I worked in the garden all day, while the bobcat watched from her favorite tree, the pigeons picked up any bits I uncovered and the tortoise and deer waited outside the fence for me to throw them green peppers and corn.

As I took down the tomato cages and pulled up the plants, I ate the last ripe, sun warmed tomato of the summer. I can’t decide which tastes better, the first of the summer or the last. Each has it’s merits, yet somehow, the last tastes sweeter.

I found a Chinese radish that the rabbits missed. It was bright green on the outside and red in the inside. I rubbed the dirt off on my pants and marveled how many different flavors you could find in a single radish. (I did feel a bit Scarlet O’Hara though).

When I pulled the rattlesnake pole bean vines down from their posts, I found a few fresh ones hiding in the leaves. The deer were begging for them, but I ate them instead. I’m glad I did. They would not have properly appreciated them. besides, I needed lunch.

All the squash is picked, acorn, spagetti and butternut. One butternut weighed at least five pounds. It will be wonderful soup this winter. Unfortunately the Kurdota squashes seem to appeal to the mice and chipmunks. The rinds were chewed on nearly every one. There was one that actually had a hole bored into it and all the seeds were gone. I suppose I’ll find them growing somewhere next summer. Maybe I should coax that bobcat out of the tree.

It grew warm, and I took off my sweatshirt. It probably would have been a good idea to go get the sunscreen, but this sunburn feels so good in the chilly night.

The last big orange pumpkin got cut from it’s supporting sling on the trellis. They were labeled “Baby Boos” by the seed company, but I think someone might have been mistaken. The very smallest was the size of a basketball. I banged my head on the largest every time I walked under the 7 foot tall structure. The low, fat cheese pumpkins will have to wait for a frost, to sweeten them up before picking.

There are still fragrant herbs and lots of zinnias and marigolds blooming. Last week they were covered in monarch butterflies. They are gone now, leaving behind a few small fritillaries. Oh, and the bumblebees! They are everywhere. I frequently have to move them out of the way and yesterday, one fell asleep on my discarded sweatshirt and it grew too cold for him to go home. I put him in the greenhouse for safe sleeping and this morning, he was at the window, ready to return to the flowers.

I love the bumblebees. They are slow and gentle and let me pet them on their hairy backs. I figure, if a bumblebee can fly, then so can I…at least in my imagination.

The failures (mostly due to the numerous rabbits) didn’t seem so disheartening as I thought. There was so much bounty despite them. I can always buy beets at the store,( even if they aren’t as sweet as mine) and Jimmy is thrilled that there is no kale.

There were a lot more tomatillos and poblano peppers than I expected, so tomorrow night, I’ll can up a big batch of Mexican green sauce for enchiladas. Cabbages and carrots can wait and my Christmas limas will continue to dry until frost. Before it snows, I’ll pick the rest of the Indian corn I use for corn meal. I’ll tie it up in bundles with the rest and not only grind it for flour, but enjoy the beauty of the colors while the world is white and gray.

It seems as though I measure my years in gardens now. I don’t necessarily categorize events by dates, but as “That was the year I grew the Berkley tomatoes” or ‘Oh yea, remember, it was the year of the-squash-that-ate-the-garden”. I live for spring. I manage the summer and I revel in fall. It’s not sad to bring in the harvest and put the garden to bed. It just clears the way for all the new things I want to plant next year.

Right now, I’m going to slip these sunburned shoulders into my favorite night shirt and dream of summer days and flying with bumblebees.

