The Hermits' Rest

Lost in Time

Which activities make you lose track of time?

Ah, I’m answering this question rather than sharing my current thoughts. They’ll be more refined tomorrow.

For certain, what my husband will tell you makes me lose track of time is nature walks. I just disappear and re-emerge with no idea how long I was gone. I’m completely enthralled by the sights, sounds, and smells of new places or new things in familiar places. I don’t want it to end.

Here’s a new thing I found in the driveway! It’s delicious common purslane, a portulaca (*Portulaca oleracea*) just like the cultivated one below.

Look at the beautiful Texas Striped Sweat Bee in my volunteer portulaca/moss rose

Hanging out with the animals also can make me lose track of time. I’ve just spent twenty minutes thinking about how beautiful Carlton is to me. My love for this guy never ends.

I ended up spending more time with Drew today than I’d intended, too. I’d walked to the next-door unused mailbox to drop something off, and decided to come back through the horse pasture, you know, in case there were any interesting plants or insects. So, I was concentrating on plants when I got a feeling I was being followed.

I kept going until I felt something hot on my neck.

Then I realized Droodles was sneaking up on me.

We ended up hanging out for quite a while just enjoying each other’s company. He didn’t push me around looking for treats, just rested his head on me and asked to be scratched. It’s so good to get along with each other again!

Mostly. That ear is showing some mischief is afoot.
Yes, I’m not much of a fashionista in this weather. That shirt is very orange and the head covering looks silly but keeps hair out of my face.

Not surprisingly, the other activity that leads me to lose track of time is reading. I’ve been reading Sibley Birds, Second Edition since I bought it in New Mexico. It’s only 600+ pages. I can’t stop looking at all the birds, learning new things about familiar ones and finding out what else might be out there in Texas (and wherever else I go).

I will admit to skimming Arctic residents and ocean birds. Otherwise, I’m reading it all. But I’m in the oriole section! I’m almost done! Do not worry. I have a nice long book about animal tracks lined up. That’s what happens when people stop mailing me novels, I guess. (I’m fine for novels! I have some enqueued.)

If I’m repeating myself, forgive me. I’m working on changing my mindset and that can wear me out until I’m through the hardest part (letting go of an unproductive mindset).

Thanks for being there, friends and family. You are appreciated even when I don’t show it well.

People Bother Me So Let’s Talk about Weird Stuff

What bothers you and why?

Right now, people bother me. Sometimes the isolation out here in a sparsely populated rural area gets to me, and sometimes I’m glad I’m not around fellow humans too much. I’m so iffy on this! Humans both fascinate and repulse me. I find individuals fascinating and groups (political parties, religious denominations, single-focus nonprofits) frightening the more I get to know them. That bothers me.

What else bothers me? Inexplicable behaviors of non-human living beings, like today’s puzzling behavior involving bees and birds.

[Some of this I also posted elsewhere, but I’ve changed it a bit.]

First, bees. For the past week or two I’d been noticing a lot of honeybees around my legs. It seemed like the earth was buzzing. Upon closer examination, I saw dozens of bees crawling on the tiny blossoms of the grass (I think it’s Dallis grass) that is blooming now. The bees were all very busy, zipping from flower to flower (not leisurely sipping as they usually do), and they were loaded with pollen.

This went on for a few days. Yesterday, there was no buzzing as I walked along the field in my daily bird-watching patrol. Then, late in the afternoon I was over by the trees listening to a Yellow-billed Cuckoo when I heard something that sounded like one of those annoying drones people fly these days. I looked up and didn’t see a drone. I saw a large mass of tiny things moving along at a rapid clip. It was hundreds and hundreds of bees swarming. I guess they were moving on to better pastures. I’m not sure where their hive was before, because I hadn’t heard one in a couple of years. I hope they find a nice new dead tree!

Did you know bees swarm in giant balls o’ bees? No, they do not. This FAKE image is what WordPress AI gave me when I asked for a swarm of flying bees. Sophisticated it is not.

Moving along, I’ve also been dealing with birds overhead, specifically the beautiful but omnipresent Barn Swallows. Now, normally they hang out on our porches, building mud nests, raising babies and pooping. They also eat numerous insects, so they get to stay (also it’s ILLEGAL to mess with a nest of wild birds; you can ask Mike Mitchell about it if you don’t believe me). We coexist just fine, looking into or out of the windows at each other, and enjoying the swimming pool area.

