Poetry Sunday: Reverence

Oh, how I remember so many summer evenings like this on the farm when I was a child. And I remember them with reverence.

Reverence

by Julie Cadwallader-Staub

The air vibrated
with the sound of cicadas
on those hot Missouri nights after sundown
when the grown-ups gathered on the wide back lawn,
sank into their slung-back canvas chairs
tall glasses of iced tea beading in the heat

And we sisters chased fireflies
reaching for them in the dark
admiring their compact black bodies
their orange stripes and seeking antennas
as they crawled to our fingertips
and clicked open into the night air.

In all the days and years that have followed,
I don't know that I've ever experienced
that same utter certainty of the goodness of life
that was as palpable
as the sound of the cicadas on those nights:

my sisters running around with me in the dark,
the murmur of the grown-ups' voices,
the way reverence mixes with amazement
to see such a small body
emit so much light.

                                                ~

Yes, on summer nights when I hear the sound of the cicadas, I still remember that "utter certainty of the goodness of life." And even though I never see fireflies now where I live, I recall the feel of their small bodies and the magic of the light they emitted on those hot summer nights long ago.

This week in birds - #117

A roundup of the week's news of birds and the environment:

Summer visitor, a Common Nighthawk, in flight in the late afternoon sky.

*~*~*~*

Plans are afoot to destroy one of Miami-Dade County's last intact tracts of endangered pine rockland, one of the world's rarest forests, in order to put up a Wal-Mart, because we all know that what the world really, really needs is fewer forests and more Wal-Marts.

*~*~*~*

An interesting new study suggests that fruit colors may have evolved in order to attract the attention of birds.

*~*~*~*

Jeff of "SE Texas Bird and Wildlife Watching" has some excellent pictures of summer at one of my favorite places, Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge.

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Molt migrations and postbreeding dispersal of birds is already under way. Birds tend to move around a lot in July and it is possible to see some unusual species at this time of year. There's more on the subject of migration at American Scientist which explains some of the physiological changes undergone by migrating birds.

*~*~*~*

"The Prairie Ecologist" has some good information about a fascinating insect, the longhorned flower beetle.

*~*~*~*

A mysterious bird called the Spotted Green Pigeon (Coloenas maculata), known only from specimens, has been found to be a relative of the Dodo. Both birds are apparently descended from "island hopping" species in the Pacific.

*~*~*~*

Good news from the world of puffins: The endangered Atlantic Puffin in Scotland has had a particularly successful breeding season, after a few years of failures.

*~*~*~*

The western drought continues its devastating effects. Lake Mead has sunk to a record low and continues to recede.

*~*~*~*

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is continuing its controversial policy of shooting invasive Barred Owls in territory in the Northwest where the endangered Northern Spotted Owl formerly was resident. The more aggressive Barred Owl tends to out-compete its spotted cousin and push it out of its territory. Now FWS personnel report that the project is having the desired effect. They are seeing the Spotted Owls moving back into some areas where the Barred Owls have been eradicated. One would certainly hope that all those dead owls would not be in vain.

*~*~*~*

"The Birders Report" has a portrait of juvenile Acorn Woodpeckers in northern California. The piece includes some really good pictures of this handsome bird.

*~*~*~*

The remarkable long-distance migration route of the Semipalmated Sandpiper is being mapped with the aid of modern science in the form of a GPS locator.

*~*~*~*

Hey, did you know that National Moth Week starts today? Well, it does, so spare a little love for some of our most important pollinators. Not only do moths do yeoman's work in the pollination arena, but many of them are very beautiful. They frequently go unappreciated because they are mostly active at night. Just to prove how attractive they can be, The New York Times has an essay on luna moths, among the most beautiful of the species.

                                                                        ~

An Incomplete Revenge by Jacqueline Winspear: A review

An Incomplete Revenge by Jacqueline Winspear
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

It's been quite a while since I checked in on Maisie Dobbs. Time to remedy that.

