farmette life 10

Lo! The unbounded sea!
On its breast a Ship starting, spreading all her sails -- an ample
Ship, carrying even her moonsails;
The pennant is flying aloft, as she speeds, she speeds so stately--
below, emulous waves press forward,
They surround the Ship, with shining curving motions and foam.
(Walt Whitman)

I finally caved and looked at a broad weather chart for the western Atlantic Ocean. (I'd been avoiding doing that because I fall into the group of people who know too little to make sense of such information. Still, living in an information vacuum is hard and so I peeked.) There may be some micro horrors taking place, but for the most part, things look very calm. I'm greatly relieved, of course, but, too, I know that a calm ocean is no friend to a sailboat. You cannot "speed" or "fly aloft" without wind. I'm told that calm seas mean that you drift. And so the wait (my wait) continues.

At the same time, it's an insanely busy morning for me. I am doing a quick-turn-around trip to Chicago to spend time with my granddaughter, Primrose. I can't be gone too long because of the darn animals. You wouldn't worry about feral cats and cooped up chickens under normal circumstances, but these are not normal circumstances. I woke up to 10F (-12C) outside. Everything is frozen solid.





The porch kittens are huddled in their ever-so-lighty heated (meaning: you call this heat??) lair, and the plugged in water dish is preventing their water from turning into a block of solid ice, but food is a problem. Not only would it freeze within minutes, but, too, I may be attracting unwanted visitors to the porch by leaving a full bowl of kibbles there. But to leave less? Stop Sign is insatiable. She eats more than half the energetic cats in the shed put together.

So I feed everyone well, leave some dry stuff out anyway, cross my fingers and head out. At some point, I have to stop worrying about cats that have clawed their way into my world (especially in the last ten days).

I have an early morning appointment and from there, I'm aiming to catch the 10 a.m. to Chicago. I'm in luck. There is a window between the two and I have just enough time to scoot over to Finca for a morning coffee before getting on the bus.





The barista packs a sweet quesadilla for my journey. A gift, he says. God, I love that place -- so full of warm light, good music and lovely people!


And now I am in Chicago. I go straight to Primrose's school and, with some degree of excitement, bundle the little girl up andpack up her belongings to take back home. Unlike with Snowdrop, where the spillover is tremendous, here, everything fits into Primrose's wee little backpack.

We do stop in a store to pick up some flowers. Just because, it's ridiculously cold outside and flowers help you remember that this too will pass.






It's been only three weeks since I last saw Primrose, but she is at an age where even a few days can make a real difference.






(Like Sparrow, she builds towers, except she attacks them from the top!)






(I'm sure her parents wont be amused with my small gift of a cheap (and I mean cheap) toy phone that beeps and talks and is altogether annoying.)






Oh, the beautiful moments of a young child's life! You hope they'll stick with you forever, but in fact, they are continuously replaced by the next ones and the ones after...


My daughter comes home from work and sets about fixing a supper for a very hungry little girl.





And then it's Primrose's bedtime and her mom and I can now sit down together and think back and think forward, to all those beautiful things that are before you. To see your daughters grow up and face life with wide smiles on their faces -- this really is a magnificent thing! Sort of like growing a peony flower flush with petals, or a many hued day lily, only better! So much better!


It is another night of stars and moon beams casting their milky light over the Midwestern landscape. And, too, over the western Atlantic. Over children sleeping, over a boat pressing forward.

farmette life 9

Years go, dreams go, and youth goes too,
The world's heart breaks beneath its wars,
All things are changed, save in the east
The faithful beauty of the stars.
(Sara Teasdale)

I have before me a sunny day, bookmarked by clear, starlit nights. Ed used to say that a cloudless night sky at sea is magnificent! There is nothing that stands between you and the stars.

I do not doubt it. But our comparisons are feeble. Do either of us venture out into the forest on crispy clear winter nights? Or do we merely look up on our brisk walk from car to house to sheep shed to barn and think "nice!" and then quickly move on to return to the comfort of a warm house?

My morning check of the thermometer shows that it's at 15F (that's close to -10C). After that, I no longer can read it because the lively kittens have knocked over the base of it on the porch. They also trampled over and inadvertently turned off their own heating pad. Good goin' little guys.







(The shed cats are at the door to greet me every morning; Dark Blue looks a little wild here! She's actually a very pretty cat)






Despite the chill, it's pretty outside. Sunshine is always your friend on wintry days. It reminds you of all that you otherwise neglect to consider in this season of short days and long cold nights.






