“It is spring again. The earth is like a child that knows poems by heart.”

Spawns of Satan is already taken so I don’t know what to call the bird that pecks the side of my house and wakes me up. It has found the most inaccessible spot for me to get at it to shoo it away. I’m thinking a hose with the water at its strongest will reach the spot and scare away the bird. I wouldn’t dare try a stone because I’d probably break a window though it isn’t really all that close to the bird’s spot. It’s not a woodpecker, but I think it’s a nuthatch. Whatever it is doesn’t matter. That bird is going down!

It is still a damp day though the rain has stopped. The temperature is supposed to be in the 40′s and by mid-week close to 60˚. I think the sun would help if it would only come out of hiding.

I have to venture onto the deck later to fill the feeders. I watch the birds from the window while I wait for my coffee and have noticed how bright and beautiful the male gold finches are. Today I also had two house finches and a flicker. My stalwart chickadees have returned though they are fewer than usual.

The mornings are alive with the songs of birds. I woke up at one point and couldn’t see the clock but knew it must be close to dawn as I could hear birds welcoming the day. That is one of the best parts of spring: that the days are again filled with sound. Winter tends to blunt them. We all stay warm and secluded in our houses. The decks and yards are empty. We go from the house to the car to the store to the car and then home. Warm spring days, though, call to us to come outside. The sun is inviting. The world is alive again. It’s as if we’re shedding our winter coats and, like bears, leaving our caves. The long hibernation is finally over.

“An atheist is a man who watches a Notre Dame – Southern Methodist University game and doesn’t care who wins.”

I woke to a cold morning with a dusting of snow and a whitish grey sky. The breeze is ever so slight. Only the tips of the brown leaves sway. Snow sits on the oak and pine branches and covers all but the tall grass in the backyard. I think the day is pretty in its own way, even without the sun. Goldfinches and nuthatches are at the feeders. I don’t know where my chickadees have gone.

Gracie, Fern and Maddie are having their morning naps. Gracie went out for a short time and came running back inside as if she were being chased. She had spit on her forehead, always a sign she had run around the yard with her mouth open and her tongue hanging. Gracie does yard loops and runs around three or four times without stopping. My yard is big so she is always panting when the loops are done.

My big plans for today are to water the plants and go to the dump. Later I’ll watch the Puppy Bowl, one of my favorite Super Bowl Sunday events. Usually my friends and I get together for the game, but I’m still on the mend so I’ll stay home. I won’t even get dressed in outside clothes. The dump has no dress code.

My father spent every Sunday of football season watching a game, usually by himself. None of us were interested. He’d sit in the living room, eat snacks and yell and jump off the couch when something really good or really bad happened. We were usually in the kitchen. He’d come out to get something else to eat or drink and give us an update. We’d commiserate when his team was losing and give encouraging sounds, but we didn’t really care. Once in a while he’d yell to us about some play, and we’d go in the living for a minute or two and check out the TV. Most of the time I had no idea what he was talking about. Football, other than knowing a few basics, was a foreign language to me. I know a lot more now, even about some plays, the jobs of the different positions and special teams, but I still need my football to English dictionary.

“Outside the open window The morning air is all awash with angels.”

The rain stayed away yesterday, but today is already damp and dark so I figure we’ll get the promised rain later today. Gracie loves a cool morning, and she was out long enough to make me paranoid enough to check. I know she can’t jump the 6 foot fence anymore, but she still tries. Right now is her morning nap time.

The only light in this room is the laptop. Everything outside is still and quiet. I always like this kind of a morning. Actually, I love most sorts of mornings. I love the first gasp of breath when I go outside on a cold morning and the walk across the crisp, frosted grass to get my papers. Rainy mornings mean a run to get the papers and a day planned around a good book and an afghan across my legs. Snowy mornings have me checking how many inches have fallen. In the spring I love the smell of mornings. There is such a freshness to the start of the day when the the world is waking up from winter. Summer mornings are my favorite of all.

When I was really young, I never noticed the mornings. I was too grumpy being dragged out of bed, forced to put on my school uniform, eat breakfast and then walk to school. Every weekday was pretty much the same. The only sort of day which got my attention was when it rained. That meant wet shoes coming and going and staying inside at lunch instead of having recess.

