And there are low days. And I’m resilient and I know they too shall pass and they’re not just endemic to Vermont, God knows, but there are days where my whole being feels like the grey skies, monotonous, dull, no beginning or end; where the matted dirty grass on the hillsides, a mixture of beige and grey and brown interspersed with dirty piles of snow, seeps into my cells. And I know going up in our unfinished loft and jumping some rope, doing some sit-ups, push-ups, exercising, getting the blood going, the oxygen circulating could move this weight away - it’s happened before, I’ve done it, I know it works. But there are days where I just don’t feel like it, I don’t want to. I know I could get out in the dirt, plant winter rye grass on top of the garden to help the nitrogen level in the soil, get out there in the dirt and mud and get grounded, feel the air streaming into my blood or take a walk or hike/run up the hill for a vista that could give new perspective to this morass and the aerobic exertion might help lift this mood up, up, and away. Maybe writing would do the trick. And I can think "This doesn't compare to what other friends or relatives of mine have felt; I have no business letting myself feel down when I see what others are going through. That's REAL, that's black; mine's grey." But still ... its here. And there are days when I don’t fight it or ignore it or deny it; I don’t exercise it away or say “Buck up, get over it, c’mon!” or shove a project or job down its throat, no, I just say, “Okay, hello, I hope you’re not staying for too long this time, but hello darkness, my old friend.” And I look it straight in the eye and dance with it.
So is THIS one of the reasons I’m living in Vermont? Maybe. I don’t know. It’s the whole ball of wax, baby.
And this too shall pass.
And it ain’t the end of the world.
But there are low days … and I know I’m not alone.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Sunday, March 29, 2009
Anniversary Thoughts
(Beginning March 26)
I got up this morning and bundled myself for a sit on our front porch. It’s a little early in the year for screened porch sitting even by Vermont standards. (Note: we in New England are about a month behind everyone else - our April is your March, etcetera, etcetera; then in Autumn it reverses itself and we get the jump on everyone with peak color. In short, when it comes to vegetation, we’re late life, early death.) There are still patches of snow on the ground up where we live despite a steady thaw, and there’s a good chill in the air in the morning. But even though the crocus are a week from blooming, the days have had a tease of Spring in the air and I just couldn't resist getting out in it for a front porch sit.
The cats have been fooled by the season change for a while now and they don’t seem to catch on. Part of Oliver's morning ritual is sitting by the door like the dog in the old Victrola ads until I finally get the message and open the kitchen and porch doors for him. He jaunts out with confident male strides for a bask in the warm sun only to complain loudly to be let back in 5 minutes later. I open the door and he scowls past me, shivering with a “why the hell did you let me do that?!” expression. What a pussy! He should get a load of the Vermont teens that have been donning shorts for 3 weeks!
I loved being out there! I had my travel mug full of Fair Trade coffee, my Rainforest jacket with goose down lining wrapped about me (I guess I’m a pussy too, Oliver), and a whole array of books with which I like starting my morning. They include: a couple of meditation books, Poet's Choice by Edward Hirsch which gives a smorgasboard of his favorite poets in 3 page bites, and Strunk and White's Elements of Style, a section of which I try to read every day. AND a pad of paper. I eased down into one of our Adirondack chairs and took in the washed out white grey skies. The sun was just stretching up over the tall fir trees across the road that surround our pond, and the air was alive with bird song. It was like an orchestra tuning. Above the jabber of chirps came the caw of a crow, first in one part of the forest, and then, after a pause, it would call out from another location. Tabitha and Ron’s rooster from down the road held its own with a trumpeting gargle from time to time. And far away in the woods a woodpecker jack hammered on what I hoped was a dead tree. And all of this was layered on a foundation of quiet. There would be times when all sound would disappear, and then, just for a second, silence. It was exactly what I needed. I had awakened with an aforementioned “And why am I living here again?” murmur in my head, and this front porch hit nipped it in the bud before growing to once familiar and torturous dimensions. (For those keeping score, “mornings on the front porch” would be Reason #14 for living in Vermont, just after “walks.”)
I’ve spoken before about our taking a leap of faith coming to our place in Vermont and I wish I could also say that I welcomed every step of the way with a hearty smile, a willing heart, and a supportive word. But no, I pretty much fought it the whole way in a series of skirmishes that embarrass and amaze me when I look back at them. There must’ve been something symbolic about this whole move that scared the primordial shit out of me, even though I had set the whole thing in motion. I could feel a split right down the center of me - one side was how I like envisioning myself, this pioneer stepping out into the unknown, ready for any challenge, somewhere on the level of Lewis and Clarke and Sacagewea; the other side was a combination cliché of mid-life crisis and a poster boy for “fear of change”, kicking and complaining and writhing, conjuring up every possible image of future disaster, somewhere on the level of Don Knotts. Finally everything came to a head. Richard had at long last had enough. He was driving me to the airport for some trip, I forget where I was going or for what purpose. We’d had an argument, something about the house, some vision of future financial downfall (How prophetic. Just call me Cassandra.) A period of silence had followed. Then Richard said: “You’re miserable. I don’t know why, but you’re miserable and you’re making me miserable and I don’t like it. I look forward to the times when you leave because when you’re away from me, THEN I can be happy. That’s not right. I don’t like that. I don’t like saying it and I don’t like feeling it, but it’s true. And if you have such a dedication to being miserable, then I think you should go somewhere else and be miserable.”
And I said, ‘So what you’re saying is “what?”’
No. “What he said” was like a baby ass slap doctors used to be so fond of giving. Something inside gave way and began to thaw, not right away, not overnight, and oddly enough I became aware of it on a cold, snowy day near the beginning of our first December here. It was our first big snowfall, in a year that would give us the biggest snow accumulation they’d had in one hundred years. I was home alone. I bundled up and walked out into it. Everything was white, white, white, huge flakes coming down. They looked as if they should’ve been heavy, but they were floating down like feathers. It was as if I were inside a huge snow globe, snow swirling, trees perfectly flocked, and me smiling. I hadn't felt a smile like that in a long time. And I realized there was no problem. The only struggles were the ones I was creating. There was nothing wrong. There was nothing, nothing to worry about. I was right where I was supposed to be. WE were right where we were supposed to be. Life was sweet and fresh and ready to be rediscovered. And something inside just let go. All the fight and resistance just went away.
I’m musing on all these things just having passed through Richard and my 10th anniversary; both 10th and 15th actually – the 10th for our commitment ceremony and the 15th for our first date together. March 27th was the official date. I’m really proud of us; we’ve been a great team here, we continue to be. But it’s Richard I’d like to credit. He has been the one who has put so much work into this place, who thrives in every aspect of being here, who keeps dreams alive, and keeps his good humor while doing so. Sometimes I just want to smack him. Especially on the days I’m in a big grump (like yesterday) and he’s got that smile on his face, planning the construction of chicken coops, a man possessed with possibilities. Who does he think he is anyway? It pisses me off!
This morning it was much more like Spring than just 3 days ago. It rained, the snow continued its disappearing act and there were new arrivals at the bird feeder, warblers, I believe. ALL the cats came out on the porch for a look see. And they stayed for awhile.
I got up this morning and bundled myself for a sit on our front porch. It’s a little early in the year for screened porch sitting even by Vermont standards. (Note: we in New England are about a month behind everyone else - our April is your March, etcetera, etcetera; then in Autumn it reverses itself and we get the jump on everyone with peak color. In short, when it comes to vegetation, we’re late life, early death.) There are still patches of snow on the ground up where we live despite a steady thaw, and there’s a good chill in the air in the morning. But even though the crocus are a week from blooming, the days have had a tease of Spring in the air and I just couldn't resist getting out in it for a front porch sit.
The cats have been fooled by the season change for a while now and they don’t seem to catch on. Part of Oliver's morning ritual is sitting by the door like the dog in the old Victrola ads until I finally get the message and open the kitchen and porch doors for him. He jaunts out with confident male strides for a bask in the warm sun only to complain loudly to be let back in 5 minutes later. I open the door and he scowls past me, shivering with a “why the hell did you let me do that?!” expression. What a pussy! He should get a load of the Vermont teens that have been donning shorts for 3 weeks!
I loved being out there! I had my travel mug full of Fair Trade coffee, my Rainforest jacket with goose down lining wrapped about me (I guess I’m a pussy too, Oliver), and a whole array of books with which I like starting my morning. They include: a couple of meditation books, Poet's Choice by Edward Hirsch which gives a smorgasboard of his favorite poets in 3 page bites, and Strunk and White's Elements of Style, a section of which I try to read every day. AND a pad of paper. I eased down into one of our Adirondack chairs and took in the washed out white grey skies. The sun was just stretching up over the tall fir trees across the road that surround our pond, and the air was alive with bird song. It was like an orchestra tuning. Above the jabber of chirps came the caw of a crow, first in one part of the forest, and then, after a pause, it would call out from another location. Tabitha and Ron’s rooster from down the road held its own with a trumpeting gargle from time to time. And far away in the woods a woodpecker jack hammered on what I hoped was a dead tree. And all of this was layered on a foundation of quiet. There would be times when all sound would disappear, and then, just for a second, silence. It was exactly what I needed. I had awakened with an aforementioned “And why am I living here again?” murmur in my head, and this front porch hit nipped it in the bud before growing to once familiar and torturous dimensions. (For those keeping score, “mornings on the front porch” would be Reason #14 for living in Vermont, just after “walks.”)
