Sunset at the beach with friends. What more you could want?
May Full Moon Fire
It is always good to remember to have a fire and a full moon is a good reminder to do so. Jupiter joined in the party, so brightly shining it made your head hurt thinking about what you are really seeing... there in Space... and yet here I sit on my log by the fire. Smaller than small. Boggles the mind it does.
The dog, after much coaxing joined us. She does not trust fires. Sensible creature. It is a tricky element to be sure... but in this case she was no doubt concerned for our fur. Why would we sit next to something that could spark our fur? She didn't get it. Reluctantly, she shambled out and sat behind us, ducking down behind the log. She conceded to be wrapped up in the blankets and managed to stay put for about thirty minutes.
She couldn't wait to get back in her for reals bed in the closet. The Paleolithic-hunting-dog companion-to-man gene does not dwell in this one.
Earth Flowers
Summerwind
Here we go.
Get a rough paper sketch done and then quickly block it in on canvas.
Paint, paint, paint.
As usual it gets to the "frightful" mid-point stage where you have to have confidence that you can pull it off. Too many colours! Too garish! The poppies are chunky smears! Time for a tea break and try not to think of the impending disaster in the studio.
Go back to the studio. Take a peak. Regroup.
Paint, paint, paint.
It starts to come together. You see the end of the tunnel. Voila.
"Sumerwind"
March Fire
Bird's Nest, Wild Carrot
Mount Erskine
There are two paths up the mountain and that made all the difference. Winding switchbacks, a meandering through trees, soft green moss, tinkles of a winter brook, robin trills and the high-pitched tweaking of the kinglets high above. Glimpses of blue overhead and the occasional amber leaf of a Garry Oak mark the path below my feet.
At the summit are blue skies above and blue water below. The far islands curve in an optical illusion and I can see the friendly shapes of the mountains that guard Vancouver on the mainland.
There are, the locals say, small faerie doors marking the entrance ways to trees and undercrops of rocks. This adventure will be for another time.
Sunset from the Balcony
Fog and Ravens
Nothing but the sound of the fog-horn going off somewhere in the distance, and closer, ravens popping and quorking. The forest moves in and out of the fog. I have to keep my eye on it in case it tries to sneak across the lawn. You never know with trees...
Golden-crowned Kinglet
I'm not the fastest gardener or do-er outside. I tend to take long pauses between things and simply stare off. (It can take me 45 minutes just to dig in a couple of plants.) And so, there I was, standing and staring off into the distance when I notice a fluttering in the tangled mess of shrub, lower branches and the like. I assume it is an acrobatic Chickadee hanging onto a milk thistle gathering seeds when I see a flash of yellow. Something isn't right. My feet are already in motion before my brain catches up. Sure enough, it is a Golden-crowned Kinglet caught up in the burrs of the burdock plant gone to winter seed.
Kinglets are gleaners of the high tree-tops and to see one fluttering two feet above ground is not so normal.
Inside now, I cut, with tiny manicure scissors, the spurs of the burdock seed head away from feathers and downy underside. He is still with fear and exhaustion. I take the opportunity to remove the fine splinter-like shafts as best as I can and gently nudge a tissue into what I am guessing is the wound area.
Not sure what to do next, we both just sit quietly, my hands covering such a tiny thing. His heartbeat I can feel and my hands, having come in from the cold, are tingling with a rush of blood and now they have that strange firey heat. And so we sit, neither of us moving, just feeling blood, heat and heartbeat.
And then he stirs, the smallest amount of softness in my hands. Then a bit more. I take a peek in my cupped hands, his eyes are open. We sit quietly.
Then, true movement. He sits up and his world changes and so we move into action. I go upstairs and ask my husband to call the wildlife rescue. Their office, it turns out, is not far from us. As he is on the phone, I take another peek, he is so small in my hands, but he is looking up at me with such a spark in his eye and he ruffles a bit of red-orange under his golden crown. "I'm good to go", he says but I am not listening. I am still back with the bloodied leg, the burr, the awful upside down fluttering and I am in the future, worrying about the wound and how he will survive the night.
But my legs are walking me to the door and outside now, I crouch low to the ground and open my hands. He is attentive to the sunshine and the air. His intensity is not focused on me but out there. He's off. A few feet. Sits in the driveway, a tiny thing, no bigger than a leaf. And then, flying he settles on the lower branches of a hemlock. He pauses for several minutes. The orientation of what was into the now. He's away and gleaning the tops of the shrubs.
He is correct. We continue. This intermission is over, how long in all, I do not know. But now, I turn and cut down all the burdock seed heads on my property and set a fire in the firepit. There aren't many to burn, but enough to be able to sit in the sun with the dog and enjoy the afternoon light.