These photos are of our garden over the memorial day weekend - I hope you enjoy them! As you can see, our veggies are doing well, and our columbines are putting on quite a lovely show this year!

The Lesson of the Dandelions

So, my neighbors son-in-law came over last night to rototill the rest of my garden space, and proceeded to lecture me about my dandelions. I sighed, listened, and had to agree that they do look pretty bloody awful this year, but as I'm not so into spraying poisons around my yard, they'll have to be got out the old fashioned way. Digging/pulling by hand. Of course, I am feeling the very beginning of desperation, so my mind begins trying to find the excuse I could use to go spend money on said poison.

Yes, we have lots of them this year- the amount of rain we've gotten certainly helps- and our friendly to all growing things soil. But, what to do, what to do. It isn't like I don't want any dandelions. What would the kids pick and bring to me? Also, I'm not opposed to making a little dandelion tea once in awhile- it's good for detoxing the liver, after all. I suppose if I were feeling adventurous, I might think about adding some young leaves to my salad - they are high in calcium, iron, potassium, phosphorus, vitamins A,B,C, and D. Heard of watercress sandwiches? Yes, you can do the same thing with young dandelion leaves. One thing is certain- I miss Harley, our guinea pig who died at the ripe old age of 6 last year. Dandelions were one of his favorite treats.

As I see it, dandelions are a lesson in determination. Theirs, not ours. As for us, I believe we've gotten overly concerned with having the perfect lawn. What good is a lawn, anyway? I mean, except for a soft/ and undusty place for the kids to play- but who needs a whole half acre of lawn? Also, the spraying thing is simply a sign of our laziness, more than our ingenuity. I'll bet that the time spent on the perfect lawn might be consequential to our salvation. Imagine having to explain to St. Peter at the gate why you spent so much time, money and water on something that you..walk on.

So, for now, I'll battle them the old fashioned way- and maybe use some in the process. Wish my back a good helping of luck.

Cats, Cats Everywhere...

Well, anyone who knows me personally knows that I'm a nut about animals. I love them- all of them! In fact, I'll go so far as to say that looking back at my life and childhood- compassion towards animals was what my spirituality was about (probably should say is).

So. Should it come as a surprise to anyone that my house seems to possess a hidden signal of safe haven to every single stray animal in our area?

2001- Coming home from church, and found a black and white cat with a severed tail in our back yard... had him to the vet, neutered, tail doctored, and found out that he was FIV + (feline aids), and so couldn't keep him in our house- so, he lived in the garage for a month until All Feline Hospital had their FIV adoption day- for people who wanted to adopt a companion for their already FIV + cat. He was the first to get adopted:)

2003- House taken down over by the village park, and the owners abandoned their very lovely cinnamon tabby. Took to The Cat House in Lincoln.

2004- Early May, and a dog had been running around town for about two weeks. Something was wrong with his ear. My neighbor and I finally caught him, and I checked him out. Full of fleas/ticks- possible ear hematoma, unfixed, no tags, about a year old. Took him to the vet, and for a little over $200.00 he was all better, and ours. His name is Darby:)






2005- Scared black and white dog found in our yard- very sweet- WITH tags!! Hallelujah- spent the day with us, called owner and they picked her up later that day. Apparently, she was scared of thunder, so they thought it was a good idea to have her sleep outside.. umm...??

2005- Absolutely dripping with ticks caramel colored cocker spaniel in great need of a hair cut. No tags- after a great amount of trouble- was groomed and taken to the Humane Society.

2007- Found black and white kitten in drainage area of our front yard. The next day, found his presumed brother eating a grasshopper in the middle of the street. Same voice/same age/totally different in looks- except they're both huge! Oliver and Chester have stayed with us.

2008- Early April, and we found an elderly mixed breed dog in our yard. Wet and cold- no tags... asked around, and found out that she belonged to some people about a mile down the road. Got their names and called, and they picked her up- but... she didn't want to go.. which made me nervous. So, I called later to check on her, and the lady of the house explained to me that she is also scared of the thunder, and doesn't like to come home during thunderstorms- apparently, this is a pattern with her...

2008- Yesterday, getting ready to leave for town, and the kids come inside and say- "Mom! We found a kitten in the yard!!" Open the door to find Matthew cuddling a very scrawny, yet fuzzy black and white kitten about 4 months old. Very hungry, and extraordinarily friendly. Don't know what we're going to do yet, but Matt has him named already (which I tried to discourage...) 'Tibby'. I told him he ought to name him Henry VIII as he's hungry all the time, and number '8' .