I could hear the ducks raising hell out in back and since the bobcat is loose in the house the doggy door is closed and Sophie is inside. (Not that Sophie has ANY inclination of going outside, in the dark, to investigate noises)
So I grab a flashlight with dying batteries, wake the dog and drag her outside. We walk all the way to the back fence and the ducks are indeed, raising hell about something. The flashlight is now down to the brightness of a wet candle, but I make out the source of their distress and the reason they are all pasted against the far side of the pen.
A turkey. A lone bronze turkey, smaller than most of the ducks and looking very confused is standing in the middle of the duck pen. The turkey pen and the duck pen share a common wall. It has taller fence and high bird netting on the turkey side. Somehow though, the little bugger had flown over, but instead of freedom, he found himself in the wrong neighborhood.
The ducks were livid. You would have thought he was a bird flu carrier or a rabid fox. They all shouted obscenities as I picked him up and carried him from the pen. Two of them demanded that I change their food dish and water pool, just in case he drank or ate from them.
I apologized to the turkey for their behavior and assured him that someday he would be 5 times bigger and prettier than them and face it, who the hell would want DUCK for Thanksgiving dinner? I’m sure he felt a bit better as I returned him to the pile of turkeys in the big pen. That’s when I noticed that there was even more segregation. The geese sleep in one pile, the chickens in the shelter and the turkeys way over by the gate.
Who knew.
On the way back to the house, the flashlight went out like a rejected firefly and Sophie and I were surrounded by darkness. Actually, it was nice. The gnats that had been madly pelting us in the face dispersed and it was calm.
We could hear crickets in the garden and somewhere a treefrog called out for rain. I looked up to see if he was succeeding and saw the brilliance of the stars. There was no moon to compete and they were almost as dazzling as I remember them from my childhood.
My father would spread a blanket out in the yard and we would lay with our heads on his chest or arm. He’d smoke his sweet smelling pipe and point out the Big Dipper, Mars and the Milky way. he used to say if you listened hard enough, you could hear them sing.
In the darkness tonight, I could almost smell his pipe tobacco and feel the rumble of his bass voice in his chest. The night chill was the same and I longed for the warmth of his arm. The milky way doesn’t seem as bright without him.
Oh I know, it’s light pollution and older eyes that don’t see in the dark as well, but I think it’s also that a bright star in my life is no longer there. No matter how old you get. You always miss your dad.
Sophie, unappreciative of the stars and longing for the couch, started to whine. I shook the flashlight, hoping to resurrect it enough to guide me through the minefield of deer poop. Sadly, it failed to shine again and I’ll be washing my slippers tomorrow. We came in the house and Sophie is now snoring at my feet.
The ducks have gone quiet and I can still hear the crickets and that lone tree frog calling for rain. I don’t know if he will get his wish or not, but we could use the moisture. It’s been a bit dry of late.
I think I’ll put the cat away and go to bed, but first……I’m going to go look up at the stars and listen to them sing.

The August moon is waning and the time of letting go has begun. Coons have been gone for weeks and the second batch of possums went tonight. Birds and squirrels are a constant coming and going, so there isn’t much angst involved.
Letting go of porcupines is another story.

I have begun to think that everyone needs a porcupine in their life. Like many people, they are sometimes sharp and prickly, but you love them anyway. When they are babies, they learn to trust you and you can handle them gently without gloves. They are vocal enough to let you know if you are late feeding and grunt happily when you appear with their bottle.

When you feed a porcupine, you can do nothing else. You can’t talk on the phone. You can’t eat your breakfast. You can’t even drink a cup of coffee. It takes two hands, one to hold the porcupine and one to hold the bottle. Sometimes they hum while you feed them. You can’t rush them either. They take their time and you have to go with it or end up with a hand full of quills.

Feeding a porcupine is a lesson in mindfulness. It’s total calm (or else). It’s my Zen. I will set the computer to “The Great Bell Chant” and we sit . Sometimes the porcupine finishes first…sometimes the chant, but no matter what else you have to do or how hectic your day, you have those moments to sit.

I miss those moments of calm and the chance to simply sit. When they are weened, it’s all too easy to skip my times of mindfulness. Sometimes in the evening though, after everyone is tucked in their respective beds, but me, I will sit in the chair and listen to the porcupine softly snore.

The time comes though, that even that ends. The porcupine moves to an outdoor cage or enclosure where he learns to climb and munch watermelon, corn, leaves and grasses and crisp sweet potatoes. I often wonder what they think when they get in the woods and there are no sweet potatoes growing in the trees.

Then in the waning moon of August, it is time for them to leave. It doesn’t always work on the first try. I was worried that tonight might be one of those nights when you bring them back home and try again in a few weeks.

We know of a perfect place at the end of a dead end two track. It was once a homestead and there are little bridges of rocks across the creek that winds through it. The orchard and house are gone, but a few wild apple and pear trees have grown to replace them. It is lush with ferns and thick with oak, pine, beach and cedar. In other words, it is porcupine heaven.
We took along the possums that were eager to run off into the woods when the cage was opened and they were encouraged to experience freedom. The porcupines take a bit more time.

