Fall? For real??

Fall? Really ? Y'Sure?

No. I am not so sure. Last night a freeze. I suppose it did happen, since it was predicted and it is pretty cold, but I brought all of the plants that would freeze in. I hope they will be able to return outside in a couple days. Surely it will get warm again. Even if just for a little while.

Actually, not all of the plants came in. It seems that my rose geranium is missing. Yes, that's right missing. It was on the porch and now it is not. I realized this last night while I was bringing in the plants and noticed it was not among them. How weird. Where does a plant go? Who would take a plant? That idea is too much for me to consider a possibility. Strange, though.

This post was originally intended for this blog so I thought I'd copy it here, with the epilogue:

The following day:

Look outside, and see clumps of dirt on the edge of the granite wall. Go outside, with D, and there, lying below the wall is a tipped over clay pot with guess what lying next to it. The rose geranium. It was not plant napped! Even better, it did not freeze. The latter probably because there wasn't a frost. The former because there wasn't a plant napper. Just a plant mover and hider. Time to set up a neighborhood watch? Call the staties to dust for prints?

Daughter's wedding last weekend. Lovely, lovely, and so very happy. Exhaustion this week. I never knew putting an event like that was so  much work, even though there was tons of help from family and friends.
It was so sweet and touching. The whole thing, meeting his lovely family, friends together. The wedding itself, the whole thing. Lovely and beautiful.
 

Tentative Spring

And so, here it is SPRING! as per the calendar, anyway. The winter came and the snow is gone (pretty sure, of that, but I could be wrong. I always imagine that there is a small patch of snow hiding in the woods somewhere that hangs on, sort of like those persistent leaves, the ones that don't ever fall off of the trees but are parchment colour and dry. They whisper and shimmy in the wind but never fall. I wonder what happens to them when new leaves grow in the spring, but forget to look. Do they stay on? Are they the same ones that remain persistent year after year or are they replaced? These cogitations are what I get for walking dogs, I guess.)

And with spring comes the need for another update I suppose. I'll have to check out the pictures I have and see what can be done.

 Fall

Fall, a very weird fall, a strange fall, but indeed a fall in many ways. A free fall period, strange and replete with pitfalls (there's that word again) but not without happiness. And now it will soon be winter, the shortest day 9 days from now, and then, lightwise, anyway, we are on the upswing.
But we do need snow!

.

A lovely poem in this post:
"In Blackwater Woods" by Mary Oliver.
More poetry by Mary Oliver here
Enjoy on this autumn day.

Birds in Fall

So many birds flying back and forth from the feeders to the trees. Finches of several kinds clinging to their thistle feeders and eating upside down, blue jays chasing everyone away from the food, fighting and scolding between themselves. All sorts of other birds from small to medium, they seem in a frenzy of eating as if they will not eat again until spring. And under it all, a chipmunk runs to collect all that falls, his cheeks full, his eyes bright. Wary, he sits up on the granite wall on the way to the feeders, his skin so thin I can see his trembling, his heart beating.

So, here another fall day, early fall some would say, but when the summer is gone it is just gone. The leaves don't slide past each other any more, and even on a sunny day warmth is not summer warmth. Not to disparage warm fall days, certainly they drape like honey across the shoulders, and like honey shed golden light. But today the sky is chalk grey and the leaves crisp past one another in the breeze.

So, I felt I needed a post..leaves changing, cool, rainy, grey day. Not my favorite sort of thing. Not at all. Hopes for a sunny winter, and good snow. Not ready for the wood fires yet and all of that mess. Fortunately the summer was warm and sunny most of all. Sun makes up for a lot that is less than ideal, and a warm summer makes the beginning of fall easier to consider (not that fall cares much what I think).

Spring!!!

Lamb!!!

Some of the pictures are a little overexposed--thank you someone for leaving my camera on the wrong settings--but he is so cute!

Merry Christmas!!!
So, here it is, the annual capture the tree picture, this year with all children working hard to put on the happy Vermont family getting the tree look.

First race of the season

For those of you who wonder what ski races are like I offer the following pictures and just a few words about yesterday---blistering cold and windy. D came in 2nd, the friend pictured skiing below came in 3rd. Both teams (boys and girls) came in first! A good start to winter!

 Spectators!

 A bleak scene looking up the hill. The dark line across the trail is composed of the skiers waiting for the start.

 

Looking down the hill--coach checking running order. Notice the snow blowing up the hill. As I said, blistering.

Skier coming into and at the finish.

A fun day!!

