June 9, 2015 - Lupine

What a quandary.  June is the month of the lupine here in Maine.  Everywhere you look, the countryside is lit up like fire with millions upon millions of lupines.  Most are brilliant purple, although some are pink and blue.  Every year I hunger to see the lupine because I know that the warm weather has truly arrived, and the dog days of summer are soon to follow.

But it’s a quandary.  For all of its good qualities, the lupine has bad qualities as well.  That the lupine is beautiful and creates a heavenly vision, no one can argue.  It is also extremely prolific and helps to hold soil in place in disturbed areas.  The bees love it and it helps to feed them.  It also improves soil fertility by fixing atmospheric nitrogen in its root nodules.  It’s wonderful for helping to colonize volcanic ash and turn an otherwise inhospitable area into a field of greenery.

A field of lupines.

But it comes at a price because the lupine has a dark side.  Lupine grows so very quickly that it takes over areas at an alarming rate and excludes many plants, especially those that grow slowly.  One of those slow-growing plants happens to be native milkweed, the only source of food for the monarch butterfly.  Maine is at the northern end of the 2,000-mile-long migration of the monarch butterfly, and they really need that milkweed when they get here.  Lupine is also known to make farm animals sick and decreases the value of hay if it is in any great amount in a field.  Many of the native grasses and lichens in Maine that thrive in poor soil find the soil too fertile near lupines.  Did you ever think that too-fertile soil would be a problem?  It can be.

And then there’s the blueberry.  Blueberries are the biggest crop in Maine, with potatoes playing a close second.  It’s those special little tiny wild Maine blueberries--you know the ones that people from away pay exorbitant amounts to get?  Those indescribably delicious, nutritionally loaded little wild blueberries that favor the cold Maine climate?  When lupine gets a hold of their fields, it can wreak havoc.  Areas that were once covered with blueberries can disappear quickly because of the lupine.

There are some rare grasses that grow only in Maine and nowhere else in the world, such as the Orono sedge.  Who knows what we might someday learn from this rare grass?  Don’t forget that wheat is also a grass.  Maybe learning the unique qualities of grasses which have been untouched by time could someday help us in improving wheat in a sustainable and healthy way.  But the lupine is edging the Orono sedge out slowly but surely.  And that’s just one of the unique plants that grow only in cold-loving Maine.

Still . . . I can’t help but adore the lupine.  My eyes are drawn to its fantastic beauty.  I’m afraid this photo doesn’t nearly capture the stunning qualities of the lupine up close and personal.  There has to be a way that we, as good stewards of the land, can allow the lupine to flourish and yet safeguard the other rare beauties of Maine.  For now, I will just enjoy the sight of the lupine, but I will not spread its seed (as so many people mistakenly do out of romantic fantasies) or purposely cultivate it.  It is meant to be admired from afar.

June 8, 2015 - Rain

Standing in a storm.  All around, rain.  Rain.  Rain everywhere.  Greyness and wind.  And rain, of course.  Only the mistiness and the smell of the storm, and the indescribably sad sound of the teardrops of rain. 

Sometimes the rain doesn’t water the Earth and feed her and help her to grow, as you might imagine.  Sometimes the rain pours out what sparse feelings are left inside your heart.  Sometimes the rain rips them away and ravages what little you had left.  All of those things you thought you had so very carefully stored away, yes, all of those things.  They pour out with the rain.  You can put your hands around your heart and clutch tightly, but it doesn’t matter.  Everything slips between your fingers.  Everything slips away, except for sorrow.

Old songs and old photos and old feelings fall down from the sky.  They all mix in with your tears, and who’s to say where the rain ends and the tears begin?  Not me.  It pours down, mercilessly beating at your face.  Haunting, haunting.  If only the rain could wash all the sorrow away.  But it can’t.  Miracles seldom come from heaven.

Standing in a storm.

June 7, 2015 - Island Living

This is not my house, but I spent a good portion of my life living on a very deserted peninsula that jutted into the Atlantic Ocean.  When I saw this, it brought back many old memories.  I had to use the mega zoom lens to capture it, so it might not be as clear as it could be.