I haven't even mentioned the 20 or so animals I've taken into wildlife rescue over the years. Baby birds, thrown out of their nest during storms, orphaned baby ducks, a bat, a squirrel, a rabbit,and a canada goose with a broken wing that I chased through a city park while pregnant, after seeing it walking across a very, very busy street... all alone:(

So, what does this make me? Am I the crazy cat lady?? I don't want to be... Of course, I take extraordinary care of them-my house doesn't smell (I have a sensitive nose...)- my vet is priceless (and has helped me out over and over again with cost), I do have a 'limit' which is more feeling than number... I don't know.. Last year, we lost our older dog Micah during that whole dog/cat food scare. She collapsed, went into shock, was stabilized, but later in the week did it again, and much worse, so I had her put to sleep. Held her in my arms, felt her body go limp, and kissed her goodbye. It was hard. But what is harder for me is knowing that I could do something to help- and then don't do it. Like Oliver and Chester's brother. My neighbors found him and I wasn't sure about the situation, but I didn't want to butt in. They live in a trailer down at the edge of our block, they have two children and a pit-bull (who needs to stay in his yard...) and they didn't seem to be overly careful with him- or careful at all. He came over to our house quite often and would meow around the side of our house until we noticed and went out to say hi. That's all he ever wanted, to say hi. I know, because I'd go outside and pet him for a few minutes. He'd 'talk' to me, and then he'd disappear around the side of the house, off to do whatever it was he did during the day. Last week, as I was driving into town, I saw his crumpled body on the side of the road, and my heart jumped into my throat. I felt sick. I felt guilty...

And when the kids found 'Tibby' (who looks a lot like that little lost soul) yesterday, I felt a little bit like I was getting another chance.

In my church, there was always a lot of talk about spiritual gifts. I wonder if this is mine. I'm the cat whisperer! I know that most people suppose a spiritual gift to only apply to service toward humanity- but I have to wonder. After all, we were asked to care for creation- it was our first job. Have we forgotten that? Have we lost the connection between ourselves and the other creatures on our planet who also carry God's divine spark within them? Genesis 1:21 describes animals as chay nephesh- Hebrew for 'living souls'. This is the same phrase used to describe people in Genesis 2:7. Different translations have messed with this a bit and given the word 'creature' in place of souls when speaking of animals, and left that soul part only for us. Obviously, someone was bothered by that fact, and therefore changed it. Were they feeling a little guilty for treating animals inhumanely perhaps, and were trying to justify the continuation of that behaviour? We'll never know. But one thing I do know-

If I ever catch anyone dumping animals in the country to 'find good homes'- they should probably hope they can outrun me...

The Beauty of Clotheslines

When we moved into our house, I was delighted to see a clothesline set up in the backyard. It was in need of some care- new line and new paint- but nothing that would hamper my using it occasionally. Others in the neighborhood had them to, but the only one in use was down the street at the home of an elderly woman who appears to be the very epitome of frugality. Which I also sort of dig, as an example of what I'd like to be rather than what I actually am..
So, the very first chance I had, I began doing laundry, and for those things deemed too difficult to dry efficiently with the dryer, I hung them outside and enjoyed watching them flap in the breeze while I was outside picking pears and peaches and raspberries, and tending our vegetable garden. I'm such a hippie. I should also mention that I would dry Elijah's cloth diapers on the line, and I must say, there is something aesthetically pleasing about seeing a line of cloth diapers drying in the sunshine, stained or not!
Of course, I hadn't thought about what my neighbors might think about my clothesline. Luckily, in my neighborhood, people really don't seem to care, and if they do, they don't voice their opinion. But I've heard about people not approving of clotheslines elsewhere. In fact, there are organizations concerned with this very issue- Right to Dry! is the war cry. Richard Monson of the California Homeowners Association says that having a clothesline in a neighborhood can lower neighboring properties values by 15%, and that 'seeing people's underwear drying on the line" is "unsightly". How he would have handled seeing women's underwear flapping in a victorian breeze is up for question. Something that was a fact of life has been added to the pornographic image catagory by the ultra-prudes in our society once again. For a little extra proof, in the book Home Town Tales, author Philip Gulley talks about his 3 stringed clothesline and how it has hampered his ministry.
'People come by to visit, and we sit outside underneath the shade trees while our family underwear flaps on the line. My slender sons have tiny Mickey Mouse and Tigger underwear. In comparison, my underwear are large and ratty. They beat the air like flags. My fellow Quakers steal glances at them and shudder. It's hampered my ministry with them. I stand in the pulpit and preach about such lofty, wondrous things as salvation by grace, and they ignore me. They've seen my underwear.'
Back to the Right to Dry organizations, many of them have been set up to fight against those homeowner associations, with whom, I have no desire to ever tangle with. I'm not of the frame of mind that purchasing property includes the requirement to ask some bozo if I can grow tomatoes in my own yard, or hang my clothes out to dry, or plant pansies in the front window boxes. If bought with my money, it should be my decision. End of story.
So, I relish using my clothesline. It has 4 strings, and I'm thinking of training some morning glories along the sides this year. We'll see. I like the fact that doing a good job of hanging the clothes prevents the need to iron, and prevents them from wearing out so quickly. And I like the surprising speed with which the job is done on a good windy day.
We've become so dependent on machinery to make our lives more simple- but sometimes that machinery just chains us down. Makes us hide who we really are. Makes us hold ourselves up higher than we ought to. Makes us forget that we are all people behind those ratty boxers and brassiers hanging on the line.

