Orchids!

I have a good eye for Orchids! Several days ago, I posted images of two plants I discovered whist walking, and I wondered what they were. Now I know; they are both Orchids.

This is a Rattlesnake Plantain Orchid.

This is a photo, taken too close, of a Coral Root Orchid.
Sadly, you can't see the stuctural miracles of blossoms it
has. I'l try to get a better photo on another walk.

See those red mushroomy looking things? They are Coral Root Orchids.
There are fifteen of them in this photo. Click to enlarge.

I finished The Silent Patient. The best I can say is that it wasn’t a waste of time, but I have less respect for the phrase: “#1 New York Times Bestseller.”

Thursday was mostly cloudy. I dedicated myself to finishing the book, once chores and dog walking were done. I finished just in time to get ready to meet Anna and Gunther at the park. We had a great time together! I stayed until around 4:20; that was almost two hours talking and dog watching together. The sun came out and it was glorious.

I came home for a spa in the sunshine. It felt wonderful to be outdoors, ideally warm and vitally relaxed. I was in the warm wonderful water for almost an hour. Then it was time to make dinner and watch Twelfth Night. I lasted less than ten minutes. Even all jazzed up, which is how this version struck me, I couldn’t take the language. As I’ve said: I’ve been over-exposed to our Bard.

So, the evening was spent chilling on the couch with Her Highness, watching things I’d taped earlier in the week.

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My speech is back. Today is the third day in a row I’ve had full fluent speech. It’s like there’s a short in my brain wiring. Fluency comes, then it goes; the connection is made, then it breaks. The one constant is slow—glacially slow—progress. 

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I bought six pairs of leather gloves. I thought I was buying two. But now, this rural hick ain’t gunna get no more slivers! Mr. Sissyhands has perpetual protection. I have two fingers that don’t work anymore and hurt like bejesus if I do the “wrong” thing. The gloves lessen making movements that hurt my fingers.

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This morning began with a long dog walk with Eoin and his Whippets that allowed me to come home on this dull day and read by a fire, guilt free while Her Highness slept off the walk.

Toilet Paper!

I did my taxes on Wednesday, thanks to the rain and wanting to spend my day indoors. And then I took my completed form to the post office to mail it, and since I was in the village, I decided to stop to see if they had any Diet Coke. They didn’t. But they had toilet paper! I haven’t seen toilet paper on the shelves for months. I got the last package.

When I got home, it felt good to be dry and warm on a wet, wet day. I chose The Silent Patient, by Alex Michaelides to read. It hooked me right away. It’s an intriguing tale, rather than an aesthetic accomplishment. I’m really enjoying it.

Late in the afternoon, the rain stopped, and the sky lightened, and so I took Sheba for a walk. And trust me: You haven’t lived until you’ve taken a Springtime walk through a forest, wet for the first time in weeks. The air was full of forest perfumes. I have a very good sense of smell; it gives me immense pleasure.

By seven, the sun came out, only to set soon afterwards. My sunset is rather earlier than most in these parts, because I’m in the forest and so the trees bring an early end to direct light.

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Today began with a tidying of my home. 

That’s one thing about isolation: I’ve felt no need to put things away. The vacuum just sits in my living room, at hand for whenever I want to use it. And then, with so many things everywhere, I stopped cleaning because there were so many things to move. But this morning, order has been restored.

Today, the National Theatre’s Twelfth Night is up on YouTube for a week. I’ll be watching it tonight.

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I’ve made a list of things I need to do in the yard. As I do them, I know more will emerge. There are endless duties at Pinecone Park in summertime, but I have plenty of time to do them and no major project monopolizing and consuming all my time. 

The hardest part will be finishing the wooden walkway in the backyard. I did seventy percent of it last year and it’s an awesome part of my backyard. It works perfectly; it shows you were to walk. My lawns, however, need help. The grass needs to be thicker, but when I put seeds down, the birds eat it all. I’ll get some netting to put over the areas I seed, and I’ll do little bits at a time… forever.

The gardens are doing okay. At first, I thought: Man, these gardens look kind of anemic. But then all the Hostas started coming up and I forget about them every year because they completely disappear in Winter. This year, I plan to stake them—there’s another thing for my list!