I carried her along the stream bank, showing her the different plants, the crossings and the best trees. I found a beech with a low branch and allowed her to climb from my hands to the tree. She whined and clicked her teeth with anxiety. She nearly tumbled off the branch, so I put her on the ground. She quickly (as quickly and a porcupine can) came to me and started climbing up my leg.

Scooping her up, we walked some more. Her high pitched whine and teeth clicking gradually changed to a lower pitch of excitement and chatters. I found a big white pine with lots of thick low branches and let her crawl from my hand to the branch. At first she climbed away from me, then turned and started whining again and came back to my arm.

We just talked to each other (I talked, she whined) till she calmed down and we repeated the process. After two or three times, back and forth, she climbed higher in the tree away from me. She tasted the needles and bark and grunted happily. She had taken her choice. She was home and I could leave.

I admit. It was hard to walk away. I looked back several times to see if she was trying to reach me. She wasn’t. So in the gloaming dusk, I left her.

I hope she’ll be safe. I hope she’ll have enough to eat. I hope she finds a mate. I hope she has a long life with many babies.

I hope, that somewhere in that slightly primitive brain, she will remember me.

I know, I will remember her.

Ok, so I took in my dead friend’s cats. Annie (AKA Annie Banannie) Is so cool. She is extremely over weight and cannot jump up on things (we are working on a weight reduction program) Even though she is in a mad house and not getting the food she likes, she is pretty content to sit behind and empty aquarium and watch the world go by. If you come near her, she rolls over and purrs. She even purrs for Sophie if Soph sits quietly.

Annie is the ultimate in cool, even if her extra toes do kind of creep me out.
The other one…..well, I always thought he ( she , whatever, there is so much fur on this cat’s ass I can’t tell) was the coolest. A Norwegian forest cat (we believe) showed up at her door already declawed (don’t get me started on that) and I assume, spayed or nutered as a small kitten. It has luxurious gray fur and the distinctive triangular face of the Norse cats.

I always liked him, because he was not an “In your face” kind of cat. He strolled through the room, nodding his approval or disapproval, would try to drink the foam off my coffee and then move along as if he owned the house and he allowed us peasants to visit.

He basically had a lovely “Fuck you” attitude and I like that in a cat.

It took two attempts for her son to get him here. Annie Bannannie, rode peacefully on on the floor of the car and wrapped her arms around me when she saw me. The other cat hissed and swatted (first time I’ve been grateful for declawed cats) when cornered and wormed his way out of the carrier and disappeared before he could even get to the car.. Dave was beginning to think we’d have to set live traps. But the desire for food won over distain.

He arrived in the carrier with a zip tie on the zipper so he couldn’t escape. I was cautioned that I might want to use a long stick to free him. I opened it next to Annie and backed away in case he attacked. He stayed in the carrier most of the afternoon hissing and growling at everything that ventured within 10 feet. (Sophie, Annie, me, flies, the wall…..)

After he ventured out, he still hated the world and all it’s breathing occupants. If I walked too close to the emperor, he swatted. If I looked at him without my head bowed, he hissed. You could hear his growls at regular intervals. I thought “Ok, Annie is for petting and this long haired harridan is for avoiding. This will work out.)
Then last night, he rubbed against my leg. I froze, petrified. He PURRED. Oh my God! He Purred. he jumped up on the table while I fed the squirrels and though he sniffed them thoroughly, he showed no indication that they might be a food product. (as the dieting progresses, I’m not that confident that Annie will share those sentiments). I shut the studio door to give them peace from Sophie and went to bed.

This mornings introduction to the bobcat kitten did not go well, so I put her outside early and went about feeding. Again, the cat jumped up on the table and watched me feed squirrels. He nonchalantly sniffed in the direction of the baby bunnies.

It wasn’t until I sat down at the computer with my coffee that I learned what I’d gotten myself into. It’s like the coffee triggered the memory of who I was. he was in my face. He was in my coffee. He was laying in the keyboard and generally demanding all my attention. It’s not easy with a big ball of floof in your face to use the computer.

HE WONT LEAVE ME ALONE. He’s like an adolescent boy with a can of AXE body spray. He is all over me. I am gagging at the cat hair in my coffee.