I notice every morning now. I love the sounds of the birds and summers on the deck having coffee and reading the papers. I watch the birds flying in and out at the feeders. I curse the spawns of Satan. My deck will be closed down this weekend, and I’m sad. The furniture will be covered and the candles taken down from the trees. I’ll go out to check on the dog and to fill the feeders, and when I do, I’ll long for summer again.

“Birthdays are good for you. Statistics show that the people who have the most live the longest.”

Mornings this time of the summer are lovely. The air is still cool from the nighttime and the sun has a sharpness that highlights even the smallest leaf. My cats sleep sprawled in the sun shining through the front door while Gracie sleeps in her crate and snores loudly enough to be heard here, down the hall in the den.

When I woke up this morning, I rushed downstairs to open the front door expecting to see a planter of mums. I didn’t and was disappointed. My friend has never before failed to leave them on the steps. I stood there bemoaning the morning then I noticed the mums were by the gate. The festivities can begin.

When I was a little kid, I’d rush to the mailbox hoping for cards and hoping to find a dollar or two tucked into each card. It wasn’t being greedy. Back then a dollar meant I could buy two new books, and two dollars was almost wealth beyond comprehension. One grandmother always sent a dollar until I was a teen then she sent five dollars. Even when I was in the Peace Corps she’d slip a dollar or two in the aerogramme which warned about enclosing anything. I doubt she even noticed, but I was always appreciative of those dollars. They were hard to come by in Ghana.

My mother always made the cake. Chocolate was my favorite. We’d sit around the table after dinner with the cake in the middle and the right number of candles on the top. I’d endure the singing. It always embarrassed me a little, still does. After the singing ritual, I’d blow out the candles, my mother would cut the cake, and finally I’d get to open the family presents.

This afternoon my friends are taking me on the lobster cruise out of Sesuit Harbor. It is the perfect day for a cruise with still air and all that sun. My camera battery is charged and ready. Come to think of it, so am I.

Today, in the normal course of events, I would be eligible for medicare!

“Morning is wonderful. Its only drawback is that it comes at such an inconvenient time of day.”

Monday still carries a bit of gloom about it even though I’ve been retired for so long. The Monday horror of the alarm abruptly pulling me from dreamland after two glorious days of sleeping in, the tiny Monday papers and the start of yet another work week dissipates slowly. It took 35 years for the weekday resentment to build, and the older I got, the more difficult  it was to drag myself out of bed. I loved my job but, on Mondays, I loved it the least.

I am not a morning person. I love the late nights when I am the only one awake, and everything is quiet. When all the houses around me are dark, I feel as if the night is mine. I’d probably be a great vampire if they really existed. I’d have no problem sleeping all day; however, the biting and the blood would be drawbacks. In Ghana, I actually liked the mornings and didn’t need an alarm clock. The roosters worked just as well, maybe even better as they didn’t need electricity or batteries. It was in the mornings when my school compound came most alive. I could hear the swishing sounds of brooms as students cleaned and swept the grounds then I’d hear the water from the taps splashing into their buckets and the clangs as the students hauled their buckets to the stalls where they’d take their bucket baths. Little kids walked by on their to the primary school and greeted me as I sat outside to drink my coffee. The morning air was always the sweetest and the coolest.

I love mornings in other places, wherever I travel.  I remember Santa Fe and getting to the square early in the morning where I sat and drank my coffee and  watched the Indians set up their wares in front of the Governor’s Palace. I watched store owners sweep the walks in front of their establishments and realized sweeping is a universal. In Portugal I watched trucks unloading fish and produce in front of shops and stores. I ate fresh rolls and drank strong coffee as I walked. Most places are best seen in the early morning when people are going about their business and the day is unfolding.

 

“Summertime is always the best of what might be.”

There is something wonderful about summer mornings. The house still has a nighttime cool, the birds are singing to welcome the new day and the lawn’s grass blades glint in the sunlight their tips still dewy damp. I love to walk across that cool, wet grass with bare feet when I go to collect the papers. I leave footprints on the driveway.

This room is in the back of the house and is always cooler and darker in the mornings. The sun rises at the front of my house, stays on the backdoor side all afternoon then wends its way to shine on the deck before setting. My yard is natural with plenty of trees and weeds which get their comeuppance a couple of times a summer. I planted a dogwood over where Shauna is buried and two fir trees over my Siamese kitties. Poor Maggie still needs a tree which I’ll plant this fall. Those animals lives enriched mine so much that I want them commemorated and something growing seems perfect.

