All posts by laurahinnj

Seasons, Whatever

Weather report

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Isn’t that a pretty sun
setting in a pretty sky?
Will we stay and watch it darken?
Will we stay and watch it darken?

–The Waterboys Church Not Made With Hands

It was 74 degrees today here at the Jersey Shore. 74 degrees on the 6th of February. Hmmm… the sunset was right for the season: a pink bowl glazed with gold and orange that quickly changed to deep purple and brilliant blue that deepened then to black.

The gulls and runners were out in force along the boardwalk, as they should be, both facing into the warm wind. The cabanas and empty condos are shuttered against blizzards that may never come this winter. The marina boats are wrapped in plastic and the motels empty among the blinking traffic lights.

Where’s the snow to fill the gullies in the jetty? Why isn’t the sand crunching underfoot? Why aren’t my eyes tearing with the wind along my raw cheeks?

What is wrong with this picture?

😉

A year ago this week I was watching the iceboats on the Navesink, kids skating and playing *river* hockey. Today I put the air-conditioner on in my car and have most of the windows open here at home tonight.

This balmy weather is a treat, but I’m sure we’ll pay for it somehow. Probably with an Easter Sunday blizzard or the likes.

😉

Books, Pond, Seasons

The interim

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Hal Borland made me chuckle this morning with this:

“No matter what happens now, the year has committed itself, January is past, this is February, and up there ahead lie March and April. And May. But since man is man, not woodchuck, he has to live with the interim, not sleep it out and emerge into a green and vernal world. Incidentally, there weren’t any woodchucks out in this neck of the woods on Groundhog Day. If the alarm clock went off, they let it ring, as they usually do.

This is probably as good a time as any to remember that it is only 85 days until May Day, when violets will be in bloom and the lawn will need to be mowed again. And it is only 149 days till the Fourth of July, when the beaches will be jammed and sunburn will be as universal as sniffles are now.

And it is only 208 days till Sept. 1st. That won’t be the end of Summer by the almanac, but to all practical purposes Autumn starts with Labor Day. Back to the desk, back to work, back to school. And the next thing we know, it will be October and first frost and Columbus Day and the height of the color in the trees in New England. And before you can catch your breath it will be Thanksgiving. How time flies! If you really must know, it is only 323 days till Christmas. And then it will start snowing again.

Maybe we shouldn’t have brought the matter up to begin with. But it is February, after all, only 85 days till May Day.” — from Sundial of the Seasons

Day after day, year upon year I find a minute to read the day’s entry in this favorite of all my books. Hal Borland somehow always manages to speak to the things I know to be true and, more often than not, makes me laugh in the process.

I laugh at myself for longing to see my little pond alive again, like in this photo, rather than the sad gloomy mess it is at the moment. I almost can’t wait to have my hands in the dirt come Spring, though it will mean an end to the twice monthly manicures that have my fingernails looking pretty for a change.

That’s not to say that I’m not enjoying this time in between, but maybe that it’s the anticipation of the next that makes now enjoyable. Tonight it’s almost 60 degrees and I’m wondering if I shouldn’t have found my way out to the farm field in back to see if the woodcock weren’t feeling that same anticipation.

Bunnies, Remembering

My first love

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A bunny from memory… my sweet Mr. Bean! He was my first flemish giant and I didn’t have anything big enough to keep him in, so his litterbox and other stuff ended up in the bathroom and he had run of the house. Mostly he liked to hang out behind a chair in the living room or here in the office with me. I never knew where I’d find him… under the spare bed, curled up under the little wicker coffee table like in this pic, on top of a pile of school papers. He was such a gentle bunny and made me a lover of flemmies for life, I think. Can’t imagine not having a few of them around the place, in fact. Giant bunnies are so very different than other bunnies… so laid back and affectionate. Lots of people are afraid of adopting a giant rabbit – imagine a rabbit the size of a small dog – but they are just the sweetest of the lot. And just look at the size of those back feet! Lots of luck there.

😉

In the neighborhood, Snapshots, Whatever

Around town

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Saturday errands can be such a bore, but today was a lovely day to be out and about. It felt warmish almost and there were no signs of ice on any of the local waters.


I love living with so much water close to home; there’s always a little creek or river or the bay or ocean within sight. A water view always cheers me. And if there’s waterfowl in winter or herons and terns in summer, well… I’m sure to be smiling.


There were a dozen or more parasurfers out on the bay this afternoon, and foolishly I didn’t stop to photograph them before the wind died down. This guy had been windsailing and was just picking up his gear while I watched. Of course he insisted he was plenty warm in his wetsuit!


Even the ever-present Canada Geese are beatiful in the right light on a winter afternoon.


I visited with some gulls in a parking lot littered with broken clam shells along the river. My car and I almost ended up in that very river today due to a moment’s inattention. Foolish, but I had a good laugh at myself as a result.


Yeah… I was that close to going into the drink! Pretty view, but would’ve been hard to explain to the tow-truck guy (or the scuba team).

So… how’s the view in your neighborhood?

Whatever

Tell me a joke, quick!

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“To live content with small means; to seek elegance rather than luxury; to study hard, to think quietly, talk gently, act frankly; to listen to stars and birds, to babes and sages, with open heart; to bear all cheerfully, do all bravely, in a word, to let the spiritual, unbidden and unconscious, grow up through the common, this is to be my symphony.” –William Henry Channing

I’m working on that “to bear all cheerfully” the past week or so.

