February 28: Florid Birds

There's nothing like some tropical color to lift the spirits. We spent most of today soaking up sun and local color at "Ding" Darling National Wildlife Refuge here on Sanibel Island: herons of all shapes and sizes, white ibises, wood storks, brown and white pelicans, roseate spoonbills, ospreys, shorebirds, ducks, gulls... We took it all in--ibis's scarlet bill, yellow-crowned night-heron's golden eye, snowy egret's "golden slippers," spoonbill's unreal pink--and then capped off our day with an incredible sunset over a sandy beach on the Gulf. One of those days that's difficult to put into words, so I'll throw in a few photos after my haiku:

Don't hide those hot pinks
amid twisted mangrove roots--
bring us rose glasses.

White Ibis

Snowy Egret

Roseate Spoonbills

February 27: Arrival in Florida

We are currently enjoying evening one of our week on the southwest Gulf Coast of Florida. Since we arrived in the dark, our only clues that we're not in Maine anymore, Toto, were the roadside palm trees and the flat landscape. Clear night skies, too--Mars straight overhead and a bright waxing moon. It's unseasonably cool--mid-60s now--but compared to the Northeast, we aren't complaining.

We'll spend our first three nights on Sanibel Island, a place we've enjoyed in the past very much despite the touristy build-up over the years. You reach the island via a modern toll bridge, but a friend has told us of the good old days when you had to take a ferry to get here. The lighthouse blinked to the south as we crossed the bridge in the dark, and then we turned onto the main drag to get to our little motel, a typical beachy place with a giant bed and a tiny bathroom, within striking range of a restaurant where Paul has indulged in the past in the all-you-can-eat shrimp special. True to form, he consumed three rounds tonight and we both left happy.

The seas, as best as we could tell, looked calm here--it's so strange to think of the tsunamis hitting Chile, Mexico, Hawaii. How blessed we are to be here with few worries, blithely planning a day of birding, beach, and maybe some fishing for Paul tomorrow.

Wake to snow in Maine.
By miracles of travel,
palm trees in the dark.

February 26: Aftermath

Two of my co-workers driving in this morning on Route 105 had to pass under a fallen tree that was only held up by power lines. One of them didn't have power when he left home. Many homes in Camden also don't have power, and Internet service is down at the office, my house, and according to Time Warner, "all across Maine and New Hampshire." Roofs blew off buildings in Rockland. Tree limbs of all sizes lie scattered across the landscape, wreckage everywhere. My neighbors lawn once again hosts an intermittent branch of the river. The deluge of rain washed away almost all the remaining snow, leaving behind muddy lawns full of sodden leaves, road gravel, and wind-blown bits of trash. It's not a pretty sight.

But as I drove to the library (for an Internet connection), a big patch of placid blue sky peeked out from behind the clouds. The harbor, too, seems to be at rest now. A hint of calm after the chaos.

The sky's calm blue eye
looks down on this mess below,
unblinking, removed.

February 25: Waterfall

When I was a kid, I loved to be allowed to stay up late and watch "Fantasy Island." I loved the combination of drama and magic, knowing each couple would leave the island with everything all worked out thanks to the mysterious powers of the dashing, exotic Ricardo Montalban.

Driving below the western slope of Mount Battie this afternoon in the (still) pouring rain, I noticed a torrent of water streaming down the steep rocky slope to fall on the talus below. I was immediately brought back to the opening credits of "Fantasy Island"--the aerial view of the island that featured a breathtakingly long waterfall cascading through the lush green tropical forest. The bare, cold rock face of Mount Battie is hardly equivalent to that snapshot of Hawaii I used to savor every Thursday night. But for just a moment, Mount Battie offered up an epic bit of landscape.

Rock-skin shedding rain,
day's dramas washing away--
mountain waterfall.

February 24: Snowdrops

Photo by David Paloch via Wikipedia Commons.

I didn't see the flowers myself, but a woman I was visiting today said that snowdrops were already blooming in the shelter of her house. She also said that she'd discovered little Johnny-jump-ups still blooming under a thin crust of snow. Outside her window, a continuous stream of chickadees buzzed her bird feeder and cracked open seeds in the shelter of a rain-darkened apple tree. Rain washed the windows. The chill drear of the weather made the rocking chair set by her old cast-iron cookstove feel like the most perfect place in the world to be at that moment.

Her son had been out on the lake on his four-wheeler earlier that day, and she'd been very anxious for him--our recent warm, wet weather has made the ice rotten and unpredictable in spots. But now he was back on land, safe for the day. I noticed some ice fishermen standing out on the ice in the pouring rain, waiting for their flags to pop up. Not quite sure what the fun is in that. Maybe it was made exciting by the tinge of danger offered by the wide strip of water that had opened up along the shore's edge.

