I am in touch with my inner Sisyphus this evening. I swept and swept and swept the deck all day, trying to dislodge a long winter's worth of debris from every nook and cranny, and a Park's worth of sand from the spaces between the boards. Tonight, a cold front is blowing down petals from the trees above, and a whole new crop of sycamore pods are littering the surface of the deck. But for a moment there, for a couple hours this afternoon, that place was perfect. I took a break from scrubbing as obsessively as Lady MacBeth to sit under the canopy of the umbrella, to enjoy the sounds of the spring. I had sent all the animals inside, much to their dismay, and had planned to join them when I decided I was just too tired to go another step beyond the patio chairs. I turned off the music I had been playing, and listened to the conversation of the birds. I filled the squirrel feeders today, and while I sat, still and quiet, a few birds started creeping closer and closer to them. Some just hopped around the bushes and yard decorations, and one cardinal hen spent several minutes trying to decide whether I was real or a figment of her imagination. After a while, she was chased off by a noisy boy, who ate and chirped and didn't seem to mind when I slowly reached for my camera to take his picture several times. I swear, the more he raved about the free lunch, the more birds came into the yard to see what the fuss was about. It was with regret that I eventually had to let the dogs back out to disrupt the fine dining.
Now that the weather is turning again, I aim to turn my spring cleaning tendencies to the inside of the house. I tried to do a little of that today, to negate the odd feeling the living room took on after I moved the ficus back out to its spot on the front porch. It seems so empty in here without that giant green presence, and I've been feeling all day like I just moved in to this house. I can't figure out why the discordance is so out of proportion to the loss of one feature in the house. I will have to experiment a little to see whether I can make it feel lived in again. I'm not bringing the tree back until next winter.
My little shadows followed me all around the Park today as I checked on progress. I'm not allowed to cross it alone. The buddy system is the law here. I stood under the weeping willow again, while it danced and petted me. I had hoped to remove some of the white ropes holding it upright, but watching how much it swayed in such gentle wind made me change my mind. It's not ready yet. Maybe by the end of summer, but even then I doubt it. The bald cypress is finally showing signs of life, as one of Friday's pictures illustrated. I'm very relieved that only one tree, the lower peach, is forever dead after last year's excessive rain and insects. I haven't decided yet whether I'm brave enough to try to replace it myself. I'm still working on trying to decide how to handle the green mold that is taking over the damp side of the house. My deck looks kind of pretty green, but I might be willing to drag out the power washer and give it a whirl. But first I'm going to invest in a deck brush and see how much I can get with a little elbow grease, and maybe a couple drops of bleach.
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