Gardening May Be The Death Of Me...!

Last night wasn't restful.  Jim anticipated some pain from his tooth extraction, but amazingly, considering what he described as the dentist hacking and digging

to remove it in pieces,

he seemed to feel only relief in having it gone.

A cat fight erupted in the hallway a bit after midnight--we bolted from bed to sort the participants--Mrs. B. making faces at Willow and/or Wilbur who responded with high-pitched wails and thumps down the basement stairs; had barely resettled ourselves when they did it again.

J. muttered dire threats.

I resigned myself to sitting up with cats and a book for a bit.

Morning came with overcast skies and heavy humid air.

I had coffee, a cookie [!] and a yoghurt, then delved into gardening.

I claimed a strip in the lower garden for annuals--simply for color and for cutting.

"Don't you have more than you can handle already?" was J.'s skeptical view of my project.

'These will take care of themselves,' I assured him.  'If you want to run the tiller between the two rows, you, may, but they don't need the attention of the veggies or the perennials.'

I have enough zinnia seed to plant a quarter of an acre--saved from that first Kentucky garden in 2010.

I planted a long row of zinnias, then struggled to line out a second row .

Gardeners who lay out their planting area with stakes and string would be horrified by my

slightly wavering trenches.

G. appeared as I wrestled with the hoe and announced she was ready to go to the FFA greenhouse.

This is a project undertaken at the high school by the ag students--I didn't know about it until D.

mentioned it.

[I'm quite taken aback by the fact that the students raise tobacco plants in two poly-tunnels, set them out, tend and harvest a crop of tobacco!]

While the greenhouse didn't have a huge selection, the plants were all of the nicest quality I've seen anywhere--including the commercial greenhouses we've frequented in Casey County.

Bedding plants such as fibrous-rooted begonias, coleus, marigolds were $1 per plant, or 12 for $10 if one wanted to mix and match a whole tray.

Of course I did!

We stopped at Wal Mart for sacks of potting soil--and discovered that all the packaged daylilies, gladiolas, cannas, etc were being presented in wheelbarrow displays for half price.

I haven' planted glads in years, so chose two packages--one in mixed pastels, the other in a regal looking purple and white.

I also bought a pkg of daylilies to fill in the strip in front of the porch.

Clouds made a low grey ceiling, thunder rumbled occasionally in the distance as I worked through the late afternoon--picking a colander full of strawberries, planting the glads, finishing out the long row with a variety of flowers--cosmos, larkspur, sweet william, calendula, marigolds.

As dusk gathered I went at the weeds in the lower perennial strip hammer and tongs--really with my favorite triangular-headed hoe.

Lord-luv-us---didn't I spend days just recently grubbing out grass and nameless intruders?

The blooms on the mid-season vintage peony are a deep pink, sometimes stripped with cerise.

One of the white peonies.

I was bedraggled, sweaty, beyond tired, but gloating happily over each blossom. making the rounds before calling it quits.

The last light of the day fell suddenly golden along the Big Creek Valley.

A touch of pale blue sky to end the day.

I sat on the porch, Sally-cat sharing the wicker loveseat.

Darkness fell and the fireflies tiny lanterns sparkled through the grass of the front meadow.

The whip-poor-will began its melancholy nocturnal serenade.

Eyes closed, the better to appreciate every sound--the mockingbird still trilling from the maple at the edge of the drive; croakings and creakings of frogs and insects.

I took inventory of aching muscles, thought of the stamina and dedication needed to maintain a garden.

I remembered my old friend Esther Jane who once fiercely declared, 'I will garden as long as I am able--even if it means crawling along the rows!'

She did--and I hope I do also!

Doings

Jennie at Codlins and Cream 2 posed the query today, "What Are YOU Doing?"
I was out of bed before 7 and have just finished my 'doings' of the day, so will publish an account.
I never get through the daily 'to do' list---which can at times be disheartening. Once in a while, to cheer myself, I make a list of what I've actually accomplished.

The day began, as usual, with cats to be fed, coffee to be perked, litter boxes to clean.

Those tasks done, I nearly always head outdoors, camera in my pocket.