I’ve spoken before about our taking a leap of faith coming to our place in Vermont and I wish I could also say that I welcomed every step of the way with a hearty smile, a willing heart, and a supportive word. But no, I pretty much fought it the whole way in a series of skirmishes that embarrass and amaze me when I look back at them. There must’ve been something symbolic about this whole move that scared the primordial shit out of me, even though I had set the whole thing in motion. I could feel a split right down the center of me - one side was how I like envisioning myself, this pioneer stepping out into the unknown, ready for any challenge, somewhere on the level of Lewis and Clarke and Sacagewea; the other side was a combination cliché of mid-life crisis and a poster boy for “fear of change”, kicking and complaining and writhing, conjuring up every possible image of future disaster, somewhere on the level of Don Knotts. Finally everything came to a head. Richard had at long last had enough. He was driving me to the airport for some trip, I forget where I was going or for what purpose. We’d had an argument, something about the house, some vision of future financial downfall (How prophetic. Just call me Cassandra.) A period of silence had followed. Then Richard said: “You’re miserable. I don’t know why, but you’re miserable and you’re making me miserable and I don’t like it. I look forward to the times when you leave because when you’re away from me, THEN I can be happy. That’s not right. I don’t like that. I don’t like saying it and I don’t like feeling it, but it’s true. And if you have such a dedication to being miserable, then I think you should go somewhere else and be miserable.”
And I said, ‘So what you’re saying is “what?”’
No. “What he said” was like a baby ass slap doctors used to be so fond of giving. Something inside gave way and began to thaw, not right away, not overnight, and oddly enough I became aware of it on a cold, snowy day near the beginning of our first December here. It was our first big snowfall, in a year that would give us the biggest snow accumulation they’d had in one hundred years. I was home alone. I bundled up and walked out into it. Everything was white, white, white, huge flakes coming down. They looked as if they should’ve been heavy, but they were floating down like feathers. It was as if I were inside a huge snow globe, snow swirling, trees perfectly flocked, and me smiling. I hadn't felt a smile like that in a long time. And I realized there was no problem. The only struggles were the ones I was creating. There was nothing wrong. There was nothing, nothing to worry about. I was right where I was supposed to be. WE were right where we were supposed to be. Life was sweet and fresh and ready to be rediscovered. And something inside just let go. All the fight and resistance just went away.
I’m musing on all these things just having passed through Richard and my 10th anniversary; both 10th and 15th actually – the 10th for our commitment ceremony and the 15th for our first date together. March 27th was the official date. I’m really proud of us; we’ve been a great team here, we continue to be. But it’s Richard I’d like to credit. He has been the one who has put so much work into this place, who thrives in every aspect of being here, who keeps dreams alive, and keeps his good humor while doing so. Sometimes I just want to smack him. Especially on the days I’m in a big grump (like yesterday) and he’s got that smile on his face, planning the construction of chicken coops, a man possessed with possibilities. Who does he think he is anyway? It pisses me off!
This morning it was much more like Spring than just 3 days ago. It rained, the snow continued its disappearing act and there were new arrivals at the bird feeder, warblers, I believe. ALL the cats came out on the porch for a look see. And they stayed for awhile.
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Horton Foote
I found out on March 13th that Horton Foote had died. He had passed away on March 4th, actually, and I had missed it, but it’s easy to miss news cut off from things as we are up here. Or as I choose to be. I was traveling back north to Vermont from New York and had stopped to get some food and while I was waiting for it to be prepared I spied a copy of the Arts Section of the New York Times and something called to me to look inside it. This has happened to me often over the years, this kind of calling, and I always heed it. 9 times out of 10 I am led to something that I need to see, usually an obituary, but many times an article or editorial that sticks with me the rest of my life. This time the news was about Horton.
For those of you who may not know, Horton Foote was an Academy Award and Pulitzer Prize winning playwright and screenwriter and I had the great good fortune of working with him on 2 occasions: a workshop of his play "Habitation of Dragons" and an Off-Broadway production of "The Widow Claire" at Circle in the Square downtown; a theatre, sadly, that is no longer in existence. In "The Widow Claire" I got to play the town rube, Roger, and he remains one of my all time favorite roles. Roger is the sidekick to the town's bully and is a fellow who, like many other characters in the play including the bully, is smitten by the young widow (played by Hallie Foote, Horton's daughter). Late in the play, Roger comes to the widow's house at 4 in the morning, ostensibly to deliver a bottle of whiskey, but really to just bask in her presence. Claire makes her excuses and goes inside and then for 3 pages of script I rhapsodize non-stop to Claire's hapless suitor, Horace (Matthew Broderick), about everything I know and love about the young widow, following him around every inch of the stage as I do. This scene felt like "the 11 o’clock spot” and I looked forward to doing it every single night. Within the scene I had one of the best lines I've ever gotten to say on stage. After having exhausted every possible topic of discussion with Horace/Matthew (“Do you like hot tamales? I love hot tamales!”) , I sit beside him on the widow's front steps, waiting for her to reappear. I don't want to leave and Matthew’s character is too polite to simply say "Get the hell out." Finally, after a long silence, I turn to him, smile, and ask: "Do you prefer the light or the dark meat of chicken?"
It was like gold, like speaking gold. A gift from the Gods.
You may be asking yourself "That's all very nice, but what does this have to do with a blog about living in Vermont?" Well, there is a connection of sorts. I read in one of the articles about Horton's life that during the '60's, with his writing not getting the attention it had once received, he and his wife decided to move from New York City up to New Hampshire to raise their family, so he was in the area. I wonder why they decided on New Hampshire instead of going back down to Texas and his southern roots? Maybe New England called to him too. Maybe he needed to be away from Texas to write about it. And I know from experience that he didn't need to be there, it resided within him. I remember once when I was in rehearsal for "Habitation of Dragons" , a workshop production that Horton was directing, he stood up and began describing the town in which the play took place in order to give us some background and atmosphere. I take it that the town was the fictional "Harrison" as in so many of his other plays. He walked us down every street of that town, describing where each of the homes were and who lived in them, what the various businesses were, where they stood. To be honest, most of what he said wasn't that helpful to me as an actor, but it was fascinating watching Horton step right back into that town. He was there, he was on those streets as he told you about them.
I agree with those who say that Horton was an American Chekhov. Something simple and true and ineffable about the human condition resonated beneath his words. When I think of how much I love his writing, how it perfectly moves a story forward while at the same time revealing what's going on within characters with elegance and grace, the best example I can come up with is from a scene in his screenplay of Harper Lee's "To Kill A Mockingbird" for which he won an Academy Award. (He received another for “Tender Mercies.”) I'll describe it as I've seen it in the film, acted beautifully, but pure Horton Foote. The scene is at the end of the first act of the movie. Atticus has tucked his children into bed and as they drift off to sleep in their separate bedrooms Scout begins asking Jim questions which he answers with a simple "yes" or "no." The topic of conversation shifts to their deceased mother as the camera slowly pulls out of their bedrooms and discovers Atticus sitting quietly on the front porch, listening. The children's exchange continues with questions like: "Did she love you?" "Yes" "Did she love me?" "Yes"and finally - "Do you miss her?" The question hangs in the air, unanswered. The children have fallen asleep. Atticus sits alone with his thoughts, unmoving. And you know everything you need to know about all of those characters and where they are. In the next moment the town's judge arrives to ask Atticus if he'll take the Robinson case and the second act of the story begins.
Perfect.
Thank you Horton
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Nature Calls
I keep intending to finish and polish 2 other pieces I’ve been working on and intending to post, but life and nature keep getting in the way, so I’ll go with a rambling outpouring of present and near past events for your reading pleasure.
I was urged out of bed this morning by Richard calling from the upstairs bathroom, “There’s a big coyote on our hill.” I got up and joined him and, sure enough, there he or she was at the top of our rise in back, silhouetted through the dusting of snow coming down (yes, the 2nd day of Spring and snow. And after a week of a Spring weather tease and the beginning ruts of mud season.) The coyote was burrowing for something, then darting back and forth to several locations, tracing rodent tremors. We got the binoculars for a closer look and placing them up to my eyes, the large silhouette of the coyote transmogrified into that of a large, bushed out fox! I dropped the binoculars to my chest and lifted them to my eyes several times not believing the transformation, but I couldn't argue with the clear evidence - the coyote had turned into a fox. There’s magic in these hills. Richard and I stood mesmerized by his hunting habits, passing the binoculars back and forth between us. The fox would dig tenaciously, then pounce up and down, his spine curving up like a yoga exercise. Then, successful at flushing out his quarry, he’d dash about for a few quick seconds, catch it, and then stop still and chew in place. A pause of post-prandial delight and then right back to digging. There must be more! The chicks at our feet remained indifferent, but, of course, they couldn’t see the goings on, being tiny and squat and … at our feet on the floor.
