The Red Dragonfly Of Summer And The Autumn Leaf Of Late September

 

"Autumn was San Francisco's summer. The days were bright and warm, scented with drying leaves and fading flowers and the ever-present salt air."

 

~Susan Wiggs

The Lost and Found Bookshop

 

 Finally, a dragonfly. I hoped to be able to photograph one over the summer, but either it was too hot to think about venturing outside to do some photography, or when I did get out to the delta and it's sloughs, there was nary a one to be found. Ironic that I saw some along Desmond road yesterday, happily dancing about in the late afternoon sun. Autumn isn't exactly their season. Or is it? I don't know much about them, except that they are pleasant little creatures to photograph, and they eat nasty things like mosquitos. Anyway, I have had several days in a row of happiness, and I hope to keep up that momentum. I just want to be happy again, which I think I will be, I just need more time I guess.

 

~Me 

White-faced Ibis In The Autumn And Leaf #3

 

'Or maybe spring is the season of love and fall the season of mad lust. Spring for flirting but fall for the untamed delicious wild thing."

 

~Elizabeth Cohen

The Hypothetical Girl

 

Oh my, the sight of White-faced Ibis flying over the freshly mowed farmland of Desmond road... sigh... took my breath away. It would not have been as pretty in any other season. Autumn carries a magic in it's life, and hopefully one day I will be able to explain it and you will understand why I feel so alive right now. I mean, damn, White-faced Ibis! A beautiful country road in the Central Valley, the warm autumn sun, and the birds are only beginning to visit!

 

Of course I am drunk on happiness!

 

  ~Me

Autumn Leaf Of The Day #2

 

"That old September feeling, left over from school days of summer passing, vacation nearly done, obligations gathering, books and football in the air... another fall, another turned page: there was something of jubilee in that autumnal beginning as if last year's mistakes had been wiped clean by summer."

 

~ Wallace Stegner

Angle Of Repose

~Me

 

Welcome Autumn And Leaf Of The Day #1

 

 "But when fall comes, kicking summer out on it's treacherous ass as it always does one day sometime after the midpoint of September, it stays awhile like an old friend that you have missed. It settles in the way an old friend will settle into your favorite chair and take out his favorite pipe and lights it and then fill the afternoon with stories of places he has been and things he has done since he last saw you."

 

~Stephen King

 Salem's Lot

 

"But when fall comes, kicking summer out on it's treacherous ass... ."

Has there ever been a better description of how it feels to finally be rid of brutal summer days? It's finally here, weather that isn't 114 degrees! Yep, we broke records again this year, but the leaves that are still alive are off to a beautiful start. Life. Is. Good. Mostly.

~Me

 

 

Goodbye Summer, And Thanks For The Cheese!

 

"One swallow does not make a summer, neither does one fine day... ."

~Aristotle

What a fantastic day. Autumn is in the air. I am actually feeling better. I am able to eat more foods and, oh yeah, a little bit of American justice took place. History will play things out the way it will, but for right now it seems Donald Trump is finally getting his, and as the end of summers go, that is not a bad way to celebrate. Do worry, no hopes are raised, but I am guardedly optimistic, which is better than I have felt in a long, long, very long time.

With this post I am back to posting regularly. Daily leaf and bird photos as my feathered friends find their way along the Pacific Flyway. Good things are ahead, and it's magical.

~Me

Blue Heron, Gone Fishing

 

"Creativity is the Blue Heron inside us waiting to fly;

 through her imagination all things become possible."

 

~Nadia Janice Brown

 

 Meet the second bird in my series of posts about the gorgeous birds of 2022, the Great Blue Heron. I have seen a lot of them so far this year, which is in contrast to last year when I only saw perhaps 4 or 5. It's nice to see that their numbers have increased here in the valley. Great Egrets seemed to be increasing in numbers as well. I have no idea what that means for the upcoming Pacific Flyway for this year, but it will be fascinating to watch!

 

 

~Me

September 3rd 2022

 

105 To 87

 

"The month of August had turned into a griddle

 where the days just lay there and sizzled."

 

~Sue Monk Kidd

 The Secret Life Of Bees 

 

August sizzled, with many days hovering around 100 degrees, and now September is beginning around the same. I hate the summer, and never bought into the "fun in the sun" nonsense. Do I like the beach? Absolutely! I LOVE the beach, but I love the beach in May and October, otherwise it can be beautiful for other reasons, like winter sunsets and photographing incoming storms. Photographing lightning coming off the Pacific ocean can be beautiful and challenging. I tried it many times when I lived in the Bay Area, but as I was discussing in my last post, the delta is drying up, so those opportunities are not presenting themselves as before. Is there any good news on the horizon? Yes! As with most Septembers, autumn will be shoving summer out on it's treacherous ass (see my favorite quote by Stephen King) soon! The projected forecast for 10 days from now is a high of 87 degrees! Hope is on the way! I love autumn!