Pebbles, the old horse, is quick to note that I'm out and about, so I trudge up to the barn to dish out her very scanty helping of grain and push some hay down from the loft.

The torrents of rain which fell on Monday night were much needed, but my peonies took a beating.

You can see that some have been dashed into the mud.

Willis and Sally waiting for me to make my daily assessment of the garden.

The peony blossoms are smaller this year--I think due to the drought when they were forming.

Although this early variety was only in bud when the frosts came, the edges of the petals are

marred with brown.

The white peony which I moved to live with the two heirloom pink ones.

I have not really wanted to look at the frost damage to the blackberries.

The brambles were in full bloom when freezing temperatures sought us out for three nights running.

Although we covered the vines with a variety of old quilts, tarps and lengths of landscape fabric, it is evident that our berry crop was 'nipped in the bud.'

The peach trees were laden with thumbnail sized fruits.

Most were seared with the cold and have fallen from the branches.

Emerging leaves on the grapvine were also frosted.

Since Monday's rain, new leaves have formed.

Blossoms on rosa Therese Bugnet--also smaller than normal.

Achillia "moonshine" opening cheerful yellow heads.

The later of the vintage pink peonies is coming into bloom.

My garden tour over, I rentered the house to find J. up and dressed in anticipation of an appointment with the dentist--for the extraction of a tooth which has been abcessed.

The first Wednesday of each month is "Senior Citizens' Discount Day" at the Krogers supermarket in the next county.  J. was sure he would feel up to making the grocery run after his ordeal with the dentist.

I gathered up a book, planning to wait out his appointment at Cafe on the Square.

Photo of the Old Adair County Courthouse from Flickr

I had forgotten that the Cafe recently changed opening hours til 10 AM.

Shops on the Square don't open til 10.

I parked myself on a convenient bench, opened my book.

All traffic coming into town is routed around the square.

The occasional big truck lumbered around, cars entered or exited on the quadrants.

I could smell exhaust fumes, flowers, frying onions.

A cleaners van pulled in and parked in front of my bench, disgorging workers and their tools, blocking my view of the 300 quadrant where J, had disappeared into the dentist's office on the alley.

I left the 200 quadrant and strolled around to perch on a brick planter near where our car was parked.

Several women gathered in a conversational group on the sidewalk--all of them smoking, the smoke drifting unpleasantly in my direction.

Sighing I retreated to the car to pass the time in people watching and reading.

It occurred to me that J. had been in the dentist's lair for nearly an hour.

The cafe was now open, but I reasoned that if I headed back in that direction J. would immediately emerge.

He appeared at last [1 hour and 15 minutes in the dentist's torture chamber] startling me, as I was engrossed in my book.

His jaw was packed with gauze wadding and our drive to Campbellsville was unusually silent!

I whisked through the grocery store aisles while J. went for supplies at Lowes.

Home to put away groceries and make myself a plate of lunch while J. recouperated in his recliner.

Neighbors stopped by.

J. out in yard to visit.

The phone rang: Gina with a dramatic tale of killing a 6 ft snake which she encountered in her back yard.

More kitchen tidying.

G. arrived to regale J. with the snake saga and share my lunch.

Into old clothes and out to the garden.

Transplanted three pots of dianthus to the new peony bed behind the clothesline.

After some deliberation set out the precious yellow peonies.

They have spent a month in pots on the porch and have developed respectable roots.

Set out achillia behind peonies.

Rescued self-sown seedlings of nigella from lower perennial strip, transplanted them to peony bed.

Grubbed weeds and moved plants until nightfall.

Inside for a shower.

Conveyed scraps and peelings out to my 'dump' beyond the clothline, surprising an

opossum who was rootling there in the dark.

Took a snack of cold chicken and cottage cheese out to eat on front porch.

June bugs bumbled around the porch light, frogs and such chirred and chortled from the creek banks.

Willis and Co prowled the edges of the porch, dashing into the grass to leap at fireflies.

Somewhere across the creek in the depths of the trees a whip-poor-will calls, a mournful,

monotenous chant.

Doing--doing--DONE--for the day!



Keeping A Record of Our Days

Post # 500 in my blogging venture.

