tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-65512421957629008382024-02-20T17:56:19.985-08:00iNatureStoriesaphorisms in the way of walkingLearning how to get out of my way…http://www.blogger.com/profile/01131783016903947999noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6551242195762900838.post-83910078136356471512010-11-15T11:19:00.000-08:002010-11-15T11:42:02.957-08:00Spreckels LakeIt is a small pond really... but a real jewel.<br /><br />...and many moods too. I circle as a meditation and a bit of exercise. I live very near so I could walk to the Pacific ocean (and I do) but Spreckels Lake remains a constant for it variability. <br /><br />It is always changing. Fog hides its smallness in mystery; in sun - the rare Richmond' district event- it sparkles with miniature sailboats.<br /><br />It has made me a migratory observer of water birds: Seagulls, coots, pie-billed grebes and cormorants. Geese of course. a few ruddy ducks. mallards <br /><br />but the turtles are magnificent.<br /><br />The only 'feature' in the water is a concrete turtle that is covered by layers of living turtles in a constantly reorganizing, pick-up-sticks kind of dynamic architecture. The sun brings them out to bask but their shyness keeps them away from all edges but this little turtle island.<br /><br />It is a daily embodied reminder of the Hindu myth of world cosmology about turtles. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turtles_all_the_way_down I walk around this cosmologic world center, circling around to find my own.Learning how to get out of my way…http://www.blogger.com/profile/01131783016903947999noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6551242195762900838.post-32298713195443887562008-12-12T14:25:00.000-08:002008-12-26T10:52:55.977-08:00The Presidio Flower Memorial3/08<br />In my daily sojourns into the Presidio National park, I observe how nature moves through the city. <br /><br />The funny thing about this two year long walking tale is that it is about humans that I do not know and mostly have never seen. I only find their leavings. <br /><br />The tale begins on the last day of a young runner’s life. <br /><br />A detective intercepted me – asking questions about an unidentified young woman who was hit and left for dead on Washington Blvd<br /><br />The next day’s walk found fresh flower bouquets and grief notes tied to a fence.<br /><br />A week later, a man in black running gear, drenched in sweat from many cathartic miles, knelt silently at this spot. I walked by in fear of disturbing him. He seemed to be weeping.<br /><br />The next year was a succession of fresh flower leavings. The spot became an ephemeral memorial to the loss. As soon as the flowers wilted, they were replaced. <br /><br />As time passed, the mourners tried potted plants – in some heroic effort to keep her memory from wilting. They even dared to plant them in the Presidio soil around the spot. But the flowers were soon unearthed.<br /><br />Two years later, the fresh flowers gush only intermittently –like a seasonal spring. Recently, I saw 4 fresh bouquets all in sunset colors on my walk but on the return trip they had been swept away<br /><br />Flowers seem such an appropriate memorial to a young woman cut down - the sunny and fallen Ashlyn Dyer. I think of the black-clad sweaty, sad knight, and the driver – that unfortunate driver - that paid poor attention at the wrong micro-second. <br /><br />This flower memorial makes me a more mindful driver – because I know in an instant, I could be any one of the players in this human drama.Learning how to get out of my way…http://www.blogger.com/profile/01131783016903947999noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6551242195762900838.post-31914770120120467142008-12-12T14:19:00.000-08:002008-12-12T14:22:32.290-08:00Walk with the Mockingbirds(Published as a KQED Perspective 4/10/08)<br /><br />My exercise is walking and I do it every morning – even when I don’t have time - like today. The San Francisco Presidio National Park is literally next door - so I have no excuses and it is a particularly glorious April day. To mark it in the calendar of nature, the purple Wisteria are, in other parts of the city, giving it their all for their annual cabaret extravaganza but here in the Park I have come upon a mockingbird in full throttle.<br /><br />I stop and listen.<br /><br />Mockingbirds mimic the sounds they take a fancy too. This guy is strutting and singing to find his femme of the season. I detect in his song - a raven’s squawk, a red tailed hawk’s cry and perhaps even a wild parrot.<br /><br />Listening for his location, takes time. My eyes search high in the pines. Not there. Scanning lower, he in not in the Monterey Cypress, either. I focus harder and listen closer and this time, I find him in an understory tree almost in front of me on the trail. <br /><br />We look at each other.<br /><br />I am a bit stunned to be so close, but he continues singing – it was like he was singing to me. Sitting on a Eucalyptus stump, I give him my full attention.