~Me

September 1st 2022

 

 

Cobbler Crust

 

"It looked like the world was covered

 in a cobbler crust of brown sugar and cinnamon."

 

~Sarah Addison

First Frost

 

I know I push autumn to start early every year, but as I looked around at the YOLO Bypass Wildlife refuge yesterday, it really seemed that autumn had crossed the seasonal threshold sooner than usual. Not that I am complaining, mind you, I was simply pleasantly surprised. I always enjoy the arrival of my favorite season, but global warming has me terrified, and I know that what I saw yesterday was not a matter of the seasons having a bit of rivalry, but rather a matter of the earth saying "fuck you humans, you're causing my early demise, so here is a visual." Yolo was dry, and devoid of plants and birds. I only noticed one dragonfly, and I was there for over four hours! Everything is changing, rapidly, in the valley. My usual go-tos for birding opportunities along the delta were all dried up early this year. It's not going to take long before California won't be California anymore. 

 That all being said, we had a good time visiting the refuge. There were some lovely residents still keeping a watchful eye until their friends return. The Pacific Flyway returns in about a month, and hopefully we will see some natural correction in the weather soon too.

 

~Me

August 30th, 2022

 

 

 

European Starling

 

"On the single strand of wire strung, to bring our house electricity, grackles and starlings punctuated an invisible sentence."

 

~John Updike

 

Yesterday, while traveling along Woodbridge road, I spotted what I thought was a new bird, well, a new bird for me anyway, but as it turns out it was simply the juvenile phase of the European Starling. Birds are so interesting. I love learning about them, and seeing their different patterns. The Starlings are a particular favorite of mine. I can't wait for winter when they will be back in great numbers. I love watching them fly together in their strange and beautiful smoky sky dance. It's downright magical. 

 

~Me

August 28th 2022

The After David Is Released

Andrew Harnik 

AP/Shutterstock

 "A president cannot defend a nation

 if he is not held accountable to it's laws."

~DaShanne Stokes

The title of this post is, "The After David Is Released." It refers to an SNL skit that aired just after the 2020 election. See, a young woman in Michigan claimed, through a signed affidavit, that election irregularities had taken place and that she had been a witness to it. The lady was pretty unbelievable, and because of that, she ended up in a skit about her testimony and subsequent statements to the press. I never forgot that in the skit, Cecily Strong referred to the woman's signed statement as an "after David" rather than an affidavit. It made me laugh. Those were better days. Some of the elements of Donald Trump's BIG LIE were actually laugh out loud funny, such as Rudy Guiliani indicating that he would be holding a presser at The Four Seasons, which turned out to not be the famous hotel, but rather The Four Season's Landscaping company. The owners were just as astonished as the rest of us. Huh? Anyway, this post isn't about the subject of the BIG LIE, it's about Trump having taken classified documents into his civilian life, and stored them at his resort home in Florida.

Sigh.

What the actual fuck? Just another day in the dumb Trump experience. So, for the sake of history, here is the government's redacted version of the recent warrant issued for the search of those documents at his club. Part of the justification for the warrant, was the signed affidavits of several individuals who claimed to have knowledge of the mishandling of the classified documents. I am not including the full PDF, because it somewhat lengthy, but history will bear the full story. And if I have nobody still following my blog, I have the full PDF that I can personally reference. Either way, it's all good. So, here are the first few pages, just for history sake. I, for the most part, like posting about current events. I got used to it, due to microblogging on Twitter, so it seems natural to continue to post about it here. I wish I was posting about some good news so bigly that it would take several entries on my blog to share it, but unfortunately this is where we have been since Trump announced his candidacy in 2015. Rolling around in the surreal, disgust and fear. This is not how I expected to feel when I reached the slightly over ripe old age of 60.

I've been semi-retired from bitching about Trump, and politics in general, since Joe Biden took office but this is something different. It's history. Unfortunately.

 

 

The affidavit is over 30 pages long. There was no mention of anything related to the nuclear program, but then a lot is redacted and it's common knowledge this affidavit does not contain all that was sealed in the warrant, so my nightmares continue, and I pray he never gets anywhere near the White House ever again, but I know, deep down, that free will is a double edged sword and God isn't going to send my Philadelphia Eagles to the Super Bowl, just because I pray for it, or make the Republican party grow a soul, if its not their free will to do so.

 

And thereby lies the tale.

