Category Archives: Weather +Climate

Family, Friends, GeekWorld, Great Wheel, Kabbalah, Plants, Tarot, The West, Third Phase, Weather +Climate

Kindred Spirits

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Last day of Summer and the Lughnasa Moon

Saturday gratefuls: Mini-split air con units. Thanks, Tom. Mark’s suggestion for a topic on Sunday. Lotta sleep last night and this morning. Feeling good. An excellent meal with Jon yesterday evening. Rain. Cooler weather. Smoky on High. Lush mountain meadows, filled with waving stalks of pollen.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Sashimi. Japan.

Tarot card: Ace of Wands, Druid Craft Deck

 

Good news. At dinner with Jon we talked about our new relationship, one with Kate no longer physically present. Though she remains a psychic presence for us both in powerful ways. We agreed we wanted to continue, be family. Over sushi, sashimi, and crab wontons. Uplifting.

I spent yesterday handling various matters. Groceries. Bills. Emails. Workout. The dinner with Jon. Must have worn me out because I slept 9 hours +. Also, rain and a cool night helped.

Tom helped me find the mini-split air conditioning system. It will work for my downstairs. Just have to find a contractor and get it installed. Too late, unfortunately, for Kate.

Taking this Saturday as a rest day, a travel day as Kate and I called it. We always took a rest day after long travel.

It was a big week. Ruth and Gabe here Sunday night through Tuesday evening. A lot  of pruning work with Ruth. House cleaners on Tuesday. Kep into VRCC for his allergy shot. P.T. on Monday and Wednesday. Tarot and Kabbalah on Wednesday. Alan for breakfast, Jackie for a haircut, and mussar on Thursday. Donating the wheelchair and the rollator. Errands yesterday and the time with Jon and the evening. Not to mention laundry, folding clothes, cooking, feeding the dogs. You know, all that ordinary homestuff.

Pruning goes well. I’m on a hiatus from it until Ruth makes up her mind about all the sewing related things. Still hoping to have it complete, or almost, before the 18th. Get furniture moved around over that time period. Try to get a new feel for the house sorted out by Thanksgiving.

Have had to modify the 18th because we learned this week that Ruth and Gabe’s first day of school is the 18th. Shifted activities to late afternoon and evening. Only possible wrinkle? The Delta variant. If it continues to rage, as it has of late, it may interfere with travel. If that happens, we’ll push this out to 2022. See this from this mornings Washington Post:

“The newly resurgent coronavirus could spark 140,000 to 300,000 cases a day in the United States come August, fueled by the highly transmissible delta variant and the widespread resumption of normal activities, disease trackers predict.”

Thomas Cole and William Cullen Bryant, Kindred Spirits Painting by Asher Brown Durand

Ace of wands. Rather than go to the Rider-Waite interpretations, I’m going to read this one on my own. The Druid Craft deck speaks to me as one grounded in Celtic lore and myth.

A bull elk with an 8 or 10 point rack stands on a rock that reminds me of the Pulpit Rock in Strand, Norway. It also reminds me of a painting by Asher Durand.

A steep cleft in the mountains separates the bull from another precipice, one shaded by an autumnal aspen grove.

Above the mountains the blazing sun sends fire to the tree, the elk, the mountains, the sky while a full moon hangs, almost invisible in the fiery presence, above a small spire of rock behind the elk.

Bull with water lily, 2015, Lake Evergreen

The wand lays itself over the sun, perhaps having summoned its energy. Or, in the process of summoning it? The wand has reddish bark that seems still living, as if the wand had only recently been cut from a tree, or somehow remains alive anyhow. Perhaps a rowan? The wand as alive seems confirmed by the green leaves, eight in all, mysteriously falling away from it.

The whole scene is peaceful. Some key words that come to mind: majestic. natural. communal. creativity. fire. determination. mountainous. lone elk. aspen grove. single wand.

Black Mountain, 2015

Perhaps the wand has become a conduit between the sun and the natural world at its fall change. The push of the sun’s fire has caused the wand to send its green leaves, which it needs to continue living, on a mission, as angels, messengers of the sun’s creative power.