An Incomplete Revenge is the fifth entry in Jacqueline Winspear's series of mysteries featuring psychologist/private investigator Dobbs, a former military nurse during World War I who is forever scarred, both physically and emotionally, by that experience.

The time is 1931. The world has moved on from the conflagration of war and the chaos of the immediate post-war period, but a new shadow is cast by economic uncertainty. Maisie is worried about the survival of her struggling private investigation business in such times.

In the midst of such worries, she receives a seemingly straightforward assignment from an old friend to investigate the situation in a small rural community where there is an estate that he is considering purchasing. There is a worrisome pattern of petty crimes and fires in the area and Maisie's client wants to know the origin of these incidents and if they are in any way related to the land he wishes to purchase.

Maisie's inquiries take her to a village in Kent, in an area that grows hops. During the hop-picking season - which happens during the time of this investigation - day laborers descend on the area from many quarters to gather the hops. Among them are Maisie's assistant and his family, who spend their "vacation" hop-picking, along with many others from London, or the "Smoke" as they refer to it.

Also present to help with the hop-picking, and even less welcome than the Londoners with the local villagers, are a tribe of gypsies. Upon arriving in the village, Maisie immediately senses the hostility of the villagers toward outsiders and she wonders at the source of it. She soon learns of the tragic history of the village which included a Zeppelin raid during the war and the legacy of events surrounding that raid.

There is a peculiar secrecy that hangs over this picturesque village and Maisie becomes convinced that it is related to the incidents that she has been sent to investigate. But with no one really willing to talk freely to her, how will she ever connect the dots and figure out what is going on? Well, that, of course, is where her finely honed detection skills as well as her knowledge of human psychology come into play. With a mixture of shrewd questions and keen observations, Maisie Dobbs always gets to the bottom of things and gives satisfaction to her clients.

Jacqueline Winspear is meticulous about setting the stage for these mysteries. She pays great attention to historical detail and that is one of the strengths of her writing. Her characterizations tend to get a bit syrupy and facile at times which can be annoying, but, overall, the characters are sympathetic and one wishes them well. It will be interesting to see just where she takes this series as she heads into the 1930s.


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R + L = J? Maybe...

For all of us who are frankly obsessed with George R.R. Martin's convoluted fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire, one of the lines of the story that has fascinated us and been a source of much speculation has been the parentage of the character Jon Snow. He is supposedly the bastard son of Eddard Stark of Winterfell, but that just never seemed very likely. The uber ethical, moral, and loyal Ned Stark was never one to betray his vows, even under the most extreme provocation. What is the likelihood that he would have betrayed his marriage vows?

So, after reading the fifth volume, A Dance with Dragons, I devised my own theory about Jon's parents. I thought I was being very clever and that I was probably the only one who had figured the whole thing out. Turns out I was only one of thousands. Maybe millions.



And now that so many of us have worked out the "answer" to this puzzle, I think we can pretty well count on Martin to make sure it is wrong. Because that's just how the man rolls. He doesn't like his readers figuring things out too soon.

Two more books to go. Write like the wind, George!

Cop Hater by Ed McBain: A review

Cop Hater by Ed McBain
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Over my years of reading mysteries, I have often encountered writers who acknowledged the influence on their work of Ed McBain, but somehow I've just never gotten around to going to the source of all that inspiration. I decided to remedy that chasm in my mystery-reading experience this summer, starting with the very first McBain entry in his 87th Precinct series.

Cop Hater was first published in 1956 and the series ran all the way up until the year of McBain's death in 2005 with more than fifty entries overall. In the foreword to this re-publication of Cop Hater, McBain says that, when he started, his publisher was looking for someone to be a successor to Erle Stanley Gardner who was nearing the end of his long and productive writing career. It seems that the publisher struck gold when they selected McBain for that role.