Morning's Minion is a few months short of marking its 4th year.

When I created this on-line journal I didn't expect that I would post every day;  I did think I would add at least a few lines and photos every other day.

Its not that I lack inspiration for entries--it is the old bug-bear of quality time which defeats me.

I have 'written in my head' for almost as long as I can remember.

By that, I mean that stories, commentaries, observations, play through my mind while I work at other things, in something the way that music can play externally in a room  while we

sing along absent-mindedly.

I doubt that my family, friends, or blog followers feel any lack regarding the thoughts which don't move from the back of my mind to the computer screen.

It is I who feel cheated in some obscure way when I fail to record the thoughts, impressions,  and small happenings of a day.

The journalistic essay has long been one of my favorite forms of reading.

Often the authors of such books [usually fairly small and following a yearly or seasonal pattern]

have published work in other writing genres.

The most appealing of these authors have a gift for keen observation, combined with a rich vocabulary and

and a knack for presenting the details of 'everyday' in a way which befriends us, makes us feel that we are involved, wanting to know the sequels, the outcomes of the writer's trials and joys.

Several of Grampa Mac's diaries.

I made several attempts to keep a diary--hasn't every young girl?

I don't recall that I ever made it through a full year.

Entries might have veered from self-focused recitals of teenage angst to pedestrian accounts of homework assignments to utter daydreaming..

One could never forget that 'Dear Diary' might be subjected to discovery and ridicule!

My Grampa Mac kept a diary for most of his long life.

I suspect he may have taken on the habit after the death of my grandmother when they were in their early 40's.  I have several which belonged to her.

Surprisingly, her entries were almost as lacking in emotion as his.

Grampa Mac faithfully recorded the weather---important to a farmer.

He made particular mention if the weather or season seemed to be out of kilter.

Here again, this may have been deliberately done for practical reasons.

Any number of times when I fumed as a child--protesting that spring was delayed, winter arriving too early, the weather too cold, too hot, too wet--Grampa Mac would select several diaries from the stash in the living room cupboard, and opening to the relevant date would make comparisons.

Flipping through the pages, reading aloud, passing another volume over for me to decipher his penciled scrawl, he would usually conclude that there was 'nothing new under the sun'--his record proved that the seasons were progressing pretty much in their usual way.

Grampa Mac's entries noted the weekend visits of relatives from 'across the lake,'

his own infrequent [by today's standards] trips to the bank, the milkplant, feedstore, or the twice monthly outing to buy groceries in the nearest town of some size.

He recorded when gardens were plowed, seeds sown, crops harvested and put away. He mentioned the 'freshening' of a milk cow, the necessity of calling the veterinarian, the amount of milk shipped, the cords of wood hauled in and stacked for winter.

My two younger sisters and I, living next door, were in and out of his house whenever we weren't in school, yet our presence was noted and written down if we stayed over for supper or kept him company on his round of farm chores.

Often, paging through his cryptic entries I find myself encountering memories I haven't revisited in years. A single line opens the wellspring of long ago days and nights, completely furnished with details of sight, scents, heat or cold---almost the sound of loved voices.

[Reading one of the entries for April 30, I learned these many decades later that our old dog, Muffin, called 'Mutt' by Grampa Mac, had been struck and killed by the milk truck.  We were told none of the sad details, only that she had died and been decently buried.]

In my keeping are  the diaries of my late friend Esther Jane, a faithful diarist with a flair for writing.

Like Grampa Mac, she noted the weather and seasons. She also listed birds observed, flowers in bloom, books she was reading, the many letters received and answered.

She allowed herself some devastatingly honest comments on the personalities and foibles of friends and neighbors--comments she was too courteous to readily share aloud.

She also detailed the marriage proposal of a recovering patient with the dismissal that men of a certain age were apt to fancy themselves in love with their caregiver!

I knew her when she had retired from years of working as a registered nurse and when she had given up bee-keeping, a venture she had once shared with her father.

Always outwardly cheerful, deflecting queries about her health or welfare, the journals of the last years spent in her own home betray her concerns about the price of coal, the frugalities she practiced, the times when frailties beset her.

