March 2019
Monthly Archive
Mar 31, 2019
Yesterday morning, I heard the first phoebe of spring, and as I write these words, I have one window open to let in fresh air and the sound of soft rains.
This is how spring arrives in New England. One wet day you decide your rain shoes will suffice instead of rubber boots, you shed your coat then your jacket in turn, and you realize all of a sudden that long sleeves are too warm and short sleeves are just right. I haven’t worn sandals yet this year; so far, the weather has been too indecisive. Yesterday was almost warm enough but a bit too breezy; today was briefly sunny until the rains came.
But the phoebes know which way the earth has tilted. The song of the Eastern phoebe is unremarkable–nothing more than their name repeated, incessantly–so it is easy to overlook among the whistling cardinals and warbling house finches. But when you hear the first phoebe of spring calling in the distance–like a rainbow, the first phoebe always seems far off, its actual location hidden in a shrubby suburban tangle–your heart thrills, not because it is a beautiful song but because it comes only when winter is almost over and spring has almost come.
Mar 24, 2019
Today was a bright, breezy, spring-like day, so after lunch J and I went walking at Newton Cemetery. Most of the snow has melted, leaving the grass bare and blanched: mud season, the awkward pause before spring.
Throughout the Cemetery, there were fresh stumps and piles of massive trunks and branches: cleanup from trees that had either fallen in winter storms or had been preemptively culled. It was sad to see massive tree-corpses lying among the gravestones: if these fallen giants could talk, what stories could they tell?
The lesson of any Cemetery, of course, is that impermanence surrounds us. Seeds sprout, trees tower, and winds wreak havoc: even evergreens can’t stay green forever. A neatly landscaped grave creates the illusion of immortality: as long as a headstone stands, one’s name and memory live on. But aren’t tombstones ultimately like so many tree stumps: dead reminders of a once-living thing?
In a few weeks, the earth will erupt in green, landscape crews will have cleared away the last of these toppled trees, and both the mallards and Canada geese that swim the Cemetery ponds will have nestlings in tow. The annual death that is winter, in other words, will miraculously transform into the resurrection that is spring. In the meantime, I like to think the massive tree stumps J and I saw today aren’t dead, but sleeping: their cellulose selves dreaming of sunny skies and chlorophyll-fed days.
Mar 22, 2019
Posted by Lorianne under
Toivo
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A few days ago, Toivo started limping after our morning walk, and for the past few days she hasn’t been her usual energetic self. We have a vet appointment next week to determine whether she has a passing injury or a more pervasive problem, and in the meantime I’ve been taking her on short, slow walks, just as I did when Reggie was old and increasingly unsteady on his feet.
Normally, Toivo is an active and energetic dog, jumping and spinning when I grab her leash for a W-A-L-K, so it’s been heartbreaking to see her relative lack of enthusiasm for even a slow stroll. Most dogs relish any excuse to be a couch potato, but Toivo loves to be outside in any weather, and she normally doesn’t have a “slow” setting: she’s either asleep or ready to run, and if left to her own devices, she will play to the point of exhaustion. But like an athlete benched by injury, Toivo will remain on restricted minutes until she is back to her bouncy self. Whatever is bothering her, we don’t want her to exacerbate the problem through overexertion.
Mar 19, 2019
I’ve been seeing one or more male red-bellied woodpeckers nearly every time I walk the dog these days: either several birds are staking territorial claims on several different side streets, or one bird has been faithfully following me.
Red-bellied woodpeckers are large and vocal: it’s hard not to see them once you recognize their call and take the time to look for them. And right now, the male red-bellies in our neighborhood are perching on dead snags, excavating holes, and calling: almost begging to be seen. Although I can identify red-bellied woodpeckers by eye and ear, I’m realizing how little I know about their lives. Why am I only seeing male red-bellies right now, for example? Are the females just as plentiful as the males, but quieter? And are red-bellied woodpeckers conspicuously abundant every March, and this is the first year I’ve actually noticed them?
According to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s account of red-bellied woodpecker behavior, “When nesting, males choose the site and begin to excavate, then try to attract a female by calling and tapping softly on the wood around or in the cavity.” So apparently the calling males I’ve seen around our neighborhood are trying to attract mates to the nest holes they’ve begun to excavate. Now that I know the general areas where several male red-bellies are looking to nest, it’s likely I’ll see them in the same spots for years to come, as “The same pair may nest in the same tree year after year, but typically excavate a new cavity each year, often placing the new one beneath the previous year’s.”
Apparently, red-bellied woodpeckers have been calling, tapping, and nesting in our neighborhood for years, and I’m only now paying attention. What other creatures have led their not-so-secret lives while I’ve been hurrying around, unaware?