Thanksgiving in snippets....6 pies for 7 people…one turkey for one sandwich…"that's nuts," he says, "your mom is making a whole turkey for one sandwich?".....discussion--Elijah & Christmas eve dinner in Poland & why American Christian culture does not have a holiday where an empty place is set at the table...(we are basically a selfish, unwelcoming culture)...sometimes more about who is gone than who is there..dead relatives whisper, clustering in shadows and corners...take pictures…Aunt Midgie's creamed onions, (her Baltimore neighbors were John Waters and Divine)...Jean's last Thanksgiving not too many years ago...what were we thinking with all these pies?...gotta get a picture…"You've never heard of Lady Gaga??!!"..."don't even ask, 'who is Divine?'"....is pc passé?...big argument over that one: does anyone care anymore?--Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukah...Diwali, Kwanzaa, Eid--or do we still have to say nothing or Happy Holidays?......"coffee anyone?"

....maybe we rethink the pies next year...

Veteran's Day at a Military University

As many of you know, I teach Political Science at a military university. In  January about three dozen students will deploy to Afghanistan, one of the largest deployments in the college's history. It is also one of the largest National Guard deployments in Vermont's history.

After college a number of the students will commission into various branches of the military, others have already completed one or several tours to Iraq and/or Afghanistan--some of those are still on active duty MOS is to get a degree-- and some will never join the military but have chosen, for whatever reason, to attend a military school.

Yet the University does not have a ceremony or a day off on Veteran's Day. Not even a moment of silence.
In any year this is, I think, completely disrespectful, but most especially so in a year where so many students and citizens will deploy. So, I decided not to discuss the American bureaucracy as planned, but hold a class to honor veterans.

I began by expressing my opinion on the University's failure to officially notice Veteran's Day. Not surprisingly, the students agreed, and not because they would rather be playing video games than going to class. No, they felt that even though the University had a ceremony the day before that there should be some recognition of Veteran's Day on November 11. We then talked about Veteran's Day, why the date, how it differs from Memorial Day, who should be honored and remembered, that sort of thing.

Most of my students are freshmen, whose privileges for many things are curtailed, including being able to watch TV, so I showed them a news clip about the ceremony the previous day: Norwich Students to Deploy, a great clip of dogs greeting a soldier returning from 14 months in Iraq--yeah, yeah, of course I had to get dogs in there somewhere--(thanks for this one, Jane!) Greeting a returning friend and in my third class we also watched a you tube piece a student had received from his father: A Pittance of Time Terry Kelly.
I then asked how many students had family members who were currently serving in the military or were veterans. Almost 100%. I then asked how many had friends or knew people who were in the military or were veterans. 100%.

I pulled up a chair and sat down. "Okay," I said, "so tell us about them." Quiet. I pointed to a student and said, "You. You start. Talk about those people." And in each of my three classes they did. They talked about their mothers, fathers, aunts, uncles, cousins, brothers, sisters, grandparents, great-grand parents, many great grands, and friends who served or are currently serving in the military. One or two were at Pearl Harbor, one ran out of his barracks in Vietnam just before the building blew up, one was at Omaha Beach, one served as nurse, one served as a civilian in military intelligence, one was recon in Vietnam,  three brothers are currently in Afghanistan or Iraq ("they're just doing their duty, Ma'am.Yeah, my mom worries but that's the way it is."), one sister just returned from Afghanistan, another sister was recently released on a medical discharge after a tour overseas, my nephew was a sniper in Iraq, a friend lost his eye in Huế, my father was a test pilot, my husband trained officers during Vietnam, one person spent years in submarines, another monitors missile silos, some served in Desert Storm, some in Korea, the Civil War, the Revolutionary War, and one student can trace his family's military service back to 1066, the Battle of Hastings. One tour, five tours, nine tours, a career, "he's a great guy, but he is really crazy!," "he suffers from PTSD pretty bad," "he came back pretty messed up," "my dad and step dad are career military," "my friend enlisted yesterday".....

That's a lot of people, you guys. A lot of families, and a lot of friends. And that's why we celebrate Veteran's Day.

 

Old flags, Peacham 2009

Postscript: In my town there is a family who will send 5 men to Afghanistan in January. A father, his son, the father's brother and his son, and a second brother. "That's two generations of men, ma'am," said one of my students. Indeed.



 

red leaf

curling

like a grasping hand

but the dead and dying

do not grasp

it is we

who leave them behind

So, many months have passed since my last post. Before those months become a year and snow is on the ground again I must update, so here it is. During those months there were......

Sunrises......


Sunsets.....


Ski races......

At the finish

Waiting around after run...a beautiful warm day

Pattern in son's coffee cup the day he went back to college...

A bus trip 2/3 of the way across the country and back......

A birthday......

17!!

Spring flowers.....




Rain and mist with intermittent sun.....


College graduation....

Kittens.....

Are you my mommy?

Memorial Day......

Iris.....

More sunsets--one every day!--and clouds....

Another birthday....

One score

A friend's baby chicks...

Another birthday....

Four score and ten

Rain, lots of rain....

Faint summer rainbow, one of only a few...

A sheep on the mend...

Shadows End Flora

Grass to rake...

TJ (photo by E)

Sunflowers....

Last flowers of the year.....


And now we are here.....

Colours and rain, 
sort of like the proverbial diamonds and rust...
And so the months passed
with
Many more rainbows than rain.