encounters
Pickle Juice.
The brightest green
to wash down lunch
The midday sun scorching
Us, crouched in shade
I didn't know I needed it
This badly
It's like that sometimes
A bite of salt and vinegar
Grabs me as I swallow
Immediatly: rejuvination
I am strengthened
by a sip of pickle juice
today's haul!!
~ ~ ~
Oh boy! It’s been a silly one. Perhaps it was the cooler temperatures? Encounters with critters? The way that spring seems to be sweeping through at such a phenomenal pace? Or maybe we are just getting loopy from all this time in the sun. Likely, it’s all of it….
Everyone is blooming. It’s happening so fast! And this week truly felt like a party in the desert - finding new friends at every turn. I pass by a cheesebush, counting it - oh hey there, three little beetles just hanging in the shade. I look down at my foot - what a nice spot you’ve found, dear grub! I stop to check out a flowering tree and the bees have beat me to it. Dragonflies and hummingbirds appearing out of nowhere and vanishing just as suddenly. I’m basking in the glory of Asclepias flowers turning to delicate pods right before my eyes, wondering out loud if monarch caterpillars depend on this species of Asclepias, when a yellow, white and black caterpillar appears to greet me on the long, smooth stem (not a monarch, but a Queen Butterfly). As Beatrice and I walk down a wash full of giant, yellow-dotted Palo Verde (Cercidium florida) trees, a jackrabbit bounds across our path. And then, after stumbling upon the most lusciously blooming Ironwood (Olnya tesota), we stop to watch a beetle happily munching a freshly-plucked purple-and-white flower easily their own size.
Desert Ironwood (Olnya tesota) flowers. Purple felt like a whole new color out here.
Queen Butterfly caterpillar on Asclepias subulata (whitestem milkweed)
And it all peaked on Wednesday night. After settling down on my mat in the sand under the chaotically spreading branches of an Ironwood, I fall asleep looking up at the almost-full moon and a few scattered stars through the branches.
I wake up to a “sckwhaaaaack”. What? Hm, a bird? Back to sleep.
“SCwaaaCkkk”. This time I open my eyes and actually peak into the darkness. Is that a bird-shaped lump in the tree above my head? Eh, I’m probably imagining. I’m tired. And it’s not a very pretty sound.
“sccWWAAAAACK”. Ok. Who’s there? Now I can see them moving around, turning their head back and forth, shifting on their branch.
“SWACKK, CRWACCK, waaaaaCK ….. … … whoo whooo”. It’s an owl!! A great horned owl (Beatrice looked it up this weekend). Sitting in the tree right above my head. Shifting around up there. Waking me up at strange intervals. Even as I lay in the moon-lit darkness, slightly annoyed at this uncalled-for alarm, unsure who is causing a ruckus above me, I marvel at the size of this bird, at its company, so close to me as I sleep. What an honor to be out here with so many others in this expanse of sun and sand. What a surprise to find it absolutely teeming with life.
Later on in the night I hear Beatrice moving around, saying something about a fox? I rudely ignore her in my half sleep, probably saying “what” or “oh, wow” or nothing at all.
In that expectant time just before the sky begins to light up, when you can sense the end of night but not yet see it, I open my eyes to begin packing my things. I open my eyes to find myself staring into the face of a fox, who is looking at me from next to my backpack. Well, hello cutie! Their tail as big as the rest of them. Light brown fur. Beautiful, healthy, looking quite happy. She turns and runs off, only to come back looking for food scraps many more times before we leave.