The elk and the aspen grove, animal and plants, both salute the sun. A bull elk with a rack like that is ready for the rut, the annual fertility rite for all elks. The aspen grove, with its just turning toward gold leaves, has begun to prepare for winter, a time when it will have to live off foods stored in and around its interlocked root system.

The positive session with Jon last night, the on pace pruning, Tom’s visit a week ago, the Tarot and Kabbalah class have me feeling grounded, yet still transforming. Moving toward the creative energy of the sun, soaking it in with the Bull and the Aspen Grove. In the mountains. On my Pulpit Rock, where I stand with my kindred spirits, the river and mountain poets of Chinese history.

Life on a different, yet familiar ancientrail.

 

 

 

 

Asia, Commentary on the news, Great Wheel, Tarot, Weather +Climate

Changes

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Summer and the Moon of Lughnasa

Saturday gratefuls: Claire and her new life. Good sleep. Cool mornings. The Chrysalis of grief. Kep and Rigel, companions, angels. The six Mule Deer Bucks in the yard and across the road this morning. Sacred Shadow Mountain. Shan-shui. Maxwell Creek. Pollen. Marriage License, Ramsey County. Rebecca. P.T.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Tarot

Tarot Card drawn: Five of Wands

 

a photoshop effort of mine

Floods in Europe. A condo collapsing in Florida. Wildfires in the Pacific Northwest along with a crippling heat wave. Palm Springs 123 degrees when a friend visited. The 17 year Cicada emergence. The draining of Lake Mead. Diminishing Snow Pack. Not to mention of course, the pandemic.

Well. Biblical and climatological have begun to converge. Last week Tom suggested the Future as our topic for the Ancient Ones. When I spoke, I discovered an odd inner condition. I am not sanguine about the intermediate or long term future. Climate change and the seemingly impossible politics of grappling with it. But, I’m optimistic about the near term future as my life continues to go through changes.

Let me say it another way. “In the long term,” Lord Maynard Keynes once said, “We’re all dead.” Climate change may see to that in a more complete way that we’ve ever experienced. I suppose some adaptation will happen. Some rich people, rich nations will figure out ways to ameliorate coastal flooding, souped up Hurricanes and Typhoons, the wilting Heat, the advancing droughts, but most of us will find ourselves outside the wall, the compound.

I hope I’m wrong; but, when I look at the world’s response to Covid, a clear and present danger, it’s difficult to imagine a dramatic response to the Climate crisis, a more subtle one, though becoming less so every week.

We will try, are trying. The scope of the work and the scope of the results necessary to simply control the worst, bad is already “baked in”, seem beyond our collective decision making. As authoritarian regimes take hold. As democracy stumbles with the election of Trump-like figures. As simple justice for people of color, for immigrants lands in the media, but somehow evades public policy.

Geez. Debbie downer today. The 5 of wands might reflect this undercurrent: “Conflict, disagreements, competition, tension, diversity.” “The Five of Wands meaning could also be a personal struggle that you are dealing with on your own. This can be on a number of issues that affect you, hence you need to address them and find a solution for them.” Or, a more positive note: “…the Five of Wands in the present position is a validation of all your planning and confirms what you have earned.”

This feels true to me. And the potential meanings do not, in this instance, conflict. There is tension and conflict in my life, in my inner life too, since transformation, pupating, involves intense change. However, I also believe that my current reality does validate the spiritual path I’ve followed for many years.

Through immersion in the natural world as guided by the Great Wheel and through immersion in the ten thousand things as guided by the Tao, I have become nimble, yet solid. Able to feel a wave, even a tsunami like Kate’s death, wash through me and experience cleansing rather than high anxiety.

Perhaps when I break the chrysalis and get my wings, I’ll find a more optimistic way to understand the Climate crisis. I hope so.

Colorado, Dogs, Family, Hawai'i, Plants, Third Phase, Travel, Weather +Climate

Shadow Mountain

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Summer and the Shadow Mountain Moon

Friday gratefuls: Marina Harris and her housecleaning crew. Bond and Devick, trusted. Dr. Niguchi and his hygienist. Clean teeth. Safeway pickup. Ruby working fine. Jon, Ruth, and Gabe coming up at 1 pm. Kep and Rigel, my pals and companions. Cool weather. 59 this morning. New laptop.