Chick update. The “chicks at our feet” now in a large, warmed plastic container in our upstairs bathroom include the “injured one” and a friendly Wyandot to keep its company. No, Wyandot is not a member of a local native American tribe, but another breed of chick that Richard has here in the house. The “injured one” or Black Australorp (remember?) had a convalescent period with more and more friends of various breeds- Speckled Sussex, Buff Orpingtons, Wyandots, etc - allowed visiting priviliges until we felt it was time to reintroduce her back into the larger flock. This larger flock, by the way, has been moved from the cellar to our guest room on the main floor to offer them sunlight and get them away from the damp and cool of the lower depths. This move has given the guest room a new tangy scent, but pishky-poshky.
The reinclusion of the Australorp went very well … for about 5 minutes. Recidivism set in and after the initial “hi, how are ya, where’ve you been?” the Silver Wyondots (Another breed, not to be mistaken for the nicer more docile plain ole Wyandot) lay into her, roughing her up, and getting her hurt leg in a beak hold, the same beak hold that worked so well before. Police action was called for and we quickly separated them again. The nice Wyandot was sent in to buddy system and all was made right with the world once again. Except that ...
Richard’s geese eggs haven’t arrived yet and we’re reaching the 14 day limit. You pass 2 weeks and there's very little chance that the eggs will hatch. The eggs are insured though which is a good development. But this morning, another imbroglio set in. A few moments after the coyote/fox switcheroo and I walked into the kitchen where Richard sat disgruntled in front of his laptop.
‘What’s the matter?’ I asked.
“The eggs.”
Of course, I thought he meant the goose egg shipment and being evolved and kindhearted and rising above any old feeling that Richard is slowly, but surely becoming immersed in a chicken/goose/turkey-raising obsession, I lent some spiritual support. ‘Oh, that must be frustrating.’
“I don’t mean the goose eggs. This is the shipment of pure-bred Wyandots from a woman in California.”
‘Oh.’ Wyandot eggs? News to me. I squelched questions that began fireworking through my mind and listened to Richard get out his frustration. Something about Paypal and an egg lady not reading one of his messages in time and the eggs being shipped to his parents in Arizona rather than here. Soon, together we figured out that there may be no mistaken address and that the Wyandot eggs may very well be en route safely and securely to Vermont as intended. The storm passed and Richard’s mood eased, he uttered, “Maybe there’s no problem after all; I don’t know.” I suggested that line would make a great title for his autobiography.
Oh, I forgot! Right in the midst of the goose egg/Wyandot egg discussion, Richard gave out a “What’s that up on the hill, now?!” He was looking past me out the back kitchen window up to the top of the hill where the fox had been just a short while before and there was yet another animal there now. We ran for our binoculars and took lookout stations at 2 different windows lo and behold we spotted our first Fishercat!! This has been a mysterious, much maligned, mysterious creature, spoken of, but seldom seen, that lurks in the woods around here. It’s been decribed as a member of the stoat and mink family, though larger, with huge, sharp teeth. Cats and small dogs fall prey to these storied creatures, and I'm pretty sure that one of those was our own “Lucy”, an orange cat that made the trip with us cross-country from Los Angeles in a 10’ Budget Rental truck several summers back. She disappeared one day and it was either a fisher cat or a coyote or an owl. I loved Lucy and mourned her passing, but I'm sure its nature's payback for all the birds she nabbed out of nests, out of the air (hummingbirds!) and the rats and mice whose necks she'd snap and then come lay at my feet as love offerings.
Binoculars out again, Richard and I peered to the top of the hill. My God it was big. Like an otter. Or a bear cub. From a distance, it looked a bit cute and cuddly. Still I tried to imagine it cornered with teeth bared, maybe dripping saliva like “Alien”, and I remembered that this may have been one of Lucy’s last sights and the “cute and cuddly” monicker flew from my mind’s thesauras. I don’t know if it could feel us watching and talking about her/him, but something startled it and off it went toward the woods behind Royce’s. Wildlife. Wild life. What a morning!
I just stopped in the bathroom upstairs and where there had been 2 chicks earlier this morning, there now were 3. They’re multiplying! This is a spooky place: coyotes turning into foxes, then into fisher cats; chicks multiplying before your eyes. Scary. I sit on the toilet Rodin-like and peer in at those 3 little chicks going about their little chick lives. Not much to it, just eating and drinking and pooping and pluming their feathers and scrapping around, taking in their world, pecking playfully at one another. It's calming watching them wander around in the red glow of their heat lamp (a similar light beams out from the front windows of our guest room at night as if something infernal were going on inside). Sometimes they do take notice of me and stand and look out through the plastic. Who knows, maybe they're having the same thoughts of me as I have of them (“Isn’t he calming? I love looking at him sitting there.”) They are sort of silly and cute. Sometimes I walk in and they're completely konked out. Sacked out, still, smashed to the floor of their container as if they’ve just crashed from an all nighter. This whole thing is starting to feel like something between a state fair and a science experiment, something having to do with chicken genetics, but for now, they've got me wound around their little ... what do you call that on a chicken? Talon? I'm sure Richard knows.
Okay, that’s it. I have nothing else to say right now. Richard and I are off to Montpelier for a bite at the culinary institute before taking in a few flicks at the Green Mountain Film Festival. We’ll leave the chicks and cats (fisher and otherwise) and coyotes and foxes to fend for themselves for awhile. I’m sure all will be well.
I was urged out of bed this morning by Richard calling from the upstairs bathroom, “There’s a big coyote on our hill.” I got up and joined him and, sure enough, there he or she was at the top of our rise in back, silhouetted through the dusting of snow coming down (yes, the 2nd day of Spring and snow. And after a week of a Spring weather tease and the beginning ruts of mud season.) The coyote was burrowing for something, then darting back and forth to several locations, tracing rodent tremors. We got the binoculars for a closer look and placing them up to my eyes, the large silhouette of the coyote transmogrified into that of a large, bushed out fox! I dropped the binoculars to my chest and lifted them to my eyes several times not believing the transformation, but I couldn't argue with the clear evidence - the coyote had turned into a fox. There’s magic in these hills. Richard and I stood mesmerized by his hunting habits, passing the binoculars back and forth between us. The fox would dig tenaciously, then pounce up and down, his spine curving up like a yoga exercise. Then, successful at flushing out his quarry, he’d dash about for a few quick seconds, catch it, and then stop still and chew in place. A pause of post-prandial delight and then right back to digging. There must be more! The chicks at our feet remained indifferent, but, of course, they couldn’t see the goings on, being tiny and squat and … at our feet on the floor.
Chick update. The “chicks at our feet” now in a large, warmed plastic container in our upstairs bathroom include the “injured one” and a friendly Wyandot to keep its company. No, Wyandot is not a member of a local native American tribe, but another breed of chick that Richard has here in the house. The “injured one” or Black Australorp (remember?) had a convalescent period with more and more friends of various breeds- Speckled Sussex, Buff Orpingtons, Wyandots, etc - allowed visiting priviliges until we felt it was time to reintroduce her back into the larger flock. This larger flock, by the way, has been moved from the cellar to our guest room on the main floor to offer them sunlight and get them away from the damp and cool of the lower depths. This move has given the guest room a new tangy scent, but pishky-poshky.
The reinclusion of the Australorp went very well … for about 5 minutes. Recidivism set in and after the initial “hi, how are ya, where’ve you been?” the Silver Wyondots (Another breed, not to be mistaken for the nicer more docile plain ole Wyandot) lay into her, roughing her up, and getting her hurt leg in a beak hold, the same beak hold that worked so well before. Police action was called for and we quickly separated them again. The nice Wyandot was sent in to buddy system and all was made right with the world once again. Except that ...
Richard’s geese eggs haven’t arrived yet and we’re reaching the 14 day limit. You pass 2 weeks and there's very little chance that the eggs will hatch. The eggs are insured though which is a good development. But this morning, another imbroglio set in. A few moments after the coyote/fox switcheroo and I walked into the kitchen where Richard sat disgruntled in front of his laptop.
‘What’s the matter?’ I asked.
“The eggs.”
Of course, I thought he meant the goose egg shipment and being evolved and kindhearted and rising above any old feeling that Richard is slowly, but surely becoming immersed in a chicken/goose/turkey-raising obsession, I lent some spiritual support. ‘Oh, that must be frustrating.’
“I don’t mean the goose eggs. This is the shipment of pure-bred Wyandots from a woman in California.”
‘Oh.’ Wyandot eggs? News to me. I squelched questions that began fireworking through my mind and listened to Richard get out his frustration. Something about Paypal and an egg lady not reading one of his messages in time and the eggs being shipped to his parents in Arizona rather than here. Soon, together we figured out that there may be no mistaken address and that the Wyandot eggs may very well be en route safely and securely to Vermont as intended. The storm passed and Richard’s mood eased, he uttered, “Maybe there’s no problem after all; I don’t know.” I suggested that line would make a great title for his autobiography.
Oh, I forgot! Right in the midst of the goose egg/Wyandot egg discussion, Richard gave out a “What’s that up on the hill, now?!” He was looking past me out the back kitchen window up to the top of the hill where the fox had been just a short while before and there was yet another animal there now. We ran for our binoculars and took lookout stations at 2 different windows lo and behold we spotted our first Fishercat!! This has been a mysterious, much maligned, mysterious creature, spoken of, but seldom seen, that lurks in the woods around here. It’s been decribed as a member of the stoat and mink family, though larger, with huge, sharp teeth. Cats and small dogs fall prey to these storied creatures, and I'm pretty sure that one of those was our own “Lucy”, an orange cat that made the trip with us cross-country from Los Angeles in a 10’ Budget Rental truck several summers back. She disappeared one day and it was either a fisher cat or a coyote or an owl. I loved Lucy and mourned her passing, but I'm sure its nature's payback for all the birds she nabbed out of nests, out of the air (hummingbirds!) and the rats and mice whose necks she'd snap and then come lay at my feet as love offerings.