Gracie woke me up early this morning and I was not happy. She jumped from the bed to the floor, started scratching at the mattress and whining in my face so I’d wake up. I did and came downstairs and opened the backdoor so Gracie could go out her dog door. She didn’t. She followed me back upstairs, jumped on the bed and fell asleep after a giant sigh of comfort. I wanted to break at least one paw. She fell back to sleep. I didn’t. Right now she’s out napping on the lounge on the deck. Life is tough if you’re Gracie.

I went to my first Wednesday play last night, and it was wonderful. 1776 was the play, and I think the men’s voices were the best they’ve had in a long while. The crowd gave them a standing oration, something I don’t remember seeing at that playhouse before this. Tomorrow night is my second Friday play; it’s As Bees in Honey Drown which I knew nothing about until I read the review, an excellent one so I’m looking forward to the play. So far I’ve seen only two movies this summer: The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel and Moonrise Kingdom. Both were at the Cape Playhouse Cinema which presents movies not shown in the usual theaters. This time of year I only go to movie theaters on beautiful sunny days. On rainy days there are few parking spots and fewer seats. Even the Cape Cinema fills though its audience is older than those at the regular theaters. Sometimes when I go there I feel young in comparison.

Today is an agenda less day. They are my favorites of all no matter what time of year.

“Titles are but nicknames, and every nickname is a title.”

It’s a typical Cape Cod spring day at 50°, and I doubt it will get much warmer. It’s a pretty day with lots of sun and only a slight breeze. I slept in this morning which always makes me wonder if my neighbors think I’m lying unconscious on the floor as the paper is still in the driveway at ten o’clock. Even Gracie and Fern didn’t stir until I did and both are having their morning naps right now.

When I worked, I was up at 5 or 5:15 at the latest. My paper was seldom in the drive-way that early so I used to drink my coffee, read or watch the morning news. I’d get dressed at 6 and leave by 6:20 for my ten minute ride to work. The paper was usually delivered by then, and I’d throw it in the car to read when I got home which was usually around 4 o’clock. After thirty-three years of that, I earned sleeping-in.

A rooster was my alarm clock in Ghana. I never needed a real alarm. I went to bed early and woke up early. I had no newspaper to read so I’d sit on my front porch, drink my coffee and watch the small boys and girls walk by my house to their primary school just outside the front gate of my school. They’d stop to greet me. I was always sir, “Good morning, sir. How are you, sir?” The smallest of them were just learning English, and I figured sir was part of their dialogues. Madam would come later as that was what I was called in Ghana, Madam Ryan.

My titles have morphed over time. In Ghana, I was madam even to the women working in the market though sometimes a seller called me miss to draw my attention to her wares. “Miss, Miss,” I’d hear shouted at me as I walked by the stalls. When I got home and started teaching here, it was Miss Ryan to my students. As times changed so did my title. I became Ms. Ryan, but the miss was still around and used mostly by salespeople who didn’t know my name, “Thank you, miss.” they’d say as they handed me my bag. Now I am ma’am which is the shortened version of madam. It seems I have come full circle.

“Dusting is a good example of the futility of trying to put things right. As soon as you dust, the fact of your next dusting has already been established.”

On the ground this morning was a dusting of snow. I even hesitate to use dusting to describe that snow, but I don’t know a smaller word for the amount on the ground. When I went to get the papers, the air reminded me of early spring when the mornings are chilly but hint of a warmer day. It is only 39° now but it is supposed to be in the mid-40′s later. I know this is only February, and I know spring is a long way off, but I can’t help but think of spring on a day like today.

More and more shoots are above the ground in my front garden. A seed catalogue comes every day, and I look through it trying to decide what flowers to add to my garden this year. I have a side garden now which runs along the driveway and needs filling. I have a feeling the garden store staff will applaud every time they see me coming. There might even be balloons!

Today is in-house chore day with washing to do, plants to water, my bed to change and a few places which need polishing. The book-case is so disgusting I could write a novel in all the dust. I’d need a clever title or I could just steal Butler’s title The Way of All Flesh.

Somehow or other all of my doctor’s appointments seem to come in the spring. I figure there is some weird connection between them and the rebirth of the Earth.

For years, I made special dinners and invited friends. I usually made something I hadn’t ever made before because I enjoyed hunting through cookbooks, imagining how the foods would fit together and then preparing the dishes. Lately I’ve been saving recipes and thinking about cooking again. I also just bought a new cupcake pan and want to give it a try. I’ve always been a cake person, but I’m willing to branch out to make a few of cake’s smaller relatives.

