lives.






And yet, you have to remind yourself that all these kids who do have reasonably (economically) secure homes and caring families -- they are lucky. If no one in their immediate family is sick -- double lucky. There are challenges, for sure. For parents especially. Still, I can't help but feel grateful for all that's in place for my three grandkids and for those who are doing basically okay

(sign of the times: face masks hanging in the background.)






(Bothering Ed. Not really. There's nothing that he wont let her do. Perhaps because there's not much that she does that could possibly annoy him.)






I drop Snowdrop off at home and I linger a bit with her mommy. Just to catch up. Would you believe it? Life moves forward! Stuff happens! Comparing notes is important. And so over a glass of bubbly (water these days), we catch up.

And in the evening, I reheat pieces of the frittata, mix up a salad and sit back with Ed, exhaling. (Until the very late evening, when supplementary foods arrive from the store.) Five weeks down into isolation and we are okay. And I hope with all my heart that you are too.

Thursday - 34th

Remember when Groundhog Day seemed like a total fantasy movie? When no day was ever like the previous one? Remember when you thought a crowded restaurant, or cafe was a good thing? Do you find yourself watching movies and wincing at scenes where people seem too close?

We are in the middle of April. For us, the next three weeks are the busiest in terms of yard work. This is the time when I plant like a person who has been set loose after months of captivity. How will we proceed this year? I've been thinking a lot about this and I've made a mental list of imperatives: that I should not grow lax, just because everything is more difficult now. That we should support as best we can (curbside pickup!) the three growers -- David at the Flower Factory, Natalie at Natalie's Greenhouse, and the friendly people at Kopke's. All three are struggling. That I will adjust to the new demands without so much as a shudder. We've had harsh growing weather, cats who mess with everything in sight, chickens who scratch up tender roots, and now we also have the granddaddy of them all: isolation and a raging pandemic. So, not the easiest of times, but my gosh! How fortunate that we can plant at all! Not a peep, not a wince, not even a sigh out of me. We are going to grow stuff with a smile and it will be beautiful!






But not today, because it is just so cold this week! The daffodils are really groaning the loudest right now. I am sympathetic, but there's nothing I can do.

Breakfast. Much to discuss. As always these days.






And here come Snowdrop and Sparrow!











(Lunch)





In the late afternoon, I push myself out to work (with Ed's help) on trimming the new orchard fruit trees. It's not that I don't like doing this, but it really is terribly cool for April 16th. We do a modest job. The trees are budding. Fruit or no fruit, it should be pretty out there this spring and summer!

Back to the flower beds and tubs. I continue to weed and throw down chips on the beds. Among daffodils.


 


And I pull out flower tags, stuck into the tubs where I plant lots of annuals. How fortunate that I saved them. Normally, I walk through a nursery and pull out familiar flats, oftentimes not knowing the name of the plant, even as I have a clear picture of its growing habit. This year, I have to buy things by name. I'm starting to make lists.

By evening we're spent. Frittata time! I have some rather wilted asparagus and "aging" mushrooms. And cheeper eggs.

(Ed grabbed the camera...)






And here's someone to keep me company while the frittata is baking! (I do love FaceTime in these days of isolation!)






Quiet at the farmhouse. That is not a new normal, it's our normal normal! We practically never go out in the evenings and rarely stray far in the daytime. And still, we have made friends with local business owners -- coffee shops, bakeries, nurseries. Cheese vendors, corn growers, tortilla makers. Many are deemed essential, or are permitted curbside sales. But what a stressful time it is for them, as they hang in there by a thread. Nothing is as it was before. I can feel their anxiety in our email exchanges. We're vulnerable, they're vulnerable. We can (and should) stay in the safety of our home. They keep going. My deep thanks tonight is to all of them, for what they do, because, well, they have no choice but to keep going.

With love.