Weathering the Weather

"Conversation about the weather is the last refuge of the unimaginative." – Oscar Wilde

"In the spring, I have counted 136 different kinds of weather inside of 24 hours." – Mark Twain

Two quotes by two very witty men and both of them apply to me. This week my thoughts, my delights, and my anxieties were all about the weather. I check the weather forecast every day. Sometimes several times a day. Seeing what they say is coming helps me to prepare myself, mentally and physically, for what might come. I say "might" because the forecasters are sometimes wrong. At the beginning of the week, the predictions for the next ten days were benign – cool, rainy days with a bit of sunshine. But on Tuesday morning when I looked, they'd changed their forecast for  Thursday and Friday night and it sent a shiver through me. The temperature was predicted to drop to freezing on those nights. They warned there might be patchy frost. We are at that very vulnerable stage when things have progressed to the point where a frost can impact the rest of the gardening year. Tender flowers are damaged and never recover. Fruit trees drop their blossoms. And there isn't much I can do about it. Physically, I try to cover what I can, but anything taller than a foot is at the mercy of the frost. The fruit trees are too big to do anything but pray for them. And I did pray for them – starting on Tuesday morning and on through the rest of the week. I actually pray over my gardens, orchard, and animals every day, but the intensity of my prayers varies. Frost prayers are very intense. Then I have to resign myself to whatever comes and have faith that there is a reason for it, even if it may be just to keep me humble and let me know who is really in charge. People who work the land should never forget who is in charge.

The orchard.

The forget-me-nots are in bloom now.

It's May, one of the most delightful of all the months. May is the first in the trio of months that I consider the epitome of the year. May, June, and July have the longest, mildest, most luscious of all days. In May, the growing season hits full speed at last. The trees have leafed out. The grass is green and verdant. Flowers erupt in fields, gardens, and along the roadside. It's apple blossom time. Asparagus time. Bluebird time. Time to relish every minute of beauty the world flings at us.

Lady's Mantle (Alchemilla mollis) and raindrops.

We've been eating asparagus for a week now. It's the first and most anticipated vegetable harvest of the year. Asparagus, cut and carried immediately to the kitchen, steamed until tender and slathered in butter and a dash of salt, might be the greatest of my garden delights. The only things that might compare to it are the first ripe strawberry warm from the June sun, or the first apple plucked ripe and sweet at the almost other end of the growing season.

Freshly picked asparagus.

The rhubarb is also ready now. I love rhubarb. I love it in pies, in bread, in jam, and especially as a sauce on vanilla ice cream. Unfortunately, rhubarb, because of its tartness, always requires sweetening and I don't eat sugar anymore. I do use a very good alternative called allulose, and I will try experimenting with that so maybe I can enjoy some rhubarb treats while its short season lasts.

Rhubarb is a beautiful plant, and delicious.

For several weeks I've been hearing and seeing bluebirds, one of the loveliest of our songbirds. I have two bluebird houses, one between the rhubarb and kiwi arbor, and one in the orchard. Every year I watch hopefully as the bluebirds investigate each house. Some years they stay and raise their young, other years they decide not to. The deciding factor is usually house sparrows. House sparrows, a non-native, invasive species, vie for those birdhouses too. They are far more aggressive and persistent than the gentle bluebirds and will drive them out. I've even seen them move in and make a nest on top of the bluebirds. There isn't much I can do to arbitrate the struggle. Unlike bluebirds, house sparrows are not protected by the Migratory Bird Act and it is legal to trap, poison, and shoot them in Pennsylvania. One year in a fit of frustrated rage, I did shoot some with my pellet gun, but I prefer to use other deterrents to discourage them. If in the end the bluebirds give up and the sparrows win, I pull out their nests and block the hole in the box. I haven't resorted to any of that yet this year as the bluebirds, so far, have fended off the sparrows.

The birds seem to be competing with the flowers for color. In addition to the bluebirds, rose-breasted grosbeaks, warblers in various shades of yellow, incandescent orange orioles, and tree swallows with their metallic blue feathers have returned. I haven't seen a ruby-throated hummingbird yet, but they should arrive soon. Our year-round birds have also brightened. The goldfinches are once again decked out in their dazzling summer yellow. The house finches have donned their purple plumage. The male red-winged blackbirds have their flashy red and yellow epaulettes. We have a pair of cardinals nesting nearby and the brilliant red male comes to the feeders throughout the day. There are other less colorful birds, mourning doves, house wrens, white-crowned sparrows, chipping sparrows, and song sparrows everywhere. May mornings are a symphony of bird song.