~Me

August 26th 2022

Western Meadowlark

 

"Some birds are not meant to be caged, that's all. Their feathers are too bright, their songs too sweet and wild. So you let them go, or when you open the cage to feed them they somehow fly out past you. And the part of you that knows it was wrong to imprison them in the first place, rejoices, but still, the place where you live is that much more drab and empty for their departure."

 

~Stephen King

Rita Hayworth And The Shawshank Redemption

 

There has been a lot of happy colors in this year, so I really need to remind myself about how lucky I am. In an attempt to remind myself of all the real joy in my world, I have been tip-toeing through the photographs I have done in the wilds of the San Joaquin Valley thus far. I seemed to have organically done a lot of groups of the birds that were in the greatest numbers, rather than taken a one and and done approach to my photography and bird counts. So, for the next few posts, or so, I will be showcasing these beautiful and vibrant birds. Up first, the gorgeous Western Meadowlark, which I mostly found along Desmond road, in lower Sacramento County. This bird really seemed to love my little red Mini Cooper!

 

 

This Way Guys! UPDATE!

 

"If you're born without wings, 

 do nothing to prevent them from growing."

 

UPDATE: That contraption the fella is flying about the sky in is actually called a "paramotor" or motorized glider, not a para-glider. Thanks to my friend Bob ( https://twitter.com/WagstaffBob ) for the update!

 

~Coco Chanel

 

So one day last spring, while bird watching along Desmond road, in Galt, I noticed this fella soaring about the sky over Lodi. Sometimes he seemed closer, sometimes farther away, which I suppose is the nature of paragliding, but what stood out were the colors of his sail. They were so beautiful and vibrant it was hard to remember that hanging a puss had become my new hobby. And with the optical illusion of his leading a flock of Greater White-faced geese across the sky, I damn near broke into a smile!

 

Damn IT!   ;) It really is the little things!

 

~Me 

August 24th 2022

19 Years And A 19th Nervous Breakdown (An Anniversary Post)

 

"Homesickness is not always a vague feeling, nostalgic almost beautiful emotion, although that is somehow the way we always seem to picture it in our mind. It can be a terrible keen blade, not just a sickness in a metaphor but in fact as well. It can change the way one looks at the world, the faces one sees in street look not just indifferent but ugly... perhaps even malignant. Homesickness is real sickness... the ache of the uprooted plant"

 

~Stephen King

 

First off, I should acknowledge that today is my 19th year of blogging, and oh my, the places I have went! From the Bush administration, to the big AOL Journals migration to Blogger, to the many wonderful photo challenges I have shared with friends, to my own migration from the big Bay Area out pricing of affordable housing, and the eventual purchase of our house, and of course, the eventual sale of our first house last year. Big stress stuff. And all that without mentioning surviving the Trump administration. A thing I didn't think possible. But keep in mind, that was an attitude I feel quite vindicated about, in light of his taking Top Secret nuclear program documents to his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, after the asshole was voted out of office!

 

This year has been difficult. In some ways it has felt like the last 19 years has somehow rolled into past last year. The move from the house was a shitshow. I am still picking up the emotional pieces. I am tired. Heartsick. A little lost. And, well, scattered. The move was a huge part of it, but catching Covid-19 and a husband retiring didn't help. Neither did the murder of our Chevy Equinox, in a hit and run, in the wee hours of a chilly October morning. But I guess Covid-19 has had the most profound effect on my life. Little by little the Long-Covid seems to be healing itself, but it is a scary thing to think about a virus having such a deep effect on me almost 9 months later. It's an invisible monster, living inside your body, reminding you every day of your mortality.

I wish this post was more filled with joy for having blogged all this time. I want to feel more positive, but I am finding it so hard to find joy, which is known as depression. I am working with a new therapist to try and breakthrough my sadness. I have hope, and hubby is carrying the weight. Because of him I do have a lot of moments of joy. We still have our movies, and the fur-babies. We have music and jaunts bird watching. I have a good life, I just need to find it again. One positive thing did happen recently to mix things up. Our landlord is letting us stay put for at least one more year. I can stop worrying about having to move again. I'm home.

Things feel like they are trying to transition from all the painful negativity to a safe and quiet existence. I have a lot to work on while I am in this condo... this home... like learning to let go of the life I left behind in our home. I try to not think of the house. I haven't grieved it yet, so, oh goody, THAT'S coming! Right now the thing I need to let go of is my life in the Bay Area. All the places I grew up around, all the memories and ghosts I was used to dealing with. I guess I grieved it wrong or something. Or if I am being honest, not at all.

 

 I'm still bargaining with the universe over it. I search the rentals for ANYTHING we can afford, ANYWHERE in the Bay Area, and of course it's always for nothing. Affordable housing in California is practically nonexistent, but the Bay Area recently surpassed NYC in lack of affordable housing. My old life is always there for visiting, but sometimes visiting, and then leaving, hurts so much I think all it does is set me back. Trump didn't successfully get San Francisco off the map, at least not yet, so I must learn how to balance love and sorrow. Who knows what the 2024 election will look like? He could get back into office, and then who knows what button he will push. 