My blog, as any reader has discovered, is by my own definition a 'rag-bag' of observations, memories, family stories, the joys and exasperations of my quiet days.

Some of what I consider my better 'journalistic essays' exist as Word Docs on my PC or as printed  pages, a few, rarely, have been kept in spiral notebooks.

Will someone be interested in some future year?

A grandchild, perhaps?

As an amateur genealogist, how I have wished that my mother had kept the letters she exchanged with her aunts and her cousins, competant writers all of them, who knew how to share their days in a manner which strengthened family ties.

I cherish the handwritten notes prepared for me by Aunt Lizzie and the wonderful fragments of stories which have come to me through her son, my Cousin Tom.

Cousin Barb shares newspaper clippings and copies of yellowed old photos from the collection begun by our mutual great-grandmother; it was added to by her grandmother who served as the correspondant for her neighborhood, gathering the details of weddings, funerals, visits, chimney fires--all the goings on a

small rural hamlet.

My digital camera, my PC, the world of internet and blogging would be a puzzle to those faithful scribes who  preserved of their eras, using fountain pen, hand-sharpened pencil,

clattering manual typewritter, pasting newspaper cut-outs into a scrapbook.

Keeping a record of my days, one way or another, is simply keeping up a family tradtion.

Getting In My Own Way

Thursday as soon as a late lunch was cleared away, I headed out to garden.

With a multitude of tasks that need to be done, I worked for a bit in the jungle of the lower perennial strip--a slow slog of removing weeds and discovering plants which have spread themselves by root and seed.

Just before sundown with the sky full of feathery clouds.

A quick cup of tea, then back out into the mild evening to work in the stone bordered area which hosts peonies and transplanted iris.  There the soil which D. moved in from the back field to create the raised area, has been very hard-packed.  I took the slender hoe which J. keeps honed to razor sharpness and loosened the soil around the plants to coarse crumbles.

I moved several small nepetas to the outer edge of the stones, tucked in creeping thyme which I hope will spread to embrace the upper edge of the rocks and carpet beneath the peonies.  Pleased with my progress I carried flat stones from the rubble behind the garage, placing them so that I'll be able to step carefully among the plants.

Dusk came, the automatic yard light kicked on with a metallic hum.

I struggled up from my knees, gathered my muddy tools and limped stiffly to the shed to put them away.

A few birds made sleepy noises, fireflies, the first of the season, dotted the meadow with their tiny lights.

I woke on Friday full of plans to continue in the garden.

My morning chores seemed to take a long time, and I moved stiffly.

I went with J. after lunch to buy sacks of composted manure at the Wal Mart garden center.

D. arrived after school and while he and J. laid down a length of landscape fabric and cut holes to accomodate tomato plants, I selected 27 of the largest ones from the cold frame.

Tomato blight has been a problem each summer here--and we're told that it is an issue that always must be dealt with.

Two suggested 'home rememdies' are the addition of calcium  and sulpher to the planting area.

We bought bone meal to supply calcium and were advised that ordinary epsom salts [magnesium sulphate] will supply the sulpher.

I crawled about, dosing the planting holes with the minerals while D. shoveled in compost.

My knees hurt; getting up and down felt like a ponderous accomplishment.

I fetched water for the transplanted tomato plants, reorganized the small ones to better advantage in the cold frame. I looked at the newly purchased flowers needing to go into the perennial strips, but realized that

unless I did some kitchen time meals would be unappealing.

A peony bud glows at dusk.

Poppy buds remind of birds with heads tucked down.

A gallardia blooming quite out of its remembered location.

Dianthus in the driveway border.

I remember, [was it so many years ago?] when I could work at my day job, come home and snatch a cup of tea, a sandwich, then labor in the garden until full dark forced me inside.

It is being borne in upon me that at this point in my life, 3 or 4 hours of heavy garden work on any given day will leave me aching, complaining and nearly useless for the next  two days!

There!  I've said it aloud, written it down, confessed to the fact that age [and fibromyalgia] are altering the way I do things.

I spend a lamentable amount of time getting in my own way.

But--I can still garden!  I can still enjoy gardening!

