May Flies and It's June redux

Shanna, Daniel and Oliver

Mayfly Day
(by Jeanne Willis and Tony Ross)

Here is Mayfly,
It is her first day on earth.
It is also her last.
Mayflies only live for one day.
But is she sad?
Not at all.
She is happy to be alive!

This isn't any old day.
This is the best of days.
She lives for each moment.
She sees the world begin,
She hears the crack of dawn.
And bathes in its golden glow.
A billion buds burst open.
All for her!
She tastes her honey.

Mayfly sees eggs hatch.
Babies born.
Lambs learning to stand.
The business of ants.
The dizziness of children...
The loveliness of things.
She feels the sun's warm hug.
The kiss of summer rain.
The magic of the rainbow.

It is her wedding day.
Trees throw confetti.
There are games on the lawn.
Breezes blow,
bells chime.
Birds sing!
She dances to the music of the universe.

Mayfly lays her eggs.
It is a peaceful night.
The best of nights.
She makes one last wish:
'Little ones, may all your tomorrows be as perfect as my
yesterday!'

Mayfly watches the moon come up and the stars go out.
And is thankful for her wonderful life.

One of my favorite poems. June already..slipping closer and closer to the polar vortex. Yesterday was wonderful. Will write about it some other time. This morning: perfect. A long bike ride somewhere else for a change. Went past a new nursery. It's slogan:

We are so excited, we wet our plants. 

Alligator Snapping Turtle

She's not so pretty

Most of the year, all you can see of the neighborhood snapping turtles is their ugly snouts protruding just above the water in Thurston pond. Our neighborhood has a few smaller ponds such as the one in Sugarbush woods near my house where the above beauty lives. But every year in May, the females come out of their ponds to lay eggs.Some of them cross the road in search of sandy soil to dig holes in. Our street is particularly busy today as the neighborhood is having its garage sales and drivers are distracted. I was trolling them by bike. What do I want? More playground equipment for the kids? Discarded dishes to make my own lawn art? I assumed she was finished laying eggs and was going back to the pond but she was was in danger of being a speed bump. A couple of people stopped to help me. Strangely no one could identify her even if she literally was in their front yards. I first tried to direct her with a large stick which she turned around to snap in two. A neighbor thought she looked dehydrated (not to me, the moss was still wet) and dumped water on her. Another appeared with a  snow shovel. I scooped her up and carried her to the park.

I had posted her photo on Facebook. Within minutes, Josh messaged me to inform me she was a snapping turtle. Duh, who do you think taught you about turtles? When he was a kid, the School of Natural Resources offered to pay him to scoop the turtles out of Thurston Pond so they could mark them. He learned o follow the trail of bubbles.

My son-in-law snapped his Achilles tendon playing soccer He has been outfitted with  an enormous boot that makes it impossible for him to drive. Shanna stopped by for our crutches. How is he to get to work when she is off delivering 2 of the kids to different schools? Lots of complications and changes of plans.

Tonight we are going to have a rare Moms Night Out: dinner and then to a music place. Should be fun.

Also, I was able to solve a mystery yesterday. Back when we were glamping in Big Sur at the yurt place,we came across these huge pink blossoms, which my sister-in-law with her degree in botany could not identify. Yesterday I found it on a new friend's blog: tree dahlia.

I included Steve's arm to show how big this blossom is. Originally grown in South America. The stems are like bamboo: hollow and used there for pipes. Apparently they have been transplanted to Australia and Northern California.

Nixon Blew It rebus

+

=

An oft stolen sign in the 70s

Hamburger Porn

Miss Tess was with us this morning. Such a cutie!

The star

The two silliest commercials currently airing:

1. One for cable TV: Its selling point is that you can watch the TV anywhere even outside. It shows a woman staring at the TV giving her instructions how to repot a plant. Meanwhile her husband is inside watching a hamburger grill on TV on an apparently forbidden to watch channel. He is salivating. His wife suddenly appears: quick the TV switches to another channel. She leaves and he can resume watching the hamburger cook.
2. For the Surface tablet/notebook: It's absurd theme song: Honestly, I want you to be brave. Really.