But…..I am loved. Hopefully not with this intensity as the weeks go by, but I am certainly loved.

Now, wait till he meets the tortoise.

The moon was spectacular last night. Her luminosity made my lantern unnecessary when I went out to feed the fawns. I watched a few stray clouds scuttle across the silver surface and noticed a tinge or orange on the very edges of those clouds. You don’t see that color in early and midsummer moons…but midsummer is past and that moon has become the Green Corn Moon.

I learned the names of the moons from an old Native American friend when I was a child. They often differ from the standard almanack moons of the white settlers. The Green Corn Moon was so named because the corn was ripe and juicy and sweet. Fresh ears were roasted in the fire and The People filled their bellies with it’s goodness. They knew that the winter would be long and there would be many nights of soup and succotash made with the dry corn of harvest. This corn was a treat and was celebrated with stories and songs.

I always feel a bit wistful at the August moon. It’s the last moon of summer and soon the light will change and the softness of the summer will turn to the sharp, crisp sky of Autumn. The moon will rise golden and her light will turn cold as she passes across the sky. The hectic time of harvest will be here and my arms will feel the itch and scratch of wool sweaters reluctantly pulled over my head.

I didn’t want to waste this moon. I took off my shoes to feel the dew and gave the deer their warm, sweet bottles of milk. This time too will come to an end. Some already turn their heads and reach for grass of the sweetfeed at their feet. Their spots are fading and they raise their muzzles to the wind. I wonder if they are smelling the fresh scent of freedom and are already thinking of forests and fields beyond the fence. My time with them is limited.

when they finished, I followed them out into the yard. We walked all the way to the garden and beyond. Every once in a while a cool nose pressed into my hand or against my leg. Sophie came to join us and that’s when the dancing began.
It started with a headbutt to the side of my leg, then progressed with a sideways shuffle to the side, soon all the deer and Sophie were running and jumping around me. The bucks would bow low and shake their heads, then race in circles around us. The does would raise up on their hid legs and then leap in a different direction.

They raced around the perimeter of the garden and then would come back to me, inviting me to run.
But I’m old and slow and not a deer. They are becoming aware of this now. I am not a deer. They long to have the company of other deer instead of old ladies. The tie that binds us will stretch and strain and finally break. Once the gates are lowered, I will see them less and less.

Some will return on a daily basis, still begging for that warm bottle of milk. I’ll indulge them, as much for me as them. Some will disappear within day and I’ll never see them again, not knowing if they have joined in a heard of wild deer or somehow died on the road or in the jaws of a coyote. The longest night of the year is the night that they do not return to the yard to sleep. I lay awake listening for the screech of brakes or the shrill cries of coyotes with prey.

Then there is always that one. The one who can’t let go. The one who will come back just to stare at the house or sleep in her familiar pen. The one that even years later, I will see in the field and it will turn and look at me and want and not want to approach me for a scratch.

I love it when that happens. I know that I succeeded at my work. I know that there is a healthy deer that would not have been there without me. It’s a little thing in the scope of the world, but it’s enough for me.

In the meantime. I have this moon, I have this night where lanterns have no need and I will dance with the fawns in the dew.

Tonight was one of those nights that reminds me that it’s not always about the animal.

The day started out on a sour note. I’d been up all night prepping for a medical procedure in the morning and was tired, sick to my stomach and suffered from other induced maladies.

A man called a little after eight about a bird that hit his window last evening. he was arrogant and demanding and did not want to listen to my advice about the bird and not being able to repair it’s broken wing. he kept pushing. I told him that I was not feeling well and getting ready to leave for the surgical center and really couldn’t deal with it at the moment. Maybe he could call back in the afternoon. He became belligerent and told me , he didn’t care. He’d “Just kill the bird and I could live with that”.

Ok, I guess I have a lot of bird lives lined up in my karma.

I got a nap in this afternoon and was trying to get caught up on the 9 hours of work that didn’t get done today and the phone rang again.It was a woman with of course, another bird. This one had a broken leg from a cat. I started to explain to her about the bacteria in a cats mouth, but she interrupted me and said she’d do anything for this bird to help it. She just lost her dog of 19 years a today and needed to do something for this bird.
I knew I needed to take this bird, even if it was hopeless.