One of my neighbors around the corner tells me that she too has snowdrops blooming near her mailbox, and that come spring she'll divide some to share with me so that next spring I too can enjoy the wonder of flowers blooming while there's still snow on the ground.

Snowdrops in the mud.
Last fishermen on the lake
brave the rotten ice.

February 23: Red Birds

A twelve-hour workday doesn't leave a lot of creative brain energy left. I just got home, and all I want to do is go straight to bed. But first, this haiku...

The highlights of my day: a cardinal wolf-whistling from the bushes when I got out my car at the office this morning, and a rosy-breasted robin cluck-cluck-clucking away from the top of a tree when I left the office for a series of meetings late this afternoon. My daylight hours were bracketed by these red birds, and despite random flurries of snow throughout the day, I couldn't help but think of the birds as signs of spring.

Chortling robin,
lusty, lipstick red cardinal,
unfazed by snow squalls.

February 22: Gray

Color of the sky: soft billows of cloud starting to darken with rain. And the river, rushing onward in the flat gunmetal light of the afternoon. And my cashmere sweater, donned today to soothe my spirit after I woke up feeling tired, cranky, and achey but not quite sick. Gray has always been my favorite color to wear when I need a lift, my comfort clothing. To accompany comfort food, which tonight will be macaroni and cheese with lobster bits mixed in. 

In this mood on this kind of day, I think of the James Taylor song "Another Grey Morning" from his album "JT," the first record I ever bought. A portion of the lyrics, which capture a gray mood so poignantly: 

She hears the baby crying downstairs

She hears the foghorn calling out across the sound

Repetition in the morning air

Is just too much to bear

And no one seems to care

If another day goes creeping by

Empty and ashamed

Like an old unwanted memory

That no one will claim

The clouds with their heads on the ground

She's gonna have to come down

The woman in that song is clearly depressed, and I most definitely am not, but I'm tired enough that I can sort of relate. I left work a couple of hours early today to take a nap and recharge a little, to make it through the rest of my work week--because it's not good when you're exhausted and it's only Monday. So now I'm going to curl up in my sleeping bag with my snoring old cat and let my thoughts drift away with the day's last gray light. The clouds look like they would make good pillows.

Not winter, not spring,

not sunny but not raining--

year's gray area.

February 21: Merganser Trifecta

Because he had surgery recently, my birding buddy Brian wasn't up for any hardcore hiking today. So instead he suggested a drive down the St. George peninsula to Port Clyde, via Weskeag Marsh in South Thomaston, to see what we might see. Other than a lone bald eagle soaring over the marsh, our biggest excitement of the day was seeing all three merganser species: hooded, red-breasted, and common. You know you're a true bird nerd when this is a day's highlight. But this is probably one of the few times of the year when this is feat may be accomplished. The hooded mergansers we saw are probably early migrants or strays from just south of here--they don't normally hang out in this area through winter. And while the hooded and common "mergs" both nest in Maine during the summer, the red-breasted merganser breeds far north of here. So today was our lucky day in this in-between, cross-over season for these diving ducks.

First, we stopped at Weskeag Marsh, where Brian spotted three female hooded mergansers in the river in the company of three black ducks. Before the eagle flew over and spooked them, we got good looks at their pretty brown crests, which were raised like feathered fans. I couldn't help but think of coy maidens of the bygone era when the way a woman deployed her fan conveyed more than words to a would-be suitor. Unfortunately there were no males around flashing their big white crests in return, so Brian and I were their only admirers.

Male hooded merganser with hood raised. 

Photo from Wikipedia Commons, courtesy of Benutzer: BS Thurner Hof.

The red-breasted merganser was a lone male off Marshall Point in Port Clyde. The red-breasted merg is notable for the crazy punk hairdo of its shaggy crest, which looks downright unruly compared to the smoother, rounder head of the common merg. In both species the female has rusty reddish-brown head feathers, while the male's head is green. Our common merganser was a solitary female spotted near two common goldeneyes off Drift Inn Beach in Martinsville. This sighting, which completed our trifecta, was unusual because common mergs don't usually hang out in the ocean. But there she was. And we were happy.

Even the spring ducks
wave fans, rearrange their hair,
trying to attract.