As my son reminded me on the phone today, Advil comes in large economy size and there's no shame in taking one after a hard day's work.

Perhaps I need to take a hint from Willis the Cat--a time for doing--and a time to

rest and recover from the doing!

Tomorrow is another day!

Weeding, Transplanting, Pottering

A nearly perfect day for work in the garden. 

I lingered on the front porch for awhile this morning, feet stretched into a comfortingly warm pool of sunshine, library book at hand.

It was after 9 before I got  under way with gardening chores.

I had 11 pepper plants to pot on--they have been very slow growers, a mixture of sweet banana types.

With those in individual pots and tucked into the cold frame with the tomatoes, I considered the 3 rosemary plants which spent the winter in the unfinished part of the basement.

All three grew vigorously under a fluorescent fixture hung above an old table, and made the move several weeks ago to the front porch.

I found large pots for 2 of them--need to purchase another sizeable container for the third.

By then Willis had taken an interest in my doings and was being more than 'helpful.'

A few tiny weeds have appeared in the herb bed, so I tweaked those out, having to fend off Willis who was in a perverse 'attack' mode.

The photo above was taken near sundown when I had run out of steam.

I began at the far end of the lower perennial strip.

This one has had scant attention since it was created in the spring of 2010.

My rather vague plan was to plant this with shrub roses surrounded by nepetas.

This left space for a few perennials and some open spots for annuals.

The 4 rugosas, favorites from my years of Vermont gardening, haven't been as thrifty here as I expected.

Rugosas, which can endure a rugged New England winter, are apparently not as happy with

zone 6 heat and humidity.

The nepetas, on the other hand, which were quite tidy and well-behaved in Vermont, have gone on a

spreading rampage here! 

Purple coneflower and monarda lambada, both started from seed, have held their own.

Poppies--somniferum and paeony types---came up in great clumps over the winter and

should have been thinned.

I'm still struggling to root out the weeds which burgeoned in this strip during our very mild

January and February. 

You can see from the photos how dry the soil is, in spite of the showers over the weekend.

When we laid out these strips we didn't leave adequate room to maneuver the riding lawn mower along the short edge of the upper strip.

I removed some plants there and sod will be allowed to fill in.

The two peonies which were first postitioned beyond the salvia were moved last September to join the vintage pink peonies near the upper garden.

There are gaps here and there--the delphiniums disappeared after their initial flowering--not liking the intense heat of July.  I'm trying to justify the expense of experimenting with the New Millenium hybrids which are more heat tolerant.

When the promised greenhouse becomes a reality I will have space to start more perennials from seed--much more cost effective.

J. had an errand mid-day at Tractor Supply, one of my favorite places.

I went along to buy another sack of potting soil.

I had noted this field of wild mustard earlier in the week when I didn't have the camera.

In the little herb garden Lambs Ear has spread aggressively  in one season.

A purple sage is being crowded, so I will divide the Lambs Ears.

Moving carefully in the small space to do the minimal weeding required, I found two tiny plants of

Lemon Balm which had self sown.

Lemon Balm delights me.  I'll let the plantlets grow on a bit and find another place to tuck them in.

In 2010 one of these lovely apricot Iris bloomed in the tangle of daffodils.

It had no blossoms last season, so I was pleased at its reappearance this year.

This morning I discovered a second apricot bloom, this one in a group of iris which rings the base of a maple tree near the drive.

For some perverse reason, Willis has barreled into this plant three times today.

I  scolded him [totally ineffective] but he repeated his performance for D.'s benefit this evening.

Iris which I transplanted last fall to the peony strip near the upper garden.

This pale lavender iris is growing in a shady corner of the upper garden.

Another pale stripey iris in the fence corner.

This is just beyond the rock walled garden which D. created.

There is a tangle of wild black raspberries here, as well as the tough-rooted stringy shrub which we battled to remove on the other side of the fence.

Golden achillea [yarrow] starting to show color.

This hardy plant is another of my favorites.

My darling Teasel, watching me from the dappled shade of the cat enclosure which is on the far side of the basement steps.  When I work in the herb garden the cats are only a few yards away

across the cement stair well.

A long day.  Much accomplished--so very much more to be done!