A very poor shot, but as good as my phone can get from a distance.
 A Baltimore oriole in an apple tree.

Monday, true to the forecast, started and ended with rain. Midday when it dried out a bit, I mowed the lawn. It was a little damp and I had to stop frequently to unclog the grass catcher, but I finished before the rain returned and I'm glad I did. The grass was very tall and the dandelions taller. It looked and smelled so nice after I cut it. Of course the dandelions, being dandelions, popped right back up the next day and made it look unkempt again.

Monday before mowing – violets and dandelions.

After mowing.

On Monday we got a new refrigerator. The one we had wasn't very old, but it wasn't working as it should. Some part that couldn't be replaced (of course) broke and we had to keep defrosting it, so we got a new one. The problem with moving refrigerators in and out of our old house is that the doors aren't wide enough. To bring in the new fridge, we had to take off the door we don't use at the back of the music room and even remove the hinges to barely get it through. We also had to remove the door between the dining room and the kitchen. Sarah was here that morning and she helped me take the doors off. The delivery men did a good job negotiating through the narrow doors. The old refrigerator wasn't picked up until Wednesday. Until then, the downstairs, already cluttered from work we're doing on the living room, was even worse. The men who came to pick up the old fridge really knew what they were doing. With some skillful twisting and turning, they managed to get the fridge out the front door. I was impressed. I'm thankful we have a fridge that works again.

Moving refrigerators in and out. What a mess.

Monday was also Cinco de Mayo. We used the day, as we do every year, as a reason to have a Mexican food feast. The Shilligs provided the food, but we hosted the event and Sarah joined us. We had enchiladas, flautas, guacamole, and Spanish rice. Sarah made cookies, two batches, one for them and one for me.

Cinco de Mayo dinner.

Sarah's churro inspired shortbread cinnamon sour cream cookies.

They were wrong about Tuesday. They said we'd have a little sunshine in the morning, but thunderstorms and heavy rain in the afternoon. Thinking that my time to work outdoors was limited, I worked hard and fast, waiting for the rain to come. I weed-whacked the edges of the flowerbeds, the raised beds, the front of the barn, along the chicken yard fence, and along the bank of the road – places where the grass and weeds grow tall because the mower can't reach them. Later that morning, my friend Nancy Jones brought by bags of bulbs she'd pulled from her garden. She clears out the rambunctious plants that have moved into places where she doesn't want them to grow and she brings them to me. This time she brought me muscari, squill, and alliums. I planted them in patches out in the orchard. Next year in the spring they will be lovely. I'm glad that Nancy shares her garden bounty with me. After that, I continued with the perpetual job of weeding flowerbeds. The storm and the rain never came. And I was glad for it. I got a lot of work done. I was pretty tired by the end of the day.

The Crandall currant bush is blooming with its spicy, fragrant flowers.

By Wednesday the forecast I'd seen at the beginning of the week was changed, and for the better. Wednesday, originally supposed to be rainy, turned out to be sunny and warm, quite a lovely day. And I was very happy to see that the forecast for  Thursday and Friday night was also changed. Now the low was supposed to drop to 38°, too warm for frost, and a chance for rain. You can't have frost when it rains. I was relieved, but still cautious. To trust them too much seemed risky. That morning I spent an hour pricking out pepper plants. They were crowded in their seed tray. I gently lifted them from the tray and gave them each their own pot. They are growing nicely and should be ready to plant outdoors around Memorial Day. I worked outdoors the rest of the day. 

With their new forecast, they got Thursday right. It was a dreary day, as predicted – gray, overcast, and chilly. After three days of working hard outdoors, I used the weather as an excuse to take it easy and rest for a day. I spent the morning getting caught up on my reading. I had a library book that was due that I had to finish. The book was Notes from a Small Island by Bill Bryson. I enjoy Bill Bryson's books. I've read several of them. I like his sense of humor. This book is about Britain. Bryson, who was born and grew up in Iowa, lived in Britain for twenty years and in 1995 decided to move with his family back to the United States. This book is about his farewell tour across Britain before leaving it for the US. I finished the book by 10:00 and then needed something else interior to occupy myself.