Binoculars out again, Richard and I peered to the top of the hill. My God it was big. Like an otter. Or a bear cub. From a distance, it looked a bit cute and cuddly. Still I tried to imagine it cornered with teeth bared, maybe dripping saliva like “Alien”, and I remembered that this may have been one of Lucy’s last sights and the “cute and cuddly” monicker flew from my mind’s thesauras. I don’t know if it could feel us watching and talking about her/him, but something startled it and off it went toward the woods behind Royce’s. Wildlife. Wild life. What a morning!
I just stopped in the bathroom upstairs and where there had been 2 chicks earlier this morning, there now were 3. They’re multiplying! This is a spooky place: coyotes turning into foxes, then into fisher cats; chicks multiplying before your eyes. Scary. I sit on the toilet Rodin-like and peer in at those 3 little chicks going about their little chick lives. Not much to it, just eating and drinking and pooping and pluming their feathers and scrapping around, taking in their world, pecking playfully at one another. It's calming watching them wander around in the red glow of their heat lamp (a similar light beams out from the front windows of our guest room at night as if something infernal were going on inside). Sometimes they do take notice of me and stand and look out through the plastic. Who knows, maybe they're having the same thoughts of me as I have of them (“Isn’t he calming? I love looking at him sitting there.”) They are sort of silly and cute. Sometimes I walk in and they're completely konked out. Sacked out, still, smashed to the floor of their container as if they’ve just crashed from an all nighter. This whole thing is starting to feel like something between a state fair and a science experiment, something having to do with chicken genetics, but for now, they've got me wound around their little ... what do you call that on a chicken? Talon? I'm sure Richard knows.
Okay, that’s it. I have nothing else to say right now. Richard and I are off to Montpelier for a bite at the culinary institute before taking in a few flicks at the Green Mountain Film Festival. We’ll leave the chicks and cats (fisher and otherwise) and coyotes and foxes to fend for themselves for awhile. I’m sure all will be well.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Sick Chicks
‘I'm not going to fall in love with these chicks! I'm not going to fall in love with these chicks. I'm not.’ Prescription: Keep repeating this mantra on and off throughout the day and try - as best you can - cold turkeying contact with any little feathered friends.
As I write this I am sitting at our kitchen table, my lap top in front of me, and a large heat lamp heated plastic container with an ailing chick inside to my right. I am babysitting this chick. Richard is off running errands, picking up various chicken necessities -- RED heat lamps to replace the bright white ones he has which he is convinced keeps them up all night and turns them cannibalistic. This cannibalistic side was made manifest when the ailing chick’s leg was somehow cut and the sight of red blood sent the rest of the chicks into a pecking frenzy and we had to separate them. We’ve administered Neosporin to the cut and attempted to rouse the chick’s spirits. Other than the healing cut, she seems to be in good health, even hearty, though she exhibits signs of loneliness. When ever you get too far away from the container, she begins chirping up a storm, and thus my proximity to her to calm her down.
In between me and the "chick's" plastic container rests a collection of EB White essays that I’ve been reading, the cover picture of which has EB at his typewriter looking to his right where his dachshund Fred sits atop EB's desk looking back at him; both are frozen, sphinx-like, seemingly awaiting the other one’s next move. You could easily substitute me for EB and the chick for Fred and get a snapshot of what's going on here at this moment. The little chick stands and observes me, every once and awhile pecking the side of its container. Maybe it wants out. Or maybe it’s “marked” me as a parent figure and is morse-coding its undying affection for me. “Papa!” (Repeat: I won’t fall in love with these chicks. I won’t fall in love with these chicks.) THIS chick, by the way, is an Australorp. Richard has been indoctrinating me with minutia about the feathered horde now residing in our cellar (and kitchen and soon who knows where) He camouflauges this programming as fun quizzes and contests, getting me to memorize their names so they're personal to me, so my affection for them is cemented, indelible. For instance, an Australorp - this little chick pecking “I love you” from the other side of its plastic emergency care ward - is an Australian version of a Orpington. Isn’t that interesting? Isn’t she cute? (I won’t fall in love with … oh, I’m dead meat.)
Let’s back up a few days.
I picked up the 25 chicks (actually 27. Murray McMurray Hatchery throws in a couple extra for good measure. Aren’t they nice?) from the main post office in White River Junction Sunday night and brought them home in their cardboard carton. Their “uncartoning” I shared with Richard and his family in Arizona via a gmail video chat connection. (Remember Richard was out of town at a family gathering? When I gmailed them, they were all playing cards around a table. It was still day there.) Everyone "ooooed" and "ahhhhhed" as I scooped each chick into their warm new home (heat lamps had been on all day per Richard's instructions.) At the bottom of the delivery crate lay 1 dead chick. She'd been pecked a bit and surely stomped over. I was a little sad; it looked so forlorn down there. Richard toughed right through it, though, telling me to quick count the live ones. "The dead one's dead," he seemed to be saying, “toughen up big baby!” He wanted a live tally, pronto, so I needed to focus! (See, I still characterize Richard as this sweet innocent, almost angelic, even after 15 years of living together. It's that smile of his. And his eyes. His voice. They fool me into thinking he’s nothing but sweetness and kindness. And then I find out the truth again. Oh, but the world can be cruel.)
'There are 25 or 26," I replied. 'It's hard to tell because they won't stand still.'
Richard seemed satisfied with that and wanted to get back to his card game and the last moment’s of his family get together. I hung up. I stuck around the container for a while longer, watching these little chirping fur balls scurry about, these little lives. I kept measuring the height of the heat lamps and checking the thermometer so as to keep the temperature right around 95. It was tough; it would either spike up to above 100 or plummet down to 80. And the first days are pretty crucial for the chick's survival because they're especially vulnerable. I had mixed some Gro Gel Plus with water and spread it on the corn feed and also sprinkled a vitamin solution into the water. They seemed like they were acclimating well, so I went back upstairs, checking in on them every hour or so. There’s a kid in me that loves stirring up trouble, and to satisfy that troublesome side I took one and then another of our cats down in the cellar for a look see. My “kid" must've been sorely disappointed because the cats couldn't've care less. Well, Sofia cared, but mostly for her own safety. She was spooked, squirming around and struggling as if I'd taken her down to the basement in "Silence of the Lambs."
The next morning! Glorious clear blue sky, sun shining, a tease of Spring in the air. The chicks were in fine fettle; all was right with the world. Doorbell. Royce, our next door neighbor, pleasantly dissheveled as always, stood at our door holding pieces of a tiny fan that he'd found and thought would help Richard in his incubation experiment.
'Incubation experiment," I queried, warm and smiling.
"For the geese eggs."
'Geese?' My mood cooled.
"Oh, I guess Richard hasn't told you."
'No'
"Well, now you know!" Royce began cheerily demonstrating the fan on our kitchen counter, but I wasn't listening anymore. A flock of geese had taken roost in my head. Geese. First chickens, then turkeys, now geese! Treachery! Richard’s taking advantage of my good will! We’re going to be living in an aviary! I plumed myself up with righteous indignation. And then ... miraculously ... it went away. I just let it go, something I would’ve held onto for weeks before. No, if Richard wants an aviary, so be it. We've talked about this. It's his investment. I'll pitch in when I can. I'm employing detachment. After all, my boundaries are clear. I just don't want chicken shit on our front porch. I walked through enough of that last year.
I gmail videoed Richard in Arizona again as he was packing for his flight back home, and gave him a morning look at the chicks, all traces of goose gone, and during our talk I noticed that one of the chicks was looking less energetic then the others. It was hyperventilating and dozy and squatted down close to the floor while the others were scurrying about, or if they too were squatted down, all you’d have to do would be nudge them and they’d immediately pop up and dart away. Not this guy. Or gal. She/he seemed to be in sad shape.
“She’s dehydrated. Try and get her to drink,” Richard urged.
I picked her up gently and dipped her beak down into the water. She shook her face in a bit of bluster, and then drank, tossing her beak back in that little chicken way that looks like tossing shots back at a bar.
“Sometimes you have to teach them to drink,” Richard encouraged from Tempe. “They don’t know how.”
‘Okay’ and I continued. After a few more drinks she seemed a bit more sure on her feet, less wobbly.
“I’ve got to get ready for my flight home,” Richard said, and signed off, sending his love.
I continued my little triage unit and began feeling a sense of pride in my little chick. She was coming back, she was going to make it. She began pluming her matted feathers out, she pecked at some grain. I called Royce back over to get his take on the whole enterprise, wondering if we should quarantine her away from the others. Royce had grown up in our house and, in fact, his family had had a large chicken operation here at one time, with up to 5,000 pullets housed in several large barns, now long gone.
“I’d just main line her.”
‘Main line?’
“Just keep her with the others. She’s coming around. She’ll be fine,” he assured me and left.
