LIMINAL LIVING #20: 13 MAY to 19 MAY 2024

Animals, Beach/Ocean, Birds, Collector Garden, Community, Fencing, Field Trip, Flowers, Garden Work, Insects & Arachnids, Liminal Life, Nature Preserves, Seasons, Sense of Place/Travel

LIMINAL LIVING #20: 13 MAY to 19 MAY 2024

May 19, 2024

Weekly recap of my ritual of existence in this liminal space called life. (See here for more info.)

Weather

It was dry this week, with only 1/5 of an inch of rain in total. Temperatures ranged from a high of 77.9°F on Tuesday to a low of 41.4°F on Monday night. The average high temp this week was 68.4°F, the average low temp was 49.4°F. All in all, pretty springy, if arid.

Beginnings

Lots of very fresh asparagus available this week!, including some grown in town.

Saw my first dragonfly this year, in our yard, a beaverpond baskettail, which I’m not sure I’ve ever seen before.

My husband mowed the lawn for the first time this season on Friday.

We visited Bedrock Gardens in Lee, NH for the first time this season (they only opened on Tuesday :-))

Wild Flora, Fauna, Fungi

Photos from various places this week.

Birds Merlin heard (23 species, I think) in our yard, at the nature park, and around town this week:

Wandering

I walked in town on Monday, Tuesday, and Friday; we both walked in town on Wednesday and Thursday. We walked/hiked at a local nature park on Saturday.

On Sunday we left for three days away, starting with three hours of exploration at Bedrock Gardens in Lee, NH, on our way to more vacation in Kennebunk, Maine. We walked at the Rachel Carson NWR in Wells on Sunday afternoon, then on the beach where our motel is located (piping plovers!), and went to dinner at a new (to us) restaurant, Batson River, that evening. (More on that trip in the next instalment!)

Some landscape photos from some of these places (Bedrock Gardens photos are below):

Merlin-heard birds at the Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge in a few minutes on Sunday afternoon:

Curiosity & Discoveries

I enrolled in a 10-day online meditation course on Equanimity with Sharon Salzberg on Saturday, starting a month.

So much at Bedrock Gardens, which we visited on Sunday, is a curiosity and/or a discovery. It’s a collector’s garden, with interesting and odd things from around the world, and this time of year there are spring ephemerals like mayapples, very large Jack-in-the-Pulpits, trilliums, and frogs and tadpoles in and around the ponds.

BEDROCK GARDENS

And some birds here, but I accidentally deleted a bunch of them, including the Baltimore Oriole, which we also saw.

Creating

I missed a chance to create a Garden Blogger’s Bloom Day post on the 15th May — just too busy with other things outside. Hopefully in June.

Repairing and Maintaining (everything but the house & yard)

Financial: I updated financial/investment totals for an hour on Thursday morning.

Body/Mind: I did some medical admin on Monday and Tuesday for a procedure on Wednesday. I worked out 4 times (4 hours) this week, and I took at least an hour-long walk every day this week — I walked more than 10,000 steps every day and 14,000 or more on four days. I’ve started taking my blood pressure every few days at random times to have a record of it since it climbs when in a medical office; this week the systolic (top number) ranged from 127 to 108 and the diastolic (botton number) from 73 to 65. Pulse on pulse oximeter ranged from 73 to 61.

Hobbies: Husband fly-fished on Monday.

Cat: I printed out a sheet of feeding instructions etc. for the cat-carer on Saturday and organised his things for her.

Gardening/Yard

My husband put up the fence — metal and bamboo poles, fishing line and netting — around the vegetable garden on Thursday as the shelling pea seedlings are now a few inches high and the arugula has emerged. He mowed (for the first time this year) and did some weed whacking on Friday.

I bought two hanging baskets of colourful petunias from the local farmstand on Tuesday. I’m wild about these colours.

I worked in the garden on Friday evening, weeding and clearing up around the patio and the fruit guild (more to do). I planted my friend’s poppies on Tuesday and did some other gardening then, too.

Some garden pics; the two Olga Mezitt rhodos seemed especially vibrant this spring:

Nesting – design, decor, maintenance, food, supplies, etc

Supplies: Ordered a second pair of Kizik shoes on Thursday, the first ones fit so perfectly.

Cleaning/Maintenance: I did towel laundry on Monday and clothes laundry on Wednesday and Saturday (twice due to upcoming trip). Cleaned the toilets. Tidied up before we went away on Sunday morning.

Food: I made the penne dish with pine nuts, local asparagus, shrimp, and our chives on Monday and we had that through Wed. for dinner.

We got Chinese takeout on Thursday, which we had through Saturday, and Sunday we ate out in Kennebunk.

Sleeping & Dreaming

Another not-great sleep week, with extremes in time asleep from 9 hours 16 mins to 5 hours 44 mins. On average, I slept 7 hours and 18 mins this week, with an average sleep score (FitBit) of 82.7, which is low for me. Sleep scores ranged from 72 to 91. I had 12 hours 27 mins of REM and 7 hours 18 mins of deep, quite low for me.

Reading / Words & Ideas / Listening / Watching

Always love this:

And, on the other side of the spectrum, this article, The Last Thing My Mother Wanted, written by her daughter Evelyn Jouvenet, in The Cut (8 May) was just fascinating to me.

I quite like this, which seems related to both of the items above:

Connections & Community

Local Support: Bought two hanging baskets at local farmstand on Monday. Bought asparagus from local co-op on Monday, and bought more (very local) asparagus and some chips at the local farmstand on Tuesday. Got takeout from local Chinese restaurant on Thursday and ate at a local restaurant in Kennebunk, Maine, on Sunday. Picked up two Two Good To Go bags from local bakery/café, on Wednesday and Saturday, and we ate outside on the patio there on Friday morning.

Relationships: A friend had surgery on Monday morning and I checked in with her on that day and Tuesday. Chatted with neighbour in his yard for 15 mins on Friday. Stopped at friends’ house while on a walk on Thursday and chatted for 15 mins or so (they’re recently returned from a couple months in Alabama). Chatted with another friend along that same walk for about 10 mins; husband saw that same friend the next day and chatted for longer. Texted a friend on her birthday on Friday. Wrote a long email to a friend on Tuesday.

Someone I know in town gave me some poppies from his garden on Tuesday, which I planted promptly but I’m not sure about their prospects; a couple have already vanished, due to weather, transplant shock, or something eating them, or all three, I’m not sure.

Poetry Posse met on Tuesday afternoon, with 8 of us sitting outside by a friend’s pond and sharing poems etc.

I hosted the permaculture group on Zoom on Thursday morning, with 6 of us in attendance to talk about gardens and the book we’re reading. Salon met on Friday with 6 of us in person and 1 on Zoom. Here’s the creeping phlox show at our Salon host’s house: