The growl of a neighbour's lawn-mower has been obvious for an hour or so, and now, as the wind shifts, that wonderful scent of fresh-mown grass and clover is drifting in through one window and down the length of the house, searching for an exit.
Other, more distant, mowers have woken from their dry-winter slumbers over recent days, and even mine has poked its nose out of the garden shed for a little exercise, smashing the drifts of brown plane-tree leaves to a less water-repellent compost. It's back in the shed now, waiting for another warm spell, and the rosellas and other birds are, I think, grateful. All those areas yet unmowed are thick with tiny flowers and little seeds and subtle herbs that feed the birds, or feed the things upon which some of the birds feed.
As well as crimson rosellas, king parrots, and various honey-eaters, the finches, silver-eyes, wrens, magpies, currawongs, and kookaburras all look happy exploring the explosion of life that is our little vale in spring time. Even ducks and herons call in from time to time.
We humans and our machines are well behind the times, though - long before any of us thought of mowing, those first good showers of rain swept in a few weeks ago and woke the green shoots across the brick-bare earth beyond the front hedge, where the passing shoes and boots of locals and tourists had seemed to have worn the grass to dust. Within weeks there were patches of grass long enough to dampen the shoes, and even the socks, of travellers.
The moisture softened what had seemed impenetrable, and suddenly there were thousands of little holes and twisted coils of worm-castings as the hidden workers woke, wriggled, and flourished - opening, aerating, and fertilizing the soil. The earth-worms do for free what would otherwise cost us many hours and dollars. Few humans would willingly work as long and as hard as the worms do, and fewer would achieve the improvements these labourers contribute to the world they draw sustenance from.
Hidden buds swelled and opened, and just as suddenly, the bees were humming and buzzing in throngs as they searched through the hedges, herbs and vegetable gardens. Stems and twigs that seemed beaten down or even killed by the frost and bitter winds of winter found new suppleness - verdant or rosey blushes spread, and flowers that seemed unlikely a few weeks ago now draw crowds of avian and apian admirers as they trade nectar for procreative assistance.
Beautiful in its own right, this dance of insect and plant creates a wealth of food - honey, fruit, berries, and vegetables - and it happens whether we are watching or not. We can help, if we are careful, by fostering the growth of the plants that will provide food and shelter for all those natural workers - many of whom we rarely notice or know -and avoiding acts that will harm them.
How can we know if we are doing good or ill? That is a task that will occupy lifetimes of taking the five senses out into the garden and the bush - our lifetimes, and those that came before us, written or recorded for our benefit. There are those who will teach us, if we are willing to live out there with them, touching, smelling, tasting, seeing, and hearing.
Sunday, 16 September 2018
Tuesday, 11 September 2018
Warming up
The transition from winter to spring seems to have been more precise and punctual than is usual for the Blue Mountains. Winter was clear, dry, and often frosty.
The wind arrived to blow the frost away, and our lake became a bonsai version of a storm-tossed ocean.
The snow, when it fell, settled mostly on the ranges beyond the Cox's River, and only a few flakes drifted across our gardens when the wind swung a little. Finally, the rain arrived.
The blossoms that had been latent were suddenly bright in bush and garden.....
The bees were suddenly spoiled for choice....
Everywhere I walk there is life. The warming soil and air has brought out that amazing community of worms and insects and lizards and birds that aerates our soils, pollinates our fruit and vegetables, and eats the aphids, bugs, and caterpillars that try to set up colonies on our favourite plants.
The magpies are dashing frantically to and from the heights of the tallest pine tree in the neighbourhood, ferrying a constant supply of worms, grubs, and donated mince to the demanding maws of this year's clutch of chicks.
The kookaburras are back, too - greeting the first rays of sunshine with their cheerful chorus, and patrolling the edges of our gardens, picking off the early skinks, while hoping for larger fare in the form of an snake or two.
Every season, in a place like this, has its pleasures and its wonders, but there is a lot to be said for the first few weeks of spring.
The wind arrived to blow the frost away, and our lake became a bonsai version of a storm-tossed ocean.
The snow, when it fell, settled mostly on the ranges beyond the Cox's River, and only a few flakes drifted across our gardens when the wind swung a little. Finally, the rain arrived.
The blossoms that had been latent were suddenly bright in bush and garden.....
The bees were suddenly spoiled for choice....
Everywhere I walk there is life. The warming soil and air has brought out that amazing community of worms and insects and lizards and birds that aerates our soils, pollinates our fruit and vegetables, and eats the aphids, bugs, and caterpillars that try to set up colonies on our favourite plants.
The magpies are dashing frantically to and from the heights of the tallest pine tree in the neighbourhood, ferrying a constant supply of worms, grubs, and donated mince to the demanding maws of this year's clutch of chicks.
The kookaburras are back, too - greeting the first rays of sunshine with their cheerful chorus, and patrolling the edges of our gardens, picking off the early skinks, while hoping for larger fare in the form of an snake or two.
Every season, in a place like this, has its pleasures and its wonders, but there is a lot to be said for the first few weeks of spring.
Monday, 3 September 2018
Am I Seeing it Right?
Does art imitate life, or does life imitate art? An oft asked question, but the apparent assumption is surely wrong - that one might be true does not mean the other must be false. Why did I even ask the question?
Yep - I'm once again lost in the pages of an interesting book, one that began simply enough but soon began to reveal layers of interwoven complexity that had me questioning my own perceptions - not only of the words I was reading, but of memory, understanding, and my experiences with life and other people.
My encounter with The Menagerie of False Truths developed from a simple beginning that soon took on twists and turns that echo its contents. Awake before dawn, and not wanting to disturb a sleeping household, I often put earplugs in and turn on my tiny pocket radio. At 5 am on most Saturdays of the year, the ABC Sydney station, as well as the one on the Central Coast, broadcast a show called The Big Fish.
The name, and even the promotional material, imply a show that might largely be a one hour fishing report from various correspondents around New South Wales, when in fact it is a radio stage, across which parade a remarkable array of characters, who tell fascinating, informative, and (mostly) amusing stories about people, fish, nature, weather, and, sometimes, politics.
This particular morning I tuned in a bit late, and found myself listening to the host, Scott Levi, questioning a chap about some exotic location in which he had been fishing for trout. The speaker, eventually identified as Greg French, was articulate and erudite, and it became apparent that he had written a number of books. A casual angler myself, I had not previously encountered his work - audio or published - and made a mental note to check the catalogue of my local library to see if we held anything by him.
We did, though we are not yet in possession of his latest book - Water Colour - but held other items by him, including "Menagerie" It was a title strange enough to pique my curiosity, and I ordered it sent up from the branch at which it had been reposing.
It swirls, as the pages turn, from disturbing, to amusing, to tragic, and back to disturbing, all the while informing as well as questioning. French touches on - digs into - aspects of perception and mis-perception, understanding and mis-understanding, ability and its lack, art, life, arrogance, humility, love, anger, grief, and suffering.
Each new understanding, though, came with an awareness that there must have been much more that I had missed - a re-reading will be in order, along with diversions to investigate concepts and information previously unmet.
At the heart of this novel are the perceptions, understandings, and behaviour that arise from the differences of mind and thought that society refers to as Autism, or The Spectrum, and the effects that those differences send to ripple out through families and communities that surround such people. It can be too easy to forget that each of us has a particular way of perceiving and understanding the world around us, and that of course affects our responses to the world and the life in it, including other people - what we see and hear may well be quite different to what they see and hear and feel.
Like fingerprints, each world view has its own unique whorls and curls and patterns - fingerprints, like world views, are meant to help us get a grip on the world around us; each pattern, though unique, still does its job, though some do not fit their surroundings as well as others.
The world we live in is complex, from micro to macro, beyond our ability to fully understand - but understanding it is a journey worth taking. Surprises are guaranteed, but so is delight.
Yep - I'm once again lost in the pages of an interesting book, one that began simply enough but soon began to reveal layers of interwoven complexity that had me questioning my own perceptions - not only of the words I was reading, but of memory, understanding, and my experiences with life and other people.
My encounter with The Menagerie of False Truths developed from a simple beginning that soon took on twists and turns that echo its contents. Awake before dawn, and not wanting to disturb a sleeping household, I often put earplugs in and turn on my tiny pocket radio. At 5 am on most Saturdays of the year, the ABC Sydney station, as well as the one on the Central Coast, broadcast a show called The Big Fish.
The name, and even the promotional material, imply a show that might largely be a one hour fishing report from various correspondents around New South Wales, when in fact it is a radio stage, across which parade a remarkable array of characters, who tell fascinating, informative, and (mostly) amusing stories about people, fish, nature, weather, and, sometimes, politics.
This particular morning I tuned in a bit late, and found myself listening to the host, Scott Levi, questioning a chap about some exotic location in which he had been fishing for trout. The speaker, eventually identified as Greg French, was articulate and erudite, and it became apparent that he had written a number of books. A casual angler myself, I had not previously encountered his work - audio or published - and made a mental note to check the catalogue of my local library to see if we held anything by him.
We did, though we are not yet in possession of his latest book - Water Colour - but held other items by him, including "Menagerie" It was a title strange enough to pique my curiosity, and I ordered it sent up from the branch at which it had been reposing.
It swirls, as the pages turn, from disturbing, to amusing, to tragic, and back to disturbing, all the while informing as well as questioning. French touches on - digs into - aspects of perception and mis-perception, understanding and mis-understanding, ability and its lack, art, life, arrogance, humility, love, anger, grief, and suffering.
Each new understanding, though, came with an awareness that there must have been much more that I had missed - a re-reading will be in order, along with diversions to investigate concepts and information previously unmet.
At the heart of this novel are the perceptions, understandings, and behaviour that arise from the differences of mind and thought that society refers to as Autism, or The Spectrum, and the effects that those differences send to ripple out through families and communities that surround such people. It can be too easy to forget that each of us has a particular way of perceiving and understanding the world around us, and that of course affects our responses to the world and the life in it, including other people - what we see and hear may well be quite different to what they see and hear and feel.
Like fingerprints, each world view has its own unique whorls and curls and patterns - fingerprints, like world views, are meant to help us get a grip on the world around us; each pattern, though unique, still does its job, though some do not fit their surroundings as well as others.
The world we live in is complex, from micro to macro, beyond our ability to fully understand - but understanding it is a journey worth taking. Surprises are guaranteed, but so is delight.
Sunday, 26 August 2018
Rainbows Made From Mud
Beyond the lawn that stretches from our back door, past our clothes line, around the corners of the orchard, there is a darker space. Keep walking and suddenly the warmth of the sun is gone from your shoulders. The shadows of the pines, casuarinas, hakeas and eucalypts are dense along the bank of the creek.
You can walk silently, your footfall absorbed by the deep carpet of fallen leaves and needles that is slowly darkening within those deep shadows, becoming one with the soil below. Where your boot soles bruise the rotting carpet, scents arise to tickle the nose - mold, terpenes, slime and mud all contribute to the bouquet. Stand quiet for a few minutes and the currents of life that stilled themselves at your intrusion will slowly resume their flow.
Insects will skitter, and skinks rustle among the leaves and fern-fronds. Perhaps a snake will rasp across the drying leaves in pursuit, the fear inspired by your presence overpowered by its need for prey. Wrens and finches will flit through the leaves, seeking a safe path between the serpent below the winged raptors above, and perhaps a pair of ducks will push ripples across the surface of the pool, startling the water insects, tadpoles, and minnows.
Stand still, breath slowly - more life will become obvious as you become less so. Lower your gaze and see the tiny scurryings among the blades of grass, as ants and spiders go about their business.
A place that seemed still and empty is revealed as a thriving market place of living and dying. Look closely, breath even more slowly - there is another level here, known more in the imagination than by any apparent movement.
Those fragments of plants and animals and fungi now fallen from their places are still busy - dying and decomposing and becoming part of the mud in and beside the creek. Mud that binds to and is bound by the roots of the trees and shrubs and ferns and rushes and grasses and violets that thrive on its richness. Below the mulch, the mud is alive, and is sharing its life with the fractal root-web of feeding plants.
Just there, by the bank - see the smooth grey-green and cream dappled bark of the eucalypt that dominates the head of this pool. Look inside it - see the miracle. Somehow that patient, motionless, trunk is busy pumping a vast flow of liquid towards the sky. From the sodden earth below, the sap carries microscopic fragments of that dark mud, lifting it twenty metres or more to the tiny, solar powered factories we call leaves.
Look up - you can see the undersides of the branches, twigs, and leaves - an airborne net to equal the complexity of the one below the surface. Yet there is something you cannot see from there. Back you go, back out into the sunlight, across the lawn, until you are further from the base of the tree than its topmost leaves are.