However, lately, the little darlings have not been at all happy with me. They aren’t nesting anymore, just flying around the ponds and in the air catching food. They are always there, and for some reason they resent my presence. When I go for my morning or afternoon walks, I often hear a very loud CHIRP, with a Doppler effect as the chirper moves away. The swallows ambush me from behind, for the most part, but occasionally they fly right at me and veer off just before they make contact with my head.

They are fast little guys.

I have absolutely no clue as to why they are dive-bombing me. I’ve had Mockingbirds and Red-winged Blackbirds do this when they are nesting nearby. But, hey, do they think I want to home in on their mosquitos?

Bwa-ha-ha. This is AI’s best attempt at “giant mosquito.” One big eye and antennae on the side of its head. Well, that was a fun experiment.

All the other animals and plants are absolutely not bothering me. I enjoyed seeking out small flashes of peace and beauty around the property today. This stuff is literally saving me, y’all. If things go to hell in a hand basket, at least I’ll be able to enjoy wherever we end up!

But things will be fine. Humans, bothersome as they are, seem quite resilient.

I’m Certain That…

List 10 things you know to be absolutely certain.

1. Bullies are everywhere

2. Humans are driven to belittle whoever they see as the “other”

3. There were no “good old days” — it’s always sucked

4. Hormones make things really hard for women

5. Life is better with companion animals

6. There is something wonderful wherever you are

7. Politicians are not to be trusted

8. You don’t really know anyone else

9. Everyone is interesting

10. Peace may not be attainable, but it’s a worthy goal

Relaxing

We didn’t get any rain today, but we got nice clouds, and the high temperature barely got into the 90s.

That enabled me to accomplish many mundane outdoor tasks like weeding and setting up the pool furniture, work with Drew (sadly, Apache has a sore foot AGAIN*), and relax.

After a good day’s work and all those chores, I went for a nice swim for more exercise. The water feels great now that we figured out that the pool heater was somehow turned on and it’s back to normal! I got in my beloved pool float and just drifted around in the cool breeze. I felt like a happy wet noodle.

No photos of me floating, so here’s this morning’s Great Egret in the pond.

To demonstrate how relaxed I was: after I got out I sat in my chair by the woods to listen to birds. It was just perfect, so chill that when I heard a rustling noise I just looked down and enjoyed watching a shiny coach whip snake go on its way along the fence.

It stopped at the gate and paused, looking at me with its bright eyes, then headed on its way. It just said, “Hey, snake.”

Amazing what a little break in the weather can do for you.

*his foot is sore from getting some stuff trimmed that exposed bruising from his previous episode. Tarrin told me how to treat it, and he’s better today.

I’m Not Getting Older, I’m Getting Better?

What do you think gets better with age?

The ambiguous question here could be asking about fine wine, whiskey, cheese, or the patina on sculptures. It could also be asking what gets better as people get older. I’ll answer that one, though I warn you a lot of it will sound familiar. I don’t have that many themes in me.

One thing that I and many of my friends have found to get better with age is the ability to not need to be popular, liked, or acclaimed. It’s like that dull women group on Facebook: we are able to accept our ordinariness as well as our quirks and unique features. Not everyone will be impressed. And many of us elders are just fine with it. Loving yourself just as you are is something that takes a while to learn, for many.

Age also brings long-term perspective. It’s hard to have the insights that come from a long view until you have one. If you make it past age 50 or so you start to see patterns that repeat and can say, oh yes, I remember when television was going to ruin us but didn’t — probably video games didn’t ruin our children and TikTok won’t ruin our grandchildren. Maybe.

Me pensively taking the long view. Best I can do.

A final gift of age is that you come to appreciate little things in life. As your mind and body weaken, you are glad you can still read books and move around some. You appreciate sunrises and sunsets, because you don’t have many left. And you rejoice in the kindnesses you see in others.

That’s the best part for me, ferreting out the goodness hiding in plain sight. Try it! You don’t have to be older to do it!

Speaking of goodness, I cleaned my saddle and replaced my missing conchos. I have a saguaro cactus theme.

(I think the title to my post came from an ad for hair dye, right? Yes, I looked it up. It’s from the early 1970s.)

(Bonus: I think I wrote a five-paragraph paper, the thing we kept being assigned to do in high school. Mrs. Chisholm would be pleased, if she were still on this earth.)