But it was not to be. I came back down later in the day and after her initial burst of life, she’d begun failing. I called Richard again, one last check in before his flight, and seeing her he said that he didn’t think she was going to make it, the difference between her and the other chicks was now so great. The rest weren’t ganging up on her, but they’d walk over her. She couldn’t keep her balance. I wished Richard a safe flight and hung up and a defiance rose up in me. I kept urging her to drink. And she’d try, but it seemed to sap rather than strengthen her. She’d sit there in between drinks, trying to cheep. There was barely any sound. Then she'd just sit and gasp. She was trying her best, I thought, and it wasn’t quite good enough.
A few weeks back I’d read EB White’s essay “Death of a Pig” and I now found myself in a parallel universe with that tale, not as prolonged, not as beautifully documented, but it was deeply sad. I hated knowing that this little creature had “suffered in a suffering world.” And I felt a deep affection for it, for its pluck, for its trying to survive. I felt she/he was doing it for me.
Richard arrived late, around 9, tired after a long flight. I’d fixed dinner. Like a country doctor he went down and checked out the flock and the little hurt one.
“She’s dying. She’ll be gone by morning,” he said as he sat down for dinner.
But she was still hanging on the next day. It took her until the afternoon of that day to pass on. We removed her and lay her beside the other dead chick in the delivery carton and planned a future burial. But we were soon distracted by traces of blood on the towel paper at the bottom of the wooden container and spotted our little hurt chick in the nick of time. We nabbed it out, just as one of the rooster chips had not only pecked her leg, but grabbed it in its beak and was tenaciously tugging at it. We slapped him away and airlifted her to safety. There followed a tug of war of our own between Richard and me as we haggled about what kind of container to house her in and then where that housing was to take place. When we decided on the kitchen, we then had to deal with our cats’ curiosity, especially Astrid’s, but they seem to have gotten used to this change in the kitchen layout.
Some time has gone by since I first began writing this. Our Australorp is well on the mend. Her cut is healing nicely and is starting to blend in. Richard got a couple of the more docile chicks from the cellar and tossed them in to keep her company. They all seem to be getting along well, 3 ladies catching up on the recent "medical procedure" over lunch. They still have a long way to go when it comes to dining manners, however; they stand in their feed bowls when they're eating and their water bowls when they're drinking.Honestly! You'd think they were brought up in a barn!
PS: Richard’s geese eggs are late. Somehow they’ve gotten waylaid in the mails and no one knows quite how to track them down. Richard has constructed an incubator out of an ugly old green plastic cooler that had been hanging around in our attic and that I’d been urging him to get rid of for over a year. Now it’s come to good use. It really is quite a contraption he’s concocted; something called a gopher-bator. I don’t know if that’s his name or an adopted one. It’s got levers and dials and thermometers and a light bulb. I think it looks like a Mad Scientist’s version of an Easy Bake Oven, but it’s certainly making him happy. (For his lowdown on all this, check out: the Poultry Chronicles by Buff Orpington.)
As I write this I am sitting at our kitchen table, my lap top in front of me, and a large heat lamp heated plastic container with an ailing chick inside to my right. I am babysitting this chick. Richard is off running errands, picking up various chicken necessities -- RED heat lamps to replace the bright white ones he has which he is convinced keeps them up all night and turns them cannibalistic. This cannibalistic side was made manifest when the ailing chick’s leg was somehow cut and the sight of red blood sent the rest of the chicks into a pecking frenzy and we had to separate them. We’ve administered Neosporin to the cut and attempted to rouse the chick’s spirits. Other than the healing cut, she seems to be in good health, even hearty, though she exhibits signs of loneliness. When ever you get too far away from the container, she begins chirping up a storm, and thus my proximity to her to calm her down.
In between me and the "chick's" plastic container rests a collection of EB White essays that I’ve been reading, the cover picture of which has EB at his typewriter looking to his right where his dachshund Fred sits atop EB's desk looking back at him; both are frozen, sphinx-like, seemingly awaiting the other one’s next move. You could easily substitute me for EB and the chick for Fred and get a snapshot of what's going on here at this moment. The little chick stands and observes me, every once and awhile pecking the side of its container. Maybe it wants out. Or maybe it’s “marked” me as a parent figure and is morse-coding its undying affection for me. “Papa!” (Repeat: I won’t fall in love with these chicks. I won’t fall in love with these chicks.) THIS chick, by the way, is an Australorp. Richard has been indoctrinating me with minutia about the feathered horde now residing in our cellar (and kitchen and soon who knows where) He camouflauges this programming as fun quizzes and contests, getting me to memorize their names so they're personal to me, so my affection for them is cemented, indelible. For instance, an Australorp - this little chick pecking “I love you” from the other side of its plastic emergency care ward - is an Australian version of a Orpington. Isn’t that interesting? Isn’t she cute? (I won’t fall in love with … oh, I’m dead meat.)
Let’s back up a few days.
I picked up the 25 chicks (actually 27. Murray McMurray Hatchery throws in a couple extra for good measure. Aren’t they nice?) from the main post office in White River Junction Sunday night and brought them home in their cardboard carton. Their “uncartoning” I shared with Richard and his family in Arizona via a gmail video chat connection. (Remember Richard was out of town at a family gathering? When I gmailed them, they were all playing cards around a table. It was still day there.) Everyone "ooooed" and "ahhhhhed" as I scooped each chick into their warm new home (heat lamps had been on all day per Richard's instructions.) At the bottom of the delivery crate lay 1 dead chick. She'd been pecked a bit and surely stomped over. I was a little sad; it looked so forlorn down there. Richard toughed right through it, though, telling me to quick count the live ones. "The dead one's dead," he seemed to be saying, “toughen up big baby!” He wanted a live tally, pronto, so I needed to focus! (See, I still characterize Richard as this sweet innocent, almost angelic, even after 15 years of living together. It's that smile of his. And his eyes. His voice. They fool me into thinking he’s nothing but sweetness and kindness. And then I find out the truth again. Oh, but the world can be cruel.)
'There are 25 or 26," I replied. 'It's hard to tell because they won't stand still.'
Richard seemed satisfied with that and wanted to get back to his card game and the last moment’s of his family get together. I hung up. I stuck around the container for a while longer, watching these little chirping fur balls scurry about, these little lives. I kept measuring the height of the heat lamps and checking the thermometer so as to keep the temperature right around 95. It was tough; it would either spike up to above 100 or plummet down to 80. And the first days are pretty crucial for the chick's survival because they're especially vulnerable. I had mixed some Gro Gel Plus with water and spread it on the corn feed and also sprinkled a vitamin solution into the water. They seemed like they were acclimating well, so I went back upstairs, checking in on them every hour or so. There’s a kid in me that loves stirring up trouble, and to satisfy that troublesome side I took one and then another of our cats down in the cellar for a look see. My “kid" must've been sorely disappointed because the cats couldn't've care less. Well, Sofia cared, but mostly for her own safety. She was spooked, squirming around and struggling as if I'd taken her down to the basement in "Silence of the Lambs."
The next morning! Glorious clear blue sky, sun shining, a tease of Spring in the air. The chicks were in fine fettle; all was right with the world. Doorbell. Royce, our next door neighbor, pleasantly dissheveled as always, stood at our door holding pieces of a tiny fan that he'd found and thought would help Richard in his incubation experiment.
'Incubation experiment," I queried, warm and smiling.
"For the geese eggs."
'Geese?' My mood cooled.
"Oh, I guess Richard hasn't told you."
'No'
"Well, now you know!" Royce began cheerily demonstrating the fan on our kitchen counter, but I wasn't listening anymore. A flock of geese had taken roost in my head. Geese. First chickens, then turkeys, now geese! Treachery! Richard’s taking advantage of my good will! We’re going to be living in an aviary! I plumed myself up with righteous indignation. And then ... miraculously ... it went away. I just let it go, something I would’ve held onto for weeks before. No, if Richard wants an aviary, so be it. We've talked about this. It's his investment. I'll pitch in when I can. I'm employing detachment. After all, my boundaries are clear. I just don't want chicken shit on our front porch. I walked through enough of that last year.
I gmail videoed Richard in Arizona again as he was packing for his flight back home, and gave him a morning look at the chicks, all traces of goose gone, and during our talk I noticed that one of the chicks was looking less energetic then the others. It was hyperventilating and dozy and squatted down close to the floor while the others were scurrying about, or if they too were squatted down, all you’d have to do would be nudge them and they’d immediately pop up and dart away. Not this guy. Or gal. She/he seemed to be in sad shape.
“She’s dehydrated. Try and get her to drink,” Richard urged.
I picked her up gently and dipped her beak down into the water. She shook her face in a bit of bluster, and then drank, tossing her beak back in that little chicken way that looks like tossing shots back at a bar.
“Sometimes you have to teach them to drink,” Richard encouraged from Tempe. “They don’t know how.”
‘Okay’ and I continued. After a few more drinks she seemed a bit more sure on her feet, less wobbly.
“I’ve got to get ready for my flight home,” Richard said, and signed off, sending his love.
I continued my little triage unit and began feeling a sense of pride in my little chick. She was coming back, she was going to make it. She began pluming her matted feathers out, she pecked at some grain. I called Royce back over to get his take on the whole enterprise, wondering if we should quarantine her away from the others. Royce had grown up in our house and, in fact, his family had had a large chicken operation here at one time, with up to 5,000 pullets housed in several large barns, now long gone.