As I clean up the shed, I want to scold the cats (a pointless exercise, but it makes me feel good) for bringing in the occasional rodent. But then of course, I see the upside of their feline presence: it is the first November at the farmhouse where I have seen no traces of mice! For us, that's huge. Mice are destructive, bacteria laden, hard to catch critters. Eleven cats are keeping them away from our home. I am grateful.

And I am glad that, for the most part, the cats are not birders. I have not seen a decrease in the bird population at the farmette and though the cats do like to spy on all things that take flight, in the end, they seem to prefer going after mice, chipmunks and squirrels.

(when the morning sun hits the crab apple just so, the colors are exquisite!)













Breakfast.






Sometime in midday, I learn that Snowdrop is once again under the weather. Her mom takes her home. That means I pick up only Sparrow at school -- something that puzzles him greatly. It's funny -- when she is in the room, he tries to match her forceful presence. He stands up for himself! But when she is not there, he is at loose ends. I need to remind him of the possibilities.

(he did water play at school, which necessitated in a change of clothing; I pick up a little jail bird today!)






(Sparrow loves to build Duplo towers... from the bottom down!)






(go get your boots! time to get going!)





I bring him home in the early evening, staying for a while to visit with the sick girl and her mom.

And only then do I turn my attention to grocery shopping for the week. It's late. But I have no time for it tomorrow or the next day. And so I try to imagine what I will be cooking next week, weaving through the aisles too tired and hungry to really care. Food. In cart. Pay. Go home. To animals and finally, at some beastly late hour -- to cheeper eggs for supper and a quiet evening on the couch, thinking about starlit skies from the warm safety of the indoors, as the thermometer does its nightly plunge into territories I would prefer not to explore.

farmette life 8

Don't go far off, not even for a day,
because I don't know how to say it - a day is long
and I will be waiting for you, as in
an empty station when the trains are
parked off somewhere else, asleep.
(Pablo Neruda)

As I wake up to snow, to cold, to cats everywhere, meowing to be fed, messing with our porch, clamoring to be first, as I push the snow off the walkway, glance over at the car with wipers frozen to the windshield, as I sit back down and consider where I should eat breakfast -- table? couch? -- it strikes me that it feels like I've been alone on the farmette for a very very long time.

How ridiculous! -- you'll say. Day 8 and you're complaining? So many people live with distance, in isolation for periods far in excess of that!

Nonetheless, I look out the bedroom window this morning...






... and I turn up the furnace, because it feels cold and I walk downstairs with a sigh. There's lots to do.

The porch cats first. I see that Stop Sign likes her new elevated resting spot!


 



She sees me. The meowing begins. She wants food. The shed cats are up by the house too. They join in the meowing.

I have to smile at the absurdity of it all. If you had said to me even a couple of years ago that I'd be caring for 11 cats, I would have retorted -- you've got the wrong person! That's never going to be me! No pets, no cats!

Yet here I am.

Next, let's deal with the shed cats. The herd accompanies me down the path, making sure I don't, by chance, stray...







Clean, clear, feed, retreat. Back to the porch to also clean and clear up the bowls. The little ones are off for their morning constitutional. It's a good moment to tidy up. There's always a mess in one place or the next. Today, there's a dead squirrel, head missing, lying in repose on the warming pad inside their lair. Honestly guys? You think that's good snuggling material??

I think -- this has been a very long week.


Breakfast.






I have to think the early winter caught these guys by surprise. Typically robins migrate to Georgia, Texas, Florida, or Mexico in November, but this is a brutal November!






Well, they've picked over most of the little apples. Now go! Before the deep freeze comes tomorrow!






I pick up happy kids. Sparrow is showing off his increasing stability...






And we nearly always find Snowdrop working hard on an art project.






At the farmhouse, there is the ever present challenge of finding a common play ground. Today, it seemed easy.






(Sparrow, thrilled to be doing art at the art table with Snowdrop.)











At the end of the day I turn on an Olivia  (the short video about an audacious and spunky pig) -- Snowdrop regards this as the penultimate treat. Sparrow agrees.

Happy campers, both of them!





In the evening, the snow begins to fall once again. What are you going to do but shrug your shoulders, take out the pot of chicken soup and remind the cats to be careful out there, in the wintry lands.

farmette life 7

I am in love with Ocean
lifting her thousands of white hats
in the chop of the storm,
or lying smooth and blue, the
loveliest bed in the world.
(Mary Oliver)

Could it be that Ed's ocean sail will be less of a meteorological adventure than my solo November days at the farmette? Of course, I don't really know what he is facing right now (and may it be only modestly adventurous!), but I do know that yesterday's predictions for Wisconsin have been tossed aside and what's coming our way is much more dire. Snow tomorrow -- there's that, but honestly, that's peanuts compared to what follows. By Thursday night we'll be down to 11F (-12C) and by the beginning of next week we'll sink even lower -- to 7F (-14C). Scanning the charts for the next several weeks, I see only one brief moment when we'll rise above freezing. That's just nuts!

