plum tree in bloom, where the cats are buried. last day of may.

this is what i ate today, along with some asparagus fresh from the garden. the single false morel that grew out on the yard. i waited a couple weeks for it to grow, (have some friends even, but no...) it tasted all right, but it kind of felt silly to do all the boiling and rinsing and repeating over one little mushroom.

a packet arrived from japan, an order number n from uguisu. actually, it had come on friday, but it didn't even occur to me to go get the mail (it's a bit of a walk). nothing usually comes on a friday, and i sure wasn't expecting anything yet. five days from japan is pretty good. from the states it's a two or three week wait.

yea... i just had to buy another pair of those silk toe socks, i'm hooked. another issue of tennen seikatsu magazine, too. and a gauze towel with butterflies. now i have a set for all seasons. sakura, butterflies, mushrooms and snowy rabbits. plus snowflakes. winter's so long over here... in the packet i found an extra kitchen towel, a gift. i was so touched i teared up. maybe i like the gauze towels a bit too much, or it could be the sensitive time of the month. i also cried while watching got to dance and a bit over the warm night air while i took a stroll. quite a bit, to be honest. it's also a sensitive time of the year for me. and it's come so suddenly. the nights hardly even darken anymore. it's less than a month to the equinox.

i seem to have reached another level of maturity, eating dried figs as candy. i never used to like them before, not at all. and now out of the blue i can't get enough. i suspect potassium deficiency.

oh, what a dull post with photos of an ugly fungus... i'm sorry. this is all there is left to my life, eating the forage and shopping online for nice things even though i have nowhere to put any of it.

there are little treasures growing in the shady groves. i found these tiny, lavender-coloured violets when i sort of stepped off the road into an area usually covered by tall ferns, trying to find out why a tree was creaking so loudly. this has been our home since 1984 but i don't recall ever seeing them before. i picked some for pressing and also some ferns and herb paris shoots, woodland bouquet for a vase.

wood sorrel is in bloom all over the place. we call them fox's bread or cuckoo's cabbage. i'm especially fond of them, i believe because they gave me my first experience of what it's like to pick and eat something delicious straight from nature. and they are beautiful.

summer came today on the wings of a swift. i was already forewarned last weekend, by a dragonfly that rested by my blanket for a while. i spent an entire day just sitting under the oak, watching it unfurl its buds, sketching things i saw fly by. a raven was one of them, i waved my hand like i always do, and it stopped on top of a tall tree to sing some raspy songs. i can't even begin to describe how much it means to me that they have taken residence in this area, and that they take notice of me like they do.

another thing that marks the beginning of summer is wasps. every year, for a day or two, they find their way indoors, one by one, or maybe just the one, and i keep escorting them out. and then they stop. we did that routine on sunday. so, officially, summer can begin.

my dad surprised me with a hedgehog the other night — my favourite! it's never easy to bite into one though, i always get rid of the eyes first... the inside is made from cake and pastry leftovers and whatnot, it's dense and cocoa-flavoured, sometimes there's rum or other liquor. this is the fancier version, the 'potato' one is just a lump, sometimes with a dusting of cocoa powder on top. as a child i always had a potato pastry and never could quite finish one, they used to be huge. in the cafe my family frequented, which sadly quit business a few years ago, they always had bits of meringue and other indentifiable cake parts in them. reuse and recycle, indeed.

this was the beginnings of dinner. first asparaguses of the year... so incredibly tasty. i like to roll them on a hot pan with just a smidgen of oil. oregano, purple giant hyssop and bistort i just stir-fried with some frozen veggies, sprinkled the chopped-up chives on top and that was it. rhubarb and mint got turned into dessert, again just boiled in sugared water until tender and layered with plain yoghurt. i can't get enough of it.

goatweed, that wild leafy border in the photo, is edible too (and quite tasty) but unfortunately i can't stomach it at all. but that doesn't stop me from picking and enjoying the sprouts every now and then anyway. i'm hoping to grow tolerant one day. they are so abundant in the garden.

these are fermenting raspberry leaves. i didn't have a small enough jar handy, so i covered the crumpled up leaves with a plastic bag filled with water. the idea is to keep the air out and the juices in. after a few days, when the leaves have turned dark, i will dry them. raspberry leaf is one of the best herbs for me, it's calming and eases menstruation. it tastes quite nice too, especially when prepared this way. there is no shortage of this one, either.

the raspberry bushes need some trimming and organizing, but so does everything else around here. it's really overwhelming. i have all the time in the world to tackle the tasks, but not the strength. these spaghetti arms are no match to secret garden here. we don't have any machinery besides the lawnmower, and don't really know the neighbours well enough to ask for favors. there are ditches to be dug and trees to fell. and roofs to repair.

even though there is nowhere i'd rather be at the moment, a part of me is so terrified of the decay and desolation that it makes me want to run away and never ever return.