Among the first things that struck me about reading this book was the similarity between styles of McBain and the Swedish duo Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo who wrote the Martin Beck series that I've been reading this year. The Sjowall/Wahloo series started about ten years after the 87th Precinct one. They were among those writers who acknowledged their debt to McBain. They professed their admiration for his spare and straightforward way of telling his stories and sought to imitate it in their own writing. They succeeded very well.

The second thing that hit me in the face in reading the book was the heat. The mythical city of Isola where the story is set is experiencing a terrible heat wave. It is July and all anyone can talk about is how hot it is. This novel was set contemporaneously with its time but now, 58 years later, that makes it a historical novel, taking place before the time of almost universal air conditioning. Sweat is a constant factor in the story. It runs off the characters and down the pages as we read.

A third thing that is very arresting (pun intended) about the story is that it takes place before the Miranda decision of the Supreme Court. McBain describes a very different world of interactions between arresting officers and suspects. The suspects are never advised of their constitutional rights to remain silent and to have a lawyer to represent them, and the police have pretty much a free hand in browbeating the people they arrest and trying to get a confession, as well as sometimes actually beating them.

The main story here involves the murder of cops - all detectives assigned to the 87th Precinct. The first two detectives that are killed, on two separate nights after they leave work, had been partners, and so the initial suspicion falls on cases that they might have been working on or had worked together. But then a third detective is killed, one who had not actively worked with the other two on anything. This leads that man's partner, Steve Carella, to begin to suspect that the killer of the men - the same gun was used to commit all three murders - was not a "cop hater" at all. Perhaps the motive for the killings has nothing to do with the fact that the men were policemen. This, ultimately, proves to be a very insightful analysis of the situation.

As I was reading the book, I couldn't help thinking that, even as later authors paid homage to McBain, he himself was influenced by the old TV show "Dragnet." Indeed, he acknowledges as much in the story. As the detectives review possible suspects, one of those suspects turns out to be in Los Angeles, and a detective in the group comments that they "can leave him to Joe Friday!"

This was an interesting reading experience, both for the obvious connections with other authors I have read and am currently reading and for the historical view it supplies on a time that wasn't really so long ago and yet is vastly different in perspective and in its approach to police work. I think it will be fascinating to continue reading the series and see how - and if - that changes over the years. After all, the series went on for another 49 eventful years after Cop Hater and I suspect that it must have evolved with the times in order to stay so popular for all those years.


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Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day - July 2014

Having missed June's Bloom Day because I was on vacation, I want to make sure that I get in on the fun this month!

Here is some of what's blooming in my zone 9a garden just outside of Houston in Southeast Texas. 

Datura, aka "devil's trumpet."

Cosmos. I love these bright blossoms.

The bumblebees love them, too! 

'Katie' ruellia is one of the better-mannered ruellias.

Blue plumbago is one of my most dependable summer bloomers, beloved by butterflies.

Hamelia patens, aka "hummingbird bush," has begun its bloom which will last for four to five months until our first frost.

Echinacea purpurea, the purple coneflower, has also begun to bloom.

While in another part of the garden, other echinaceas continue their bloom.

The humble marigold gets in on the act.

'Black and Blue' salvia.

'Mahogany' esperanza.

The ground cover wedelia sports its daisy-like yellow blossoms.

The weird and wonderful bloom of the Dutchman's pipe-vine.

Another weird blossom - the porterweed.

'Ellen Bosanquet' crinum.

The firecracker plant, Russelia equisetiformis, is just beginning to bloom.

But yellow cestrum has been blooming for months.

Anisacanthus shows why its common name is "flame acanthus."

These old-fashioned petunias are another long-term bloomer. They've been in bloom since spring.

Likewise, the 'Tangerine Beauty' crossvine gives its big flush of bloom in spring but continues to put out a few blooms right through summer and fall.

'Dortmund' rose - a simple, single blossom.

'Pride of Barbados' attracts butterflies like this Sulphur.

And on these hot days, the little fountain in my backyard garden attracts birds wanting to cool off, like this Northern Mockingbird.

