Hawk!

This afternoon I went out to clean the birdbath and heard a hawk call--and there it was on the garden trellis.  It wasn't fussed about me being so nearby scrubbing and spraying water, it sat up there preening its feathers and looking around for a snack.  I thought it was a Cooper's Hawk but looked it up and it was a juvenile Red-tailed Hawk.  Big.  I was surprised to see the wrens out in the honeysuckle and flitting around with a big hawk looming over the yard but it didn't seem to pay attention to them.

Speaking of the honeysuckle, it's covered in blossoms.  I saw the male hummingbird sipping on flowers when I went out just now to take this picture but, of course, it flew away as soon as I crept outside.  This honeysuckle is another plant from my dad's parents' farm in Evansville, IN.  Dad dug up a few plants and brought them up to Green Bay over the years and this is one of them, along with the rhubarb and his rose bush.





All of the poppies are open now.  I love the swath of orange above the bright green of the leaves.  Soon the daisies and bee balm will replace the poppies.

This morning I met DS, DIL1, LC, and OJ at the Botanical Garden for a stroll and to finally give DIL1 her birthday gift.  They had a couple pairs of LC's shorts that needed taking in for me.  She's so slender, has no hips, and lovely long legs that it's hard to find pants to fit.  Good thing Meemaw sews.





13 June--Barbara Malcolm,  Tropical Obsession. 

The ancient limestone thrusts its jagged and tortured bones above the sea that swirls angrily at its base. The grinding waves shove broken pieces back and forth, polishing them into a semblance of smoothness. You can tell how long the pieces have been exposed. The dark just-revealed parts grasp the skin like Velcro, leaving hundreds of tiny cuts behind; the older pieces are smooth and bleached nearly white. Underwater when a Parrotfish takes a bite of coral for the juicy polyps it contains the scar left behind is white. But the cliffs that bare themselves to the pounding waves are nearly black. The dark color lends an air of menace to the already forbidding rocks that jut like rotten jagged teeth from the foaming salty saliva of the earth.

It looks innocent, the mound of broken coral pieces shoved up by the waves but try to walk across it and you find out different. The stuff rolls and slides, never firm, never stable. Jack clambered up toward the blue Caribbean sky arcing cloudless overhead. He felt undignified and awkward which made him angry that Manning was forcing him into this island-wide scavenger hunt. He got to the top, flushing a pelican as he did, and stood up staggering a bit on the shifting coral rubble and looked around. Nothing. No Manning, no treasure, no further instructions. Oh wait, something was fluttering stuck to a piece of driftwood. Jack slipped and stumbled over to grab the paper before the ever-present trade winds blew it to kingdom come. Not just yet, was written on it. "Damn him." Jack crumpled the paper and threw it--into the wind, so it blew back in his face. He caught it and shoved it into his pocket, looking around, sure that Manning was somewhere nearby laughing.

They sat there, the trio of Beaded Periwinkles, what the natives call Kokolishi, huddled together in the middle of the weathered bench by the shore. Three white and lavender shells looking so symmetrical, almost manufactured, that Jack doubted they had arranged themselves that way. They were too perfect, too similar, and all pointing their tips in the same direction. Manning must have stood back and looked at them. How could he be certain a passing gull wouldn’t disturb them? He had been careful to select empty shells. It would ruin the effect if one of his clues crawled away before its message was delivered.  Follow the kokolishi on the bench to the sea grape.  What the hell was a sea grape? Jack thought.

It was a beautiful sunny day today but the temps never got above 65 degrees.  By Wednesday it's supposed to be near 90 and humid.  *flings hands in the air*  This weather is crazy-making.  I turned on the furnace yesterday morning because it was so chilly in the house after the overnight temperature hit 45.  Tomorrow I'll turn the a/c back on.  Crazy.
--Barbara