the guilt

Wake up early. C'mon, get moving. Oh, stiff back from the heavy digging? Well, a warm shower and some stretches ought to help.

Open the box of day lilies that I get every year from Kentucky. Such potentially pretty stuff! They're for the expanded front bed, but I can't resist keeping some for the court yard, for porch viewing. Let me plan out their distribution.

What's this? Blasted ground hog! Overnight, he decided to rebuild his condo number three just by the lilac, under my hostas. The weird thing is that he moved the soil and quite a number of big rocks around the hostas and dumped them to the side of my great daylily bed. Can groundhogs carry heavy stones??

I go inside.
Ed, do we have a gun?
Say what?
Well, you know how our neighbor hunts down pesky animals?

Ed knows I'm not serious, but, too, that I am annoyed. Last year we filled that very hole. The groundhog dug it up the next day. We filled it again. Eventually he gave up.

No, I don't want to shoot him, but nor do I want him right at the edge of my day lilies throwing boulders and loose dirt around.

We decide to let him keep his hole, but we camouflage it with chips so that at least it doesn't look awful to the passerby. (Who am I kidding: there are no passerbys by the lilac. Our courtyard is very private.) Ed will say -- he has as much right to be here as you and I...



Breakfast, lovely, on the porch.






A quick garden walk...












...and I'm off to my daughter's so that she, Snowdrop and I can walk to the downtown farmers market together.

(On the drive over, I spot two sandhills in the field just west of us. In the next months, this field will be given over to a development. Right now, it belongs to the cranes.)







It's a beautiful day! The sun comes out and the air quickly warms to a perfect May day (really more like a June day -- temps reach the upper 70sF, or around 25C).

While Snowdrop's mommy shops for some cheese curds, I make a mistake. I figure the girl's been sitting long enough in the stroller.
Want to stretch and run up the hill?--  I ask, taking her out of the stroller and placing her on a grassy knoll, perched just over the sidewalk.

Snowdrop is totally cooperative and she does a lovely stretch, then runs up to a tree and back down to the ledge. Only neither she nor I realize that a hefty run down will propel her with a good bit of speed, so much so, that it's not easy for her to stop when she reaches the ledge. And she doesn't stop, tumbling down the few feet to the sidewalk, face catching the concrete slab.

It's my fault.

This being Madison, people are ever helpful. A young woman takes out a first aid kit and gives me clean tissues to wipe her up.

Oh, it could have been so much worse. Snowdrop is a bit rattled and complains that her nose hurts (indeed: the skin below it is rubbed raw), but apart from that she seems to have caught the fall well and I can't find any other bruises.

By the time my daughter rejoins us, the little one is settled back in the stroller.
You wont believe what just happened... I tell her.

As we continue our walk around the Square, Snowdrop is a bit subdued and unhappy about her upper lip (which she refers to as her nose area), but, too, the sun is now squarely in her face so there are many reasons to be a tad less cheerful.


We recall the first emergency room visits my own girls endured: my older girl, when she was short of one, tumbled with greater force at the zoo, getting grit and pebbles into several wounds (I know, I know -- not really ER material, but first time parents tend to panic at the sight of a lot of blood). Then there was her sister, at two and a half, with an onset of pneumonia. I suppose Snowdrop, at 28 months is lucky to have rarely been sick enough to even call a doctor and she isn't the kind of kid who gets bloody knees and bruised elbows often.

Still, watching her uncheerful face, gaga feels the guilt.

We're done with our market walk. Oh! I spot the perfect pick me up: honey sticks!
Can I get her one?
Sure. My daughter knows how much Snowdrop and I both love honey. The little girl doesn't know about honey sticks.






She is hooked. And happy.






Her old self now, walking with us, pushing her stroller, chatting the whole way about things she sees, challenges she faces... (I can climb over that wall! I can walk by myself!)

(She appears to me as if she's ready to take on the world again, or at least the state of Wisconsin!)






(Finding pleasure in the sprinklers that are dousing the Capitol Square tulips right now. What kid doesn't love a sprinkler?)






Still, I want to offer her one more small pleasure -- a visit to the toy store. Needless to say, she loves it there. Toys to admire, a free balloon to take home.





And then we're back along the lake, walking to her home, and from there I drive to the farmette, where I work the whole afternoon digging, digging, planting, moving, planting some more. Uff!


