Nancy' s Nature Nook

As I say goodbye to the beautiful forsythia and cherry blossoms I welcome the next phase of growth in my yard, the daylilies, lily of the valley, ferns and so much more.

Click once or twice on picture to enlarge.

This morning as I was chatting on the phone something caught my eye, some sort of stealth operation. It turned out to be eight or so squirrels running along the tree line inside my yard. It’s not unusual to find a couple of squirrels zipping around, up and down trees in what looks like a great game of tag, but this was something else.

(Cue music: the opening instrumental riffs of “I Heard It Through The Grapevine.”) One by one an adult squirrel and a variety of young squirrels, two black and the rest gray, ran single file across the yard, skirted the property and went into the neighbor’s yard. They crossed the road and circled back to my place and proceeded to run around the house; very weird! I managed to snap a photo of one gray squirrel at pause.

On a somewhat related note, once the coast was clear, a huge cardinal landed in a tree out front. I nabbed a picture of him too.

Click on each picture once or twice to enlarge.

While having breakfast yesterday, a drizzly Sunday morning, I spotted this little bird flitting around outside the kitchen window. I think that it’s a female Goldfinch or possibly a Lesser Goldfinch. She was traveling with a slightly rotund, dark yellow male.

Click once or twice on each picture to enlarge.

I was having a cup of tea, basking in the sunshine on the little porch off the kitchen, when I spotted this young visitor.

Click once or twice on each picture to enlarge.

I just returned home after two weeks away in North Carolina, the pollen capital of the world, and found a new visitor in The Nook. I heard a loud thunk-thunking Sunday afternoon and tracked down the source of the noise. This is what I found.

http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Pileated_Woodpecker/lifehistory

Click once or twice on each picture to enlarge.

My cyclamen plant was in full bloom and looking spectacular the other day so I grabbed a quick picture of it. (Notice the witch hazel tree visible outside the window. It blooms bright yellow in early March and keeps hope alive that spring will in fact arrive.)

As I looked more closely at the cyclamen I noticed a tiny visitor lounging on one of the leaves, “sunning” itself near the shade of a pink blossom. The scene appeared to be the insect version of a Caribbean holiday.

Click once or twice on each picture to enlarge.

A few years ago I spent the better part of September in Ireland, staying in a lovely apartment which was a few miles south of Dublin and a short walk to the ocean. The weather that entire month was sunny and warm, often sunscreen worthy. A gem of a month.
One early afternoon my friend George and I decided to stroll along the seaside from Monkstown through Dun Laoghaire and on toward the James Joyce Tower (aka the Martello Tower) and the 40 Foot in Sandycove. I knew the 40 Foot to be some kind of swimming area frequented for the last two hundred or so years by those daring enough to enter its frigid waters. For most of those years the 40 Foot was strictly the province of men. (No women allowed!) They swam naked or clothed as they chose while the women and children were relegated to the boring bit of sand and sea that fronted the road. That all changed in the early 70′s when a group of Irish women libbers “invaded” the enclave and had a swim. Now the place is open to everyone.

As George and I approached the 40 Foot from the main road we came upon that tiny spit of beach and ocean bay; it was a spot I’d driven by many times and one that was not particularly interesting or appealing. We continued by walking down the short drive skirting this beach and heading toward the ocean until we reached a small building. We walked along the narrow path that curved around the side of the building and popped out standing before the wild, open ocean. The 40 Foot, in fact, is no little swimming hole, but an extraordinary deep water inlet with stone steps leading down into the Irish Sea. It’s a shock to come upon and amazingly beautiful and tempting, this roiling bit of water hidden away from everything.

George and I went as close as we could to the water’s edge and leaned against a small stone wall, our faces turned to the sun and sea, as we watched the handful of swimmers who had braved the freezing, turbulent deep. (George had a good laugh when the water rolled up over my left runner (the Irish word for sneaker), completely soaking it. She’d been there many times before, swimming and hanging out, and had the good sense to stand on my right, farther from the water.)

As we lolled about in this astounding place a handsome Irish fellow, maybe in his late thirties, came out of the water and stood behind us (and the wall). He dried himself with a towel while vocalizing, as we all do when were cold as hell, with lots of exhalations and grunts. I turned to chat with him about how cold the water was and he told me that he swam there every day. I asked him whether he took his daily dip for pleasure or for punishment. He looked at me for a moment and then replied,  “It’s a little of both……but that reminds me of a story.”

And here’s the story that he told me.

There was a man who died and upon his passing he was asked where he might like to go, to heaven or hell. The fellow thought it over and decided that he wanted to give hell a try. So off he goes and finds himself in hell. It was delightful! Everything a person might want was there to be found; he amused himself endlessly going to the movies and great restaurants, playing in the casinos and golf courses, attending concerts and dance recitals, frequenting nightclubs and partaking of any other form of entertainment he might desire. After he had been there for some time he ran into the Devil. He approached the Devil and told him that hell needed better PR because it was a fantastic place. The Devil shrugged and went on his way.

One day the man decided to do some exploring and ventured a great distance from his usual haunts. As he went further and further afield he noticed some kind of light far away in the distance and detected the slightest bit of some odor. As he drew closer he saw a giant, flame-filled vista and smelled the acrid stench of sulfur. He heard the tormented screams and cries of many voices pleading and begging for mercy, “Save us, save us, help us, forgive us.” The man was terrified and raced back to familiar surroundings.

Several days later this fellow once again encountered the Devil. Still terribly shaken and upset he explained what he had seen and heard at that awful place. “What was that? Who were they?” he asked. The Devil snickered and said,

Oh….that’s the Catholics. They insist upon it.