Sorry... it was all the uprooting talking just then.

"Monsters are real, and ghosts are too.

 They live inside us, and sometimes, they win."

~Stephen King

 

~Me

August 23rd 2022

 

 

Watching And Waiting

 

"And so the problem remained; lots of people were mean and most were miserable, even the ones with digital watches."

~Douglas Adams

 Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy

 

I don't especially like digital watches. I learned to tell time on a good old fashioned analog clock, and by the way, the very same classroom also contained an abacus! Shrug. I don't know, I suppose all things digital was cool enough when I first noticed they existed, but they seemed like cheating on time somehow. Same numbers. Same time. Shrug. But somehow they just never clicked with me. Even my ultra fashionable Swatch watch from the 1980's was an analog, god I wish I could find it, it's only worth like a gazillion dollars now. Go figure, you never know what will increase in value do you? Too bad time itself doesn't get more valuable as you grow older. It just ticks away, and one day you realize that it has caught up with you and perhaps, in fact, has gone past you. I guess watching time, doesn't necessarily mean one understands it's implications.

The first watch I ever bought myself.

Mervyns 1983

My favorite watch to wear for "malling".

Macy's 1984

I have a sizeable collection, but these are my favorites.

~Carly

 

OUATIH

 

"Nah, it was dumber than that."

~Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt) 

Once Upon A Time In... Hollywood 

 

Warning: Spoilers Below

 

Hair will always be my favorite movie, full stop, but in 2019 a new movie came along that floored me, and I find myself watching about as much as I do Hair. It's the 9th film from Quentin Tarantino, Once Upon A Time In... Hollywood. It's smart, funny, violent, gory, sweet, shocking, and downright chilling. In other words, it's a movie by Quentin Tarantino, so as you might expect, it's complicated. But what Tarantino did was to give the audience, his audience, a chance to visit the night of August 8th,1969, and dream of a whatif scenario, like any of us of a certain age did, since the tragedy happened all those years ago. I was 8 years old when the murders occurred. I had been in Los Angeles the year before when my sister and I visited Disneyland with my sister-in-law.

 

 We drove around all over Tinseltown, and marveled at the lights along the Sunset Strip. I will never forget the lights of the city. We drove to Malibu and through some of the canyons on day 2. Benedict Canyon was one of them! Our 5 day vacation was exciting, and wildly fun, and I still daydream about it to this day. My sister and I bonded that trip, and spent some time talking about our bother who was serving in Vietnam. Sis and I had never been particularly close, and we still aren't, in fact we haven't spoken in 25 years, but our first vacation away from our parents was filled with so much innocent fun that I feel a little sad that she and I are no longer friends, or family for that matter, because life is short.

 

Sharon Tate only lived 26 years. She had a younger sister too. Unfortunately they never got to live a lifetime of sisterhood, and here my relationship ended over so much self-inflicted indifference and deliberate malice that it's obscene. My heart aches for the life Sharon Tate never got to have, because of individuals filled with rage, drug induced paranoia and societal indifference. My sister acted out for similar reasons. Sharon was gorgeous, so much so that it's rumored that she was the inspiration for Malibu Barbie! And it's easy to believe, as there was a pretty strong resemblance between the actress and the doll. It's kind of a nice thought. I was a fan, even as a child. When I heard the news of her death, I was so sad, I remember discussing it with my friend Jimmy, my best friend, who would pass away himself a few short months later. 

 

His death left a huge hole in my life, and in the hearts of everyone on our street. The kids didn't play together anymore, and the parents stopped having friendly cookouts together. No dads watching football together, or moms meeting after PTA meetings for gossip and a quick drink before the menfolk got home from work. So many times over the years I have thought about those two uniquely devastating events, and what it would be like had neither had occurred. I have played it over in my head about a million times, but it always ended up the same, that poor lady passed away, and my friend was gone at 8 years old. The End. But as it turned out, there was someone, somewhere, about my age thinking about tragedy too, and in 2019, he gave me an ending I could get lost in, to a great deal of satisfaction. It's fiction. Sharon Tate's story did occur, but as I sit here, an old lady of nearly 60, watching as tragedies happen almost daily, I am grateful to Quentin Tarantino for giving me an alternate reality to step into for a bit of relief. He couldn't bring my friend back and change the events that led to his death, but he did give Sharon Tate a different story.

 

Once Upon A Time In... Hollywood.

 

If you haven't seen OUATIH watch it.

 I can't recommend it enough.