Sparks of Joy and Awe:  Single life.

Teeth cleaning. Every six months. You know the drill. First time without Kate. We always went together. Kate, always with Kate. She travels in my lev though, everywhere. (Lev is Hebrew for heart/mind. I agree with this more ancient binding of the intellectual and emotional, but English doesn’t have an equivalent.)

Unexpected moments when Kate comes to mind. Seeing Jackie for my second haircut with only lev Kate. Jon, Ruth, Gabe coming up for a visit. Like old times except, no Grandma. Writing. Thinking I should let Kate see this.

Each time I’m aware of her, see mail addressed to her, walk by her ashes and my small altar to her, the pain lessens and integrating lev Kate becomes more of a joy. WWKD is an important sieve. I can hear her voice, know her responses which would differ from mine.

As I said of Kate’s mother Rebecca, who haunted Kate until the day of her death, ghosts live within us. Not all ghosts are hungry ghosts, mean and demeaning as Rebecca was. Kate’s ghost, lev Kate, her spirit and knowledge living with me, brings me a smile, a warm glow. May it always be so.

Kate, BJ, Ruth, solar eclipse 2017 at BJs Idaho house

We’ve had rain the last two nights and temperatures have dipped into the high forties. Perfect sleeping. The rain not only improves our wild fire situation, but also knocks down the Lodgepole pollen that filters inside, leaving yellow layers on wood surfaces. Tree sex. We’re in the middle of it right now.

The Aspen, a later evolved species, use a different strategy. Casting male pollen into the air hoping it lands on a female cone has the hallmark of Pine’s early place in the evolution of Trees. Though Aspen produce seed, cloning through shoots sees Aspen Groves, all with the same DNA, common. More certain than blindingly flinging your stuff into the wind. But both work.

Jet lag not too bad. Going to sleep at my regular time between 8 pm and 9. Getting up between 5:30 and 6:00. Jagged still, but less so. Working on the plan. Fiscal and physical order here on Shadow Mountain.

Jon, Ruth, and Gabe arrive around 1 pm, bringing dinner with them. Ruth will start the process of removing Kate’s stuff by defining what she wants from the sewing room. Sewing machine, yes. But, what else, she’ll decide today. She’ll also take Kate’s t-shirts and make me a quilt from some of them.

Jon plans to work on the Subaru’s brakes, moving forward the time when it can leave the garage. I want it gone since the garage is a key pruning site. Most of the near term pruning will involve Kate’s belongings, getting them distributed where they can help the most.

I plan to move the Stickley table from downstairs into what had been Kate’s sewing room, creating a more formal dining area. Will use her storage spot as a pantry.

This process will take a while, but I’d like to finish before August 18th when family will gather for a final tribute to her. Would have been her 77th birthday. Doable.

Hawai’i has receded. Now faraway, 3,000 miles over water. Loved, not forgotten, but no longer present. Wait and see.

Byodo-in, Oahu, 2021

 

 

 

 

Family, Great Wheel, Hawai'i, Holidays, Weather +Climate

Big Island. Miracles.

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Summer and the Shadow Mountain Moon

A year. Either I will make a yes or no decision about moving to Hawai’i at the end of it, or at some point during the year. That is, if I haven’t already.

When I went to the Ira Progoff workshop in Tucson, the inner work there made me see that being part of Ruth and Gabe’s lives would pass us by if we didn’t move. When I got home. Kate and I talked, agreed. Then we started working on the move. Took about a year, a little less.

I feel like I’m in the same spot about moving to the Big Island as I was when I left Tucson relative to Colorado. I want to do it. But, I need a conversation with Kate. Maybe I’ll write it out. Dialogical, as Progoff suggests. Put it in the workbook.

]In other words I feel confident. I want to go, though there are a lot of details to work out. Yet.  I need a talk with a confidant, a person who won’t let me blow smoke. Kate. The Ancient Ones. Maybe Jamie. Tara, Marilyn.

A year from now. Or, so. I may be writing Ancientrails from a spot near Mauna Kea, Mauna Loa, and Kilauea. Hope so.