Luckily, we have continued to have regular rain showers this summer which has kept the garden looking lush and has helped with the blooms, so color abounds in the July garden.

I hope your garden is looking lush and healthy this Bloom Day. Thank you for visiting, and, as always, thanks to Carol of May Dreams Gardens for hosting Bloom Day. 

Someone by Alice McDermott: A review

Someone by Alice McDermott
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I found this book slow-going at first - maybe because I started reading it in a doctor's waiting room with all its attendant distractions. But I soldiered on and at some point something clicked and I was there. There in the mind and life of Marie whose story this is.

Marie is an ordinary woman from an Irish Catholic family in Brooklyn. We first meet her when she is seven years old, waiting on the front stoop of her apartment building for her beloved father to come home from work. While she is waiting, a young woman named Pegeen, a neighbor, stops by, having herself returned from work. The two talk and Marie learns that Pegeen has suffered a fall on the subway. Later that night, Pegeen dies, perhaps as a result of that fall. This event sets the bittersweet tone of this novel, where death is always present. Death is a part of life. Especially ordinary lives.

Marie's story is told in strictly nonchronological fashion. Instead, we get her recollections as they might have occurred to her on any given day late in her life when she is the final survivor, the only one left from that early neighborhood. Those recollections are scattered from childhood to old age, with adolescence, young adulthood, motherhood, middle age all playing their part. We follow Marie through the aches and pains of adolescence, the exquisite pain of first love and sexual awakening. We feel her devastation when the adored and adoring father dies, leaving Marie, her mother, and her older brother Gabe.  

Gabe, too, is an interesting character. He is the firstborn, the golden child of whom so much is expected. A solemn scholar, he is destined for the priesthood and maybe someday the office of bishop. He makes a start on that road, but finds he cannot continue after his father's death challenges his faith. He leaves the priesthood and joins the military. This is during World War II. He is a lonely soul for reasons which Marie at first does not understand. Later he suffers a mental breakdown which will further impact the lives of Marie and her family.

Marie, meanwhile, is a bit of a tearaway, an obstinate and rebellious child. Her father indulgently referred to her as their little pagan. All that is expected of her is that she will marry and have children.

Through Marie's life we see the changing world of the Irish-American community in Brooklyn at around the mid-point of the last century. The importance of the Church, the family, the neighborhood is all there in the recollections of the ordinary daily lives of Marie and the people around her.

The grown-up Marie resists going to work, until her mother finds her a position with the local funeral parlor that is so much a part of the social life of the community. She reluctantly goes for her interview and is immediately hired. She will be a "consoling angel" at the mortuary. She will continue there through her marriage until she is pregnant with her first child.

Death is the angel that hangs over everything here. The young child Marie's best friend's pregnant mother teaches her friend to cook. When the woman's baby comes, she dies an agonizing death in childbirth. Later, Marie's mother tries to teach her to bake soda bread, but the child slyly sabotages it by putting in too much soda. She appears uncooperative and rebellious. It is only much later in the narrative that we learn that, to her child's mind, she had thought that if she learned to cook, her mother would die.

Marie's first love becomes a humiliating experience when the man she loves rejects her to marry a richer, prettier girl. She cries to her brother that no one will ever want to marry her. He consoles her by telling her that, yes, someone will.

And someone does. She marries a good and decent man and they have a long-lasting marriage and a happy life together. They have four children, the first of whom is born after an excruciating labor that had me squirming in sympathy. Afterwards, an infection almost kills her. She is told not to have any more children, but ever rebellious, she chooses the more dangerous path.

Nothing earth-shattering or terribly dramatic happens in this book. It is literally a chronicle of the everyday life of ordinary people, of the universal experience of urgent matters of life and death. But it is a finely tuned and beautiful book with haunting imagery that confers dignity and importance even to these humble, ordinary lives. I identified strongly with Marie, because I, too, have an ordinary life. Perhaps that's why I loved this book so much.





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