I chose an odd entertainment. Sometime back in the 80's while listening to my favorite classical radio station, KUSC Los Angeles, I was introduced to Façade, an Entertainment, poems by Dame Edith Sitwell (1887-1964) set to music by Sir William Walton (1902-1983). It's a strange and fascinating work. The poems are recited over the musical accompaniment. Edith Sitwell was a fascinating eccentric. Her poems are odd experiments where the actual sound and rhythm of the words are as important as what they mean. Walton's musical accompaniment is brilliant. Façade was first performed publicly in 1923 and caused a scandal. For the performance, Edith sat behind a decorated screen and recited the poems through a protruding megaphone. The critics condemned it as ridiculous drivel. There were some famous people in the audience at the premier, Evelyn Waugh, Virginia Woolf, and Noël Coward. Coward was so outraged by the performance that he made a scene and stomped out. Despite a shaky beginning, Façade eventually gained an appreciative audience. I know it's not to everyone's taste, but I love its quirkiness. To me it epitomizes the avant-garde strangeness of 1920's. It kept me entertained for an hour. Here is one of my favorite of the poems. It's meant to be read aloud and is even better with the music.

Country Dance

That hobnailed goblin, the bobtailed Hob,

Said, 'It is time I began to rob.'

For strawberries bob, hob-nob with the pearls

Of cream (like the curls of the dairy girls),

And flushed with the heat and fruitish-ripe

Are the gowns of the maids who dance to the pipe.

Chase a maid?

She's afraid!

'Go gather a bob-cherry kiss from a tree,

But don't I prithee come bothering me!'

She said,

As she fled.

The snouted satyrs drink clouted cream

'Neath the chestnut-trees as thick as a dream;

So I went,

And I leant,

Where none but the doltish coltish wind

Nuzzled my hand for what it could find.

As it neighed,

I said,

'Don't touch me, sir, don't touch me, I say,

You'll tumble my strawberries into the hay.'

Those snow-mounds of silver that bee, the spring,

Has sucked his sweetness from, I will bring

With fair-haired plants and with apples chill

For the great god Pan's high altar … I'll spill

Not one!

So, in fun,

We rolled on the grass and began to run,

Chasing that gaudy satyr the Sun;

Over the haycocks, away we ran,

Crying, 'Here be berries as sunburnt as Pan!'

But Silenus

Has seen us …

He runs like the rough satyr Sun.

                                                    Come away!

Dame Edith Sitwell, Façade, Sir William Walton.

After finishing my book, Façade, and lunch, I took a stroll around the gloomy garden making notes as I went of the things I need to do when I have a warmer day and renewed energy. When I came back inside, I felt shiftless. I tried to start my next book, The Pillars of Hercules: A Grand Tour of the Mediterranean by Paul Theroux, but I couldn't focus on it and set it aside. I looked for some more music, but nothing appealed to me. So I went upstairs and watched some episodes of one of my favorite shows, The Repair Shop, until afternoon chore time. By then it was raining, of course. If it's going to rain, it will invariably be at chore time. I can't say that Thursday was an entirely wasted day, but it came close.

I got up during the night on Thursday/Friday to check the temperature. When I went to bed, it was 40°. At 2:00 a.m. it was 38° – still too warm, barely, for frost. When I got up on Friday morning, it was still 38°. When I checked the weather map, I could see that the counties west of us were under a frost warning, but not Potter County. I felt relieved that we had escaped the frost and offered a prayer of thanks.

A blurry blowup from the weather map.
Potter County is the top middle county to the right of the blue frost county.

Friday morning was chilly, gray, and rainy again. Two such mornings in a row are hard for me to handle. I couldn't do any work outdoors, and I was tired of being indoors. I spent time tending to my houseplants and my seed trays and that helped. As an act of hope and defiance, I switched out all my winter clothes in my closet and dresser for my warm weather clothes. I put away my winter coats and brought out my light jackets. I felt bold. While I did that, I listened to music. I needed something upbeat yet mellow and nostalgic. I set up a queue of songs by some of my favorite pop vocalists, Karen Carpenter, James Taylor, Carole King, and Bread. I think the 70's was the greatest decade for pop/rock music.

My Friday morning music queue.

The day brightened in the afternoon, but there was a chilly wind blowing that had me worried. The temperature never rose above 50° and I had a feeling that after the sun went down it would cool down enough to give us frost even though the weather service said it wouldn't. Better safe than sorry. At bedtime the temperature was at 38°. Stacey and I went out and covered the lilies. I have one raised bed planted in just lilies that we covered with a sheet. There are other lilies scattered throughout the long border, but we could do nothing for them.