Tom Crane alerted me to the Solstice. I had it in my head as the 22nd, so I wasn’t paying attention. It’s the triumph of Sol in the North. He stands above our lands longer than on any other day. The longest day. Spreads his power on the narrowest patch of Earth, too, so the energy concentrates, intensifies.

Me, though, I see it another way. Darkness moves in. The days begin to shorten. Can the Winter Solstice be far behind? Seasonal processions make me happy. Even here in Hawai’i Kau moves slowly toward Ho’oilo. Ho’oilo brings rain and somewhat cooler weather. Transitions.

The Great Wheel turns now toward Lughnasa, the festival of first fruits celebrated on August 1st. The growing season busily stores Solstice energy, converting nuclear fusion to stored carbohydrates. You want miracles? Try that one.

We only get so many seasons. Part of the deal. I’m celebrating this one. See you at the suntan lotion counter.

 

Minnesota, Mountains, The West, US History, Weather +Climate

June 17 addenda

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Beltane and the Shadow Mountain Moon

The basilica, Minneapolis. From my hotel room.

The growing season turning red hot. Dry. Minnesota, that state of lakes and the Superior Lake, of -30 nights in January, of down coats and cabins, all red. And not a drop of rain to share. How can this be? It’s not Minnesota’s color. Brown is the color of the West, of the Mountains. Not 45 degrees latitude, half way to the Northpole.

We know these insults in the Rockies. Past that line where we all get less than 20 inches of Rain. For the whole  year. Yes, we know. We suffer it, fold up a few tents, turn off the lawn sprinklers, run the AC. Fight Wildfires, hope they don’t burn our home. But. Minnesota? The world is out of joint.

On Oahu where I sit writing this we’re in the warmish dryish season where the temps tend to be in the 80’s and Rain still falls. Twice in the last two days. Then, there’s all that Ocean. The Mountains squeeze out purified Ocean drops, fling them at the already green, always green slopes.

Here it’s pretty much as usual. Or, maybe I think that because I know this world much less well. I recall reading that the tropics will be affected least by global warming. Sea level rise though. Vanuatu has advertised its extinction. Do not want to go the way of Atlantis. I understand.

As the world literally burns, Republican and capitalist violinists play on, from the pent house to the mountain retreat to the air chilled vaults of Swiss banks.

Beyond the Boundaries, Dogs, Dreams, Great Wheel, Hawai'i, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Shadow Mountain, Third Phase, Travel, Weather +Climate

Namaste

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Beltane and a faint sliver of the Island Moon

Tuesday gratefuls: Seoah’s massage. Muscles aching. The Palms lining the boulevards here. Murdoch. Working out. Needing help with it. The Sun. The Ocean. The Pearl River. Tropical Fish and that big Crab I saw. Kep and Rigel. Kate, always Kate.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Namaste to the Trees, the Ocean, the Mountains.

Not Hawai’i. National Western Stock Show Pro Rodeo

Walked this am without my heart rate monitor. I didn’t want to “work” out, but be out and do some good for my heart at the same time. Forgot how much I enjoy it. Time to contemplate, meditate, or be in the present.

Continued my new practice. Put my hands together, a short bow, and Namaste to certain Trees, the Ocean, the Mountains, the Sun. Even the Crabs and brightly colored Fish. This small gesture has surprised me. I say, “The god in me bows to the god in you.” I can sense reciprocity. That is, I can feel a return bow, an acknowledgment that yes, the god in that Monkey Pod Tree knows the god resident in me. Those jagged green Mountains send me the blessing of the ancient deity who lives within them. The Ocean as well.

I don’t do all the Trees or Mountains because that would look very strange and take way too long. I’d never get back to breakfast. But in those cases where I did stop, bow, silently speak the bond it created sprang to life immediately. Yes. Hello. Back at ya.

In the process, btw, I found myself yearning again to live here. Much as I try to be practical, think through the steps, hobble myself from making a too fast decision, Hawai’i and the Pacific keep beckoning. Honestly, dude.

That’s the thing about some dreams. They won’t let you alone. Keep intruding, saying, Hey, don’t forget! The horizon line on the Pacific, where the Earth curves away from my sight. The Hawai’ian donuts. The Plants in their abundance and in their color. My soul bows to each of them in turn and hears back from them, “Come.” The living Wood of the Outrigger Canoes and their Paddles. Kane and Ku. The Whales. Aloha, Charlie!

