We are now on the other side of Mud Season, the wave of silty mud is waning, much like the amount of blue paint protruding from beneath the coating of mud on my poor car. I wish it was a coating of chocolate or a protective shell like that of a turtle, but instead my car is ensconced in a crumb coat-like veneer of mud. I think I will have to give Constance Elantra a re-birthing ceremony, when I can actually wash her that is, and yes, I named my car.
Anyway, sorry I veered off of the narrative road there, I think I am feeling sorry for my poor automobile. She'll be cleansed of the road detritus soon enough, my yard however, is a much larger cleansing project. Part of having land is the upkeep of it, and every year I have to rake my park as I call it. I mean, I love the hundred plus year old massive Ponderosa pines and the campgroundesque-like scenery the yard provides, but dang the Rakening is getting a touch harder with each passing year.
Needles, needles on the farm, to rake you all will kill my arm....
I mean, I am gradually turning a lot of the yard into gravel gardens and low upkeep spaces, but I still have at least 8 solid days of raking ahead of me. Not that I am complaining, I love raking actually, it's great for the arms and shoulders, not to mention that I get to have a lot of fun messing around with the dogs while I do it.
Take Flabbins (AKA Lani) for instance. This creature loves to drag branches out of the woods and place them onto areas that I already have raked. She then Flabbinses, which is my term for her joyful rolling around like an over-cooked pasta noodle. I think it's her way of showing that she cares, or that she is just laughing at her stupid human trying to clean Nature's carpet. Either way I feel a bit....mocked...
Flabbins though, she's a minor interruption compared to Feffis (Crazy Cora). She goes on repeat action mode and tries to bite the rake tines. Every. Single. Rake. Swipe. It's great really, because it teaches me patience and accuracy, for I really have to focus to hit the ground with each swipe and not my dogs irritatingly snapping maw.
The dogs though, they are mostly interested in their day jobs of being cat contentment disruption terrorists, which of course I hardly notice as I usually rake with my headphones on. Today, I listened to the Lex Fridman Podcast, he had on Cal Newport, and nothing makes a tedious task less tedious than listening to two geniuses talk about the concepts of Deep Work and productivity. Plus, the weather was absolutely smashing!
A couple hours and multiple rake load trips to the fire pit in, I felt a rumbling approaching. My brother had showed up. He strolled toward me and the firepit with a half rack of liquid refreshment and a shoot the bovine fecal matter look of intent on his visage. I grabbed some chairs.
So, in the end, I might not have gotten as much raking done as I intended, but honestly, the pine needles and branches will be there tomorrow, and sometimes it is just nice to sit around a smoldering pine needle fire, shoot the breeze, and listen to your Holstein steer calf bellow that he'd really like some hay, right meow.
And as most of the time, all of the images in this post were taken on the author's now in slightly smoke-scented flavor iPhone.