forget-me-not smoothie. like cures like, maybe?

an awesome shade of rot. there is a photo of a disheveled moth i fished out of the ditch that would have gone with the colour scheme, but blogger is at it again rotating my pictures... it annoys the hell out of me.

i shouldn't have said anything about the zigzag adders... very nearly kneeled onto this one, hiding silently in the hay. so silently that i mistook it for dead, when the bits of twig i threw received no reaction. only when i tried to lift it with a rake, the head turned slightly. no hiss, nothing. we stared at each other for a long time and i made a request for a warning next time, to prevent any biting incidents. this was a small one and it was probably a little torpid, even though it was not a cold day.

they are not exactly shy or timid creatures, like they are rumoured to be. they do tend to stand their ground. but they are not mean or aggressive either. although this one gave me a bit of evil eye.

equisetum palustre - toxic

equisetum arvense - healthy

not sure of this one yet...

after digging up heaps of goatweed and rescuing every single worm encountered from mutilation in the (slow) process, i had my little plot to sow spinach, radish, and other goodies, nestled between the gooseberry bush and rhubarb. the latter grows at formidable speed and i love boiling a stalk or two in a dash of water and some sugar to make a syrup of sorts, to enjoy with old faithful — turkish yoghurt.

it makes me so happy to be here, nature part of everyday life, fresh food growing right outside the door. but doing these things saddens me as well. i can't keep the ache from surfacing. this should be shared, and there is only one i ever wanted to share with. i don't know how to leave the past behind. it's always right there. and especially today.

one more time... lemon butterfly & blue anemones. spring. i have better and more in focus shots of the butterfly but none as dynamic as the one above. it reminds me of a superhero.

it finally started to rain last night and i'm expecting an explosion of green in the coming days. every day has brought out something new already. i don't know what it was today, but there appeared to be some sort of shrew festival going on by our old compost pile. dozens of them were running about, jumping up and down rocks and squealing and squeaking. they seemed so gleeful. perhaps they just like the weather a bit cooler than it has been. i do too.

the days have been lusciously warm ever since mothers' day on sunday. seems like seasons just switch on nowadays instead of slowly shifting. in november snow fell and boom! — it was winter. spring came just as abruptly, one day the streets were dry and clear and that was it. and now, summer. or spring proper. i have sunburn on my collarbones and birches are folding open their tiny, sticky, green leaves and dripping sap into bottles tied to cut branches. cranes cry in the marshlands and swans are migrating back, too.

it was too hot for raking so i took to the woods in search of mushrooms. false morels are starting to pop up, and i also wanted to find a cinder conk, or chaga, but they keep eluding me. i enjoyed walking through the forest with arms bare, no mosquitoes yet. it is bone dry out there, the air smelled of hay and pine resin. tufts of winter fur from various animals were everywhere.

a huge, black adder nearly tripped me over, cutting across the dirt road right in front of me. i was lost in thought, eyeing the pebbles on the ground, but the snake was considerate enough to hiss at me before slithering away. i wish i had managed to get a photo. an adder as wide as my skinny fist, almost. we seem to have mostly the black variety around, not too many of the 'regular' zig-zag backed ones.

i did get a photo of someone equally beautiful and about the same colour. just look at the detail on the rear of that fantastic bug, who is totally posing for this shot, by the way.

hopefully i will not wake up to heavy artillery fire again, like the past two mornings. there is a military testing ground not far from here, and it has been like a war zone for days now, rapid fire alternating with what sounds like missiles. peace and quiet in the countryside, yeah right.

...

they say you can never go back home, but here i am. too tired to even feel like a loser for moving back home at 31. nothing seems real at the moment, not the teetering towers of cardboard boxes, nor the notions of not being able to go 'home' anymore... meaning my little apartment, which was so light and airy and sunshiny on the day of leaving that i cried and cried while checking all the cupboards and closets for the last time. that place did see me in tears quite a lot, i had my best year ever in there but also the worst ones of my life so far. it was necessary to move away, and luckily the bathroom was filled with cigarette smoke from next door on the last night, reminding me of that fact. still, it was tough to put down the keys and shut the door behind me.

i've been wishing for a small countryhouse to become available by this same road, closer to town, which has been luridly wishful thinking. only now such a house is on the market, and for cheap too. it's perfect, and i can't stand it, because i have no way of getting enough money to buy it soon enough, a house like that will go in the blink of an eye. the timing of it appearing just seems so fateful somehow... like it ought to become my home. it's what i need. and as usual, it's also what i can't have. not without miracles at least.


but if i do find 50 thousand euros under my pillow tomorrow morning, i will buy that little house, paint it white and the trimmings dove grey, the door dark red. i'll fill the little yard with white flowers and chicken of all colours. and i'll become sickeningly content and never complain about anything again, just blog about the renovations in my beautiful little house and all the omelettes, meringues and pancakes i'll be making. i promise.