😉

Common, ordinary, everyday sorts of troubles, but finding the way through without giving in to the urge to be unnecessarily cranky is something of a challenge. Mostly, I feel like sticking my head in the oven!

😉

I think I find meaning in this quote today because it speaks to personal choice and responsibility for one’s own happiness. A challenge for many of us, yet so simple for some others of us.

Little by little I’m learning enough about myself to keep my emotions mostly even and I find that little things, even big things, no longer hold the same power over me that they might have at one time. Sometimes I don’t do so well with that, though! It takes practice, I think, for me to feel relaxed and flexible enough mentally to ‘go with the flow’ when the universe seems to have other plans for me. Laughter is my way around that crankiness… and lots of ice-cream.

Anybody know a good joke or two.. to cheer me?

Books, Whatever

Too many books?

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I don’t have nearly enough shelf space for all my books, so they tend to pile up in all the expected places around the house. This is 1/3 of one of the 4 piles on the desk in my office – the top of the tallest pile that threatens to topple over at any moment. All but the King book are ones I’ve already read, but haven’t found a place for just yet.

The Michael Korda book was part of the horse obsession last summer – thank goodness that never went much beyond books! This was my least favorite of the bunch I read and I still haven’t managed to recycle it to the trash.

The Pine Barrens field guide more or less lives on my desk together with a wildflower ID book on the off chance that I’ll feel like puzzling over the bundle of photos I took there this spring and summer. The McPhee book is a great one, but I’m only a quarter way through it since October or so. I’m not really reading that one in a linear way anyway; instead picking it up and reading a chaper when it falls out of the pile at me.

😉

Fields of Sun and Grass is a great book… one that I’ve read a few times; most recently back in April in preparation for that trip up to the Meadowlands in North Jersey

So… I’m wondering what you all do with the books you no longer have a use for? Anything natural history related that I’m willing to part with I donate to the local Audubon chapter for fundraisers, but the rest of them? Save me from being buried, please!

From the field, Pastimes, Whatever

Weird Monday

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Asbury Park has what I think is the nicest stretch of boardwalk here on the northern shore of NJ – too bad most everyone is too afraid to walk it. It’s empty like this even in the summer, except for the homeless people who sleep below it and then sit around leering at passerby during the day.

I’m caught deciding whether today felt more like an episode of The Twilight Zone or Candid Camera… ever have one of those days? Today’s field visits were going fine until I ran over a gull – that jinxed me, I think. Silly gulls were fighting over a bit of bagel or something along Ocean Ave. and this one decides to drop down and grab it just as I was accelerating at the green light… I think it tried to fly underneath, but didn’t make it. I hate killing things with my car!

I went by some of the local ponds to look for ducks at lunch time and every one of the good ponds is frozen. I was wandering around with my big lens looking for some open water and one of last week’s redheads or hoodies when this lady in a car stopped me and asked if mine was a good camera. I started to explain to her that it was reasonably ok for the type of photos I’m capable of and blah-blah-blah when I realized that she was trying to take pics of the Canada Geese with one of those cardboard throw-away cameras from Walmart. Pfft! Shut me up quick.

My next visit was with a lady who was off-her-rocker-crazy. Before I even got in the door I knew I was in for something interesting. I’ll just say it was a very short visit and I kept the door in clear view at all times.

😉

This evening I went to the Y for a yoga class and then tortured myself for a bit with the weight machines afterwards. There’s this guy that I see there pretty often, old with a really bad dye-job and he wears those ridiculous spandex exercise things that show every possible … nevermind … you know what I mean. He really works himself hard and wears earphones the whole time, so I guess he can’t hear all the grunting and moaning he does with the strain of it, but the rest of the weight room hears it all. I sat there on the leg press listening to the obscene sounds he was making, trying to keep a straight face myself, and watching all the women in the room doing the same. At one point, all us girls were laughing openly at him, but every single guy in the room was staring straight ahead pretending not to notice. That just made it funnier to me!

What a weird, weird day.

Bunnies, Garden, Pastimes, Seasons, Whatever

Summer… or snow

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The gray snowless sky is getting the better of my mood lately, I think. I love the winter and the chill wind, but it all seems pointless without a covering of snow to change the view some. It’s all just brown and monotonous otherwise.

I walked and walked in the woods this afternoon to get rid of the restlessness and to look for some color or something of interest. Finally I settled on the boost a visit to the greenhouse would give… that stifling heat and the smell of growing things and the color! I do this often enough that the ladies who manage the greenhouse know not to ask me if I need help with purchasing something… I’m there just to wander among the flowers and soak up enough of the moist air to help me remember that winter and its gray wont last forever.

I saw the beginnings of their Spring display, with primroses and pansies and the most wonderful of hydrangeas. Bunny topiaries and sweet little bird’s nest wreaths. It’s all deception now, in late January, like the seed catalogs with their pics of tomatoes red and juicy enough to make my mouth water at the thought of a summer afternoon wandering barefoot along the rows of my garden. That memory seems like such a luxury at this time of year, roaming around the garden to see what’s ready for picking, sitting down beside the pond to watch the dragonflies and the fish, hanging out there until the fireflies come to flash their love songs in the night.

My heart’s set on summer… or snow.