Cuckolded

Cuckold  ˈkəkəld, -ōld ORIGIN: late Old English, from Old French cucuault, from cucu ‘cuckoo’ (from the cuckoo's habit of laying its egg in another bird's nest). The equivalent words in French and other languages applied to both the bird and the adulterer.
     For the second time this summer a pair of purple house finches have built a nest in the corner of our front porch. They are hidden up there on the ledge where we have placed a shallow clay pot liner. We love the little parents who scold us when we walk out to get the mail. They fly to the crab apple tree and say, cheee, cheee, cheee. Their first nesting hatched three babies, so we were shocked when this time around there were seven eggs! An ominously large brood for a little mother to raise. But wait! When I looked more closely (we lifted the liner down for a few seconds to peek in because we’re curious, and then quickly replace it before the parents die from anxiety.) Suddenly, I realized that two of the eggs were not like the others. (I could hear that Sesame Street song in my head urging me to decide which one was different.) I looked again. Two were noticeably larger and different in color. More brown speckles. I know that Cow birds are like the English cuckoo bird playing a nasty bully-trick on honest little birds, sneaking in and dropping a giant egg or two that when hatched will put to death the natural children, and with their voracious appetites, will stress the parents who can’t seem to tell the difference between the interlopers and their own poor, starving babies. So the cuckoo is the source of the word “cuckold.” The story of the sailor who has been away at sea for over a year, who returns home to find his wife has a baby. Thus the saying emerged: “I’ve been cuckholded!”
     I didn’t expect to find the cowbird in an urban setting. At our house? I have no problem interfering with their ugly agenda. I remove the two eggs, take them to the driveway and smash them on the cement, heartlessly killing the little alien invaders. I’m not looking too deep for meaning here. Or am I? Why should I turn every story into a Me Story? Unless God means me to reflect on this passion I have for rescuing. Maybe removing cuckoo eggs is not what I’m supposed to be doing. Maybe I’ve misunderstood the difference between selfishness and stewardship? Perhaps my zeal for finding and saving has more to do with my own needs than it does for helping others? This might make more sense if you knew I was struggling with boundaries. More wisdom to learn, even at my age.

Finch nest on Toad Hall porch.

Cowbird eggs in hand.

Cuckolded!

Dangerous Rhubarb Cordial

Last of this season's rhubarb

We are having a quiet 4th of July. Sandy, a friend from New Zealand, a nurse practitioner, is staying with us for three weeks while she keeps up her annual licensure at Mayo. Another good friend, Larry, from Scottsdale, is here for a month working as a hospitalist and he will join us later.  I'm just home from Laity Lodge in Texas where I spent every last spoon of energy I own at a women's retreat. Yesterday I felt like I would never, ever get out of bed again. It was the kind of day when everything made me weep. Like the wren outside our back porch who finally found a mate after singing a solid month before he found her. Cheesh.
Today I'm so much better that the first thing I did was strain the rhubarb cordial that has been brewing on the breakfast nook table for three weeks. (You understand. I have priorities.) A friend sent me this recipe and said to watch out, it is so refreshingly delicious you could drink a quart before you are even aware. Of course, given the ingredients? It wouldn't be long before I was happily unaware of anything. However, due to the company we will keep today, if I were to fall and bump my head, I'd be in good hands.
Hope you all are having a wonderful Fourth and keep your fingers away from lit fuses and hot grills.

I'd be pale, too, if I soaked in vodka for three weeks.

Ready for ice and soda water.

Rhubarb Cordial
Bring 6 T sugar and 1/4 cup water to a boil, stirring just until sugar dissolves; remove from heat. Cool Place 5 cups coarsely chopped rhubarb in a two quart glass container. Add 3 cups vodka, 1/2 cup Grand Marnier or other orange-flavored liqueur and cooled sugar syrup; stir. Screw lid on tightly and let stand at room temp for 2-3 weeks or until all the color leaches out of rhubarb. Strain over a bowl, discard solids. 
Enjoy it straight up over ice or with club soda. Remember: all things in moderation.
For another great recipe: Sparkling Rhubarb Lemonade link
http://carpeseason.com/sparkling-rhubarb-lemonade/

God is gross

This gives you an idea of how long her wool can get.

