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Today should be just about heaven. The rising sun is brightly illuminating the tops of the pines and there is a fair blue sky. I don't think there's a cloud until you get to Kansas. We're around 480' elevation here and a good bit up from the nearest creek.
Hunting season may have started, and i worry about how gun shots will play on Christine's nerves knowing the deer that visit us and that hunting lands are directly to our east. I should go buy purple paint to mark our boundary.
Last Sunday was moderately pleasant, too, and instead of yard work i took off into our woods. I crossed into the hunting lands and back a couple times -- there's a bag with three propane cans and something else i should go collect for the trash that i found. I assume they are empty, and i assume they were left by hunters and not the litterbug previous owners.
I started out near our eastern boundary and cut west, finding a massive sweetgum (liquidamber) and the large rock that had tickled my father. There's no loam in places - the clay shows through a bit. I saw a fairly common orchid and some wintergreen. The southwest corner is well marked with a pipe. Cutting back east i found thickets of autumn olive and the ground covered with stilt grass. I was waving my walking stick in the air ahead of me to clear the orb weaver webs and then whacking the grass, to alert any snakes. Despite looking at my location on my phone I got turned around more than once. It's Mirkwood, i tell you, Mirkwood back there. If there are Hobbit capturing spiders i will not be surprised.
Ugh.
It was a bit depressing, and i stalled on yard work this week. Today i will get back in the groove. In good news, there's no honeysuckle back there. I did see a place where one of the giant vines of poison ivy had apparently collapsed under it's own weight right at the edge of our clearing. I've no idea what to do with that: "nothing" sounds like the right plan.
--== ∞ ==--
Another thing that happened last Sunday: I attended my first Meeting for Business at the FUM meeting. Of two remarkable things, one was that they discerned about a slight change in wording in their minute to repeal HB2 (the "Bathroom" bill). An out transwoman in their community had concerns about how the wording made it sound as if the meeting did not reject the bathroom provision but all the others. No one was defensive (although there may have been a long email thread to which i was not party), there was compassionate discussion -- including for those who have been stirred up to fear -- and the minute was adjusted promptly.
The other remarkable thing was the informality. Over the week i've grown to realize that the formal practice of business meeting with which i am familiar is partly due to the large size of the meetings. I've not decided what i think, but i am becoming acquainted with the Quaker Police in my head, tut-tutting about the form.
The meta-Quaker police are going to tut-tut about THAT, as form is not the goal. And i think a spirit of Love and Justice moves unhindered in this community.
Hunting season may have started, and i worry about how gun shots will play on Christine's nerves knowing the deer that visit us and that hunting lands are directly to our east. I should go buy purple paint to mark our boundary.
Last Sunday was moderately pleasant, too, and instead of yard work i took off into our woods. I crossed into the hunting lands and back a couple times -- there's a bag with three propane cans and something else i should go collect for the trash that i found. I assume they are empty, and i assume they were left by hunters and not the litterbug previous owners.
I started out near our eastern boundary and cut west, finding a massive sweetgum (liquidamber) and the large rock that had tickled my father. There's no loam in places - the clay shows through a bit. I saw a fairly common orchid and some wintergreen. The southwest corner is well marked with a pipe. Cutting back east i found thickets of autumn olive and the ground covered with stilt grass. I was waving my walking stick in the air ahead of me to clear the orb weaver webs and then whacking the grass, to alert any snakes. Despite looking at my location on my phone I got turned around more than once. It's Mirkwood, i tell you, Mirkwood back there. If there are Hobbit capturing spiders i will not be surprised.
Ugh.
It was a bit depressing, and i stalled on yard work this week. Today i will get back in the groove. In good news, there's no honeysuckle back there. I did see a place where one of the giant vines of poison ivy had apparently collapsed under it's own weight right at the edge of our clearing. I've no idea what to do with that: "nothing" sounds like the right plan.
--== ∞ ==--
Another thing that happened last Sunday: I attended my first Meeting for Business at the FUM meeting. Of two remarkable things, one was that they discerned about a slight change in wording in their minute to repeal HB2 (the "Bathroom" bill). An out transwoman in their community had concerns about how the wording made it sound as if the meeting did not reject the bathroom provision but all the others. No one was defensive (although there may have been a long email thread to which i was not party), there was compassionate discussion -- including for those who have been stirred up to fear -- and the minute was adjusted promptly.
The other remarkable thing was the informality. Over the week i've grown to realize that the formal practice of business meeting with which i am familiar is partly due to the large size of the meetings. I've not decided what i think, but i am becoming acquainted with the Quaker Police in my head, tut-tutting about the form.
The meta-Quaker police are going to tut-tut about THAT, as form is not the goal. And i think a spirit of Love and Justice moves unhindered in this community.
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