A beautiful day here.

poppy and thrift

The Virgin Killer

Got up early in the rainy fog to purchase 2 more baskets from the Farmer's Market.
Except for a few perennials to fill in my rock garden, I am done

One of my container gardens. Needs to fill in a bit. It should look better in 2 weeks or so

And by virgin killer I mean the nut job who killed because he was frustrated by being a virgin, virgin status of victims unknown. He couldn't believe that women were not throwing themselves at him.

In the middle of the night, I actually skimmed through his 141 page manifesto detailing all the wrongs he allegedly suffered. Could this been prevented? Is it his parents' fault? Did he discuss his plans with his psychiatrist? Why do kids grow up the way that they do? He seemed to have everything going for him.

The whole incident reminded me of the movie A Beautiful Boy, which dealt with the aftermath of a college student mass killing his classmates but never showed the killer or discussed his motives. All the parents could say was he was quiet, vaguely unhappy, and aloof and as a child, he was physically beautiful. The media descended upon the parents like locusts trying to figure out what monsters they must be to have produced such a monster. They were forced into hiding.

From this kid's rantings, it was obvious that his parents were bending over backwards to please him. But they couldn't make other kids like him, no matter how hard they tried (and they tried hard).. My favorite part of his biography was him ranting how selfish his mother was for not attracting richer men to marry so he would have even more money at his disposal. As it was, she gave him a BMW to drive and first class accommodations on European vacations. She also gave him unlimited computer time (the step mom tried to keep it under an hour a day). 

To me, he was an obvious schizophrenic with all his delusions about people laughing at him for being a virgin. But could his killing spree have been prevented?

No  one needs to have an automatic weapon. Yeah he killed the first 3 without them. I just hate the thinking behind the NRA. Deer hunters can use shot guns to kill deer; hey don't need assault rifles. Although the parents could not have predicted the killing spree, he at least sounded like a candidate for suicide. And with his anger towards women and even his little brother, his psychiatrist should have put him on the mentally ill list.

Was there any hope for him? I feel for his parents and most of all I feel for the parents who lost their children to this nut case and  the easy accessibility of weapons.

And news of yet another Pakistani honor killing of a daughter  in broad daylight, with plenty of cheering on-lookers and absolutely no interference from the powers that be. It makes me so sad that some cultures are so evil. 

I am waiting for threat of thunderstorms to go away so I can bike.

Orange is the new red

Scenes from Memorial Day: Daniel about to receive an Allie nose kiss

Happy in pink

Recently, I was reading a review of Latin for Bird Lovers.The book explains how misleading some names are: bald eagles are not bald but piebald (which means having a white patch), godwits mean good to eat but they are not tasty at all, and my favorite: robin red breast. The reason they are called 'red' when they are not is that allegedly the color orange was not named until the 16th century. I assume there were no orange trees where there are robins but sunsets, wild lilies? They had no word to describe the color orange?

Yesterday our 8 direct descendants were here ( along with 2 spouses). We need a bigger table. Very fun to see the kids all playing together. We are blessed with very cute grand babies.

Muggy and stormy today. At least I didn't need to water my new plants. I tried a new nail place today. I presumed it would be Indian because all the businesses in its strip mall are (including Curry Pizza, I kid you not) but it was Chinese. Less expensive than the Ann Arbor places. The did a good job but the color wasn't what I had hoped it would be. I wanted orange and instead, it is more red.

my nails

Muguet des Bois

lily of the valley  There is a 20 foot row of them near my patio. They belong to the neighbor
These are difficult to photograph with an iphone but  I am too lazy to bring out the good camera

irises

columbine

Ah the fragrances of May. I run out into the country and am treated with honeysuckle and apple blossoms.
On and adjacent to my patio are the lilies of the valley, purple petunias, stock and lilacs. So wonderful in the evening!

Muguet des Bois was an Avon fragrance  that as a teenager that I bought with the very little money I had. I would smell wonderful for about an hour. It did not last long.

Later today, we will have all the babies and grandbabies here. How to fit them all in comfortably?