the mark haley holler: May 2011

Ground Ivy

Have you ever noticed how little you notice on a daily basis? Honestly, who has time, attention, or capital to spare looking at life through a macro lens? Someone recently kindly commended me for finding joy in the little things. I don’t feel like I really deserve commendation. Maybe I’m just what some people would call easily amused. But that comment did make me think about little things. Really little things. And how much peace and wonder can be found searching no farther than my own yard for those little things. A song writer that I like put it thus, “Love is the little things.” Well, I’m sure that’s been said before, and by wiser people than Pomplamoose. (Really, how much wisdom can you expect to originate in a pop song?) But what if they’re right? I imagine God put a lot of love into little things. I imagine it delights Him when we find delight in them. So here’s the best I can do without a macro lens; welcome to the Mark Haley Holler Love Microcosm Tour.

As I was wandering around my water-logged yard, kneeling to take pictures of tiny flowers, Abe said, "Mommy, 'ookit dis!" And I thought he meant the rake handle, but then I saw the rake handle had a resident! Abraham was in microcosm mode too!

And here's one of my favorite little things, in a tree.

What I found out while doing this microtography was that if I got close enough to take the picture, I also got close enough to smell the smells. Ground ivy is very pleasant and minty. I kind of want to cover my whole yard in it. I got close enough to hear sounds of water moving through the dirt beneath me under the pressure from my body. I got close enough to feel the springy-ness of that ground cover vine with the tiny, white, four-pointed flowers. It was very multisensory, and it stopped mattering that it was wet and overcast. I had peacefulness for a couple of hours in the middle of a difficult week.

So, the end of the school year is nearly upon us, thank all the powers that be, and the rain that has been pretty much a constant companion throughout April took a brief break as well. With the cessation of rain came 81 degree weather with almost total humidity, but I am not complaining. It was enough that I was able to take the boys on our first, abbreviated Once-A-Wednesday Adventure of the Adventure Season. Limited time, funds, and gas made the creek on Colvin's Bend road an ideal destination. It is always a favorite, anyway. Tell a small boy he's allowed to jump in the water with his school shoes on... Happy boy!

We've been visiting Colvin's Bend creek frequently this Spring to observe the ebb and flow of run-off water from all the rain. The result has ranged from a jaunty one inch deep trickle over algaed rocks to a raging torrent that looked raft-worthy, even if it wasn't in truth. This was our first chance actually to walk up the creek bed--ever-slippery road to those who want to go someplace off the beaten path.

I think the boys enjoy this pastime as much as I do. I wouldn't suspect them of humoring me, except for the faces Charlie makes in some of the pictures I take. Perhaps this is his way of accepting his Mommy's idiosyncrasies. Bubbly stream algae? Mommy will take a picture. Spikey white flower on a rock? Mommy will take a picture. Boy on a rock? Mommy will take a picture... and as long as we find tiny turtles and frogs and get wet up to our wastes in the bargain, all this gratuitous photography is just to be borne with childish stoicism.

I didn't get a picture of the frog, by the way. It sat, frozen on the mossy ledge, willing us not to have seen it, and would've probably continued to pretend rockdom if Abraham hadn't yelled, "'Og!" and pounced at it. Alas, mom-tographers have to be quick on the draw. But this was a pretty, mossy ledge, so why waste the opportunity?

The wet spring we've been having has brought with is a abundance of flowers I never noticed before. Some, I am confident weren't there before to notice. They must like the wet. I've even found one or two that I haven't photographed, i.e. the aforementioned "spikey flower on a rock," which is some kind of Stonecrop.

Stout Blue Eyed Grass and Star-of-Bethlehem seem to like the wet as well.

The creek walk wore the kids out properly, as nothing else seems to, so we slept well at night... in a mobile sort of way. Charlie has a history of something that at least resembles night terrors. Some nights, he seemingly wakes up, completely terrified. He paces/runs back and forth crying and wailing. Nothing much will snap him out of it. It just has to run its course. We're not even really sure that he's awake. That night it was calmer, and maybe a little bit weirder. Joe and I were laying in our bed, talking, when Charlie came in. He was silent and somnolent, or possibly even sleep-walking. He crawled into the middle of our bed, and seemingly continued his night's sleep as though uninterrupted. So rare is it that we get to cuddle a totally inert, calm Charlie, that we let him stay right there throughout the night.

Abraham comes to our bed pretty much every morning between about 4:30 and 6:30 a.m. He sleeps lightly, and has built a circadian rhythm on waking up when Daddy leaves for work. So it happened that on Thursday morning, when I got up to start the day's ablutions, there were two sleep-diaper-clad, warm, skinny little bodies in the bed I left behind. When I left, they were sleeping normally. When I returned from the shower and starting some laundry, they were sideways in the bed, with Charlie's leg thrown over Abraham's head, sleeping undisturbed. Of course, when I really need it, I can never remember where I left the camera. And I was laughing so hard that I made Charlie stir. So I missed the key photo op, but I got this one instead. Little boys really do sleep in piles, like puppies.

So we've kicked off the Adventure Season in fine style, but I would be remiss if I didn't recap the months between last year's adventures and this. Since I don't have time and I'm pretty sure you don't want to read Abraham and Charlie by Hannah Tolstoy, what about a photo-recap?

WINTER