February 20: Birthday

Both my feet are now firmly planted in middle-age: today I'm 43. My family has fortunately always been one to celebrate special days, rather than mourn getting a year older, so I'm OK with this. And I couldn't have asked for a nicer day on the anniversary of my birth--blue sky, the river sparkling in the sun, temps in the 40s, chickadees singing their love songs in the bare branches. My mother tells me I was born during a blizzard, so by comparison this is a virtual spring to commemorate what might perhaps be called the late summer of my life. I'll take it. Beats the alternative, in terms of both weather and life.

As you get older, people make much less of a big deal about your birthday unless it's a milestone year. My husband was working all day, so I had no real plans other than a visit with a friend recovering from recent surgery and dinner out tonight with my husband and parents at Lily Bistro. Future plans to connect with friends will drag out the celebration a bit, but I think it'll be another seven years before I'm getting a real party.

So I have to say, as much as people criticize electronic technology for depersonalizing our relationships, e-mail and Facebook have totally made my birthday a funny kind of virtual party. I received maybe half a dozen moving e-mails today from family and friends (including a wonderful horoscope telling me that, like Poland in 1918, the return of my sovereignty in imminent). And I've gotten a gazillion good wishes on Facebook--from family and friends all over the country, including one currently in the Galapagos Islands. Sure, Facebook is reminding them that today is my birthday. And OK, a couple of them I hardly know. But they didn't have to say anything. Most of my birthday wishes were sincere and heartfelt sentiments from friends from whom I would otherwise not have heard from in the normal course of events. I felt the positive vibes. This is a good thing. Thank you, everyone! (And for all of you who wished me good birds, I hope to take advantage of that tomorrow.)

Also, my mother called to sing "Happy Birthday" to me, which she does every year. It's not really my birthday till I get that morning call from Mom.

One year older now,
I'm still a child when Mom sings,
grateful to be here.

Update: Right after posting this, my sister and niece called to sing "Happy Birthday" to me too--another gift!

February 19: On the Cusp

Today is the last day of the astrological birth-sign Aquarius, the Water Bearer. Tomorrow, my birthday, is the first day of Pisces, the Fish. When you're born on the first or last day of a particular sign, you're considered "on the cusp," possessing traits of both signs. While I think for the most part I'm a typical Pisces--introverted, creative, sensitive--I can also be extroverted and very rational like an Aquarius. (On the Myers-Briggs personality test, I scored equally for I, introverted, and E, extroverted.) And although I take a lot of this astrology stuff with a grain of salt, I have always felt that dichotomy in myself of the creative vs. the intellectual, and the passionate, emotional person vs. the obsessive control freak. (Though, really, we probably all do!)

Pisces the Fish is a water sign, of course, governed by the planet Neptune (Neptune being the classical Roman god of the sea), and I've always felt an alignment with water and the ocean. (Growing up on the coast of Maine plays no small part in that, as well.) Interestingly, though, the Water Carrier Aquarius is a "fixed" air sign. I guess it makes sense that you would want something fixed to hold something flowing.

My being born "on the cusp" of these two different but somehow congruent signs might explain in part why I collect pitchers. I learned on Wikipedia that in Hindu astrology, Aquarius is kumbha or pitcher. I have no idea what attracts me to pitchers--perhaps the fact that they can be beautiful, works of art sometimes, but are also vessels with practical value as holders of liquids. The act of pouring from a pitcher is a lovely, graceful gesture. Being part Water Bearer and part water sign, perhaps it seems only natural that I would be drawn to pitchers in this way. I think in general that I connect strongly with things that are both aesthetically pleasing and useful--frivolous tchotchkes don't do much for me unless they have some personal meaning in and of themselves.

While of course several of my pitchers feature birds, one of my other favorites is the fish one in the center.

In a graceful arc

water flows from a pitcher;

words pour from my mouth.

February 18: Stained Glass

I attended a reception today for my friend, glass artist Janet Redfield, at the University of Maine's Hutchinson Center in Belfast, to celebrate the recent installation of her 49-foot stained and fused glass piece in the Center's lobby. The back wall of the lobby--what you see across the room when you enter the building--is all windows. Janet's piece, which took her six months to complete, borders the top of that entire section. The two interwoven wavy blue lines represent the two main rivers of Belfast: the Passagassawakeag and Little Rivers. The Passy opens into Belfast Harbor, while Janet tells me that the Little River was the City of Belfast's first drinking water supply. The circles within are abstract. Janet likes to play with color and shape, and wanted to create visual joy within the dynamic, organic lines of the waters that literally brought the city to life. Now, students coming into the Center for classes can't help but notice this incredible panorama of light and color and glass stretching in front of them. They're confronted by art, by something beautiful to brighten their day, perhaps even inspire them, whether they want it or not--you've got to love that.

Intertwined rivers

of glass, interplay of light--

vivid stuff of life.