When Honeysuckle's principal owner, Anita, is gone, seeing to her health and well-being as a pet falls on me, though Denis is good to bring her dandelions in summer and kale in winter. As we all know, sometimes our pets purposely do things that are disgusting - I'm thinking about how our dog used to find things to eat on the boulevard during walks; things I don't even want to know what they were; things I could't stop him from gulping down however quickly I jerked back on his leash and yelled NOOOO. Or, and this is true of any animal we may be responsible for husbanding, like cows or goats, …. or it may not be anything they can't help, like musky glands or baby lambs stuck in birth canals. Or even the normal digging, biting power cords, chewing one's home to bits.

Anyway, I was thinking about things like this as I had Honeysuckle positioned upside down on my lap because her long wool sometimes needs to be trimmed away from certain parts of her anatomy - she had a buildup of matted and clotted fecal matter that needed to be carefully and meticulously cut away. She lay patiently on my lap as I snipped away and thought what a nasty mess this was. But as usual, I couldn't help thinking about the deeper meanings our encounters hold for us if we think about them for more than two seconds. How good I felt helping this innocent animal with something she couldn't do herself. Although it was stinky, it felt right and proper and grace-giving - like in that moment I was doing exactly what God told us to do when he blessed our Mother and Father in the garden and sent them out to take care of the earth.

Then as I was reading and reading and reading, because it is such a looooong book that requires eating in small bites, The Letters of C.S. Lewis to Arthur Greeves, I came across a letter on the very topic of how we can be repulsed by the natural consequences of being a natural beast, and thought how clever I might have been to be able to scold C.S. Lewis for his scruples.

"Physical disgust is a sensation which I have very often and of which I am always ashamed. If one lets it grow upon one it will in the end cut one out from all delighted participation in the life of nature. For God is gross and never heard of decency and cares nothing for refinement: nor do children, nor most women, nor any of the beasts nor mien either except in certain sophisticated classes. And yet it's hard to feel that the faculty of disgust is a sheer evil from beginning town. I don't know what to make of it." (#146, p. 371)
I couldn't agree more. 

Do even part-time owners look like their pet? Here we are getting ready for a clipping.

Morchella Eschulenta (Morel Mushrooms)

It has been perfect morel mushroom weather. A cool, moist spring with a few warm days causes this strange woodland treasure to appear for those who have eyes to see and enough stamina to push through miles of thorny vines and masses of tangled brush and trees. Anita and I have tromped through promising woodlands for hours looking and haven't found a single one. The vendors who sell them at Farmers Market have a slightly scornful look for the pitiful folks who step up to pay $30.00 a pound for their springtime addiction. To us it is like junk. White Tiger Heroine from Maynmar. Truffles from France. Etc.
This week I thought maybe we could afford a small treat. You know. A tiny amount. I could buy exactly 9 medium mushrooms - about 1/2 pound. That would give us three each. That is what I planned to do until last Sunday when Joe, our friend from Heartbeet Farm, offered to take us out to a wooded area near their farm.
After two hours of searching and Denis getting lost, we were about to give up when Joe found a large patch poking out of the decay and leaf litter. Denis wrote a beautiful blog about our experience  http://www.blog4critique.blogspot.com/. You should go read it now.
It was almost enough to pick them and just fondle them without ever getting to eat. I couldn't bring myself to hope for more, but when Joe insisted we take them all, it felt like Christmas, like strawberries and cream, like unmerited grace.
I can't imagine preparing them any other way than the way my mother taught me. Anything else seems like an awful waste. Sinful. I'd rather have two intense morel-ly bites than a sliver here and there lost in a pasta dish or quiche.


Look how they blend in with surroundings and are very difficult to see.


Happy with a basket FULL of morels. This must be about four meals worth.


First, cut the large ones in half lengthwise and soak in cold salt water about 5 minutes. This drives out little critters hiding in the crevasses. Drain and individually rinse each one under running cold water. Handle gently. Morels are hollow so shake the water out through the stem. Place on a clean dish towel and pat dry. Don't worry about a little dirt in the cracks. It won't hurt you. You need bacterial diversity, don't you?



Mix a simple tempura-like batter.
Batter
1/2 cup flour (Or substitute corn starch to be gluten-free. It takes a little more to get the right consistency.)
1/2 cup milk
1 egg
1/2 t. salt, 1/2 t. garlic salt, pepper
Whisk together in shallow bowl. Should be the consistency of cheap paint. Not too thick. Dip mushrooms in and turn to coat.
Saute in medium hot skillet with plenty of butter for browning. They should sizzle when placed in pan. Press down on them a little to flatten. Turn when browned and crisp. Doesn't take long.  Drain on paper towels. Eat while hot.
I was right. We've had them on three occasions and enough for one more round. Grace upon grace, we've never had this many morels! I'm all for experimenting with food. But not here. Not with these. 