In the evening, Snowdrop is with us for supper and a sleepover. Pizza! And play. She brings her baby from home and tells her: you're visiting grandma and grandpa now! (Home baby, meet farmhouse baby!)






It's a fairly early bedtime. Perhaps she doesn't need it, but I do! Tomorrow is a very full day. One hundred tomatoes to plant, daylilies to finish... So much to look forward to! And I do. Guilt slowly receding, I look ahead to a day that I'm sure will be beautiful, in all ways.

attachments

Not long ago, I realized that I know the land too well here. I know every plant I ever brought in and I remember many that I deeply regretted putting in (invasive beasts!). I know how the light works its way across the courtyard and how this changes dramatically with each season. I know where the soil, enriched by composted chips, hides layers of gravel which criss-crossed the land when this was once a working farm. I know what I must do to make each flower field healthy and strong. I know where the raspberries send off their root systems. I know where the cheepers like to dig. I know where the humming birds hang out and where the groundhog likes to set up his summer condominium. I know where bramble loops over the prairie and where dry pine needles add a special scent to the air.

And I know that this week, the farmette is at her gentlest, prettiest, sweetest and most beguiling, as if the season of mosquitoes, or of deep freeze, or of mice in the farmhouse, or backed up septic systems -- as if those challenges were trite nothings, because now we have our reward, our period of sheer pleasure.

This is how it feels to live here now: I am attached to the farmette as deeply as if I had lived here all my life. Ed and I try to be good stewards, stumbling, heaving, planning, digging, even as we know that we could do so much more. But not too much more, because the beauty of this place for us is in part in its tussled face, where it is never exactly right, never fully articulated, not tidy, not well groomed. It is its own story of joyous chaos.


It's Friday and so we are both in a hurry: I must grocery shop, he must attend to his machining projects. Still, even before breakfast, I struggle to create a space for that peony that made its way here last night. The soil is rocky, clayish, gravelish, awful. It takes many minutes of hammering away at it to get the spot ready. But I'm not complaining. This is what I can give to this land: my work, my sweat, my effort.

Besides, when I look up, I see the lilac, hugging the corner of the porch.






And of course, the falling petals of the crabs.






Now, I have to say this one detail about my photos (and perhaps you've noticed this on your own): they don't shy away from repeating a vignette. Just because you've seen a graceful clump of white narcissus yesterday, doesn't mean you wont see it again today. If something thrills you a few days in a row, do you turn your back, just because you were made happy by it in the past? Of course not!

Today's narcissus:











And the new tulips that almost look like miniature peonies!






Time to go in for breakfast. (The cheepers follow, always full of hope!)






Unfortunately, this morning we cannot linger. Just a handful of minutes!






Oh, just a few more!






Alright. We disperse.

And after my Friday shopping chores, I go to pick up Snowdrop, who again picnicked with her class out in their playground. As I come in, she is madly and with utter joy racing a trike between tires.






But she is also happy to be going with me for our adventure. Yesterday I dragged along the stroller even as she walked the whole way. Today I think I'm so clever in asking her -- do you want me to leave the stroller in the car so that we can walk?

She says -- yes! I want to walk!

And she does. And we stop constantly to admire everything! (She loves the name "forget-me-nots"!)






(I'm grateful to this corner lot which is rarely mowed and always full of things to admire.)






When we approach the coffee shop, she once more asks to get a treat. I've said no all week long and indeed, even today I have packed a snack for her, but on an impulse, I reconsider. It's Friday! It's a glorious day! Let's sit out for a minute at the coffee shop porch and enjoy it!

(Snowdrop picks a doughnut, which is a tad too sweet for my liking, but the little one is always quite satisfied after just a few bites.)






Yes, she is eyeing the playground. Yes, Snowdrop. You can go on the swing.

And of course, all this just tires her out. When I say it's time to get back to the car (parked at her school), she begs to be carried.

We compromise. I carry her for a block. She then walks for a block. I carry her a bit more. She walks for a bit more. Lesson learned: an energetic "yes, let's walk!" does not take into account an already full day of activity. A stroller, just in case, is never a bad idea.

But as always, at the farmette, she is revived and ready to take on.... the sandbox!






However am I going to get her out?  I'm thinking that she should be napping. It's so late in the afternoon! Luckily this day, this weather, this everything is making her so agreeable. We transition to something else:
Want to hose down your feet and hands and water the strawberries? 
Yes!

