What an array of weather we have had this week, all the way from cool rains, right through to the extreme humidity of our sub-tropical climate.
I think that if you compare the two photos above, you will see what I mean ~ the first photo shows a kookaburra on a bright sunny day, feathers fluffed up, and looking very handsome indeed.
The second photo shows a bedraggled kookaburra on a dull day, with feather weighted down by the drenching rain.
All of these photos were taken during the last week…….
In the next photo you can see a placid kookaburra enjoying a quiet moment in the morning mist. The purple tree beside him is a Jacaranda, a beautiful tree which puts on a brilliant show in the late spring in our area.
For a couple of months now I have seen very few rainbow lorikeets, even though most days until recently I have had thirty to forty of them in my garden at a time. Their numbers seem to have decreased, and I have no idea why. This week though, they have started to visit again, first just two, then four, and today I had six lorikeets here, enjoying breakfast at the bird feeding table.
Without the rainbow lorikeets in the garden to take photos of, photography loses some of its appeal to me. I think I would feel the same if any of my regulars stopped visiting though, they are like my own little wildlife family, right outside my back door, and I miss them when they are gone.
With summer making its way back during the last few days, Christmas being just around the corner is becoming a harsh reality……but how did the year vanish so quickly?
What a hot day it has been today! We’ve had a series of days of higher than expected temperatures since the new year began, and I’ve had enough!
In keeping with my word for the year, authentic, I am staying true to my feelings, and announcing that I’ve had enough with this heat. I’m not happy.
About 5pm, after the rain, with the thunder still rumbling in the distance. This kookaburra wanted his dinner!
The truth of the matter is, I’ve tolerated our hot summer days rather well for the last two summers, although they have been unusually cool for here. When I say cool, I mean less humid. Temperatures have still reached up to over thirty degrees celsius, but with less humidity. This summer though, the humidity is back, squeezing the oxygen from the air and leaving us all dripping with sweat!
The Noisy Miners were all atwitter on the clothesline.
Today, I made a decision of mammoth proportions, totally out of character for me, whilst at the same time being authentically me ~ I’ve ordered a small, portable air-conditioning unit, which will live in my office/sewing room. The cooler air will make me feel a lot happier.
The sky had an eerie yellow-green glow as the sun began to set.
How can anyone be expected to work with a clear head, whilst battling to think straight with their melted brain? It’s simply impossible to do so. I have work related sewing to do and so many sewing and craft projects that I can hardly wait to begin, but not in this heat!
The Butcher Bird had flitted back and forth for food all day. I think he must have stocked his larder, knowing there was a storm approaching. Here he is at 8pm.
I’m not a big fan of air-conditioners. Ceiling fans cool the air very nicely, however I don’t have a ceiling fan in my office. Tomorrow, however, I will be collecting my mini air-conditioner. The money spent on the unit and the extra electricity used to operate it will be earned back tenfold through work production, which has currently ceased, and peace of mind; no more being agitated by the hot days. And I’ll only use it on the hottest of hot days.
One of the kookaburras enjoyed a view of the sun setting from the clothesline.
There is often a display of something very special indeed to be had after an unbearably hot day, and that is the cooler relief that an afternoon storm brings. And even more special is the sky….just look at those colours!
A picture paints a thousand words! This sunset is straight out of the camera, free of any editing.
No one can control the weather and it’s no use trying to fight the heat. I think I may have just worked out a solution to staying busy, which I want to do, whilst tolerating the heat….perfect! 🙂
“Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don’t resist them; that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like.” ~ Lao Tzu.
The days have flowed naturally forward for me this past month, in fact they have flowed with so much ease that I am wondering where the last month has disappeared to. It’s not a complaint, but more of a learning process than anything. I’m actually having difficulty in finding the words here to describe how I feel.
Resistance is subsiding. I would love to be able to declare that resistance has disappeared from my life completely, but there are still occasions when I will bristle slightly, catch myself and tell myself all is well. I have learnt how to calm any adverse feelings very quickly.
I’ll be the first to admit that the recent anesthetic I had for a small hospital procedure has played its part. For two weeks I floated through each day with my feelings wrapped in cotton wool. Without the thought stresses of everyday living my household chores were completed with ease, a raised voice didn’t bring any feelings of tension, so my world just wafted along on the late winter breezes.
In realising that my anxieties over any given situation would neither make nor break the outcome I could see the benefit in letting go, giving up resistance, staying calm, letting what will be ~ be. I would even go as far as saying that my calmness may have even neutralised situations where other family members were involved.
During my time of still being under the peaceful spell of an anesthetic I made the choice to continue this gentle life after the chemical cushioning had left me, to allow the magic of life to just happen.
