August 20, 2009 – 8:42 pm
A few weeks back we discovered another gift from 1011 12th Street, a plum tree, in our very own yard, laden with delicious tiny plums. Actually no one knew what kind of tree it was for a long time. There were guesses that it was a cherry tree by the looks of the fruit. Someone tasted an early fruit and absolutely didn’t like it. I think the unripened fruit freaked them out. We all avoided the tree. But then a nice man came and was pumped and picked handfuls and shared the goodness with us. Now we know.
So, this week I decided to pick a few buckets before they were gone. Margot hung out with me the whole time. She finds solace in the shade of this tree. She is able to watch birds and remain aloof all day. But she was happy for me to come visit her in her zone.
It took be about an hour to pick and pit. This I did alone. It was fun and therapeutic. Afterward I had a bowl of pitted fruit and stained hands.
That is not to say I did all the work myself though, really I only did the easy part. Laura picked up some jars and sugar at the coop. We had a late night of making some decent tart jam. Exactly as I want jam to always be. Not too sweet, nice and gooey.
It was our first time canning and it was a real experience. I was extremely nervous and intimidated by the process. Laura reassured me and told me that I was a geek for freaking out too much. Turns out, the process is really mellow and now we have seven jars of extremely delicious plum jam. We are saving some for the winter when fresh local fruit is scarce.
I’m really only writing this post to boast. Sorry, but it is so delicious and I think about it constantly, like LOST.
Five-minute ferry ride to another Island for lunch, tested out one of the land cameras we found in the old darkroom at the DoS.
This morning the lake was warm, our palms stained from thimbleberries. Summer on Fidalgo Island — rules pretty hard.
Have you ever done this? Man, lake swimming is pretty amazing. Part of growing and living in “SoCal” is the ocean, you don’t have lakes. Lakes are something entirely different. They have a different kind of mystery. The ocean can be brash and noisy, but lakes are more quiet about their secrets, they silently suffer.
Although I miss the salty waves and bobbing around in the swell, I have fallen in love with swimming in lakes. Lakes are something we have an abundance here on beautiful Fidalgo Island. There are like ten. So far, my favorite is Trafton (pictured above). I was told that it is very magical and I believe it. It was made by a meteor. The water is the color of rust. Much darker than any of the other lakes.
But isn’t this an island, you ask, isn’t there ocean surrounding you on all sides? Well, yes, that is true, but it is not like La Jolla Cove with its rhythmic waves and tickling Garibaldi. The ocean is more like a bay — and it is very cold — even for Lynne Cox, maybe. There is one “swimming” beach nearby though, it is waist deep forever:
April 13, 2009 – 10:33 pm
We are having a party, let us give you a proper goodbye.
NEWSFLASH: We’re out, yo.
Come May 1, 2009 we are moving out of the desert and into an old fire station near the forest of the snow owl (see B). Eagles will rest on our shoulders as we pick wild berries and we will learn great truths from the ferny depths. There will be mushrooms and ocean and cool dudes on motorcycles. We may meet this friend. There will most def be lots of musics and “art” and references to these symbols:
Department of Safety! (We are going to live there.)
We must heed the call of the mountains.
GET SOME WHILE YOU CAN. We are.
January 28, 2009 – 12:30 pm
Our living room has two big windows. They function as the main cooling element for our whole apartment. Last June, one of the screens fell out (and Margot went with it!). It is hard to describe the process of getting that screen back, but I will do my best.
But first! Let’s talk about the functions of screens and windows. Our apartment has outside walls mostly on the South side of the building so we get direct sun pretty much all day. And living in LA it gets fairly hot in the summer, like really hot. So all summer when we were less one window, we were burning up. And because we are energy conscious badasses, we are totally decided against buying an A/C.
But you may be asking, why didn’t you just open the window anyway? Well, let me tell you. We have a paralyzing anxiety about opening that window. What happened is, one night we were reading downstairs and we were so hot that we had to open both windows. While we were reading a HUGE COCKROACH FLEW IN THE WINDOW AND INTO LAURA’S FACE. That’s real, a true story. It was deeply traumatic.
So, since opening the window equals shepherding Margot and weird subconscious anxiety, we haven’t, for about 6 months. Well, that’s a lie. Sometimes we have to, like one night when we were sauteing chilies and couldn’t stop coughing. But it’s rare… and for < 5 minutes.
But now, today, six months and a day from when the screen fell out, we have two screens again. Let’s hope this is a metaphor for our country.
and it made us blush.
