Monday, July 26, 2010

Throwing Stones


Nobody much cares for the smug self-satisfied individual. So, fair warning dear reader, you may want to detour from this garden path.

But a finer path could not be had.

I found every last stone.
I hauled every last stone.
I dug the dirt for every last stone.
I placed every last stone.

Alright, alright you are more than justified to throw a few stones. I know the smug look on my face is wholly intolerable.

Saturday, July 24, 2010

If Walls had Ears and Stones Could Speak


Some places seem to have an animated echo of the people and events that have come before, as if the walls or stones or trees hold fragments of another memory. Over the year, I've lived in a few places where the past seemed interwoven, quite nicely, with the present. But for all my interest in the history of the places I've lived, I've never been curious enough to do any research - until now.

Perhaps it is the steep pitch of the road, the lack of electric lines, or the length of the Vermont winter that provokes a sense of camaraderie with the hapless souls who have set a stake here, but whatever the brand of madness, I've developed a keen interest in learning more about the people that have made this mountain their home.

This past week I took to the mountain with an old undated map that listed families and their long abandoned farms as well as marked the spot of an old mountain schoolhouse. Of course, the summer months are not ideal for seeking out old foundations. Blackberries are at the height of thorny lushness, ferns have grown above my head and beneath all the green growing things, unseen things lurk in wait to twist an ankle. Nevertheless, off I went, roaring up the dirt road on the ATV like a nineteenth-century archaeologist in search of the prized find.

With a little guess work I stumbled upon a small rectangular stone foundation set back from the road about thirty paces. As I walked along the overgrown foundation wall I easily conjured up the children sitting at their desks in the below-zero normality of Vermont. Little faces focused on their slates as their cold fingers marked out pesky sums. The spirit of the place was there.

But so were the circling horse flies and the swarming mosquitoes. And after finding myself engulfed in a thicket of blackberries and having to pull out the thorns from my hands with my teeth I decided that perhaps the spirit of the place was inciting me to go a bit too native. I will have to wait for another elusive spring for more foundation hunting.

Friday, July 16, 2010

Shards and Fragments


On Plants:

The bobbing-in-the-breeze color of the poppies has activated the mental litany of a line from a Neruda poem. "Your mouth, a poppy."

When it rains, the round saucer leaves of nasturtiums collect polished pools of water, rolling around the leaf in the wind as madly as mercury.

On Frustrations:

No sooner do I get the lawn mower working, it begins to rain. Gone are the days when all I had to do was sweep the balcony, dead head the flowers and open a bottle of wine.

Out of bed. Boil a kettle of water. Dump coffee in the French press. Pour the boiling water into the French press. Wait for the coffee to steep. Pour a cup of coffee. Add cream. Take first sip of coffee. Without fail, the Little Miss wakes up. Top of the morning!

On Language:


Word of the Day in our household; bug, bird, ball, baby, mama, papa.

And the acquisition of "bug" and "bird" have put in check my masculinization of the natural world. For ease in description, it has been decided that we are now creating all bugs and birds female e.g. she is a nice bug, look at her. But not with the intent of objectification... I suppose I should reread the French feminists on this point.

On Realizations:

Montpelier has its full share of crazy nutters, like anywhere else, but at least they are not all lying in wait on the train, because there isn't a train.

A certain Little Miss "stole" a pair of $2 flip flops that she had been chewing on in the store and then dropped on the foot rest of her stroller where they were forgotten at the counter. I have decided that I actually enjoy wearing stolen flip flops. Like prostitutes in Ancient Greece who would inbed the soles of their sandals with a come hither calling card that left a trail behind them on the street, there is a small sense of the naughty in my new shoes.



(Image: Kiki Smith, Tattoo Print, 1995, Screenprinted tattoo on machine-made paper, 17" x 27")

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Vive la Revolution


Although I'm not much of a flag waver, I do love the French and Bastille Day with its waving tricolor is a favorite from the pick of holidays. Storming the Bastille, eating brilliant cheese, drinking good wine and toasting my long standing crush on La Fayette makes for a fine celebration.

So I started the day with a cafe and croissant at the Red Hen Baking Company http://www.redhenbaking.com. (How they manage to make croissants that melt in your mouth seems to be a mystery this side of the Atlantic, as I've searched long and hard for that particular taste memory of Paris with much cardboard disappointment. But Red Hen whips them up without flaw. So perfect, I will dare to say their croissants are even better than memory because they are only fifteen minutes away.)

Later after a shopping stint and a whole load of books (more on this later), the husband and I hungrily feasted on brie and baguette while Little Miss poked and picked the brie off her soggy baguette with a wry little face.

The only thing lacking to our fine celebration was a bit of accordion playing. (As unlikely as it may sound we do have a beauty, although I will kindly say that other instruments are more successfully played around here.) And truthfully, I only think of the accordion in recollection of a particularly fine Bastille celebration at La Creperie http://www.lacreperieusa.com where a friend and I were serenaded by old French men in striped shirts and berets while we dined outdoors on pate and crepes and drank plenty of fine French wine. Eventually and after many renditions of La Marseillaise, we took a late night taxi ride home. Vive la France.