Time must pass, for many reasons, before I take action, but it feels more compelling each time the idea of life here resurfaces in my thoughts.

Seoah suggested Pilates for me. There’s a place in Evergreen. I think I’ll try it. Something new. It focuses on flexibility and balance as much as strength. What I need.

Return to Shadow Mountain. Two weeks from today. Time to immerse myself in the new, post-Kate’s physical presence life. Finish up with social security, close that Minnesota credit union account, put my new budget  process to work in everyday life. See my CBE friends, hike in the mountains, hug Kep and Rigel. This has been what I needed, this time here, a respite,  a time for recovery. By the 22nd though I’ll be ready.

 

 

Family, Great Wheel, Great Work, Health, US History, Weather +Climate

Colorado Can Lead

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Ostara and the Ovid Moon of Metamorphoses

Wednesday gratefuls: Chipmunk wife. Snow. More. And, yet more. Vaccines. Diane and Mary. Formula 1. Netflix. Yin Yang Master. Biden at work. 45 in Florida, his natural habitat. The Woollies. Spring. The Great Wheel. Its turns. Celebrate.

Sparks of joy: Snow. Life itself.

 

The Snow coming down again. Like Minnesota rain, straight down in gentle punctuated lines. Sat watched it against the Lodgepoles yesterday afternoon. Their red Bark, their Branches beginning to droop, covered in Branch shaped dollops of white. The Japanese Ukiyo-e prints and some paintings often show Snow and Pine trees. This was the same. It was easy to imagine myself in the mountains of Akita Prefecture, Kep wandering around on genetic home territory.

Then. Spring snows. Not the harsh snows of December and January. Wet, yes, but coming as a confection rather than an invasion, even in the depths we’ve had over the last three weeks. It’s as if we’re being inundated by confectioner’s sugar, a big wire shaker somewhere overhead.

And, even better, as Kate just said: “I see Snow and I see no Fire.” May it be so. This helps. Better Spring moisture gives some protection during June, our month of greatest fire danger. Historically. In July the monsoons come and soak the afternoons. Though. Has not happened but once since we’ve been here.

Kate has swollen salivary glands. Chipmunk face. Or, mumps. But she’s not been anywhere to catch the mumps. She had mumps as a child, anyhow. Good thing we already have an appointment for her at 1:00 pm today. My annual physical follows. Good times at New West Physicians. Painful enough to require an Oxy. Unusual for Kate.

Boulder continues to be in the news. A Libertarian ethos reinforced by cowboy culture is in a scrum with the progressive politics of metropolitan Coloradans. Boulder is the epicenter of this Mountain state’s radical left, as Berkeley is to California. I don’t know if that has anything to do with the shooter’s motive, but even if not, it’s still a bloody metaphor for the tension.

I do think there are ways through this impasse. At least here. I’ll mention the primary one I see today. Coloradans are outdoor oriented. Even if you never get out to hike the trails, ski the runs, or camp in a Mountain Meadow, the Mountains loom in the background or foreground. The Skies turn blue and the Sun shines in that bright, cheerful Colorado way. We all care about the wildlife, the rugged valleys, most of which we will never see.

Rancher culture in particular loves the land, too. The way forward that I see presses this love of the outdoors, of the wild things that live here, into a compact for a Colorado future both wild and free. The drivers for this compact will include a need for better water policy, climate change, changes in the nature of agriculture, especially toward regenerative agriculture. Regenerative agriculture has a foot hold in the Flint Hills of Kansas. What they do there can work here.

This idea and its friends excite me, make me want to get into the mix. Colorado can lead the nation I think just because of the conflict and tension. Use the power and energy it generates to forge a covenant between metro and rural.

Garden, Great Wheel, Holidays, Humanities, Memories, Mountains, Myth and Story, Our Land and Home, Plants, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Shadow Mountain, Third Phase, Weather +Climate

They Say It’s His Birthday!

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Spring! and the Ovid Moon of Metamorphoses

Shoutout to birthday boy Publius Ovidius Naso, or Ovid as we know him in the English speaking west. He’d be two thousand and fifty-four today.