<br /><br /><br /><br />Then I heard it. I heard - laterally - all the other mocking birds in the forest. All staked out in separate territories, singing for their sweethearts to come. <br /><br />Suddenly the breeze was sweet and heavy and cool like spring buds. <br /><br />Next week, I will not remember my everpresent to do list but I will always remember the moment, when I sat on eucalyptus stump in the Presidio, the air was full of spring, and song and I was outrageously happy and alive. <br />Learning how to get out of my way…http://www.blogger.com/profile/01131783016903947999noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6551242195762900838.post-60984293967880113982008-12-12T14:12:00.000-08:002008-12-12T14:16:34.681-08:00Mockingbirds and Xhosa Cat calls23 June 2004 - (this was published as a shorter version in a KQED Perspective) <br /><br />I live on the edge of the Presidio forest in San Francisco; my garden stays the edge between the suburban grid of the Richmond and the Cypress-Pine-Euc forest of a hundred and fifty years ago. Its Army-made origins do not diminish its beauty nor enhance the fact that there is a war dance underground, on the surface and in the air. It is the natural order of birds and ground creatures against the human orderings of pets, machines, and gardens. <br /><br />Gophers operate the lowest tactical undercover missions tunneling into the earth. These result in mysterious disappearances of individuals in my planted rows. It is like some inverse straw that sucks the plant and air down into the earth leaving a neat little round hole where the plant use to be. <br /><br />The raccoons, skunks and my cats run a peaceful sequence of territorial occupations with German train precision. My cats set the guard in day as I water, and stay at their posts to guard the territory (and annoy the dog packs with their paid walkers) facing down the meanest mutts behind chain link bravado. When night arrives, skunks exercise their garden easement. Unless mating, they simply amble through on their way to or from Lobos Creek. They do not explain their business. I do not ask. They only lingered one romantic evening in early spring when two choose our garden for a hooting and grunting love tussle. Ignoring their screams was about as effective as in a thin walled motel room. After the skunks, the Raccoons roam in well fed family groups until early morning divining out and digging up the table scraps that I have hidden for the earthworms.<br /><br />One morning the ravens woke me. Even my cats bolted upright, thinking momentarily but edited away the next, that ravens were in bed with us. They were actually only feet from our heads but outside the walls, on the roof. Whatever the dispute, it was passionate and operatic. The screeching rose and the entire black bunch rolled off the roof to morph instantly into ravens scrambling for air. One flew away with something white, furry and newly dead in its beak, took cover in the magnificent cypress only to flee upon sight of the returning Red Tailed Hawk. There was no resistance. The Hawk simply took its kill gracefully and flew away (but I think I could see it chuckling…) I have seen this Red Tail on several occasions, patiently enduring aerial scoldings of this raven group. I have seen her circling with two or three ravens nagging her; swooping near but (not too near) to get her to back away from some well kept secret nesting site. One talon could finish any of those ravens but she just kept circling in big, blue, patient spirals.<br /><br />No matter who is in control of the ground or airspace, my resident Mockingbird commands the airwaves. This Mockingbird with a jones for urban mimicry, has made his home in my garden. Seeking his sounds from us humans; he has nurtured a dangerous fascination for the urbane. He mocks fog horns, fire engines, city vehicles backup sirens, police cruisers, and ambulances. All this mockery is delivered loud and in triplicate. It is a strange staccato rendition that begins to sound like some crazed Starwars battle soundtrack. His mating symphony continues until the magical hour of 2am when (coincidentally?) the bars close. <br /><br />I have found this even more fascinating when he began to mock me. Having a soft voice which is always the first to go hoarse in a trade show, I have perfected an exotic sound of my own that is half click, half quack. Having spent months trying to pronounce the name of an African tribe that employs this unique clicking sound in its language – the Xhosa. I can be loud when using this semi natural sounding call (in triplets) to let my cats know this is the time to come loping to me like faithful, little, canines. Or to start hiding from me, if I have offended them or for no particular reason just because they are not ready to come inside yet. It is a magnificent sound that even has deniability; my neighbors will not call me up later to ask me not to scream it under their window because they were trying to sleep. They simply roll over and attribute it to “forest sounds.” When the mocking bird began clicking Xhosa cat calls, I was charmed by my mockingbird’s extremely good taste and that I had arrived in some important way to be part of his edge ecosystem.<br /><br /><br /><br />Then I found his feathers on the garage floor. The mocking bird had not just mocked a call but he had successfully achieved the intention of the call which was certainly was not his desire, he just wanted to make music.<br /><br />The Mockingbird’s mate still lives and so do little baby mockingbirds. I could hear their practice triplets to Mom’s (sad?) assurances. My hunter cats got big kitty cowbells around their necks so they are now confined to hunting rats and mice. There is no shame for cats doing what cats do; learning to respect your own nature is what we are here to do. But one must be careful who and what you mock becauseLearning how to get out of my way…http://www.blogger.com/profile/01131783016903947999noreply@blogger.com0