Look up again, see how the late afternoon sun is playing on the leaves - and something else. Tiny flecks of white among the green and orange growth - the tree is in blossom. The final destination of that miraculous flow of dissolved mud, brought all that way via root, trunk, branch, and twig, is that fragrant cluster of creamy reproductive complexity. In a few months, some of those flowers will have become gumnuts, holding within themselves seeds tiny enough to make acorns look clumsy.
But now, as the blossom basks in the sunlight, another miracle is taking place. Listen and look - living bells that chime and squawk and flutter and flash in shades of blue, green, yellow, orange and red - the rainbow lorikeets have arrived to feast on the nectar that is the penultimate product of that mighty trunk. The bees that have had only tiny honey eaters to compete with are now scattered by the chattering, swirling, feathered rainbow of lorikeets, and must circle hopefully, or yield, and return to their hive, and the leaves and petals that fell last year to become mud are once again airborne.
You can walk silently, your footfall absorbed by the deep carpet of fallen leaves and needles that is slowly darkening within those deep shadows, becoming one with the soil below. Where your boot soles bruise the rotting carpet, scents arise to tickle the nose - mold, terpenes, slime and mud all contribute to the bouquet. Stand quiet for a few minutes and the currents of life that stilled themselves at your intrusion will slowly resume their flow.
Insects will skitter, and skinks rustle among the leaves and fern-fronds. Perhaps a snake will rasp across the drying leaves in pursuit, the fear inspired by your presence overpowered by its need for prey. Wrens and finches will flit through the leaves, seeking a safe path between the serpent below the winged raptors above, and perhaps a pair of ducks will push ripples across the surface of the pool, startling the water insects, tadpoles, and minnows.
Stand still, breath slowly - more life will become obvious as you become less so. Lower your gaze and see the tiny scurryings among the blades of grass, as ants and spiders go about their business.
A place that seemed still and empty is revealed as a thriving market place of living and dying. Look closely, breath even more slowly - there is another level here, known more in the imagination than by any apparent movement.
Those fragments of plants and animals and fungi now fallen from their places are still busy - dying and decomposing and becoming part of the mud in and beside the creek. Mud that binds to and is bound by the roots of the trees and shrubs and ferns and rushes and grasses and violets that thrive on its richness. Below the mulch, the mud is alive, and is sharing its life with the fractal root-web of feeding plants.
Just there, by the bank - see the smooth grey-green and cream dappled bark of the eucalypt that dominates the head of this pool. Look inside it - see the miracle. Somehow that patient, motionless, trunk is busy pumping a vast flow of liquid towards the sky. From the sodden earth below, the sap carries microscopic fragments of that dark mud, lifting it twenty metres or more to the tiny, solar powered factories we call leaves.
Look up - you can see the undersides of the branches, twigs, and leaves - an airborne net to equal the complexity of the one below the surface. Yet there is something you cannot see from there. Back you go, back out into the sunlight, across the lawn, until you are further from the base of the tree than its topmost leaves are.
Look up again, see how the late afternoon sun is playing on the leaves - and something else. Tiny flecks of white among the green and orange growth - the tree is in blossom. The final destination of that miraculous flow of dissolved mud, brought all that way via root, trunk, branch, and twig, is that fragrant cluster of creamy reproductive complexity. In a few months, some of those flowers will have become gumnuts, holding within themselves seeds tiny enough to make acorns look clumsy.
But now, as the blossom basks in the sunlight, another miracle is taking place. Listen and look - living bells that chime and squawk and flutter and flash in shades of blue, green, yellow, orange and red - the rainbow lorikeets have arrived to feast on the nectar that is the penultimate product of that mighty trunk. The bees that have had only tiny honey eaters to compete with are now scattered by the chattering, swirling, feathered rainbow of lorikeets, and must circle hopefully, or yield, and return to their hive, and the leaves and petals that fell last year to become mud are once again airborne.
Tuesday, 21 August 2018
We humans are vain creatures - we long considered ourselves the only animals on the planet who possessed true language, the only tool users, the only artists, and the only truly conscious beings.
It seems likely that some of the other primates and the cetaceans, oh, and some of the birds, at the very least, would disagree with us.
Laurens van der Post and his story of the pact between honey badger, the honey-guide bird, and bushman is an example of communication - stories are told by humans, but how is it that the birds and the badgers also know to take part in the hunt for homey?
We still like to say we are distinguished from all other life on this world by our ability to tell stories - but is that true? Animals of many sorts have been known to deceive other animals using calls, posture, body language, and pantomime - is that not the telling of stories.