Saturday gratefuls: Safeway pickup. Kabob skewers. Kate’s fluid flowing. Psalms class finish. New class start April 9. Writing poetry. Colorado Mountain Sun. Ancient ones on Justice. Vaccines. April Fool’s Day: shot II for me.

Sparks of Joy: Unclogging Kate’s feeding tube and avoiding another ER adventure. Wu wei, the Way of my life.

March 1, meteorological spring. No romance in that one. March 20, today, 5:37 MST, the Vernal Equinox. Spring. Ostara. Bunnies and crosses and parting of seas, oh my! Lots of romance, lots of theological pulling and hauling. This religion defining moment: resurrection and another: the Exodus. I settle these days for the Sun and the Earth’s celestial equator. See this explainer if you need more. More or less equal hours of Sun and night.

Yes. We’ve moved from the transitional time of Imbolc to the birthing blooming buzzing time. Spring. No wonder the Anglo-Saxons, those Northern European ancestors of so many of us, chose a fertility goddess, Eostre, to celebrate. Estrogen. Ostara. Easter. Yes, the Catholics took her name, added it to the resurrection celebration, and, voila: Easter!

Jesus as Eostre. A dying and rising God like Tammuz, Adonis, Attis, Dionysus, Osiris, or Jesus seem like good company for a fertility goddess. Any gardener can testify to the thrill of planting dusty brown clumps of vegetative matter in the Fall of the year and in the Spring of the next year, the rapture of a moistened bed pierced by green shoots, then Tulips, Crocus, Grape Hyacinth, Iris, Lilies in colorful flower.

Isn’t resurrection a matter of taking a dead thing, or what appears to be a dead thing, putting it away, and having it rise out at the right time? If you listened to the Southern Gospel Revival’s rendition of “Ain’t No Grave” )two posts below this one), you heard the line, “Ain’t no grave, can keep my body down.” Further on, “When that trumpet sounds, I’m a risin’ from the ground.” Could be sung by every Tulip bulb I ever planted.

This is the right time to celebrate those things you may have planted a while back, projects or dreams that have needed some time in the grave or the soil or the unconscious.

It’s also the right time to look at the bed you’ve tended, the one in which you planted them, your life. There might be weeds, or, as I prefer, plants out of place. Note that this means you may have good habits or plans or projects that have become plants out of place in your life. You may have to remove them so your new projects and dreams will flourish.

Ask Eostre for help. You might find her in your anima, perhaps buried in your shadow. She’ll burst out, give things a boost up, if you let her. I’m sitting right now on Shadow Mountain, imagine what lies beneath.

Coronavirus, Family, Health, Holidays, Mountains, Shadow Mountain, Third Phase, Travel, Weather +Climate

A Good Day

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Imbolc and the waning Megillah Moon

Thursday gratefuls: Kate, feeling better with a new placement of her feeding tube. Our 31st anniversary. Vaccine shot #1! Vaccines. Polio. Snow. Big Snow. Living in the mountains.  Ruby, sure footed on the snow. Blizzaks.

Sparks of Joy: Vaccine shot #1! Vaccines. Kate. Seeing her yesterday.

Kate on our 2011 cruise around Latin America, Santa Marta, Colombia

What a day yesterday. A good day. Needed one. Went into see Kate. Can’t miss seeing your wife on your anniversary, right? She looked and sounded wonderful, better than she has for weeks. I took her an empty olive jar filled with wine. Looked like a urine sample since it was white wine. I figured the hospital would be less likely to reject a glass jar than a wine bottle.

31 years. Good ones. We’ve been places together, grown flowers and vegetables, raised many dogs, and have two wonderful sons.

Her self-advocacy convinced the interventional radiologists to snake her feeding tube lower, getting it all the way into the jejunum. We’d expected that placement during her surgery to create the feeding site.

This puts the tube further down, out of the small pouch of her stomach created during her bariatric surgery. Hopefully this will mean less or no leaking, allow a faster feeding pace, and better absorption of the nutrients and calories. Since malnutrition is a major, perhaps the primary, medical issue for her at this point, we may see some significant improvements. Yeah! Go, Kate.

Love is a verb. Love guides and wills you to act. And, love is the act itself. Life without love is a sterile desert, nothing blooms. Flower for those you love.

