The Joy of Accomplishment

32 F at 7:30 a.m. The sun rising in a pastel sky.

I was awakened from a half sleep on Wednesday morning by cats squabbling beneath my bed. As they shot from the room I identified the pugilists: Robert and Shelby [aka Crabby Cat.] 

Muttered growls and hissings followed their dash through the great room. Elmo exploded from the foot of the bed in apprehension, Rosie bounced across my pillow in interested pursuit.

I creaked from bed, cornered Shelby in the grey dimness of the living room, lifted her gently by her scrawny scruff and deposited her quietly out the front door. 

Back in bed I piled pillows so that I had a comfortable view through the west window. A milky haze covered the descent of the full moon. Sorting through a mental lexicon of descriptive phrases I decided that the sky resembled the soft opal sheen inside a shell.

Pondering my options for the day I thought that it was high time to finish the construction of a skirt begun weeks ago, then on to laying out a stack of quilt blocks. 

As it happened another task took precedence. 

 

It was nearly noon when I walked up the lane to the mailbox. J's laundry was churning away in the washer, three small butternut squash quartered, seeded and put in the over to roast for cream of squash soup.

The temperature was easing toward 50 F, there was no wind. I returned to the house long enough to pull on a pair of gardening gloves, then back out with the clippers. 

It took nearly an hour to trim back the mounds of nepeta which have straggled dankly over the south/east retaining wall since being blackened by frost. In other years I've done that bit of pruning in mid-autumn, but found that handling the plants while still green left me sneezing and snuffling the rest of the day. 

Various mat-forming weeds thrive every winter in the garden beds. I disinterred a few clumps, along with the wiry stems of polygonum. I snapped off dry stalks of coneflower, noted that some of the roses have already sent out tentative tiny leaves during the recent warm spell.

My energy was holding up, so I moved up the slope to tackle the sprawling sage and dead stems of yarrow in  what was originally meant to be a herb bed. 

The mushy remains of iris leaves, a straggle of unwanted vinca were pulled away under the ground level window of the downstairs living room.

The raised bed beneath the kitchen window needs a thorough overhaul; blackberry lilies and Michaelmas daisies planted there 3 years ago have proven too tall and floppy for the space.

For now, the only thing to do was some severe cutting back. This done, for the sake of tidiness I snipped off the dead stalks of plants that spent the summer in the black raised bins near the greenhouse.

The sun had moved in its low arc across the south ravine, lowering the temperature of the front dooryard. On the west end of the house it was still warm and sunny.

Many attempts to weed and mulch the west garden have been defeated by the persistence of a coarse bunching pasture grass.  I yanked some of this, now shriveled and bleached, from around the roses and several clumps of dwarf nepeta. 

I clipped dry stems of monarda/bee balm, delighting as always in the Earl Grey tea scent that clings to the plants. 

Three hours of work, much left to be done, but I was noticing the ache in my shoulders; the sun was sliding along the south-western edge of the horizon. 

Willis-the-cat, who had trudged resolutely up and down the slope as I carried bundles of cut stalks to scatter around the foundation of the old shed, had now parked himself on the retaining wall, a reminder that neither of us has the staying power of former years. 

J. left his workshop and appeared as I was making my last trip with garden refuse. We walked two loops of the meadow track before coming inside for the day.

I am fascinated by the look of winter trees. The beeches produced a heavy crop of nuts this year, some still clinging to bare branches.

Seed balls on a sycamore.

Beech nuts.

A twisted hickory on the eastern boundary fence line.

I marvel at the twisted branches of the hickory.  A large old oak which stood nearby went down in a gale of wind several years ago. I wonder if the two trees growing closely together forced the hickory to take on these contortions.

Tulip poplar.

A bristle of coneflower heads in the rough strip along the lane.

The youngest under-story beeches still hold papery leaves.

Willis, ever faithful companion.

It was slightly above the freezing mark when I looked at the temp gauge this morning. The early sun disappeared by noon, but was still shining when I washed the insides of several sun-facing windows.

Going outside with veg parings for the waste heap, then taking out cat litter I felt the cold bite of the wind. 

Jim's requested meal of baked corned beef with veg is almost ready.

After we eat I must bundle into warm clothes and trudge to the mailbox and at least once around the meadow loop.

Then--finally--downstairs for a bit of sewing.