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Photo Memory of the Week
Posted: 2024 May 11
Prose of the Week
"This is the way of providence: dandelions in abundance that give pleasure by their beauty and create fun for children who blow the seeds everywhere. I think it is a kind of proof of original sin that whenever we are given something in abundance, we are not grateful but instead invent some silly category to tarnish these gifts simply because they are common. We call them weeds: invasive species. . . . If dandelions were only found on obscure Pacific islands, people would book eco-tours to see them, and all the best magazines would contain sermons masquerading as articles on how global warming, overpopulation, warm houses, and free markets threaten endangered dandelions."Source: Being Perfect, by David Beresford; Gilbert Magazine, Volume 24, Number 3, Jan/Feb 2021
Posted: 2024 May 11
Poetry of the Week
The Dandelions
- Helen Gray ConeUpon a showery night and still,
Without a sound of warning,
A trooper band surprised the hill,
And held it in the morning.We were not waked by bugle-notes,
No cheer our dreams invaded,
And yet, at dawn, their yellow coats
On the green slopes paraded.We careless folk the deed forgot;
Till one day, idly walking,
We marked upon the self-same spot
A crowd of veterans talking.They shook their trembling heads and gray
With pride and noiseless laughter;
When, well-a-day! they blew away,
And ne'er were heard of after!Posted: 2024 May 11
Music of the Week
Tweet of the Week
Posted: 2024 May 11
I’m starting a support group for people who didn’t see the Northern Lights last night.
We are valid. Stop erasing our existence
Any joiners
This is our flag pic.twitter.com/sCIpt5rSNn
— Helen Nettleship (@Nettleshippy) May 11, 2024
Tag Archives: Gardening
The Paving Stones of Good Intentions
Gardening follies. Continue reading
Spared
Stay tuned. And if you see a squirrel, yell at it. Continue reading
Anonymous, Eponymous, Eunonymous
Who thought up this plant, anyhow? In fact, who thought up any of them? Continue reading
Snip Snip
Pruning trees – the activity, the judgement required, the variables – is a metaphor for deciding where to put my own life energies: which branches to keep, and which will never amount to anything. This one will never come … Continue reading
You in Your Small Corner…
Driving over the bridge across the canal, I enter the stretch of this artery that is — to my Western Canadian sensibilities — just a few feet too narrow for four lanes of traffic zooming to and from the downtown. … Continue reading
Ouch and Double Ouch
I feel the burn instantaneously. The merest touch, no more than a glancing blow, scalds left forearm and leg. I don’t see my life pass before my eyes, exactly, but it’s a close thing. My attacker has been lying in … Continue reading
Let Loose the Tweezers of War
It’s war. Oh yes, I know all about the mixed records of our ongoing, all-out shooting wars and police actions: the War on Terror, the War on Drugs (notably not a War on Addictions), the Wars on Oceanic and Online … Continue reading
Specialization is for Insects
Balancing potted shrub on right hip, I walk carefully along the rock wall dividing our property from a lightly wooded and heavily weed-infested area. Returning to the driveway, I repeat my trek six times. All shrubs present and accounted for, … Continue reading