(I explain to her that we've had to put on netting to keep the chipmunks away -- they've been trying their darndest to get to the pots.)






We make our way back to the farmhouse.
Look gaga! I'm on the balance beam!
Stretch out your arms! It's easier that way!
(She does. Straight up!)






Inside, I give her just a few minutes to play. And to read. (My daughters reminded me about this book from their childhood. I found it at a used book place.)






She is instantly attached to it. All those cousins and aunts and uncles! All those children, heading to grandma's! In the book, the young families gather from the five boroughs of New York to visit the grandparents who reside in lower Manhattan.

A home is not made better or worse by where you live. I remember once liking Manhattan. Still, in May, the farmette is an effervescent bubble of sheer magic. That it's my home now and therefore, by extension, my family's home is nothing short of sublime.

the best of times

For me, these days, right now in mid May, truly offer up the most ravishing, absolutely bewitching moments outside. It really cannot be finer than now.

Of course, the farmette flowers haven't yet plunged into their period of bloom, but it hardly matters. We have beautiful weather, exquisite colors everywhere, subtle greens, swelling buds, sweet sweet whiffs of fragrance, and we have time: Ed and I have time to take it all in.

A comment on today's photos: I admit to there being quite a bit of Snowdrop. And yes, she's a sweet child and my most wondrous granddaughter, but beyond that, she, like all children, shows off best the mood of the outdoors now. I take a photo of a meadow and it's nice, sure, even pretty if I get it right. Place a child in the tall grass and you understand immediately the beauty of a walk through that lush field of dandelions and violets. You feel the breezes. You see the curiosity in her eyes and it becomes your curiosity too.

My first walks this morning though are solo walks.

That lilac! It dominates the landscape now.






... as the crab girls continue to shed their pretty petals.






Ed and I eat out on the porch. And again, it is a very long breakfast.
We did well here -- he says, looking out.
I smile at that. We've gone through so many projects, so many mistakes, so many new ideas, but ultimately, we love what we have created all around us: it's a little crazy, a little unkempt, a little excessive and a lot beautiful.






(Just by the porch, the white narcissus continues to put out a round of flowers.)






After breakfast, I clean up the daylily bed (where the daffodils are now blooming). I want so much to remove the last few rows of tiger lilies, but Ed is devoted to keeping them there. They don't fit, they are quite ordinary, they spread voraciously (they don't call them ditch lilies for nothing), but they somehow have become familiar to him and he associates them with that corner of the farmhouse.
Plant your extra day lilies somewhere else -- he suggests, hoping that I'll give up on wanting to ditch the orange spotted tigers.
You wont trim the trees and so we actually do not have that much sunny space within view of the porch.
What if you enlarge the bed by the big crab?
I agree to that and spend the rest of the morning preparing a space for the last of the plants that I'll be putting in this weekend.


And now it's time to drive over and pick up Snowdrop. (This is the view toward the crabs from where we park our cars.)






I ask her if she wants to ride the stroller or walk and for the first time since school started for her last August, she chooses to walk the whole time.

It does make for a longer adventure. The little one has to explore, to pick the dandelions...






... to show off her puffing skills.






Too, we spend a lot of time identifying flowers. She knows them all by now and I sincerely believe she loves them almost as much as I do.

The swing: of course, there must be the swing in the park by the lesser lake.






It's hard to lure her away. A snack will do it!
Sit here, right next to me, gaga!






And then we are back at the farmette. She already announced in the car that she is going straight to the sandbox. She does exactly that. (Meanwhile Scotch wonders what all the fuss is about. Sand? Weird stuff. What's the attraction??)






I don't know, you should ask Snowdrop.






I worried that all our outdoor time would be spent making stuff out of sand, but this turns out not to be the case. After a while, Snowdrop is ready to explore. She picks her own path (and her own dandelions). The cheepers always follow us...






For once I'm glad Ed isn't a spectacular mower. Bits of meadowland are delightful at this time of year.






As we walk to the eastern edge of the farmette, I point to her the truck farmers working the land, planting vegetables.






She puts it together right away. They take it to the market! -- she tells me emphatically.
Yes they do.






We walk through what is one of my favorite farmette spaces -- between tall white pines that someday may offer her terrific climbing opportunities. Today, she is the explorer and I am her partner in crime.






And the cheepers are her faithful followers.