Sunshine; Blue Sky; COLD Wind!

One of the iris transplanted to the new garden which D. created last September.

The irises in the perennial strip along the drive were nipped in the frost two weeks ago, spoiling their blooms.

Others here and there in the yard were not in full plump bud and escaped the cold.

The wind is fierce again today. I carried the camera with me when I walked down to the mailbox.

I love to watch tall grass ripple in the wind.

You can see a bit of that motion here as the wind whooshes across from the north and sweeps

down the valley.

The early pink peonies which inspired the enlargement of that area for planting.

The tomato plants are snug in the improvised cold frame.

I didn't open the glass today.

The only spot that would have been sheltered from the wind sufficiently to enjoy outdoor work is the area behind the garage--where hopefully there will someday be a greenhouse.

It is just beyond the cold frame to the right.

A self-sown clump of johnny-jump-ups at the edge of the herb garden.

His majesty, Willis, who thought he needed a nap near the fireplace after his many exertions outside in the wind.

G. brought me this fragrant rose yesterday.

I should have taken a photo in daylight as the colors are distorted by the flash.

It is a deeper red, a climber, variety unknown.

Again today I lacked the courage to crouch in the wind to work in the perennials.

It was even too blustery to hang laundry on the clotheslines.

I scurried about the dooryard doing small chores then retreated to the house and made tea in the green teapot and a kettle of chicken soup.

I got out the armful of charity shop cotton shirts which are destined to become quilt blocks to replicate

my g-grandmother Eliza's scrap quilt.

Removing shirt buttons and cutting/ripping the shirts into usable sections is tedious.

Far easier to lay out new fabric and cut the strips to size.

I discarded collars, cuffs, pockets and other oddments in a heap on the floor beside the dining table.

Later intending to gather them up for trash I found that Eggnog-Cat had taken over the pile as a nest.

This evening I carried the stack of salvaged fabric to my sewing area downstairs to be sliced up with the rotary cutter.

I didn't bother to start the wood fire and found that after an hour or so of working, the chill of the basement had crept into my bones.

The current weather is far more seasonable for April than the heat of March which rushed trees and flowers into reckless bloom.

Perhaps by tomorrow the wind will subside and I can fuss over my plants.

If not there is always the quilt, the cats, and tea!

The Rescue of Charlie

I may have established elsewhere that Charlie-Cat and his tribe are not intelligent felines.

Charlie and Maisie along with three kittens, were rescued by a woman on the

Wind River Indian Reservation in Wyoming

who had witnessed the neglect and abuse of the cats by a neighbor.

Two of the kittens, Chester and Mima, came to live with us, as did eventually their parents.

They probably hadn't half a chance at intelligence, since we suspect that Charlie and the late Maisie were likely too closely related to be producing kittens.

Charlie is an amiable sort, extroverted, noisy, playful.

He is also quite clumsy, a stalker, an instigator.

On several occasions Charlie has dashed out an open door and immediately gone completely witless.

His usual style is to dive into the shrubbery which surrounds the house, gazing round-eyed at me as I attempt to crawl within reach.  At the last moment he whirls and dashes in the opposite direction still hugging the foundation of the house.

This can go on for upwards of an hour--I usually have to inlist J. to help before the wretched cat is cornered and hauled inside.

Charlie doesn't 'answer' when called, even indoors.

He waylays other cats, pouncing from behind a door or a chair, prancing sideways, while the flustered cat--usually Mrs. Beasley---resorts to hissings, battle cries and desparate dashes.

When this behavior occurs at night, all noisy hell breaks loose.

On Friday morning, Charlie darted out the front storm door which is on a slow-moving hydraulic closure cylinder.  I saw him melt over the side of the porch to his usual lair in the bushes, but when I followed him out a few minutes later, he had disappeared.

I prowled around the house, getting down to peer into the hydrangeas, wedged myself behind the rectangles of trimmed box, expecting to encounter his innocent blue gaze.

When I didn't find him, I wasn't too concerned.  He has never deviated from this routine.

The afternoon went by. Every hour or so J. or I made the circuit of the house, calling, searching in the bushes for the missing cat.