When you live on a peninsula and boats go by, you wave.  Usually the people on the boats wave back, if they notice you.  Your neighbors are really only passing boats and crafts, and it’s interesting to think of what they might be doing on the boat.  The ocean has the peculiar quality of wafting sound to you that you could not ordinarily hear.  It carries voices and sometimes full conversations for impressive distances.  I always wondered if the boaters wondered about me, the crazy lady waving from the dock.

Out on the peninsula.

I guess the thing you think about the most is the weather, especially the wind.  Astronomical tides accompanied by a storm can be terrifying but exhilarating.  Every morning very early, you do a sky check and try to decide what you might be able to accomplish that day.  There’s always more work to do than you could ever possibly hope to get done.

Living on a peninsula can be lonely.  In the winter, you can spend many days without seeing a soul or talking to anyone.  I’m okay by myself because I’ve had to learn how to be so, even though now I don’t have to do it to quite such an extreme.  There are a lot of people who say that they would like nothing more than to just get away from everyone and everything and live alone on an island.  Be careful what you wish for as it may be given to you.

Still, it’s an eye-opening experience because there’s no running from yourself out on an island.  There are no distractions and there’s nowhere to go, really.  There’s a difference between life and living, and out on an island in the Atlantic, you learn that difference whether you want to or not.

June 6, 2015 - The Birth of Land

So when the trees grow right out of the rocks--right out of them!--in Maine, don’t be surprised.  Don’t be surprised at witnessing the birth of land, because that is what you are doing when you visit the rocky shores of Maine.  That is how it happened at some point everywhere on Earth.  What?  Didn’t you know that?  Didn’t you know how land--how Earth--is formed?  The birth of a deciduous forest rolls in ecstasy at your feet.  Have the sense to be humble.

The plant life grows, it dies, it sheds, and it decomposes.  It is in the decomposition where you will find the stuff of magic.  It is in the decomposition where you will find the telltale signs of the Great Alchemist.  The sight, the sense, the dampness . .  . of the passing of She who changes.  And then new things grow from the death of the old, feeding and regenerating and in turn dying and decomposing.  The cycle continues on and on, and layer by layer the Earth grows, inch by inch she swells.  The land is born.  And that’s how it happens.

But . . . but . . . but . . . before there were any layers in which to grow, how did the first things grow?  Laughter.  Can you hear the laughter?  I hear the Great Alchemist laughing as we are caught in the quagmire of logic.  Transmutation she whispers . . .

The Earth as she forms.

June 5, 2015 - Weaing-O-The-Green

The ponds are shimmering, and the lily pads are growing and swimming on the surface.  The green grass encircles the pond, and it’s hard to tell where the grass ends and the pond begins and vice versa.  I always miscalculate and end up with wet shoes, no matter how hard I try.  Each time I tell myself that this will be the time I don’t step into the mud and sink up to my knees, and each time I’m wrong.

The grass is still that brilliant paddy green color, which is only seen in the springtime.  Summertime will bring the deep green color, and late summer and fall will bring the tired green color.  But for now, we revel in paddy green as the new pink lily flowers just start to open.  I sometimes wonder if the color seems so brilliant green because the grass is simply bursting with the golden energy of the sun.  Each blade seems to give off a peculiar glow, and that’s called paddy green.

I could have gone closer (since I was already a mess) and taken a nice photo of a lily, but this is about the green.  You’ve heard of the “wearing-o-the-green” at St. Patrick’s Day?  Well, this is Maine’s rendition of the wearing-o-the-green.  Right now, everything is so plump and full.  Let’s rejoice in this brilliance!  We know it won’t last--can’t last--and that makes it all the sweeter.

The paddy green.

June 4, 2015 - Sitting On The Fence

I’m sitting on the proverbial fence here at the Cathance River.  At this precise spot is where the river is divided from its freshwater portion to its tidal portion.  At this precise spot is where the river says, “This is where I take a stand,” and downward it plunges, rushing off to find an outlet that will eventually empty into the ocean.  The river is on its way.