“I’d just main line her.”
‘Main line?’
“Just keep her with the others. She’s coming around. She’ll be fine,” he assured me and left.
But it was not to be. I came back down later in the day and after her initial burst of life, she’d begun failing. I called Richard again, one last check in before his flight, and seeing her he said that he didn’t think she was going to make it, the difference between her and the other chicks was now so great. The rest weren’t ganging up on her, but they’d walk over her. She couldn’t keep her balance. I wished Richard a safe flight and hung up and a defiance rose up in me. I kept urging her to drink. And she’d try, but it seemed to sap rather than strengthen her. She’d sit there in between drinks, trying to cheep. There was barely any sound. Then she'd just sit and gasp. She was trying her best, I thought, and it wasn’t quite good enough.
A few weeks back I’d read EB White’s essay “Death of a Pig” and I now found myself in a parallel universe with that tale, not as prolonged, not as beautifully documented, but it was deeply sad. I hated knowing that this little creature had “suffered in a suffering world.” And I felt a deep affection for it, for its pluck, for its trying to survive. I felt she/he was doing it for me.
Richard arrived late, around 9, tired after a long flight. I’d fixed dinner. Like a country doctor he went down and checked out the flock and the little hurt one.
“She’s dying. She’ll be gone by morning,” he said as he sat down for dinner.
But she was still hanging on the next day. It took her until the afternoon of that day to pass on. We removed her and lay her beside the other dead chick in the delivery carton and planned a future burial. But we were soon distracted by traces of blood on the towel paper at the bottom of the wooden container and spotted our little hurt chick in the nick of time. We nabbed it out, just as one of the rooster chips had not only pecked her leg, but grabbed it in its beak and was tenaciously tugging at it. We slapped him away and airlifted her to safety. There followed a tug of war of our own between Richard and me as we haggled about what kind of container to house her in and then where that housing was to take place. When we decided on the kitchen, we then had to deal with our cats’ curiosity, especially Astrid’s, but they seem to have gotten used to this change in the kitchen layout.
Some time has gone by since I first began writing this. Our Australorp is well on the mend. Her cut is healing nicely and is starting to blend in. Richard got a couple of the more docile chicks from the cellar and tossed them in to keep her company. They all seem to be getting along well, 3 ladies catching up on the recent "medical procedure" over lunch. They still have a long way to go when it comes to dining manners, however; they stand in their feed bowls when they're eating and their water bowls when they're drinking.Honestly! You'd think they were brought up in a barn!
PS: Richard’s geese eggs are late. Somehow they’ve gotten waylaid in the mails and no one knows quite how to track them down. Richard has constructed an incubator out of an ugly old green plastic cooler that had been hanging around in our attic and that I’d been urging him to get rid of for over a year. Now it’s come to good use. It really is quite a contraption he’s concocted; something called a gopher-bator. I don’t know if that’s his name or an adopted one. It’s got levers and dials and thermometers and a light bulb. I think it looks like a Mad Scientist’s version of an Easy Bake Oven, but it’s certainly making him happy. (For his lowdown on all this, check out: the Poultry Chronicles by Buff Orpington.)
Sunday, March 15, 2009
The Chickens are Here!
I just got an early morning call from Lorraine at the White River Junction Post Office that the chicks are here! "We're open 24/7 here at the main office," Lorraine assures me with a sassy, no-nonsense snap. "These chicks'll be delivered priority to Newbury tomorrow morning, but it'd be alot better for 'em if you came down and picked 'em up today; and look outside, it's a bright, sunshiny day, perfect day for a drive!" It was hard to say "no" to Lorraine, but I took her number and said I'd sort out my day and get back to her. Sort out my day? Well, I do have a schedule of sorts -- work on taxes, write, a walk in the woods since I didn't get outside at all yesterday, the Hanover Chamber Orchestra at the Lebanon Opera House at 3 followed by a trip to the co-op in Hanover for supplies. And since Hanover is close to White River it could all work out perfectly, so I picked up the phone to give Lorraine the good news.
"And who's this?!" Lorraine cut right to the chase.
'It's -- well, you called before for Richard Waterhouse and his chick order.'
"Oh, yeah, yeah! I got 10 chick orders here, just wanted to keep 'em straight."
'I'm Dan Butler; I'm Richard's partner.' I paused slightly, still expecting some response to the news that I'M GAY!! There wasn't any reaction. 'I think I can come down and pick up the chicks, but it'll have to be later in the day, maybe around 7.'
"We're open 24/7 here, come anytime you want, someone'll be here."
'Good, good'
"It's Dan "what"? What'd you say your last name was?"
'Butler'
"Oh! Like 'Rhett Butler!' The two of you might be related."
'Hmm. I might be related to a fictional character?'
"And a hell of a good one, why not?!"
Lorraine gave me directions, told me the best entrance to come to to rouse some action from whomever might be working at the time. She assured me that the chicks would be on the express ramp all ready for me to pick up whenever I showed up. And then she thanked me for calling back, wished me a good day.
In between Lorraine's initial call and then calling her back I went downstairs to check and see if everything was in place for their arrival. I could feel Richard in all the care and preparation: the heat lamps perfectly poised, grain in the little feeder, cloth on the container floor to keep them warm. I wondered why there wasn't newspaper like last year, but Richard must know what he's doing. There's a dollhouse feel to the whole affair, that and the preparing of a newborn's room. It made me smile. It's going to be fun having them here when he gets home from his trip; he'll be so surprised, a little bit of Christmas morning. I went up to the garage and brought down a galvanized garbage can to store the feed in. Felt like pitching in where I could.
I'm going out for a walk now and enjoy some of Lorraine's sunshiney day. Did I put "walks" down as one of the reasons I'm living here? If I didn't, they are. They ground me, make me feel a little Henry David Thoreau-ish. I'm reading "Walden" now, by the way, and for the first time. This came at the gentle urging of my friend Brian and the writer EB White, both of whom are big Thoreau fans. In EB's case the nudge came from an essay of his called "A Slight Sound at Evening" which celebrated the 100th anniversary of the printing of "Walden" which he wrote in 1954, the year of my birth. Like EB, I can go back and forth on "Walden" - I get tired of his harangues against society, in particular - but I do feel a kinship to Thoreau, especially on these solitary days when Richard's away. Thoreau's experiment to cut himself away from the bustle of society and choose instead to be more closely aligned with a natural pace so parallels my life right now. It's stunning at times. And when Thoreau connects to what he's experiencing, what he's learning, what he had intended, there's a poetry and presence in his words that speaks to me directly. "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not my life ... I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life." And here's another passage for you, more famous perhaps. "I learned this, at least, by my experiment: that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours."
I don't know if I've ever known the direction of my dreams or whether I have an imagined life that I endeavor to fulfill. Of course there have been things I've wanted, that I've gone after, but all in all, I don't think I'm a good one when it comes to clearly identifying my dreams and goals ahead of time. They seem to find me, and through the experiencing of them first hand then I realize that they're my dreams. I've spent a long time questioning that natural process and many times labeling it deficient, telling myself that I SHOULD know my dreams, that something was WRONG if I didn't, that I'd better buck up and get with the program. But I'm realizing that this is what my trip to the woods may be teaching me, that there is a way, MY way, my NATURAL way, not to be questioned, but to be nurtured and appreciated. I don't have to harangue against the way other people live their lives, how they set and meet their dreams and goals. That's their business. But maybe rediscovering and accepting my unique way of living is my particular beat to a different drummer, maybe this is what keeps me from a life of quiet desperation. So I allow it to find me, I take my hands off the controls, I open to it, I welcome it like an unexpected phone call on a Sunday morning or a shipment of baby chicks that need to warmed and cared for.
Friday, March 13, 2009
Playing hookie and a bit of a ramble
An advisory warning: This post is not officially from Vermont.
I've been visiting my dear friend Gina this week, someone who reaches back to my "growing up days" in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Gina now lives near Suffern, New York, in a house that was once a tavern/inn/country store. The front part of her home still has the original hearth and beneath the living room's floorboards there's a space that must've been a root cellar or storage area. She's not clear how old the house is exactly, but it does show up on maps as far back as 1820. It's been a restful few days. I like to think that there have been alot of people who've found rest and rejuvenation at this spot over the years, travelers, seekers of fortune, wanderers, tradesmen and women, along with all the invisible faerie folk that people the hillsides (that's a bit of the pagan Irish and Gina coming out in me.) There's a good, grounded feeling. Staying here reminds me of home because our house in Vermont is on a road that parallels the old stage coach route from Boston to Montreal and the original inn for travelers still stands just off the road about a mile and a half away. After its life as a tavern, it had been a schoolhouse; in fact, our neighbor, now in his late 60's, remembers going to school there as a child, but since that time the building has gone through a series of derelict years and now stands grey and weathered and forlorn. I half expect Miss Havisham to come to one of the windows chomping on a piece of wedding cake. I've heard that someone does live on the property and tends to the building, but I've never actually seen them. There are periodic signs of life, maybe they live behind the building, but all the mysterious comings and goings lend a haunted quality to the place that I enjoy exploiting.