In fact though, despite the bitter cold blast, the "loveliest bed in the world" still is the one in your own home, especially with the furnace humming away comfortably, keeping you toasty cozy, even on the coldest days. I remind myself that people manage to stay productive, happy and calm in far colder climes than ours.

Still, the onset of the Arctic air poses some challenges. I quickly purchase another heated bowl for the porch cats. And I throw extra shavings into the coop. Too, the cheepers will need more food now that scratching the ground is yielding little.

Small stuff, right? Sure, but I feel I need to be careful. In these frigid days and night, the farmette animals need a helping hand.

(Morning: feeding the animals. Cats do like to climb...)






(Breakfast)






(out the window: morning birds...)






In the afternoon, I pick up the kids, both in school again. Sparrow first. When he sees me approaching, he is on top of it! Over to the cubby, get out the lunch box, take off slippers, reach for the boots.






We then pick up Snowdrop (in the building next door). She is always so proud of her brother. Always happy to show him something of her world.






(At the farmhouse: mini pizza snack...)






(Animal shadows on the wall...)






(out the window: evening birds...)






Evening... Waiting for the snow, the cold, watchfully waiting to see where this unusual month will take us.

farmette life 6

What way does the wind come? What way does he go?

He rides over the water, and over the snow,

...

But how he will come, and whither he goes,

There never a scholar in England knows.

(Dorothy Wordsworth)

Dorothy Wordsworth -- now there's someone who had a tough like, particularly as measured by 21st century standards (she died in 1855, senile, disabled, not recognized for her talents, but by many accounts a happy woman, living in the home of her famous brother and his family). Our standards, of course, include access to technologies that allow us to give better answers to questions about the wind. 

We know with a fair degree of certainty, for example, that this Thursday, the winds will usher in a record breaking cold. (13F, which is -10.5C. Really!) And where will Ed's sailboat be then? What winds will buffet the hulls of their small craft? I'm back with Ms Wordsworth on that one -- I do not know.

I suppose I should consider this day to be a gentle one. It looks like it may be the warmest of the month (topping us off at 45F, or 7C). When I go out to feed the cats, I'm struck how pretty it still is outside. 

Somehow that bold last rush of autumnal color passed me by this year. We lost it to the winds, the snow, the ridiculously early onset of winter. 

 

 

 

I notice that the kittens, along with Mama Stop Sign, spent the night on the porch. And they are coming out of their hiding spots now, to explore and to do the kitty thing...

Their boisterous play is at once charming and unnerving.

 

We thought we'd be okay with having cats out on the porch for the winter, but watching them now, I'm not so sure. There are the usual kittie grossities (I wont detail them -- you might be having your meal!) And today -- the screen climbing. 

 

 

 

 

 

I go on line and purchase a scratching pole for them. Ed would have built one himself, but, he's rolling with the waves and so I go with the next best thing -- Amazon.

 

Breakfast.

 

 

In the middle of the day, I have an appointment that takes me right by the Arboretum. I give myself a lecture: if this day is too cold for a walk, then I am done for. A real exercise loser. 

I get out of the car and go for a brisk walk. And it's really lovely!

You can still find autumnal color. Not too late!

I do a quick loop through the forest...

... and come out to splendid sunshine. Fleeting, but still, there in time to make the carpet of leaves glitter!

Well now, I feel I said a proper farewell to Fall.

Snowdrop is still under the weather. Her mother is staying home with her. I pick up Sparrow after school and bring him to the farmhouse.

 

(He loves cats. He tries very hard to join the ones on the porch.)

When it's time to take him home, I realize that he and I have to hustle the cheepers first into the coop. It will be too late if I wait until I come back. They'll have climbed the barn walls by then and I wont be able to reach them. 

It's not easy balancing him while filling the feeders and closing up the bunch of girls plus Happy, but we manage!

And as I drop the little guy at home, I see that his big sister is recovering nicely!

Evening at the farmette. Animals fed and accounted for. All but Dance, who's out chasing a wee mouse around the picnic table. 

Sleep well, children, animals, sailors out there. Sleep well and wake up to a splendid new set of adventures tomorrow!