oregon spring

The old saying goes:

March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb.

Going out like a lamb is not looking so good right now…

Let's just say I'm pretty sure nobody around here is in a big hurry to see the new film Noah.

a melancholy thursday afternoon

Fog

The fog comes

on little cat feet.

It sits looking 

over harbor and city

on silent haunches

and then moves on.

- Carl Sandburg

the rites of spring

I know spring officially began a week or so ago, but up here in the Pacific Northwest, it ain't really spring 'till the sun comes out and the forecast looks like this:

there are other signs, too:

the Knuckleheads basking in the sun like the matched bookends that they are,

The plum trees are in full bloom,

I weeded the raised vegetable bed and found the biggest carrot I've ever seen

(here's another shot just for scale)

and the most important sign of spring? 

Walking around barefoot all afternoon!

Here's wishing everyone a warm and sunny spring, wherever you are!

the soul of a tree

(click on image to see more)

This is one of my favorite trees of all time. This giant old man maple rises up out of the narrow strip of soil between the sidewalk and the street, his roots forming a great mossy mound that has caused humans to repave around it many times over the hundred or so years of his existence. I'm convinced he watches over the neighborhood, so I greet him with a kind thought and pat his rough coat of bark whenever I pass by. Click here to see more.