Mar 11, 2019
Today has been a day of small victories. The sun was out for most of the day, so the snow piles are slowly shrinking. I heard a Carolina wren singing in the morning, saw the red-bellied woodpecker in his accustomed spot on a dead snag down the street, and photographed the witch hazel that’s been blooming for weeks in a neighbor’s yard.
This afternoon I spent too much time unpacking boxes and putting things away–this is the week when our monthly bulk orders of pet food, cleaning supplies, and other household necessities arrive–but I got the trash and recycling out to the curb for tomorrow’s collection, I’ve prepared my classes for tomorrow, and the pets are fed and the refrigerator is stocked. I graded fewer papers than I’d hoped today, but I made some progress with my paper-piles, and that itself is progress.
In March, teaching becomes a game of Drop the Ball: you’ve long given up your naive hopes of juggling everything, so you constantly assess which obligations can drop without shattering and which might actually bounce. This morning while walking the dog, I slipped and fell on an icy sidewalk mere yards from where I’d slipped and fell on hard-packed snow a few weeks ago. My ego was injured both times, but today I didn’t bruise: success!
In March, you downgrade your definition of bliss: instead of holding out hopes for heaven, you content yourself with those scattered, spare moments when simply strolling down a clean, sunny sidewalk with solid footing and dry feet passes as perfection. I’m slowly reading a book by Anne Lamott called Small Victories: Spotting Improbable Moments of Grace, which I’d gleaned from our neighborhood Little Free Library. I read a chapter here and there when I have time, which means the book mostly sits on my desk, waiting. Some days simply getting to the end of the day with one’s hair still rooted in place feels like a minor miracle.
Mar 10, 2019
Today brought a day-long mix of snow, sleet, and rain, so J and I took a break from the wintery weather by going to the McMullen Museum of Art at Boston College to see their current exhibit, Eaglemania: Collecting Japanese Art in Gilded Age America.
The centerpiece of the exhibit is a monumental bronze sculpture that was donated to the College in the 1950s by the estate of Larz and Isabel Anderson, who bought it in Japan during their honeymoon. A gilded replica of the statue sits atop a pillar near the main entrance to Boston College, and subsequent conservation of the original suggests it was crafted during the Meiji period, possibly by the celebrated sculptor Suzuki Chōkichi. The McMullen exhibit contextualizes the original bronze alongside Japanese sculptures and scrolls depicting birds of prey as well as other items from the Andersons’ personal collection.
J and I enjoy going to the McMullen regardless of what’s on exhibit there. The Museum is small, so you can take your time examining individual artworks, and the exhibits are well-curated. We always leave the McMullen feeling like we learned something: today I learned, for instance, that samurai warriors practiced falconry, a pastime forbidden to commoners even though hawks and eagles often appear in Japanese art. Even though I’ve seen the BC eagle perched on a pillar by Gasson Hall countless times, today I learned how huge and impressive it is when viewed at eye-level.
Although I didn’t take any photos at the McMullen Museum today, you can view official press images from the exhibit here. Eaglemania: Collecting Japanese Art in Gilded Age America is on view at the McMullen Museum until June 2, 2019.
Mar 3, 2019
This morning on my way to the Zen Center, I saw a large Cooper’s hawk perched atop a telephone pole. I was stopped at a traffic light at the time–a captive audience–and after the light changed, I drove around the block, parked, and walked to the corner to take photos.
While I was standing there, a man walked by with a dog. There was no reason for him to look up–he was, after all, walking a dog–so I alerted him to the sight overhead, telling him he’d never get a better view of a Cooper’s hawk. And indeed, she was all but posing, sitting in the morning sun, aglow. “Looking for squirrels,” the man observed, and my inner ornithologist felt obliged to correct him: Cooper’s hawks eat birds, so she was probably trying to decide which of many bird-feeders in the neighborhood to feed from.
I was, as I mentioned, on my way to the Zen Center, so I continued on with urgency, not wanting to be late for morning practice. And while stopped at a light in the heart of Central Square, I once again looked up right at the moment a flock of pigeons fell from the sky in a single swoop: a rain of wings as a couple dozen birds zoomed from rooftop to sidewalk en masse. It was a split second of wings, with no falcon or hungry hawk in pursuit–just a whim pursued, collectively–and then the light changed, and I wondered whether anyone else had been looking up at the precise moment when the sky fell as feathers.
And then on my walk from the heart of Central Square to the Zen Center–a route down Modica Way then Green and Magazine Streets–I passed a man with an impeccably waxed handlebar mustache at the precise moment when an avalanche of ice thundered from the roof of a nearby townhouse into a narrow alley. And in that split second, I glanced up, saw a shower of ice hailing down, and then met eyes with the mustachioed man, our eyes exchanging a greeting that doubled as an admonition: heads up.
Hoarded Ordinaries 