Going to Bed Cooler

What time do you go to bed and wake up currently?

The important thing about going to bed tonight is that it’s in my own bedroom, where I can wind down in comfort. Yes, the parts (mostly) arrived and the upstairs air conditioning unit is fixed. I hated to complain, since downstairs was fine and we are very fortunate to have the motorhome to sleep in (made challenging by the malfunctioning slide—those things are a lot of trouble). I’m happy to be upstairs doing my evening things.

Highlight of my day: new conchos for Apache’s saddle. One of his got lost. Let’s see if I can get them on.

To answer the question, these days I head upstairs at around 9 pm unless there’s something interesting on television (rare). I get ready for bed, but then I stay up blogging (as I am now), adding observations to iNaturalist, and reading. It’s nice and quiet and comfy, so I go to sleep when I feel like it, usually 10:30-11.

Here’s the male of the grasshopper I shared yesterday. Roseate skimmer. Or carmine.

Like in the olden days, I sometimes wake up in the middle of the night and read some more. They say using your phone wakes you up, but I select pretty boring articles. That helps when I wake up concerned about out someone or something.

One concern was that I discovered my very important knitting needle was broken.

I’m usually up around 7 am, except for Thursdays, when I’m up at 6:15 to do open office hours at 7, for the Europeans who might need help with Planview apps. Few do. On the other hand, lots of folks needed help today! It evens out. I’ll really miss all the interesting people I meet once this job ends!

I’ll have more time to ride in the motorhome and look at weather phenomena then.

You may note that I sleep a lot. I always have needed more sleep than many people. I expected to need sleep as I got older, especially since my thyroid medication has bumped up my metabolism a bit. But I sure enjoy 9 hours. Lee sleeps more than me!

I’m yawning like Carlton, so time for bed!

I do fine on less sleep, but I don’t want to keep Lee up. If I could, I’d stay up so I could watch Colbert or the Daily Show. I miss them, but avoiding too much gnashing of teeth over news is healthy for me.

The Good Stuff: Equine Edition Plus

A little wiped out so I can’t write something long about comfort. So I’ll be brief but positive! This blog needs that, don’t you think?

I’m just pleased as punch to be able to announce that I’m in the best relationship yet with both my horses. That’s taken a lot of work and patience, but sure feels good. I’m glad my trainer works hard and is patient, too (plus she cares).

These are her filly and new calf. They have become playmates. It is extra cute.

It’s become a true pleasure to work with Apache. Funny story: I asked Tarrin if maybe something was wrong with him, because he’s been acting so laid back and agreeable. She laughed and said maybe I’m meeting my horse for the first time. He finally feels good and is showing his friendly and fun personality all the time, and he’s calm. We’ve both come a long way in that department. Dang, it’s fun to get better together.

I don’t have a photo of him today, so here are two more friends. They are good to each other.

And Drew is back to the horse I enjoyed so much before. Whatever he was angry about has passed, and he seems to feel better, too. I guess his shots are helping. I’m enjoying him rather than just working with him because I’m supposed to. I guess we figured things out.

Me riding Drew wherever I ask him to go. It was fun.

The good stuff plus today was that I managed to actually bring myself to reach out to someone about how bad I’ve been feeling lately. She listened, came up with ideas, and made some plans. It just felt good to explain how I feel and be listened to. That’s all I needed.

I’m going to have to find something fun to do this weekend, because we aren’t going camping as planned. The bedroom slide isn’t working in Seneca (Tarrin’s son looked at it but the easy possibility of a loose wire didn’t pan out). And I don’t want to leave the animals alone with just someone feeding them. At least I can ride the horses. My friendly, well behaved horses!

This female roseate skimmer reminds us that some change is good.

Present and Future Excitement

What are you most excited about for the future?

Gosh, I’m not excited about much in the future. Watching the fall of a civilization and seeing the rights of myself and my friends and family threatened isn’t what I’d call exciting; it’s more terrifying. And I feel so small and powerless (if one more person tells me I can make everything better by voting I will over-react in a ridiculous fashion. I DO vote but that’s not how things truly get done).

I’m feeling old, tattered, and fragile, like this wind-beaten Viceroy

Wait, I do look forward to driving around in Seneca and finding new bits of nature to explore. I hope to have that freedom. After all, I’m a harmless old woman and I have a heterosexual spouse, so I’m not too threatening on the surface. I just want to look at birds, bugs, and plants. Finding new ones is excitement enough for me.

