An Arachnid, spring petals, and simple chores
Living up in the Santa Cruz Mountains again, back beneath the forgiving spread of the mighty Redwoods, I find different rhythms are moving my days.
This funky old cabin grew from the bones of an older farmhouse, moved twice, then at last disassembled and rebuilt in a different shape. The kitchen is the heart of this place; having a living room with exposed ceiling beams and many windows, a small bedroom with an off-kilter closet door, a teeny maybe-office space, and a once porch/now walled into a small sunroom - all radiating from the cooking/eating/settling in the evening room. There is no machine to wash your dishes; they are done by hand and dried with a cotton cloth or left to dry until morning the next day. A large, rectangular table takes up the center of the room; it was build by the prior owner and I don't think is likely to be able to be moved out even if I were not enchanted by it.
A long clothesline stretches across the little ravine and the seasonal creek. There is a funny cheep and squeal to moving it along, clothes moving in the breeze, catching a bit on the rhododendron bushes that no one planted. Clothes feel more real, dried in the air coming the valley instead of heated and blown by a device.
It takes longer to do household chores but they are somehow more mine this way.
There is an apple orchard of a few dozen aging trees on the other side of the rise, where our landlord/neighbor is building his retirement home. His family name is Wolfe. Other fruit trees had started to bloom a week or more ago. That orchard was slow to awake even in this strange warm year. Is it the hollow where they grow? Their age? Or the antiquated varieties (when asked what kind they were, he waved his hand and vaguely said, "lots")? Yesterday in the dawning, I saw petals there.
Earlier this week, I unexpectedly met a local living uninvited in our place. Stepping out of my hot shower, I went to wrap my hair in a towel, and a HUGE spider dropped out and skittered around the bathroom floor. The cats were very intrigued. I was running late that morning, so at first I slid over a bag to protect the bug from the beasties and went on with my routine. I stopped myself, walked to the kitchen for a cup and paper for relocation, and captured the eight-legged dude and escorted him outside. It was wrong of me to make him wait, in possible fear and certain danger, but I am relieved that I made the right decision to make the time to come to his rescue. I have shaken my towel before using it since then.
I am working at the animal shelter, down in the coastal city below the river valley where I live. I was welcomed back from my year of exile.
I am home.
This funky old cabin grew from the bones of an older farmhouse, moved twice, then at last disassembled and rebuilt in a different shape. The kitchen is the heart of this place; having a living room with exposed ceiling beams and many windows, a small bedroom with an off-kilter closet door, a teeny maybe-office space, and a once porch/now walled into a small sunroom - all radiating from the cooking/eating/settling in the evening room. There is no machine to wash your dishes; they are done by hand and dried with a cotton cloth or left to dry until morning the next day. A large, rectangular table takes up the center of the room; it was build by the prior owner and I don't think is likely to be able to be moved out even if I were not enchanted by it.
A long clothesline stretches across the little ravine and the seasonal creek. There is a funny cheep and squeal to moving it along, clothes moving in the breeze, catching a bit on the rhododendron bushes that no one planted. Clothes feel more real, dried in the air coming the valley instead of heated and blown by a device.
It takes longer to do household chores but they are somehow more mine this way.
There is an apple orchard of a few dozen aging trees on the other side of the rise, where our landlord/neighbor is building his retirement home. His family name is Wolfe. Other fruit trees had started to bloom a week or more ago. That orchard was slow to awake even in this strange warm year. Is it the hollow where they grow? Their age? Or the antiquated varieties (when asked what kind they were, he waved his hand and vaguely said, "lots")? Yesterday in the dawning, I saw petals there.
Earlier this week, I unexpectedly met a local living uninvited in our place. Stepping out of my hot shower, I went to wrap my hair in a towel, and a HUGE spider dropped out and skittered around the bathroom floor. The cats were very intrigued. I was running late that morning, so at first I slid over a bag to protect the bug from the beasties and went on with my routine. I stopped myself, walked to the kitchen for a cup and paper for relocation, and captured the eight-legged dude and escorted him outside. It was wrong of me to make him wait, in possible fear and certain danger, but I am relieved that I made the right decision to make the time to come to his rescue. I have shaken my towel before using it since then.
I am working at the animal shelter, down in the coastal city below the river valley where I live. I was welcomed back from my year of exile.
I am home.