At dusk I widened the search, going into the dim woodshed, trekking up to the barns, eyeing any place I thought a rather dense cat could hide.

There was no sign of Charlie.

It rained Friday night and I pulled back the curtains on Saturday morning, opened the front door soon after daylight thinking, "Surely the rain will have fetched him home."

Still no Charlie.

We patrolled the dooryard again when we returned from our museum outing.  G. drove up to ask if the

wanderer had returned.

When there was no sign of Charlie again this morning I tried to convince myself that he was

'lost and gone forever.'

After breakfast I pulled on my boots and chore coat and went out into sunshine and cold north wind.

I told myself I wasn't really looking for Charlie.  He was gone.

Never-the-less, I called his name as I stood in the nearly empty tobacco barn.

I continued to call at intervals as I headed for the treeline at the western edge of the property.

I have never been able to pinpoint accurately the direction of sounds; in recent years tinnitus has completely distorted the hearing in my left ear.  It was several seconds therefore until I realilzed that I was indeed hearing the cry of a cat over the rush of the wind.

I moved along the line fence, pausing to call and listen.  Sometimes the answering 'meow' seemed to come from the depths of the wooded strip, at other times it seemed to ring out behind me.

Finally, I raised my eyes toward a particularly loud and despairing yowl and there was Charlie--in the crotch of a tree a few yards beyond the fence.

I conversed with him, but it was immediately evident that he would do nothing to remove

himself from the tree. He cranked his head around, gave me the benefit of his imbecilic azure stare,

and roared in dismal entreaty.

I pulled the camera from my pocket, adjusted the zoom and recorded  evidence of his presence, before clumping back to the house for assistance.

J. put on his cap and hastened to assess the situation.

After greeting Charlie with mildly unflattering epithets, he returned to the garage to fetch a folding ladder.

Knowing he would have to descend from the top of said ladder encumbered with a struggling cat, I raced in to phone for D.

The line was busy.

I trailed back to the woods where J. was attempting to find secure 'footing' to place the ladder.

I got tangled in the sagging barbed wire fence while trying to climb over, extricated myself in time to follow J. back to the garage.

While J. rummaged out several short lengths of rope, I got M. on the phone.

M. roared with relieved laughter when I announced that Charlie had been found.

Back at the edge of the woods J. was lashing the ladder to the tree trunk, running additional lengths of rope through the rungs and securing them to nearby trees.

I spotted D.s car coming along the road.

'Oh, do wait a minute," I said, imagining myself straining to grasp Charlie as J. dangled him from midway on the ladder.

 D. appeared, striding long-legged across the field, his parents bringing up the rear.

J. attempted to detach a squirming, squawling Charlie, who gripped the tree trunk,

heedless of impending rescue.

J. wrenched Charlie from his leafy perch; I managed to get over the fence as the family strode through the long meadow grass and arrived on the scene.

J. passed Charlie down to my reaching arms and hopped down the remaining rungs of the ladder.

While D. helped to dismantle the rescue equipment, G. crooned to Charlie and M. whisked bits of bark from his fur.

Charlie, suitably chastened, hid his furry face in my sleeve.

Deposited on the kitchen floor Charlie scooted to the kibble feeder.

His offspring huddled in the doorway to the basement stairs, round-eyed, staring at him with a wary disconnect.

Mrs. Beasley, whom he heckles and intimidates, laid back her ears, crossed her eyes and backed away.

Teasel inflated her tail and hissed.

In the hour and a half since his rescue, Charlie has paced over the house, grandly ignoring the watchful feline residents who aren't quite ready to welcome him home.

He retreated under the bed behind my desk for a restorative think.

Mima has sniffed at him and declared he is not her father.

J. has had a nap in his recliner with the indominatable Willis sprawled on his front.

I have toyed with the idea of going out to weed in the second perennial strip--the damp ground and the chilly wind are daunting.

D. has phoned to say we are invited to share one of M.'s good Sunday dinners in 20 minutes!

The puzzled worry of a missing cat has been removed, although we have wryly admitted to passing two very quiet nights without Charlie's disruptive presence.

Tomorrow will be time enough to return to weeding!