I’ve sat on other fences before.  It’s no fun.  Should I go this way or that?  Should I do this or that?  Should I stay or should I go?  Meanwhile, “this way” and “that way” and “this thing” and “that thing” continued on doing what they do, oblivious to my existence.  I was the only one who sat there paralyzed.  In life, we can only sit on our fences for so long.  We can only nurse our injuries for so long.  Eventually, we have to take a stand.  Eventually we have to take the plunge.

I’m done waiting.  I’m going forward.  I’ll meet you at the ocean.

The "head of tide" on the Cathance River.

June 3, 2015 - The Hunt For Maine

If I were to leave the countryside and move to a crowded city area, I would be haunted for the rest of my life by Maine.  I would see her in my dreams.  Around every corner I turned, I would be looking for her green shadows.  I would be listening for her birds, straining to hear their songs.  I would look for the furtive movement of her deer and moose, only to be impoverished and starved by their loss.  Alas, in vain I would search for her earthy scent until I perished.

But I am a hunter and I hunt for Maine and I cannot do anything else.  I am mesmerized by Maine.  I am in love with her bounty.  I am awed by her beauty.  I am left speechless by her natural wonders.  I am made humble by her vast rivers and lakes.  I am subdued by the treacherous cliffs of her shores.  I am enslaved by her uncharted and untouched territories--wild, terrible, and free. 

I am poisoned with her, the Mistress Maine.  I am addicted to her, the beguiling green princess.  I am obsessed with her fruited fields.  I am infatuated by her woodland promises.  I am completely enraptured by her savage wildness.  I am lost in the depths of her mists.  I am drowned gladly in her abundance.  I am hopelessly . . . helplessly . . . drawn by her endlessly . . .

The hunt for the elusive princess continues . . .

June 2, 2015 - The Sound of Grey

The relentless onslaught of rain and cold continues and forms a June that looks more like an October, save for the colorful leaves.  In fact, there is very little color when the weather takes on this tone.  The green lushness we should be experiencing is muted by the absence of the Sun King.

It is not only our vision that is assaulted by the greyness, but our hearing as well.  Can we “hear” grey?  I submit that we can.  I think colors have sounds to them, but we get so caught up in the sight of them that we pay no attention to their sound.  Once again, our other senses and sensibility are dulled or completely overshadowed by the sense of sight.  Sleight of hand reigns supreme when vision rules the world because the glamor and glitz of it all is so provocative and enticing.  Rest assured that the denizens of other worlds know this only too well.

The eyes of grey hold fathomless secrets.

How does “grey” sound?  With grey, it is not what we hear but what we do not hear that counts the most.  We are bereft of the buzzing of happy insects.  We are abandoned by the calls of the birds, save for those of prey.  The soft and sleek whispers of the wind in the leaves have been taken captive and placed in a dungeon.  Everywhere, there is a dulled and muted feeling, and a great longing builds in our bodies as it searches in vain for the sounds of the other colors.  We are hungry.

Grey is commanding and domineering.  Grey withholds sentiment.  Grey is furtive and secretive.  It plots and plans while revealing nothing.  It is the ultimate poker player, one whom you do not wish to bet against.  What has it done with the rest of the world?  Looking into the eyes of grey, I receive no answers, only a reflection of myself.

June 1, 2015 - A Terrible Duel

There was a terrible duel.  It took place in the skies--in the heavens, in those places where mortal man cannot tread and return to tell the tale.  There were flashes and booms and terrifying screams.  The two opponents were well muscled and very well matched, each a skilled master.  The fight ranged all over, from low valleys to high peaks.  Each opponent fought with bravery and talent and honor, and each greatly admired the other for his expertise, although that did not stop him from attempting to destroy the other.

In the end, the two masters completely spent and exhausted, they each went to their own secure lands.  Each had gained new ground, new territory.  Each planted a flag on areas that the other held just days ago.  For now, the Sun King reigns supreme.  His power is massive.  But there are tales from the north, whispers, secrets told in dark places--even in these days of golden light--that the other master will return with unparalleled strength and unleash a formidable army.

It’s a lie.  But there are rumors . . .

The emblem of the Sun King.