Monday, July 12, 2010

At Last, Optimism


It is a rare day that you will find me sitting around on the sunny side of the street, plucking silver linings from the clouds while sipping lemonade, but a few days ago, after fuming through the last seven weeks of the precious Vermont summer laid to waste by chain saws and logging skidders, lightening finally struck.

At last, a practical benefit from the logging occurred to me. So, geared with a rake and an old wooden bucket I set off on a collecting expedition.

A rare and pretty picture I surely made, surrounded by logs and raking away, but those bad boys had been ripping through the hemlock producing bucket upon bucket of top-of-the-line wood chips that, I am pleased to say, are now being used as a fine organic mulch for my kitchen garden. It is anyone's guess how many more weeks will be given over to the logging , but I'm hoping for at least five more buckets worth for my cucumbers.

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Feasting for Days



When you live in the city shopping for food is an integrated element of daily life. Coffee is purchased at the cafe on Sunday mornings, sausage and cheese at the German deli two doors down from the bookstore and bread can be had from across the street. Once a week you may make a trip out of the neighborhood for the freshest mozzarella and some great produce or stop at the supermarket for a few things, but overall, food is something you pick up from here and there in the manner of hunter gatherers.

Well, on a scorching hot day, when the asphalt seems to heave and hiss down city streets, you won't see many gatherers out and about schlepping around a heavy haul from the supermarket, which is exactly why I had completely forgotten about the simple summer pleasure of watermelon. Watermelon with a crusty sprinkling of smoked sea salt to pink the sweetness is as fine a feast as any. After all, it is high in iron, (more than the leafy greens of spinach), high in zinc and other trace minerals, as well as a first rate source for Vitamins A & C and few things taste as fine that are so good for you.

So, in the cornucopian food shopping of country life, I've discovered the benefits of hauling in the bounty with a motorized vehicle. I still miss the German deli and the fresh mozzarella, but I've been feasting for days on watermelon and intend to ride out this heat wave doing very much the same.

Saturday, July 3, 2010

Self Help Anyone?


I once read somewhere that Frieda Lawrence was known to throw plates at D.H.'s head - whole sets of fine bone china crashing at his feet. To my mind it's a shame that he never wrote about these incidents, as he always seems to capture the ephemerality of the senses so well and his description of the sound would be worthwhile.

Nevertheless, Frieda's technique for dispelling aggression is probably ill advised for the average coupling. It's far too messy to clean up afterward when you don't have a housekeeper and it might be misunderstood.

So, I wish to suggest an alternative method for the diffusion of aggression or frustration or whatever you want to call it, politely. It's pretty simple. "Take out" something that needs taken out i.e. at least be productive., which leads to my unlikely segue onto the topic of burdock.

During my first summer on the mountain, I would cut the purple flowers from the massive stalks of the great burdock for arrangements in the house. The flowers are not the most delicate or enchanting but they do have their interest, if, and only if, you are unaware of their true potential.

My herb encyclopedia claims that burdock was greatly valued during WWII when traditional Western medicines where being directed to the battlefields and continues to be highly prized by herbalist today. Well, with burrs the size of golf balls that latch onto beautiful wool sweaters or the backside of the dog with a greater tenacity than velcro, these monsters are the Monsanto of the third grade lecture on seed dispersal, and you won't find me cultivating these beastly bullies in my gardens.

So with a little more of an understanding, I am out there this summer with my aggression and clippers, hacking away at the burdock in leu of plates or anything else easily found at hand. Thankfully, the burdock has a drawn out carrunch when cut that lends itself quite well to satisfaction.

Oh, and I promised some general self help. So, if you should lack either burdock or extra china, which I am assuming you do, I suggest cleaning out your desk without any forgiveness for the slips of paper that hint at important things to remember, or ruthlessly attacking your inbox with the delete button. Or simply, pick up Lady Chatterley's Lover and remember Frieda. Now there was a woman with some spirit.

Thursday, July 1, 2010

A Theory and Discovery


Yesterday, while driving around on one of our little jaunts in the countryside, I was able to test a little gardening theory. We were about an hour-and-a-half away from the mountain in the North East Kingdom and came upon a little town where all of the houses, without exception, had beautiful cottage gardens. The plantings were not the typical-to-Vermont mass of lupines with a clump of old, rusting, metal things thrown in somewhere prominent for good measure. Rather, there was plant variety and artistic composition involved in these gardens.

Well, it's a one, two, three in deduction. When a tiny little town is situated thirty-five minutes from a grocery store, with a forty-five minute, siren-blaring drive to the emergency room that certainly helps to enforce Darwinian law, and the town has been digging in the dirt, en masse, with the success of a garden show, then a pretty solid conclusion can be drawn that a first class nursery is nearby.

Happily, my theory proved correct in this instance and, quite by chance, we turned down a dirt road and happened upon a nursery that put the truck in quick reverse. Perennial Pleasures Nursery of Vermont http://www.perennialpleasues.net offers a delightful selection of green growing things in their nursery but they also host a Garden Skills Workshop and a Garden Tour of their stunning display gardens every Sunday.

So baring a deluge to rival Noah's, I'll be following the dirt roads north again in the next few days. Obviously, Perennial Pleasures has taught the town of Greensboro Bend a thing or two about gardening and I want in on it.