Rabbit rabbit

All moments, past, present and future, always have existed, always will exist.

Rabbit rabbit

 

Small reprieves of coffee and birdsong

Today is a good day, the rain falling and falling, finally, all the bags of compost dispersed this weekend making even bare patches in the garden look lush and happy. True, rain is falling on a wheelbarrow heaped with items headed for the trash, but I am content in the knowledge that both garage and shed are tidier than they've been in years. And someone stopped to pick up the huge wooden toboggan we left on the curb, hoping a passerby would fall for it the way Mark did years ago (it's lived in our garage, yearning for snow, for years).

But most of all, today is a good day because Mark and I started it by consoling a crying boy in the park who had lost his phone as he rode to middle school on his bike. We asked where exactly he'd been riding and promised to deliver his phone to the school if we found it. "Oh no," I fretted, slowly searching a block of damp sidewalk. "We have to find it!" Reader, we found it. And we got to tell him we found it and see his smiley, relieved little face. 

I found you some things:

Artificial yes. Intelligence? Not so much.

Alliumphobia, perfectly rational.

Here's to October, the month of months! If you're reading this, I probably love you so, so, so much. 

Rabbit rabbit

O hushed October morning mild

 

Rabbit rabbit

The days grow short when you reach September

 

Rabbit rabbit

 

We quiver inside our shocked fur

I've seen a half dozen hummingbirds in the last two weeks, enticed by my prolific red bee balm, one of which hovered in the air like a little AI creation, 18 inches from my face, and I swear looked me in the eye.

Oh the dinosaur blue jays, a crow mama and teenage baby calling for peanuts, dozens of sparrows startled out of the rain-dampened grass when I open the screen door, little goldfinches with their shockingly bright feather jackets, a woodpecker diligently working on the remains of the suet (previously ravaged, loudly, by starlings). 

When I look at the garden I see the holes where we need to plant more flowers (tis the season of yellow and red — I need more blue! more purple and pink! more white!). But if I list everything in bloom I'm stunned by it all. Lucky, lucky, lucky.

Especially this past (long) weekend, when Stella and Ben visited and indulged us on an arduous canoe paddle and a wild and stormy boat ride out to Eastern Egg Rock to get a really good look at the puffins nesting there. We also spotted seals, porpoises, and many seabirds. In return, we indulged them with a perfect Red's Dairy Freeze score (4 for 4 nights). Plus there were lobster rolls, bocce, board games, an Eastern Prom food truck picnic, bubble tea, and used bookstores. And the back garden fauna was satisfying too: a rabbit* (first rabbit we've seen in our yard in 25 years); two skunks, flaunting their white-striped tails at twilight (we all yelled SKUNK!!); lots of squirrels.

Seen, but not captured on film, no matter how hard I tried:

Flashing sign at the corner of State and Congress: SNOW HAULING

Alarming the tourists since 1999:

Mark, to Ben and Stella, in line for the puffin cruise: "Did you hear about that humpback whale that flipped a boat over the other day?"

Up top we saw so many puffins!

Below deck there were bodies on the floor.

*I think it's a New England Cottontail