Bleeding heart blooming in the corner of the foundation.

White bleeding heart growing in a crack by the spigot.

I got up twice over Friday night and early Saturday morning to check the thermometer. At 1:00 a.m. it was still 38°. At 3:00 a.m. it had dipped to 36°. At 5:30 it was 34°. And just as the sun came over the hill, it fell to 33°. From the window, I could see no sign of frost. I breathed a sigh of relief and said a prayer of thanks. By 8:00 a.m. it had warmed to 50° and I went out to uncover the lilies and see if there was any sign of frost in the outlying parts of the property. It seems we escaped any damage by one degree.

Saturday was a busy day. It usually is. The weather, after it warmed up, was beautiful. My first task of the day was raised beds. Because of Sarah and Tosh's new business venture, I needed more raised beds. I will be growing vegetables for their kitchen and the seven beds I had were inadequate. Saturday morning I went up to Genesee Builders Supply and bought lumber for eight more beds. When I got back, Stacey helped me put them together. Now I need to get mushroom soil to fill them. I now have fifteen raised beds in my vegetable garden. When we finished with that, we helped Kurt plant potatoes. This year the potatoes are in a long row out in the big garden. We should have an ample crop. Next, we brought all the dahlia and other tubers stored in the cellar up for inspection. There were some that didn't survive winter storage, but still plenty to give us loads of flowers this summer. Stacey worked on the living room walls for a while. That has been a slow project. I'm hoping it will be done by the end of the summer, but we'll see.

New, empty raised beds.

Dahlia tubers in storage bins.

Stacey working on the living room walls.

Kurt working in the grape vines.

The big garden after a days planting and tilling.

I checked the forecast before I went to bed on Saturday night. It looked okay – low of 40°, high clouds. I didn't do anything to protect against a frost. I woke up at 1:30 in a panic. I'd dreamt that it had snowed. I checked the thermometer. It was 38°. Should I dress and go out and cover the lilies? I went back to bed. I woke up again at 3:00 and checked. 36° – still okay. When I got up at my normal time, 5:30 it was 34°. Way below the predicted temperature, but not that surprising. I got ready for the day and went out to inspect the garden. All was well. Fretting over the weather wears me out. The forecast for the week ahead looks good. No nighttime lows below 45°. Maybe I'll get a full night's sleep.

Today is Mother's Day. For our sacrament meeting, we had the young missionaries from the Olean Ward come and speak. We don't have missionaries assigned to our branch anymore, so we borrow the Olean missionaries now and then. They gave good talks. After church they came here for lunch. The Shilligs and the Fosters came too. We had Stacey's preferred simple Mother's Day lunch – sandwiches, chips, lemonade, and cookies.

I've been sitting here thinking of a suitable tribute to my mother. I can hardly express my feelings. When we talk on the phone these days we always commiserate about the troubles that come with growing old. At ninety-six, she has far more to grumble about than I do – eyes, ears, actually an entire body inside and out that doesn't do what it used to anymore. She has forgotten a lot of what she was like when she was younger. Decline has become her normal, if resented state. We talk about the past and the things she did and she says she can hardly believe she was once like that. But I remember. My father was a busy man when I was growing up. Between his work and his church callings, he was gone a lot. My mother had to deal with the six of us children most of every hour of every day. And we were not always angels. I know you find that hard to believe, but we weren't. I wasn't. My mother for many years drove us everywhere we needed to go. Back in those days, church kept us very busy. We had meetings all day on Sunday and during the week there was Primary, Relief Society, and Mutual. She managed to get us where we needed to be all by herself most of the time. And she wasn't just a chauffeur, she held callings. Over the years she has been a leader in the Junior Sunday School, a Primary President, Relief Society President, teacher in several auxiliaries, a missionary, and some of those things several times. All of that while doing the things necessary to keep our family fed and clothed and clean. I remember. My first memories stretch back to when she was in her early thirties. I could tell a thousand stories about her. Now, just a few years shy of a century, I still see her as that woman. She's still there under the gray hair and the wrinkles, the hearing aid, the cane. I am blessed beyond measure to be her son. Her price is beyond rubies and I rise up and call her blessed.

Me and my mother, 1958 & 2024.