So we waited for her. We finally gave up at 7:30 and started eating dinner. She shows up on about the third mouthful.

She’s driving an expensive car. She’s blond, in her mid 50’s. She has cowboy boots and smells like horses. Now anyone that knows me well, understands how and why that is an immediate PTSD trigger for me. I put my dinner down and let her in anyway.

The bird was hopeless. I could see the puncture wound when the cat broke it’s leg, but I fed it and made it cozy anyway. I knew I couldn’t do much for the bird, but I could for her.

We looked at the animals inside. I let Sophie lavish her attentions on her. I took her outside for a tour and asked her to tell me about her dog. We pet baby bunnies, watched the bob cat, played with Crow and the Blue Jay Brothers and then took her out to find the fawns. Red of course, figured if she was with me, she was OK with him and came to her for scratches and nuzzles.

She was here for about an hour and a half. She smiled the whole time. My diner was coagulating on my plate, I was still tired and worn out, but she was feeling better. That’s all that mattered. She was feeling better.
When she finally left around 9, I ate my cold chicken. After that I went in to check the bird. I dressed the wound with antibiotic powder, just in case it’s a claw wound and not a tooth and set the leg. It doesn’t look hopeful, I don’t think I can do anything, but make it comfortable and watch it die.

But you know what? It isn’t about the bird. It’s about the woman who lost her best friend of 19 years today and the fact that she smiled for an hour and a half.

I feel bad for the man this morning. He couldn’t see beyond his own immediate needs. He could have called back later in the afternoon. He could have explained why it was so important that I take the bird. Instead, he reacted with anger that his needs couldn’t be met immediately.

He couldn’t see that sometimes…. it isn’t about the bird at all.

Yesterday, as hot as it was, I went out and picked the black berries. In this heat they don’t hold long and if I want black berry jam and a pie for Jimmy, it needs to be done.

The heat was shimmering in the air and I could smell the chlorine of my little blow up pool that was my incentive to finish the job. I could almost feel the cool water close over me as I picked.

Of course Crow and at least two deer accompanied me, along with Sophie, my lab. My bucket didn’t fill very fast as it was “Pick two for the bucket, one for the crow, two for the deer and don’t forget Sophie”. Luckily the heat was a bit much for them in the sun and all but Crow left me. He moved up into the mulberry tree and contented himself with dropping mulberries into the pool below. (Now you know why I have a slight lavender cast to my skin).

I have a milk crate, one of the old sturdy ones) out there to reach the berries on top of the little arbor, but I still fall a few inches short, so there are plenty of prime berries for the other birds to eat. My young robin, came and did exactly that. After about an hour, I moved over to the other side of the fence.

Levi doesn’t mow as much as we do and the grass along that side fence and berries is long and tangled. There is a deep pink rosebush that rambles along and through the fence and I had to tread carefully to avoid it wrapping around my ankles. (A 1oo year old rose has very long thorns)

My flip flops kept getting caught in the long grass, so I left them behind as I kept picking. Being in the brush like that, not all the berries make it to the bucket tied around your waist. Every so often, you hear the soft plop as one hits the ground, but who wants to search through the weeds for one berry.

Sometime, I became aware of something occasionally tickling my feet and ankles. I has seen a little deer mouse scurry through the fence when I began and I knew that there was a grass snake that lived in that comer, so I really didn’t think much of it. Then something definitely sniffed my ankle.
I looked down and there was a tiny brown bunny at my feet. Every time I would drop a berry, he would sneak in to eat it. I laughed out loud and it scurried away.

It was too hot to continue and my bucket was heavy around my waist and the call of the pool was irresistible. I left a handful of berries on the ground where the bunny could reach them and climbed back through the brambles and richly scented roses.
I fell into the pool and let the cool water envelope me. I lay on my raft with the current from the filter swirl me around. I watched clouds, then trees, clouds then trees, pass through my vision.

Crow came down to join me and I was nearly asleep when he started dipping his beak into the pool and spitting water on my head. I figured this meant he was ready to go inside and I knew everyone’s feeding time was coming up. (Including my husbands)

As I passed back through the arbor, I noticed the pile of berries was gone. Happy bunny. Happy me.