Bean Counting

As June edged into July, the summer increasingly seemed marked by “that sort” of day – disjointed, frustrating, compelling, anxiety-ridden, tiring and tiresome days.

There was plenty of heat in Houston and elsewhere being measured with thermometers. There was even more heat rising around the country that didn’t seem to fit into any known scale – heated words, over-heated emotions, simmering anger and pot-boiling rhetoric. While terrible thunderstorms – even an uncommonly strong derecho – raged across the Eastern Seaboard, there was enough political and social sturm und drang to make even the most avid Wagnerian happy.

More than once, while contemplating apocalyptic imagery from the Colorado wildfires and apocalyptic language from political commentators of every persuasion, I found myself thinking of a favorite poem written by Kay Ryan. Poet Laureate of the United States from 2008 to 2010, Ms. Ryan represented the U.S. at Poetry Parnassus, a festival held at Southbank Centre as part of London’s Cultural Olympiad.

ellaella, remembered

From the beginning, she was a godsend. New to blogging and confused by the intricacies of setting up a site, I began browsing the WordPress forums, seeking answers to questions I barely could formulate.

Her avatar was the first to catch my eye. The apples – two red, a few green – shimmered on the page. I asked my questions, and she answered in a way I could understand. Like other experienced forum volunteers, she brooked no nonsense, but never ridiculed. I began to learn, and began looking for her avatar even when I had no questions.

In the beginning, I never considered why she might have chosen apples as her signature image, but in time the apples made perfect sense. Ellaella was a New Yorker at heart, a former resident and devotee of “The Big Apple”. Her favorite apple, the Honeycrisp, perfectly represented her personality – a sweet heart, accompanied by crisp, concise opinions and a tart tongue to share them.

Shaping the Gift of Reality

Long before encountering a palm tree, years before skimming across watery ribbons of lapis and azure entwined through the heart of Caribbean islands, lifetimes before walking entangled and thorned into tumbles of bougainvillea and the shadows of tropical dreams, I loved Winslow Homer and his art.

A prolific and engaging American watercolorist, Homer (1836-1910) moved from New York to Prout’s Neck, Maine in the summer of 1883. Despite his love of the New England coast, he often vacationed in Florida and the Caribbean. His mastery of his medium and his unique vision of the islands produced exquisite renderings of sun-drenched homes, palm-fringed beaches and great, vivid falls of blossoms redolent of nutmeg and honey.

During a first visit to the Caribbean, I was intrigued to discover how completely its marvelous realities entangled themselves in my mind with Winslow’s work. It seemed impossible to separate the threads. I had expected to think, “Winslow Homer’s painting looks like this.” But as I gazed about, wriggling my toes into sugar-soft sand and tasting the salt-heavy air, I came to a rather different conclusion. The Caribbean looked liked Winslow Homer. It was as though the artist himself had absorbed, intensified, and re-presented the sea, sand and sky in such a way that his paintings were distillations of the islands – purer than reality itself.

Sweet Abundance

Cooler weather and occasional showers have mitigated the drought in parts of Texas, and summer’s spectacular wildfires have ended. Still, dessicated pastures, disappearing herds, abandoned lakes and empty stock ponds make clear the continuing need for rain.

Hidden behind these more obvious signs of drought lie other consequences, equally troublesome if more personal.  Enjoying breakfast in a Hill Country kitchen last weekend, I heard a tiny sigh as I split a biscuit and reached for the glass dish holding my friend’s homemade preserves.  “That’s my last jar of peach, and close to my last jar of fig,” she said. “It’s only December,” I said. “Don’t you usually have enough to last ’til summer?”

Yes, she allowed, she usually did. But this year drought put an end to her gardens and orchards. With so little rain, the fig trees barely produced. Peaches were available from irrigated orchards, but they were expensive. Pears were the size of walnuts, and the walnuts didn’t make. Even the dewberries weren’t good, setting so little fruit she left it for hungry birds and animals. The sweet, succulent blackberries that overflowed her baskets in the past withered and died, offering up only a cup or two of tart, nearly tasteless berries. Without good berries an abundance of pies, cobblers and sauces disappeared, not to mention the brandied blackberries that always had been a holiday treat.

After Ike: A Surge of Gratitude

 

Just prior to the two-month anniversary of Hurricane Ike’s arrival on the Texas Coast, ferry service for passenger cars was reinstituted from Galveston to the Bolivar Penninsula. The primary link between an island and coastal communities that can be awkward to reach even under the best of circumstance, the Galveston ferry is both luxury and necessity. Prior to the storm, every trip across Bolivar Roads carried a combination of residents, fishermen, tourists and sightseers. Most came in cars, but many walked onto the boat just for the pleasure of crossing the water, feeding seagulls from the after deck and hoping for a sight of pelicans or dolphins playing off the bow.

After the storm, ferry service stopped, but not only because of damage to the boats. There was storm damage to the ferry landings themselves, and sand and silt deposited by surging water had to be dredged out of the channels. When it became possible to operate the first ferry, the convenience of commuters and pleasure of sightseers was the last thing on anyone’s mind. The first priority was getting heavy equipment and emergency supplies to communities like Crystal Beach and Port Bolivar, where the devastation ranged from unbelievable to horrific.

But now, anyone can use the ferries. It takes patience, because full service hasn’t been restored. But the fish are biting, dolphin are swimming, and the seagulls seem delighted to find occasional popcorn and bread crumbs in their air again. When a woman mentioned to a grocery store checker she’d made a special trip to take the ferry, I asked her why. “Because I could”, she said, looking at me as though I were a bit dim. “It sure felt good.”