I love clotheslines and all that they stand for: beautiful and proud, art installations with clothes, the flags of our life. So join me as I hang my clothes. Save energy, take time to whiff the blue breezes, feel the sparkling yellow sunshine, beautify Poughkeepsie and hang a clothesline. In Venice, when one woman wants to compliment another it is said: "She hangs a beautiful line."

-Marian Dioguardi to the Mayor of Poughkeepsie when she voted to restrict clotheslines to the backyard only, September, 2007

my lawn mower, my friend

Eight years ago, I was pregnant and we were searching for a house to buy. The market was crazy at the time, interest rates were high.. but we took the plunge anyway. When it came down to it, we had to decide between two houses. One larger house on South Street in Lincoln, NE with absolutely no yard, garage or driveway, or a much smaller house on a large corner lot with a very large detached garage about ten miles west of town. Allan said..'I like this one, it'll be good for the dogs'.. about the latter, and I had to agree. Every time we'd visited the birds were singing, children were playing outside in the neighborhood, and neighbors waved from car windows as they passed by. South street was just that. A street. The house was nice, but when you walked out the front door, there was the street with 4 lanes of traffic two feet in front of you. Probably not good for dogs, or for our little one on the way. Anyway, we settled on our house, and after much weeping and gnashing of teeth, everything was settled and we moved in.

This is where the problem started. When we had talked about how nice the large yard would be, I'd completely forgotten that I had married the polar opposite of anything resembling handy. It isn't that he can't be handy when he wants to be, it's that he rarely wants to be.. handy. Soon, our grass began growing up around our ears, and Allan went to purchase a mower. Seeing as we'd just plunked our very meager savings down to buy the house, we went with a very simple little push mower for which we paid a little over the hundred dollar mark. Problem was, I couldn't start it. Allan mowed the first time, and when the grass started to grow, I decided one day to mow. So, I'm standing in our front yard, 8 months pregnant, pulling the stuffing out of the darn thing to no avail. I heard a large truck behind me and turned to see the Schwan's man coming up my sidewalk. 'Should you be doing that', he asked. 'Probably not, but I need to. Do you think you could start it for me?' 'Umm, sure, just be careful.'

And thus started my first day of mowing. Later that week, I mentioned to my doctor that the reason I had a sunburn was because I'd mowed, and he scowled at me and wrote out on a prescription pad... "Allan will mow the lawn'. I took this home and showed it to Allan and I think it embarrassed him a little.

The following summer, Allan decided that rather than mowing the yard in a traditional fashion, he would mow a maze into it. He kept reminding me that he is the graphic designer in the family and any objections I had were because I didn't have any creative vision. All I knew was that people kept driving by our house, slowing down and staring at our yard. Finally he mowed it down.

After that, I decided it would be a good idea to find a mower that I could actually start on my own. That way, I could mow the yard without having to nag anyone about it. I hate to nag. Prefer doing things on my own. Plus, I figured that I could mow a little at a time every day while the kids were outside playing. This worked for a long time. Until last summer, when the realities of neglect happened upon my mower.

Philip Gulley talks a lot about the importance of maintenance in a few of his essays. How you should drain the fluids, wipe it down with gasoline, have the blade sharpened- all before you store it for the winter. This is not something we've ever come close to doing. Actually, the mower has been lucky for the past several years if it gets fully shoved into the garage before the first snowfall. Therefore, my mower went kaput. In a big way last year. People kept saying things like, 'They don't make them to last like they used to' in order to soothe my troubled spirit.

Well, this year is different. A good portion of our yard is in use as a large vegetable garden, and therefore, much less mowing will be done. However, it will still need to happen. For years, I've been tempted to try an old push reel mower and if you don't know what that is, it is an old fashioned motorless mower like you can see in the opening credits of Leave It To Beaver. But, I'd bended to the opinion of everyone I come across that 'They're hard to push'. Well, after doing some research, and finding out that the people saying this had never, actually, technically used one- so therefore were unqualified to make this statement, I've taken the plunge. Last night, Allan put my new mower together. It came in a rather small box, and took him about 20 minutes to assemble (see, he can be handy when he wants to be). Then, I mowed the front and side yards. It was fun! Like giving the grass a haircut. Made a gentle swooshing noise. You could technically get up and mow at 6am if you wanted to, and no one would care! I can mow the lawn while still being able to hear the kids! I get better exercise, too. It was certainly not hard to push, and in some cases, I actually found it easier than the large one I had before. It doesn't slip sideways down into the ditch, for instance.

So, the point is, sometimes it's good to listen to your inner voice. In the selection of a lawn mower- an item that I use at least 4 times a month- I needed to pick what was right for me. I am a hard worker, but when I'm working I prefer to not have to worry about whether or not something is going to work or not. We waste a lot of time that way. Buying things to make our lives supposedly more simple- sometimes has the opposite effect.

And.. at least in one area of my life, I'll be able to give the finger (so to speak) to the oil companies! Ha!! Take that!!