First vaccine dose. Pfizer. Left arm. No pain or swelling. I sat in a socially distanced chair afterward, a small plastic timer stuck to a doorjamb behind my head. 15 minutes. Carla, the nurse, watched the long hallway filled with just shot folks. My timer beeped and I could go on with the rest of my day. And, I was that much closer with being able to go on with the rest of my life.

Even with the chaos of the weekend and the last three days I felt jubilant. A positive, wonderful step toward dealing with the virus instead of passively trying to stay out of its way. After a year.

45 in the rearview. One of two jabs complete. Kate feeling better. The stimulus passed. A big snowstorm on its way. I could get giddy.

I started yesterday with a trip to Bailey, The Happy Camper. (THC, get it?) Bought my Cheebachews for a good nights sleep. Had to wait until around 10 am so 285 could clear the snow and ice collected over night. That’s the beauty of the Solar Snow Shovel. The continental divide snakes along the horizon just after Pine. Snow covered.

On the way home I stopped at Scooter’s Barbecue. Voted the top barbecue joint in all of Colorado two years in a row. And it’s in Conifer. Odd, but true.

The guy who runs it is a linebacker sized guy, Southern. Thick accent. “I have this catering job, a Mexican wedding in South Park this Saturday. I’ve told them we’ll not be here on Saturday, that they have to pick it up on Friday.” He shook his head, “These people.” I waited for a racial slur, “They just don’t understand March in Colorado.” Ah. Good.

We’ll keep yesterday as one of the good days.

 

 

Colorado, Family, Health, Mountains, Our Land and Home, Shadow Mountain, The West, Weather +Climate

Post Interrupted

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Imbolc and the Megillah Moon

Saturday gratefuls: Kate. Her doggedness. Rigel’s, too. That stimulus bill. Biden at work. Spring and Winter playing with each other. Now it’s my turn! Spring this weekend. Winter next week. Writing poetry again. Going with life as it streams through 9358 Black Mountain Drive. Elk Creek Fire paramedics. Swedish E.R. Dylan.

Sparks of Joy: Vaccines. Ode’s prints. Ruth.

This post got interrupted yesterday:

Elk Creek Paramedics came to our house yesterday. Kate was in extreme distress, trouble breathing, pain, nose bleed that wouldn’t stop. They took her out of the house and down the hill to Swedish E.R.

She’s still in the hospital this morning (Sunday, March 7) though I expect she’ll be released today. No obvious reason for the incident in x-rays or blood work. Scary, but looks like it will resolve.  Kate’s Caring Bridge site

It started here.

Colorado on my mind. There’s a fascinating thread on Pinecam.com about whether it makes sense to live up here. Here’s the key section from the post that started it:

“My wife and I own property in an unnamed Foothills community served by a community well system. I’ve got reason to believe there are issues with water supply, long term, and so we may be looking at selling soon. We’ve also experienced difficulty finding property insurers willing to write policies in our area due to wildfire risk – it’s not impossible, just expensive.”

I finished reading it all, and the responses reflect concerns in the minds of most who live in the mountains, especially in the more developed areas like Conifer and Evergreen.

When I lived at sea level in the Midwest, I often wondered how people could live in flood plains. I mean, they’re flood plains, right? Well, I understand now. Many of us live where the land calls us. Kate and I do.

This is the WUI, wooee! Wildland/Urban Interface. Sociologically we’re an extension of the Denver Metro area, an exurb, much like Andover is in Minnesota. About the same distance out, too. Different geology though.

In Andover we lived on the Great Anoka Sand Plain, a shore line area of the ancient glacial river Warren. Lots of rain, a deciduous forest, oak savanna, and fields that grew whatever crops folks wanted. We grew perennial flowers, vegetables, fruits and nuts, kept bees.

In Conifer we live on a mountain top at 8,800 feet. This is the arid West. Drought often, as it is now. Folks grow what they can and some do well, but it’s tough with the more intense sun, elk and mule deer, rocky infertile soil. Unlike Andover, we live here on the sufferance of the wild fire cycle.

On our property water availability depends on precipitation and older water stored in cracks in the bedrock. Our well has been refractured, meaning the rock got opened up some by water under pressure or drilling.