Situations are what they are, people do not change unless they choose to do so themselves, the world continues to spin, night becomes day and day becomes night again. The sun continues to rise, the tides ebb and flow. Birds build their nests and look out for juicy worms to catch. A baby is born, someone loses a loved one. And these events will continue, day after day, whether I am stressing, or not.
This must be why there are people who become hooked on drugs or alcohol, I contemplate. When the cushioning is felt, it’s a feeling you want to have stay around forever. How sad it is though, when the addicts don’t realise that chemical substances will wear off, needing to be replaced time and time again. I wish for those people that they eventually can find the magic within themselves, without the chemicals.
Life experience has brought me to the place where I’m now at. The difficulties of life are our greatest teachers. If you have read my last two posts, you will know what I’m talking about, how resistance can take us to an unhappy place. Talking, honestly, the kind of talk in which we wear our heart on our sleeve to our loved ones is a great remedy.
Imaging the worst case scenario, which I did before my bliss-giving anesthetic, only to learn that there was nothing wrong with me in the first place was a real eye opener for me. Worry didn’t change the reality of the situation, but worry may, and probably would have, caused a major health issue. Who needs that?
We will always experience human feelings so long as we are alive. Joy, pain, happiness, sadness, we want to feel emotions, but what is worry, is it even a real emotion? I know it can be destructive, so I am working towards banishing it from my life completely. I hope you can do the same. Show worry, resistance and stress out the door; flow with the tides of life, accept and enjoy what is.
These beautiful kookaburras who came to my garden when we were digging around in the earth, waiting patiently for a worm or some other grub to show itself for them to swoop down and enjoy for their dinner don’t seem to have a care in the world. We have so much to learn from animals and birds. They stay calm, remain patient, don’t complain about the sun or the rain, cold or heat, and they don’t hold any grudges against that dratted bird next to them who catches the worm before they do!
We have the choice, we can choose to put our busy minds into neutral and allow the magic to happen. It takes practise, but it can be done. How cool is that? 🙂
“Suddenly to be transported to that place where the air was so still that it held its breath, where the light was so golden that the most ordinary things were transfigured – to be transported into that delicate warmth, that caressing fragrance…..” ~ The Enchanted April, Elizabeth Von Arnim (1922).
Mount Warning in all its glory.
The month of April really has been the most enchanting month, with the sun’s rays losing the harshness of summer, yet the cooler winter air has not yet arrived. More and more flowers are breaking out in bloom as each new day arrives, the breeze is the gentlest I have felt it in a long time and the birds flittering around the garden are just happy to be alive.
I’m happy to be alive; I wouldn’t want to miss out on a single day spent in the garden at this most beautiful time of year.
Prince of Orange.
“Gardening is about enjoying the smell of things growing in the soil, getting dirty without feeling guilty, and generally taking the time to soak up a little peace and serenity.” ~ Lindley Karstens.
A favorite in the garden, my Tibouchina tree.
The bees are buzzing, the butterflies are fluttering, and oh how I love to get my hands in the soil. I can feel a trip to my local garden centre is imminent, and I’ll probably arrive home with way more plants than I intended, but that okay, there’s always room for just one more beauty in the garden.
No shortage of lemons.
During the last couple of weeks I have made two Lemon Meringue Pies, which is Ben’s favourite, as my lemon tree branches are overloaded, almost to breaking point, with huge, juicy lemons.
If there’s one thing I enjoy as much as gardening, it would have to be picking freshly grown fruit and vegetables straight from the garden and bringing them indoors to devour with my family.
Crazy clouds on a fine day.
“In my garden there is a large place for sentiment. My garden of flowers is also my garden of thoughts and dreams. The thoughts grow as freely as the flowers, and the dreams are as beautiful.” ~ Abram L. Urban.
Blooming Dahlias.
Tomorrow, when the month of May is here, I expect the weather will begin to cool down somewhat and by June we will all be wearing warm jumpers again for perhaps two or three months. These photos belong to April though, and needed to be shared before we bid April goodbye again for another eleven months.
This has been the most Enchanting April I can remember, ever. Did I say that about last April? Perhaps. But that’s okay. I will probably go into raptures over my garden and the wonders of nature all over again next April as well.
A lone Kookaburra.
“….April came along softly like a blessing, and if it were a fine April it was so beautiful that it was impossible not to feel different, not to feel stirred and touched.” ~ The Enchanted April.
Three for dinner.
I’ve spent so much time in the garden lately that I have hardly found any time to read at all. I have come across more books written by Elizabeth Von Arnim though, including “Elizabeth and her German Garden” and “The Solitary Summer”. Being the keen gardener that she was, it is little wonder that Elizabeth was able to describe the beauty of the gardens at San Salvatore in “The Enchanted April” so poetically.
Mind your manners now….