I envy the coming of Spring here in Suffern. Daffodils and croci are already poking their heads up through the ground, and all the hillsides, still brown and grey, teeming with denuded trees, ache for green. You can feel it in the air. Vermont is another story. We're a month away from any flowering activity. Last year, a monumental year for snowfall, the largest in a hundred years, the snow hung on well into April. I found myself forgetting that there ever had been green out there, a form of snowblindness, I'm sure. So you find ways to fend off the encroaching madness. You force bulbs (that sounds heathenish). You plant narcissus and daffodils, amaryllis, even tulips in bowls of small pebbles to fool yourself into believing that spring is just around the corner; you start seeds in little peat-mossed, plastic covered terrarium containers so you can pop-em in the garden as soon as freezes stop (that can sometimes stretch past Memorial Day) and get a jump on the short growing season (90 days tops). Other than that you can knit, quilt, loom, read Victorian novels, write poetry, gather round the piano and sing songs like "Momma's Sleeping in Her Coffin in the Box Car Up Ahead." You may be asking yourself "And why did you choose to live here again?" and don't worry, I ask myself that question too at times, but it all seems to even out in the end. Sometimes I just don't know and go with it anyway.
The sap is running. During my walk down our road the other day I noticed galvanized pails hanging from the sugar maples, the "old way" of gathering sap. I prefer this to the more modern method of blue tubing dangling from tree to tree and oozing into a plastic reservoir somewhere nearby. That practice smacks of a hospital ward to me, as if the sugar maples were hooked up to a life support system. This fantasy is not that far from the truth since you overhear old timers talk about the climate having gotten so warm that it no longer sustains the maples and so they're slowly but surely dying out with the most optimistic forecasts giving them 10 more years tops. (And here on Gina's property all her ash trees are dying off because of an incurable fungus. Ugh.) It's hard to get my mind around predictions, to once more accept that these are the times we live in, that we will see trees, species, ways of life die out, that despite out best efforts, there are irreversibles. So I've decided that in addition to learning what I can to slow the process and to help out in any way I can to put off the inevitable, I will simply appreciate them as fully as I can while they're here.
When I first became aware of Vermont during a brief affair with a guy from the Green Mountain State back in the late 70s, he told me that there was more virgin timberland in Vermont now then there had been at the turn of the last century. I was more into making out and hot times then hearing about fun facts about the woods, but the book of pictures that he gave me of the forested area around his house as evidence was beautiful and despite my desire to be and experience all things that had to do with the city rather than anything bucolic some appreciation must have stuck. Now I wander back through the woods on our property (we have 55 acres, 45 of which is forested) and I marvel at the perfectly laid out stone walls serpentining over the hills and once defining cleared farm land and now overtaken and reclaimed by trees and vegetation. It's comforting to know nature's doing just fine despite our clumsy jabs at progress, some things die out, others take their place. We muck things up a bit by introducing some fungus or parasite which decimates a whole strain of trees and some other tree takes its place.
I'm just rambling today. It feels like a walk through the woods. Thanks for going along with me. I hope you have a good one.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
100 or more reasons, huh?
Vermont colloquialism of the day: "I weren't sure I'd be able to deal with it." We heard this twice in the past week, once at the recent annual town meeting, and just this morning from an electrician friend of ours. Richard had to write it down to make sure he remembered it. The person will be going along, speaking just fine, and then one of these local phrases will pop out as if it had quotation marks around it. It's almost like a dialect, something ingrained, natural, thoughtless. I like it. It brings to mind one of our first encounters with local folk here when we were doing some demolition work on the place. Two trash collectors showed up, a lanky toothless yet smiling self-professed "yankee" and his tough diminutive wife, to give us an estimate on all the old plaster and bricks and boards we needed carted away. They were really quite friendly, apologizing for having shown up late (they were 2 minutes late, tops) and assuring us that that would never happen again. As they rooted around we all conversed amiably and Richard and I told them we were moving out from Los Angeles. "California!" the toothless man pronounced jovially, "The land of fruits and nuts!" Richard and I nodded, smiling, not really knowing what to say next. (I'm not sure whether that fits into the category of a Vermont colloquialism, but it certainly popped out thoughtlessly.)
So 100 or more reasons I'm living in Vermont. I don't know if I'm going to keep count, don't hold me to it; I just thought it was a catchy title, so sue me. But to satisfy you literalists I will do a bit of a rambling list today, not in any order of importance:
1) The seasons. Granted, Vermont's winters last a little bit longer than we born and bred midwestern boys are used to, but still, all and all, it suits us. There's something that stirs our spirits, feels natural and right about experiencing all 4 seasons. I find myself appreciating each one with much more sweet fierceness. Autumn is magnificent, my favorite season, but I love spring and summer just as much because the balance experience of winter helps me be more present and grateful for every day of the green. One more winter note, we did learn from Vermonters last year that if you're able to break up the cold months with little trips to warmer climes, it does cut back on vitamin D deficiency, cabin fever, and general stir craziness. Winter here really stretches from mid-November through most of April.
2) Change and adventure. Richard and I were both fortunately in the same mood, an amorphous itch to just take a leap somewhere, to answer a pull, to go for broke. We were both tired of living in deserts (LA and Arizona). I wanted to move back East, I loved New England, and I wanted to infect Richard with that love. Richard took that initial infection and created an epidemic. I can sometimes wander into the question "And why the hell are we living here?" but mostly I'm just enjoying the ride.
3) No advertisements on the interstates. We wondered what was different at first and then it hit us, there are no signs, no ads, just scenery. It's amazing when you take the marketplace bombardment out of your visuals.
4) Canopies of sugar maples versus cement and concrete. This didn't hit me until I was here for awhile, but though I did love living in LA, I realized what an energy drain it had been to block out the endless miles of concrete and cement and shopping centers and outlet stores and buildup. Here there's mostly nature.
5) Our elusive moose. There's a big bull moose that comes and drinks at our pond and I've yet to see him. Richard's actually spied him, but I've only seen traces of him, huge hoof prints mushed into the soil and meandering from our pond up the rise behind our house. I cringe a little when the pops of guns echo around our woods during deer season and wonder how something that big will be able to find shelter amidst all the mayhem. Still looking out for him.
6) Proximity to Hanover and Dartmouth. Okay, not officially Vermont, just over the river from Norwich, but, oh, what a lovely setting, sparking romantic images of ivy-covered college walls. Hanover is the closest hub for co-op shopping (more particulars on that later), movie theatres (35 minutes away. I'm sure LA denizens are grasping their hearts right about now), decent shopping, other arts performances and exhibits (the Hood museum and the HOP series), fun restaurants (the Canoe Club, Molly's, Murphys, Orient, Umbleby's, and the new Korean/Japanese place that just opened), and EXCELLENT coffee (Dirt Cowboy).
7) Annual Town Meetings. We've only experienced 2 and we hear they're not nearly as rambunctious and dramatic as they used to be, but still there's something quite moving in an entire town showing up (for the most part) to take an active part in the welfare of their community. People are articulate, thoughtful, colorful, friendly. I'm proud to be a part of it.
8) Our house and land. The history behind the place. The sturdy original construction. The pitching in on reframing of the barn, the building of the porches and mud/room, painting, upkeep. Walks in all seasons up the rise in back, seeing signs of the wildlife all around, letting the silence in. It's all indescribable in its beauty and embrace. Note: Richard, in the flurry of his New England infection, has done the lion's share of the work on this place from the very beginning. It tapped some hidden well of certainty that he was to be here and the work on the place gave him purpose and direction. He just went for it completely from the very beginning and it was awesome to behold.
9) Co-ops, farmers markets, naturally raised meats and vegetables. I know this was readily available in California, but here -- maybe due to the state being smaller and food paths simpler to keep track of -- I have more of an awareness of how good food sources are an embracing part of most everyone's lives. With very little effort you can find out where your meat is raised and how it is raised and support that farmer's methods. You can buy local produce and support your local farmers. You KNOW your local farmers. And getting back to the seasons, you much more readily eat the vegetables that are of that season and feel a closer tie to the land.
10) An independent spirit. There's a pioneering spirit here. People can come here and reinvent themselves. There's a history of free thinking, it's in the air. This is where secessionist meetings have been held. I believe there's something written into the original constitution that states if a single legislator brings up the issue of secession from the United States that the topic must be debated in the State legislature. (Again, don't hold me to this, I need to do a little more research, but I don't think I'm too off the mark.) Socialism and helping take care of one another is not a dirty word here.
11) Just being in New England. I was a history nut growing up, a real nerd, and there's something that conjures up through my bones knowing I'm spending most of my time traveling throughout Vermont, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Connecticut where the country first broke into revolution and began wrestling with the ideas and ideals they wanted to make manifest into a United States. I love living here knowing that, especially in these equally revolutionary times. It's so interesting to me that people seeking something new and daring came to this place and called it "New England" which implanted this schizophrenic divide inside, a split between the NEW planted in the soil of the old, ENGLAND.
12) Close to nature. This fits into the seasons and the canopies of trees versus buildings, but there's something whole-making being here where the pace of nature is still king. We're not imposing our pace. To that end, we don't have television. We do have wifi and listen to some radio, but television -- bye-bye -- and 95% of the time we don't miss it.
12 reasons, not too bad. A bit scattershot, but there you have it. Gotta go, I'm off for a drive down to New York. That is one of the slight drawbacks here, the distance in driving from here to NYC, a place I dearly love. However, the distance and seclusion that can make it seem so inconvenient also makes this place special. Go figure.