I remember times when Snowdrop felt a little uneasy up high on Ed's shoulders. Not any more. She asks quite often -- ahah, can I ride on top?
He never says no. Ah, the world must be especially fragrant and lovely from way up there today!







Evening. We don't slow down just yet. When Snowdrop leaves, Ed and I drive to the local farmers market (first time this season!) and then we continue on to visit two women who sell plants out of their back yards (we stop by their place every year). I buy something: a baby peony that many would call a tree (it's really an "itoh"), if only because its habit is quite different from that of the conventional herbaceous peony. I have great hopes for it as an entrance anchor into our beloved courtyard, where so much of farmette life takes place. Yes, it will take years to establish itself. Have I grown this patient in life? Perhaps.

Thai take out for supper and then we're outside again, working on our outdoor projects until it is so dark that I can't see the end of the shovel, let alone what it is that I'm digging.

We retreat indoors then. I sit down to my favorite wine. Ed and I talk about how sometimes in life, you discover your passions and talents when you're no longer young. I think about this for the rest of the evening. Has my palate grown? Have I shifted and side stepped? Maybe. Restless people never stay in one place. Ever.

Such a beautiful day! Such a gorgeous night!

Wednesday

At last, we wake up to a warm morning! We're moving into the next stage of spring. Yes, our daffodils are mostly past their blooming period. The fruit trees, too, are shedding petals. Today, our beautiful crabs created a lovely path of white flowers. (The cheepers appreciate its beauty, I'm sure of it.)






Tulips are staggered: some bloom with the daffodils, some hold off until later.  The lilac is in its full show mode, but it's got competition for your gaze! Today, among all this beauty, I find that the first irises are exploding!






Still, let me continue to pay homage to that lilac. It truly is a queen of spring. We eat breakfast on the porch, bathed in the lilac's fragrance. (Our breakfast, therefore, is very, very long!)






(Yes, a few twigs always make it to the table.)






(Henny among the lilac blooms...)






After, with full confidence that a frost threat is behind us, I do my annual seed planting. This always includes nasturtium. Pink for the front garden, gold and orange in the courtyard gardens. Cosmos. You need cosmos to keep you happy in, say, September. Lupine -- I'm trying to intersperse these seeds among a planted lupine patch by the strawberry beds. Poppy seeds from Giverny. Sweat pea for around the tee-pee (where, too, the vegetable pea has already been planted).

All this fills my morning. But I work my way through most of my seed packets. Yes! We're onto spring part 2!


I pick up a ready-for-adventure Snowdrop. Sometime in the course of the day, she shed her leggings and it was determined that neither those nor socks are necessary for this day (that reaches something like 66F, or 19C). Okay, I'm agreeable.

Outside, she explains to me who is who among the handful of kids picked up at this hour. That's "insert name of child here" and that's his mommy and they're going home in his stroller. Identifying proper ownership and relational ties is very important to the little girl.






Snowdrop definitely has an agenda. Almost always she asks about a treat in the coffee shop. Sometimes I'm agreeable, other times, like today, I pack a snack for her and we head to the playground. Yep, the swing is her main focus, her love, her exhale moment.






It's supposed to rain this afternoon but we are lucky. When we finally arrive at the farmette, the skies look ready for rain, but it's holding back, as if willing to wait, just to give Snowdrop what she so desperately wants...






Being barefooted offers a new set of experiences for her. Oh, sure, she'd walked through sand without shoes before, but that was last summer. When you're two, you don't necessarily remember last summer.






From Ed: she sure does love playing in the sand...






Yes she does! I tell her that I'm feeling the first drops of a shower. Snowdrop insists on staying to create her own shower of sand...






She herself is filled with sand, and for a moment I wonder if a bath is in order. We work out an easier quick fix: I use the watering can to clear her legs and hands of the fine crystals.

Inside -- oh, the usual...






You wont notice the subtle differences in these photos that recall similar moments from past days, but they're there. For example, Snowdrop is onto a new Alfie book and this one definitely has appeal for me: it's about the little boy's adventures with his grandma. The little one asks for it now every day. There's high drama in this particular story: a neighbor's turtle disappears!






The afternoon passes quickly. Snowdrop naps, she wakes up in her dozy tussled state...






... eventually she goes home. And I move on to dinner prep. But my attention drifts to the outside world.

Think of the changes that have occurred in just the last weeks! From a brown canvas, to all this. It's all so extraordinary!