I only do chores on nice days, and since today is gloomy, I’ll be doing a lot of reading. In fact, the next week looks kind of damp and dark so I’ll be doing lots of reading. But I’m also getting several Sweet Peas germinated for planting. I love their smell.

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I am desperately fond of the proudly plumbed Pileated Woodpecker who comes to visit every morning and evening. He’s scared away the Downy Woodpecker, but he has much more personality. He takes some suet, eats all the crumbs that fall on the roost, and then looks up, with his head held high, his beak pointing almost straight up. And he searches the sky; I can see his eye on my side of his head moving. 

Each visit involves pecking for two seconds, eating the crumbs for another couple of seconds and then watching the sky for about five seconds; he does that routine about ten times, and then flies away.

Conspiracy Theorists

I'm with the woman in brown.

Yesterday was beautiful I did some work in the morning but not much and none at all through the rest of the day. I had one of my morning time outs in the sun after my chores. I love having something to read, drink and eat on an outdoor lounge chair in the sun. Soon, it will be too hot for doing it.

I met Anna and Gunther as usual in the afternoon, and another fellow we’ve met before was there (Mr. X.) and later, Carmen joined us.

Anna has some strange ideas. I’ve long known that for a long time, but I don’t care. But yesterday, Anna started talking about some of her Covid-19 ideas, and Gunther, Mr. X and Carmen were all on board with her, and they really got into a sharing various reasons to disbelieve in the “official” narrative concerning Covid-19, the JFK assassination, 911 and the moon landing.

Then, at one point, Mr. X turned to me and asked,” And what about you? You’re not saying anything.”

He was right. I’d been silent for about twenty minutes when he asked me, and I didn’t quite know what to say. But before I could answer, Gunther elaborated on something Mr. X has said before turning to question me, and Mr. X. was drawn back into the conspiracy discussion.

After, perhaps, another twenty minutes, I went to Anna to say I was going to head home, and I broke up the party. 

Then I told the others: “I have a chronic mental health condition that requires that I follow some simple rules and one of them is to avoid controversy altogether. I have good mental health if I minimize my exposure to stressors, so I keep out of conversations that may cause me to relapse.”

No one said a thing relevant to what I’d said, but they all said something about seeing each other again soon, but Anna and Gunther both touched me on my back or shoulder as they spoke or as we said goodbye. It made me feel very good.  

Driving home alone, I wondered who they think is engineering all these “hoaxes;” who is the mastermind of all these engineered public deceptions? And what’s their purpose?

I’d hate to live with their doubt and their confidence of the unprovable or unproven.

As I’ve written here before: I worship at the Church of Science and Truth. Truth is the God of my proof-based philosophy; at my church there is only one purpose: To seek proven truths, for without truth, there is nothing—only chaos.  

My problem is in knowing what is true. I live in a world peopled with individuals with strong opinions and who feel free to express them. I am besieged with opinions. My friends from Rollo Park have a jingoist sense of confidence in convictions unacceptable to my Church of Science and Truth.

They believe that there is some kind of conspiracy working against them whose members control governments, the military, the press, religion, etcetera.

I, on the other hand, can’t win an argument because I am aware of my profound ignorance about many, many things—especially “big” ideas. The closest I can get to “knowing,” is to know what is publicly accepted—what is convention, that which is recognized by professional accreditors. 

What I know best is my experience and the lessons I learned from those experiences. (Lessons like not to be the only member of the Church of Science and Truth in a discussion about conspiracies.)

Plus, I “know” what I’ve been taught—all of which is, by definition, second-hand information. My capacity to “know,” is very, very limited. I live in a little tiny world of teeny-weeny concerns. I self-identify as insignificant.

Sure, I have opinions. But I know that’s what they are, so I’m insistent about nothing.

Often, as a teenager, I found myself in the company of boys who’d suddenly swerve into a discussion about faggots and queers. I found myself in a “lose, lose” situation. Damned by others if I spoke up; damned by myself if I didn’t. 

I never did. I was too chicken. And I was too chicken to say anything yesterday, too. I chose to be quiet and excuse myself with the explanation. 

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It’s raining today. It’s not heavy rain, but it’s rain and I’m happy for my gardens and for a quiet day indoors with a book.