“It pleases me to take amateur photographs of my garden, and it pleases my garden to make my photographs look professional.” ~ Robert Brault.
Butcher Bird.
All of my regular feathered friends continue to visit me for their breakfast and dinner each day. Their little in-built timers tell them all to arrive at around 7 am each morning, then again at around 4:30 pm. The Kookaburras dominate, the Magpies seem to rank second in the chain and my sweet little Butcher Birds are left to clean up the dregsy remains. (We don’t let the Kookaburras and Magpies know it, but I usually take out a little something extra for the Butcher Birds after the others have left.)
Drooping seed pods.
My hours spent in my garden will always be blissful. It doesn’t matter at all whether I am watering the garden, feeding the birds, digging out weeds or planting new flowers, my garden transports me to another world, a blissful world, an enchanting world…..
“When was the last time you spent a quiet moment just doing nothing, just sitting and looking at the sea, or watching the wind blowing the tree limbs, or waves rippling on a pond, a flickering candle or children playing in the park?” ~ Ralph Marston.
Monday, 28th January, 2013.
The interesting weather conditions have not let up today, if anything they have worsened. It appears that we are surrounded by a cyclone, high pressure systems, troughs and fronts, if that means anything at all to any of you. It means nothing to me, I just look out the window and see the trees blowing willy-nilly, branches flying off the trees, rain overfilling the bird bath and the birds huddling together in the shelter of our veranda.
“I dropped some!” This young kookaburra came onto the veranda today, out of the wind, and enjoyed a morsel of food.
We lost power last night at around 7.30 pm I think. After reading by torch-light for some time I decided to take advantage of the darkness and have an early night.
The power returned at some time overnight, I have no idea when, but it was back this morning. I planned a day of washing, ironing and vacuuming (all the fun stuff!) seeing as the great outdoors was fit for neither man nor beast.
Well, the Gods of the Power Plant had other ideas. By 10.30 am, the power had disappeared yet again.
All day we waited. I filled the washing machine with dirty clothes, all set to press the start button when the power returned.
I waited some more.
All set for a new year at school.
My son returns to school tomorrow, so we covered his books and put his name on all of his belongings. I’m not sure why I bother putting his name on things, he loses them anyway.
We ate lunch. We made drinks of tea, boiling the water on the gas burners. We hand washed the dishes that had been stacked into the dishwasher. The house remained dark, due to the inclement weather.
My husband went to the supermarket to buy kerosene for the old kerosene lamp. We may be in for another long, dark night.
I read a few pages of a new book I have. Then took a nap.
I never, ever even so much as feel drowsy during the day, but today, I did.
Can you see the dolphin leadlight-look design in this lantern?
When I woke up, the night had arrived, still there was no electricity and the candles were alight.
And here is a seahorse.
Tuesday, 29th January, 2013.
“Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.” ~ Buddha.
As you can see by the date, a new day has dawned and this post didn’t reach the point where I could hit the publish button. Thank you WordPress for auto-saving drafts! I had been saving as I wrote, but this morning I discovered that my writing had been saved mid-word, which I didn’t do manually.
This bumble bee looks far happier in my lantern than it would be outdoors right now.
Our evening meal was cooked last night by candlelight, using the gas burners of our stove top. As we began eating, the power returned.
My son had cheered, after declaring that he had never in his entire life spent such a boring day; with the return of the electricity to the house he could now watch the cricket on television and charge his mobile phone.
I had mixed emotions. Having paced around the house all day, wondering what to do next in our home which had been converted to pre-power days, it had given me the opportunity to contemplate how people back in those day filled their days, as yes, I too had spent the day feeling bored.
Mr. Frog, all aglow in the candlelight.
Life would have been so different, back in the days when life had to be planned around the natural light of day. I know I wouldn’t have been bored at all. I would take the lack of electricity for granted and plan my days accordingly.
As it turned out, when the lights came back on in our house and the candle light was no longer necessary, I felt quite sad. My eyes had become accustomed to the gentle light from the flickering flames. I had also enjoyed the silence in our home, hearing only the sounds of my families voices, the piano being played and the heavy breathing of my sleeping dog.
It had been magical, listening to the sounds of my son playing the most beautiful tune on the piano, one which he had taught himself during the school holidays. I had enjoyed the softness of the candlelight and the kerosene lamp.
I discovered that listening to the piano being played by candlelight is simply enchanting.
The gentle golden aura of the kerosene lamp was a welcome change to harsh, electric lighting.
The only real gladness I had felt was in knowing that I could return to the computer, to write again, and to see the photos I had taken throughout the day.
I’m quite sure those people who lived back in the days before power would have rather enjoyed the internet too. 🙂
What an array of weather we have had this week, all the way from cool rains, right through to the extreme humidity of our sub-tropical climate.
In My World 