Well, the dust is calling me and I need to get the wash going. Today is just going to be one of those days. I’ll hate it, but at the end, even all that cleaning will give me a sense of accomplishment.

“If adventure does not wait on the doorstep, climb out through the window”

The day is warmer than it’s been, the sun is shining and the air is quite still. I was on the deck just after I woke up and thought how much about how much I love the mornings almost anywhere I am. When I was in Europe, I was always up so early breakfast had yet to be served. I’d go outside and listen to and watch the stirrings of the day. I’d smell the air as the morning air smells different. It has a freshness full of possibilities. In Ghana, the mornings begin early, but they were always my favorite part of the day. On this trip, I loved getting up at 6 and watching as Bolga woke up and began its day. When I worked, I was up at 5 or 5:15, and I felt as if I were the only person alive. No other house had lights, and I never heard cars. On warm mornings I’d stand outside and watch the sky for the first rays of the sun. It was a glorious way to begin my day.

Today I have a few errands, and my friends and I are going out to dinner to celebrate both their birthdays. Nothing much is planned for the rest for the week. My dance card is fairly empty.

My trip has stirred the travel bug far more than I expected. I had hoped to silence it for a bit, but it seems the bug is spreading throughout my entire body. I find myself looking at different travel sites wondering about my next trip. I’ll have to fill the larder, my bank account, first, but now I have a reason to save more money.

I’m laughing thinking of all the new hobbies I should start to occupy my day so I can stay home and spend nothing. Maybe I’ll learn to crochet, and everyone will get doilies for Christmas, the kind that go over the chair backs. There’s always origami and making thousands of cranes. They can decorate Christmas gift boxes of doilies. Years ago I made my own wrapping paper with stamps and water-color trees.  That sounds like a wonderful project. It goes on the list. Colorful napkins are easy to make-it’s just keeping the hems straight which gives me trouble. Maybe I’ll make them all different sizes and shapes so they’ll look avant-garde, not messy. People will think me creative rather than untalented with a needle and thread.

Well, it’s time to make the bed, get dressed and get in gear. I miss having my bed made, and I miss calling Thomas to pick me up for the day’s adventure though I suppose, no matter where, every day can always be an adventure.

 

“One way to get the most out of life is to look upon it as an adventure”

I know it is Wednesday, my day off from Coffee, but I thought I’d post a short entry today to keep up the suspense for tomorrow’s episode of Kat’s Travels to Africa.

This morning I woke up at six so my body is beginning to adjust to US time.  I went outside on the deck as I usually do just to get the feel of the morning. It seemed chilly to me, damp from the morning dew. It was and is still quiet with only the birds greeting the day. I saw a grey squirrel at one of the feeders, but I haven’t been home long enough to wish for a weapon.

Let me tell you about mornings in Ghana, especially in Bolga where I spent five days. The air is cool, and this time of year, the rainy season, there is a small breeze. I was awake by 6 and usually went outside to see the beginning of the day. Smoke rose from fires, and I could smell the wood charcoal.  I watched carts being pulled and pushed by small boys on their way to market. Women carried market goods on their heads as they walked along the sides of the streets. I could hear a mix of voices, conversations in FraFra, horns blowing as cars, mostly taxis, made their way up the street. The horn is an official symbol of Ghana or at least it seemed that way to me. Not moving for a nanosecond on a green light meant horns up and down the row were going to be beeped in impatience. I heard a few of those. I could see women sitting in front of the fires stirring huge pots with metal spoons. They were making soup for their morning T-Zed, tuo zaafi, a thick porridge made from millet flour which is eaten by tearing off a chunk, always with your right hand, and dipping it into a soup. In restaurants they bring a bowl of water and some soap so you can wash your hand before and after. I had some for dinner one night with a light soup and some chicken. It was in Ghana I learned to like okra, even with all that slime, but I never did become a morning T-Zed eater. I always had eggs, toast and instant coffee with evaporated milk. While I was in Bolga, I bought fruit so I could have a bowl of cut fruit instead of the eggs. I tried the eggs fried, scrambled and in an omelet, but the eggs tasted exactly the same no matter how they were cooked. The fruits were sweet and delicious.

I was usually dressed and finished with my breakfast by 8. I’d figure out my day and call Thomas, my driver, to come so we could begin our day’s adventure.