Monday, March 9, 2009
The Chickens are Coming! The Chickens are Coming!!
Richard has run afowl. He's got a bad case of Chicken Fever and is enjoying every delirious moment of it. He sits cushed in his chair by the kitchen window, his face basking in the information flooding out from all the chicken sites he's accessing on his laptop. And he's lapping it all up: coop construction tips, placement and rotation of the pens, postings and podcasts from other chicken enthusiasts across the country, around the world, pros and cons of various breeds, color, plumage, laying ability, best meat birds, on and on and on. I'm a little envious. His delight is so pure, he's so happy. "Listen to this, honey!" and he launches gaily (yes, gaily) into every twist and turn of his new learning giving me no choice but to be as excited as he is by these new worlds opening up in front of him. Since I have a touch of the doldrums when it comes to passion about anything right now, there's a perverse itch to dampen his spirits, to be a voice for the "practical" side, to question whether he's giving too much attention to this frivolous poultry pursuit when he should be focusing on more "important things" like making money. But, trying hard not to scratch that itch to squelch his fun, I bite my tongue, nod and give support, listen (what a concept!), and say things like "Good for you, babe" which almost sound convincing. So I'm accepting the inevitable and am debating whether or not to change my URL address to 4 cats, 2 guys, and 25 chickens of various breeds which will be arriving on or about March 16th followed by 10 Narragansett Heritage turkeys scheduled for mid-May.
Richard's in the thick of preparations for the chick's arrival. He's set up a brooding area down in our cellar near the furnace. It's a little cold down there, but it beats the mud room/entrance area where his chicks were raised last year (yes, there's a history of chicken arrivals and more of that anon.) He has constructed a 3' by 4' wooden holding area, resting on top of an old table and surrounded by long strips of heavy plastic which attach to the old beams above and stretch to the floor below. There will be a top screen cover to protect the chicks from curious critters and to keep them from getting out once they've grown a bit. 2 good-sized heat lamps will be mounted above to warm them especially in the first crucial days when they're very small and vulnerable. The heat/cold level will have to be monitored. If it seems to chilly or they start dropping dead we'll have to move them up to a warmer, more forgiving climate, namely a shelf in our laundry room on the main floor. We live in a small Cape Cod house, built in 1832, and space is compact. We also have 4 cats (see blog address, no duh) who are antsy about being cooped up all winter and will be very interested in any bird action that might be going on inside. All of them -- Astrid, Oliver, Delilah, and Sofia - spend hours glued to the kitchen windows, gazing out to the bird feeders a few feet from the house, their jaws vibrating up and down with a feral clickity-click. They were beside themselves last year when the first shipment arrived and had to be shewed away constantly.
Richard sort of tricked me with last year's chick order. He'd been talking about it, running it past me as he does with any possible change to our place, but I didn't know that these conversations about possibility had turned to hard reality until the order showed up and the chicks were there, alive and chirping, with Richard looking up at me with his glowing smile. Any protest quickly caved and, despite my best efforts, I was won over. They were adorable, damn them! He'd split an order of Guinea keats ("chicks" for you uninitiated) with a friend, leaving 15 for Richard - in our "conversation" he'd waxed rhapsodic about their tick eating ability, a big plus. His bliss at raising the guineas became so great that he began buying a few Rhode Island Reds and Barred Rock chicks from Agway across the Connecticut River in New Hampshire. Every day the flock would grow and I never even entertained the idea that he might be taking advantage of my caving objections. No, never.
Okay, a quick summation of what happened last year and what we learned. The chicks arrived in late May or June and just got to laying age by October when we had to batten the hatches for winter and ship them down the road to our neighbors who have more insulated, winterized coopage. (Lesson: This year an earlier chick delivery to allow for maturing and egg laying by September.) Richard designed and built a cute little chicken coop last season that will be expanded this year with a fenced in area surrounding it. (Lesson: We were rather naive regarding protection for both our chickens and our garden last year. Either a fox or a raccoon got a couple hens and deer, along with the chickens, decimated parts of our unfenced garden. This year a fence around both with a 12 inch buried section to discourage burrowing intruders.) The guinea hens became a bit of a nuisance for our taste (well, MY taste, actually). Though they were comical in a "pick-a-little, talk-a-little" fashion and looked like slightly ugly matrons out in their Easter finery, they tended to squawk hysterically and shit prodigiously, especially around the main entrances to our home. They passed on this trick to the Rhode Island Reds and Barred Rocks. (Lesson: No more guineas. We gave them to friends at the end of the season last year. This year Richard has ordered brand new varieties of chickens and roosters. Also, we'll have turkeys which will have a separate coop and movable grazing areas in the orchard. As to the issue of chickens defecating on our front porch, we're contemplating cork butt stoppers but are open to any and all suggestions.)
As to my own personal lessons, I'm continuing to learn giving over, giving in, going with the flow. I question anytime a decisive, knee jerk NO comes up inside me. I don't trust it; something's going on, something's up. That "NO" response came up years ago when the idea of first having a cat came up in discussion and now I'm a doting, cat-loving idiot. It came up with chickens last year and I stepped through it, with a little bit of shit on my shoe every once and awhile. This year Richard and I have set boundaries: it's his project, he's paying for it, but I look forward to helping him build the coops and pens and aid in the upkeep and any other tasks he may ask me to do. We'll see.
Thursday, March 5, 2009
And so I begin ...
It's 2:12 am and I'm in my kitchen typing this first blog. My head is crowded with customizing options and the endless blue questions and topics on the HELP page and I could easily get distracted by a voice inside of me screaming "YOU DON'T KNOW ENOUGH ABOUT THIS!! WAIT!! WAIT!! READ AND PREPARE MORE! WAIT!!!" But no, enough, I begin.
Here I am, sitting at our kitchen table, a cup of tea to my left, a piece of honeyed toast in my stomach. Sofia's asleep on the rocker nearby. I have just stocked the wood stove with a hunk of gnarled cherry wood, the last of the cherry tree we chopped down 2 years ago out back. The wood shifts, the stove clinks and snaps. Other sounds? The clock on the wall. It's tick is so soft, it's like it's tip-toeing, apologizing for the sound "Sorry, I have to keep the time, I'll be quiet, don't mind me." The water pump in the cellar gives off this hushy moan. Richard must've turned the sink on upstairs for another one of the cats. Probably Oliver. And then there's the bump and clack of the keyboard keys. I'm a little stiff and self-conscious, correcting things, rewriting them, wanting them perfect. I lay in my bed, knowing that I wasn't going to get back to sleep and wondering if I did get up and begin this thing, where would I begin? 'Should I give a little background about how we got here, bring 'em up to speed? Explain a few things? Maybe give a little history of the area? What are you talking about?! No! If I do that, I'll try to figure the whole thing out and then I won't do it at all. Just get up! Get up now, go downstairs. Just write, now, write right now, whatever's happening, start with that.' And I got up, grabbed in the dark for something to wear, and headed to the bathroom and as I turned in from the upstairs hallway I was startled by the light coming in from outdoors. 'This is full moon strength,' I thought, but I knew it couldn't be full, not yet. And I bent down to look out the window and there it was in a clear indigo sky, the moon, just past half, hanging above the tree line, stunning, shimmering, showing off, its light sending the shadows of the tree branches stretching out across the snow spook house-like. It was glorious. This is one of the reasons I live here, moments like this, moments I would have dismissed at another time in my life, moments that now make me grateful to be living out in the boonies so close to nature, that remind me how rich life is, that make me smile like a goon. And they happen often. Not always as dramatic as the moon this morning, sometimes they whisper in, catch me by surprise. Simply walking down a country lane or up the rise behind our house. This place fits my life right now. I don't know why completely. Maybe it's needed solitude and quiet. Maybe it is the reconnection to nature and its pace, losing track of days. Maybe - as I enjoy saying to others when I recount how Richard and I decided to move from LA to Vermont lock, stock, and barrel - there's something about it that seems so illogical. Who knows. I love it.
And don't get me wrong. There are trying, frustrating, lost, cabin fever days, especially in winter. The snow stays here a loooong time. It closes in on you. You forget that anything had ever been green. And there are lonely days. There are days when I question why we're here. It all seems silly and stupid. I used to really make myself miserable grappling with 'Why did we come here?! What have we done?! How is this ever going to work out?!!' Then one day, around the beginning of December of 2007, something inside me shifted and I asked myself 'What is the problem here? Why the struggle?' and I realized that the only struggles and problems were of my own creating. Now those questioning and doubt days are fleeting. I choose to open my eyes and see all that is around me -- a shining moon, a wood stove warming, sleeping cats, snow, the view from our kitchen, my sweet partner, my sweet life --with gratitude and appreciation and joy.
I remember reading a wonderful book by Brenda Ueland years ago in one of those lost times when I needed inspiration and direction and I found both in the simple title: "If You Want to Write." It's a rich, rich book and things stick. What's sticking right now are 2 things she urged - to keep a slovenly journal and to always write in first drafts. That's what I aspire to do here. A running dialogue, a flow, a finding out who I am now, a celebration, a gripe, a forum for frustrations, a questioning, a playground. I don't know. I'll just write. And so, I've begun.
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