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Where We Ended Up
They say tonight is the killing frost. Time to bring the garden in. Not all of it, of course. Only the tender plants that grew in pots all summer precisely so they could be whisked in at the frost. The days have been beautiful. Zoom school: time-sucking but beneficial. The summer, a dream. Often an idyllic dream of backyards and careful visits to Grandma. Sometimes a nightmarish dream where the faster you run, the slower you go; having a newborn can be like that.
At the summer solstice, I attacked the poison ivy that sneaks in through our fence. It attacked me back, despite my protective gear, and it’s fair to say it won in the end. But at first, I savored my delusions of victory by escaping into the wilds behind our fence. There an abandoned train track runs along a berm, flanked by a marshy meadow. In spring, the meadow floods, and the call of courting amphibians sets the night trilling like a thousand mobile phones incessantly going off in a theater. By midsummer, the meadow dries. Daisies and other feral flowers grow there. Many aren’t proper wildflowers. Just feral, escaped. By midsummer, sun, and drought bronze the plants growing through the track with autumnal colors, though the meadow on either side remains green. Even garlic mustard, that detestable weed, looks fairly pleasant with its ragged leaves bronzed. Giant mullein torches the sky. A big blue sky that poison-ivy day, with big, puffy clouds threatening a storm that passed us over.
So might begin an essay on the importance of rootedness. On Forgotten America with that abandoned track. Only the track here isn’t forgotten because industry and commerce left us. They’re still here. Just the trains are gone. Neighbors forage in the swale along the track for wild grape leaves and other edibles. A nearby thicket grows lush and rank, yielding not just berries but remnants of what may have been someone’s vegetable garden, though it’s public land. Mosquito abatement sometimes mows the meadow in summer, which controls mosquitos surprisingly well though it beheads the daisies. Some of those daisies now grace our yard, my reluctance to poach them from the commons mowed down along with their blossoms. After too many moves in too few years, this is where we ended up. I hope this time, we get to stay.
A state that had a long lockdown is where we ended up. In a Covid-19 risk group that should apparently Protect itself Focusedly so that the rest of the world can go on its merry way is where we ended up. Zoom school is where we ended up. Zoom church. Zoom anything. During 2020’s dream summer, I needed to accept where we ended up as given, trying to make the best of it, rather than question its justice. I needed solidarity with the flesh-and-blood neighbors in our area, even if I couldn’t get physically close to them. Even if our area imposed restrictions that were pretty stupid from a God’s-eye view.
Real-estate listings don’t include the swale behind the fence, the edible weeds in the garden, or the toads (no doubt spawned in the flooded swale) that hop among them. Still, when you end up somewhere, it could be somewhere that has these as givens, and then they’re yours to live with. And everyone has to be somewhere.
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Epilogue: Halloween. Racing clouds cobweb the big, full moon and coal-red Mars as a fierce, warm wind sends leaves — and our handmade ghost — flying. Our village skipped official trick-or-treat hours this year, though some diehards showed up anyway. We lit our Halloween display with electric votives and spent dusk outdoors enjoying the view. We took a moonlit walk. We raked leaves into a big pile under the moonlight and jumped into them. The wind will scatter the pile by morning anyhow.
Happy Halloween! And remembrance for All Souls.
Darling Midge: so glad to ‘see’ you.
Lady! Hey, Lady!
Who are these people? And what are they doing in my leafpile?
Hi, Midge!
I pray all else is going well with you and yours, Midge. We miss you.
Wow, the imagery in your writing is great. Thank you.
There aren’t too many things that make me happier than a Midge visit to Ricochet. Though, I admit, abandoned railroad tracks are way up there.
Nice piece, Midge. Where have you been? Are you sticking around?
For the immediate future, I’ll still be, ah, migratory. But I hope to post a review of Arbery’s “Heroes of the Fourth Turning” soon. The script finally came out this summer, for all the rest of us who can’t be NYC theatergoers (or who somehow missed the one showing they did of it over Zoom — that would be me).
For you, it’s just a swamp full of weeds and frogs, but for @kirkianwanderer , it’s a buffet
I pulled up the garden for winter yesterday. The frost came in and burst the ripest of the cherry tomatoes, guaranteeing a bumper crop of rogue plants in the spring.
Then the trick-or-treaters came. Little Princess Emma wouldn’t leave until she got to meet Asta. “Noooooo, I wanna see da pup-peeee!” I brought doggo out into the garage and Princess Emma grabbed her by the whiskers, kissed her on the nose and made a funny face. “Was that wet, Emma?” asked dad. “No,” came the reply, “dat yucky!”
One boy came dressed as Marine. He got extra.
I saw them open for High Plains Drifter at the Coliseum back in ’92.
A few data points in case you’re thinking about geographic susceptibility to PI during your migrations.
I used to be around PI a lot in north-central Minnesota and never got the rash, but when we lived in Illinois for a few years in the early 70s, I would tend to get it. It was not fun. I blamed the hot and humid climate. Here in Michigan I do a fair amount of weed-whacking and brush-whacking of poison ivy, where the juices and fragments sometimes go flying in unintended directions, and have never gotten it, or at least not badly enough to remember. I’m somewhat careful with what I do with my clothes when I come in, and give myself a good washing with soap and hot water when I come in, but I’m still surprised that I have never gotten it here.
I wish I could say the same about Lyme Disease.
As for toads, it seems I was hearing toads do their singing far later in the year than usual, for a few evenings during a warm spell. I don’t remember just when that was. Early October?
As for things that are yours to live with, I grew up as a pastor’s kid in the days when pastors moved around a lot and lived in parsonages rather than buying their own homes. There is a lot to be said for just exploring and enjoying the people and places where you’re placed rather than having the responsibility of designing your own living environment down to the last detail. It’s harder to be happy with your own choices if everything you have is due to your own choosing.
In general I agree. I can think of one fellow, though, who had to specially design two houses he lived in. He was 6’6″ tall, and a lot of stairways as designed don’t work out well for someone that tall.
Never having any choices at all about your living environment has been known to be a problem for people, too.
I’m not Gollum! I don’t live in an East Asian swamp and violently consume all of the small animals and vegetation that comes my way raw.
I’m sorry to imply that you don’t cook them. Maybe not so much a buffet as aMongolian BBQ
My dad is 6’6″. All the men in my family are over 6 feet tall. It’s hard to find high enough ceilings in cars and homes!
Glad you seem to be doing well.
So might begin an essay on the importance of rootedness.
I haven’t read many essays on the importance of rootedness but maybe that was what that Toqueleville fellow was talking about. It is a great metaphor as anyone can see who has ever struggled with the weeds that always seem more resilient than the frail flowers or vegetables that we plant. Thanks Midge.