Bees return to hives and convey detailed information to their hive-mates, who in their turn interpret and act upon those stories.
When I was young, the science curriculum was teaching that "lesser" life was a sort of biological clockwork mechanism - all drives and instincts determined by genes.
Now we know how different the characters of members of the same species can be, how they play, form friendships and partnerships
Take the chimps who hunt other monkeys - they are observed having a conference before the hunt, and then splitting into groups, some to drive their pray, and some to lay in ambush.
Our language and story telling abilities are sophisticated, to be sure - but are they really so much more sophisticated that than other species possess, or do we only think that way because we fail to understand the depths and nuances of the communications of those others?
It seems likely that some of the other primates and the cetaceans, oh, and some of the birds, at the very least, would disagree with us.
Laurens van der Post and his story of the pact between honey badger, the honey-guide bird, and bushman is an example of communication - stories are told by humans, but how is it that the birds and the badgers also know to take part in the hunt for homey?
We still like to say we are distinguished from all other life on this world by our ability to tell stories - but is that true? Animals of many sorts have been known to deceive other animals using calls, posture, body language, and pantomime - is that not the telling of stories.
Bees return to hives and convey detailed information to their hive-mates, who in their turn interpret and act upon those stories.
When I was young, the science curriculum was teaching that "lesser" life was a sort of biological clockwork mechanism - all drives and instincts determined by genes.
Now we know how different the characters of members of the same species can be, how they play, form friendships and partnerships
Take the chimps who hunt other monkeys - they are observed having a conference before the hunt, and then splitting into groups, some to drive their pray, and some to lay in ambush.
Our language and story telling abilities are sophisticated, to be sure - but are they really so much more sophisticated that than other species possess, or do we only think that way because we fail to understand the depths and nuances of the communications of those others?
Tuesday, 7 August 2018
Oh, the Power
What wonderful. god-like powers the writer possesses! How amazing is it to be able, when some plot point becomes necessary to the continuation of the story, to be able to put it in place and then reach back down the time line of your work and insert the words and sentences that will make that plot point fit seemlessly into the suspended disbelief of the future readers.
The painter will need to paint over existing brush work to add some item or structure to support the new idea, and the sketcher will perhaps combine the eraser with overdrawing - but the underlying original marks are still there for the sharp-eyed.
The writer can miraculously delete, cut and paste, copy and paste, and insert, at will. If she is careful, those future readers will never detect even the faintest clue that the author was at any time less than omniscient. As a child, I took from the instructions of my teachers the idea that somehow the words flowing onto the page had to be the words that would be there for the reader. It was some time before I understood that was not the case - that I could write what I pleased, and screw it up and use only a few words or sentences from that page to start anew on a clean sheet.
Now I revel in that power - my pen can charge along a line of narrative or conversation as it flows from brain to nerves to fingers to ink, never pausing until it is done. I can worry about the fine detail, the justifications, the cause and effect, the wit and humour, the pathos and tears, and the believability, later - because I have The Power to Amend, Insert, or Erase, and I'm not afraid to use it.
The painter will need to paint over existing brush work to add some item or structure to support the new idea, and the sketcher will perhaps combine the eraser with overdrawing - but the underlying original marks are still there for the sharp-eyed.
The writer can miraculously delete, cut and paste, copy and paste, and insert, at will. If she is careful, those future readers will never detect even the faintest clue that the author was at any time less than omniscient. As a child, I took from the instructions of my teachers the idea that somehow the words flowing onto the page had to be the words that would be there for the reader. It was some time before I understood that was not the case - that I could write what I pleased, and screw it up and use only a few words or sentences from that page to start anew on a clean sheet.
Now I revel in that power - my pen can charge along a line of narrative or conversation as it flows from brain to nerves to fingers to ink, never pausing until it is done. I can worry about the fine detail, the justifications, the cause and effect, the wit and humour, the pathos and tears, and the believability, later - because I have The Power to Amend, Insert, or Erase, and I'm not afraid to use it.
Wednesday, 1 August 2018
Lotions and Potions
Just a little piece of doggerel that popped into my mind a few minutes ago - where did it come from, and why? I don't know - but here it is
Lotions and potions
And tablets and pills
Make you feel better
But don't cure your ills
Happy creating to all of you.
Lotions and potions
And tablets and pills
Make you feel better
But don't cure your ills
Happy creating to all of you.
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