This katydid was new for me: Black-margined Shieldback (*Pediodectes nigromarginatus*), pretty much only found in Texas.

And maybe Drew and I can become good partners! At least he is listening to my instructions like a champ this week. He walks until he is asked to trot. Hoorah!

We are good equines. We will be here for future excitement.

As for present excitement, we didn’t get any with Hurricane Beryl in our part of Texas, so I concentrated on seeing how my friends near Houston and on the coast fared. I was happy that our family members made it fine.

There was wind and .11” of rain here. I enjoyed the wind and the smell you get from hurricane clouds. You smell a little salt are, like the “cool Gulf breeze” Lee’s dad used to talk about when it was sweltering in Yorktown, Texas. To me it feels like Florida, when I’d take long walks at night in my breezy neighborhood just west of Ft. Lauderdale. I just stood and felt the wind for a good while this afternoon. Living in the moment!

Here’s a moment: the blanket through yesterday. If it hadn’t cooled off yesterday, there would have been a whole row of 95-99° highs.

I think the livestock were the happiest with today’s weather. The wind or “something gray” blew open the gate to the back pasture, so I found the horses far away at horse time. They liked that. Plus, Bianca, the lone chicken, was practically her old self today, since it didn’t get over 90°. She was out catching insects and sitting in the water trough like a happy hen.

Even her comb has some color in it again.

So yeah, even though I’m going through one of my pessimistic spates, I see what’s good out there! We all need each other’s support, so if you notice someone faltering, please reach out!

Maybe my exciting future bird will look like this!

Harmony, Before the Storm

What could you let go of, for the sake of harmony?

I’m pretty tired from moving things to minimize potential tropical storm damage and a bit warm because I’m sleeping in the upstairs bedroom with no air conditioning. I have a fan and an open window, at least until rain starts. So, I’ll answer this blog prompt quickly.

For the sake of harmony I’ve let go of any drive I have to clarify my perspective on things that happen to me. I don’t need to prove I’m right or justified to anyone else. That’s led to a lot of harmony.

I’ve also let go of the desire to have a say in current or future plans that involve anyone other than myself. It’s not worth trying to provide input or ask questions that will come across as nosy. I make my own plans for things that are just my “stuff” and do my best to let people who are affected know. I try, anyway. That’s just how I do things. I don’t need to know what other folks are up to (in general, not making a barbed comment). I just used to be way too curious/interested.

There’s probably more, but it boils down to learning to stay in my own lane, accept changes and new situations as gracefully as I can muster, and let go of expectations. This makes work, community life, and family life much less stressful for me and reduces at least some potential conflict.

And gives me more time to enjoy the weather.

For every situation there’s more than one right solution and it’s not my job to find it every time! And I don’t HAVE to share my opinion so much. That has been hard to learn and I’m not quite as far along as I’d like to be. But since I started out as the annoying student who raised her hand to answer the teachers’ questions every single time, I had a long way to go.

Curious as to what these are? I’ll tell you! They are seed pods of the beautiful pitcher’s leather flower vine *Clematis pitcheri*

Now to keep my phone charged in case we lose power. Beryl should not be too bad this far north. Think about our family on the Texas coast and my Houston friends!

Americana Listening

What is your favorite genre of music?

I guess my experience with being in a vocal trio with a Kerrville Folk Festival devotee, volunteering at a monthly folk coffeehouse for years, and living with a rock/country guitarist for three years or so doomed me. I became pretty fond of Americana music. What’s that?

I’m lucky to have lived in Austin, Texas (or thereabouts) for 30 years or more. There is a lot of Americana music to watch. I watched and listened to a lot of it with my music friends. I loved this part of my life.

Oddly, I don’t listen much anymore. I think it has to do with the loss of my older son, who is a wonderful mandolin player (he’s not dead, just refuses to speak). And some unpleasantness happened to my other son in the music scene. Plus, my vocal cords are now damaged and I can’t sing certain notes now. It has taken away the pleasure of music.

That took a dark turn. Of course there were wonderful musical moments in my life. And music moves me when I do listen. And not just Americana! I love classic rock, classical, and Celtic especially. and the music of nature, naturally. Heh heh.

Eh. I’ll stop before I go on and on about favorite artists. Enjoy looking at Fiona and Drew.

I’m fine. Just musing. Long weekend.