Honeysuckle Chews

Making mulch.

Honeysuckle chewed off the leg to her hutch.

Honeysuckle has been in a mood lately. We don't know why. She has been gnawing her hutch at an alarming rate. We gave her a couple more months before it would definitely need to be replaced. We were wrong. She has been so aggressive in her demolition project, going after the back support and the legs that finally one of the front legs fell off.  She sniffed it as if to say this is what you get when you reduce my pellets and expect me to eat timothy hay like a horse - and what did you expect? Do you want my incisors to grow through the roof of my mouth?
We have been careful to bring her every rabbity treat and comfort - even cutting her fresh apple branches and crocheting her a little rug for her foyer.  Apparently this hasn't been enough. So Anita has had to fashion a new leg - and will continue to patch, reconstruct and coddle this creature until her home falls apart for good.

Anita fashions a new leg.

 Honeysuckle at work:

Spring is making us crazy

10 days ago

Spring is making us crazy. I'm not kidding. Less than ten days ago we were doing this.
Three days later all that was left of the snowman was his little brain lying on the ground with a sunken eye. That's all. Really.
Every day we've gone out to inspect tiny green shoots of crocus, hostas, peony, tulips, bleeding heart, wondering if they would survive the snow. A few golden crocus blossoms opened, but that night, Honeysuckle's wild boyfriend bit them off clean to the ground. When the storm dumped 15 inches of snow on us May 2, we had already been waiting so long for the daffodils which were finally in full bloom, I rushed out to turn the wheel barrel over them hoping to save them. It worked.

Full pots.

In the following days few days I gradually became more crazed and obsessed for green of any kind. (Anita is worse.) We stopped by Heartbeet Farm and I noticed that Joe and Becca had moved flats of parsley, green onion, lettuces and I don't know what all, onto the ground in front of the green house. It was green heroine, a salad sea. It was all I could do to keep from falling face first and licking up the leaves.
Next day Anita and I went to the nursery. Such a bad idea. Our piggish appetites paid no attention to our budget, we wanted them all. Everything. I made little grunting noises as I passed flats of alyssum, Sweet William, geraniums, African daisies, dianthus, succulents of all kinds, petunias - mini, waving, cascading, climbing, don't-care-what. Even though there are flower snots who won't even sniff a geranium or petunia, declaring them boring and ubiquitous, we don't care. We want them all. NOW.
Now get this, we went from snow a foot deep ten days ago to 95 degrees yesterday, so it's no wonder - this kind of weather-jerking could make the Dali Lama crazy. Luckily, we escaped Hyvee's nursery with only enough flowers to fill several Metro-domes. We are pale, but we're breathing again. Our skin is showing little spots of health. Our pots are full. Our beds are laden. We are calmer.

Tulips. Finally

Wood Anemones

Wood anemones first flower of spring

Peeking through forest litter

     Yesterday I was sitting on a bench at the edge of a river bluff. Elms and lindens soared up from somewhere from way down below, their skeletal ribs towered above me and gently waved their hairless crowns as if pushed lightly pushed by a spirit. To my left a white pine soughed in the wind, creaking softly. Bright green moss cushioned the floor from my feet to the sharp edge of the cliff where it dropped a hundred feet to the river below. I was listening to hairy woodpeckers drumming on deadwood, tapping out mating calls in woody rhymes. How, I wonder, can anything beat its head that fast and hard against solid wood and survive? An eagle silently soared past at eye-level following the twisted river. She glanced at me with a severe look. I nearly overlooked a tiny wood anemone. I could have left without ever noticing – so shy it is. Sometimes its called a windflower because a windy day can cause it to open its sepals that look to me like seven tiny petals unfurling around a furry yellow center. But botanists say they are sepals not petals. When I looked more intently, then I saw anemones everywhere in small patches along the very path where I’d walked, peeking from brown litter and steep ravines. White clusters, some with the softest blush of pink. These are the first flowers of spring that took so long to arrive this year. I think sometimes its just okay to be small and hidden, quietly blooming, doing your job before the big guns come and steal all the sun and air. Hoards of bluebells. Extravagant wild iris. Carpets of wild garlic.

Today I hope you are blessed by something elfin and beautiful just doing its job.