A Look at the Eye Catching

One would think that living in a house for almost their whole life would lend itself to noticing the details, the fact that there are fifteen stairs from one landing to the next or that there's eight air conditioning vents downstairs. These are all things I've noticed and taken into account while rooted in my home for the last thirteen years. Even with the limited amount of time I spent in my back yard,(On account of all the bugs, and my phobia of bugs) I couldn't help but notice all of the details. The two knot holes on the right side of the deck and the bleeding heart flowers nestled behind the honeysuckle. I saw it all. Or so I thought. Not everything is always so eye catching.

There's a portion of my yard, quite a large one actually, that has climbing ivy growing on it. I say that lightly, it's a bit more like a cascading wall of ominous green that guards the far corner of the yard. The leaves march out like a small army off to war, cladding the trees in impenetrable armor and nobly staking out the rest of the yard. I always feared this section, my childlike imagination had no words to describe the horror that could lurk under a fog of vines like that, and I had no intention of finding out.

Armored Trees

 

The Cascading Ivy

 

As though my lack of interest in it were a cloaking spell, I ceased to see the looming shadow of undergrowth. It was a hulking mass with a lulling sense about it, nothing to ever catch my eye. That was, until I was parading around my yard one day after school, notebook in hand. My dad stood at his barbecue and watched me curiously wafting between bushes and trees. Out of curiousity he struck up a conversation about it:

Dad: "What is it you're looking for?"

Me: "I'm not looking for anything, I'm just looking."

Dad: "But, at what? What are you seeing?"

Me: "I'm trying to learn something new about all of these things that I've seen before just by observing them."

Dad: "Like what?"

Me: "Like.....I never knew baby's breath grew in ivy."

Dad: "That's because it doesn't"

Me: "Well then what's that?"

This came with a gesture at the ivy ridden tree in the picture above, and the culprit in question--this:

Ivy Blooms

 

I promptly sketched them with a myriad of questions in mind and went inside to research the first quality of the green behemoth that had caught my attention in years. Turns out that this is how English ivy, the invasive species common in most of North America, flowers. These little sprouts are pollinated by bees and other insects and typically spring up sparsely every fall. In spring, these umbrella like plumes form hard, dark blue berries that birds will eat and drop elsewhere. Although these berries are technically poisonous, it's really the seed in the inner shell that is dangerous, and that often gets discarded before any digestion occurs (Moore). With two seasons for pollination a year and an invasive personality, it's no wonder this ivy is everywhere; it's undoubtedly been spreading since before we moved in. And just to think, in thirteen years, I never once noticed it.

 

Isn't it fascinating how the things right in front of our faces are the last ones we see? Like our perception has been warped. We look so hard to find every rock and leaf, the divinity of every detail, but in the chaos of the minute, we can easily miss the object altogether. Maybe if we didn't always telescope in on the microscopic eye catching details, we'd see whole waterfalls of foliage hiding in our sights. It's possible that the things we see could become more eye catching than that which we have to search for. It's possible we've been ignoring some of the greatest beauty in our lives out of fear that's been so long seeded we forgot we had it. Maybe it's time to let go and embrace the obvious unseen.

 

 

Work Cited

Moore, Sarah. "Does Ivy Bloom?" SFGATE: Home Guides. N.p. n.d. Web. 26 Oct. 2014.

A Look at the Slowly Dying

Scarlet leaves,
Burnt edges--
Red rimmed eyes
that have been
rubbed too hard
at the tantalizing draw of sleep.

Hollow noises,
Whispering winds--
abandoned branches,
swaying and scratching;
a raspy voice,
raw from lack of rest.

A tired world,
Trudging on--
dragging late into the night;
A stubborn child
inevitably fading
from exhaustion.

The young, weary world is laid to rest by the passing days.

              --Mickayla Clune fieldnotes 15 Oct. 2014

Field notes 15 Oct. 2014

Welcome to fall, the season of shortening days, warm drinks, sweaters, football, falling leaves and death.

Yes, death.

At least, the way I see it. Traditionally, fall was celebrated for the biggest crop harvest of the year, but in some ways dreaded because it signaled the end of growing season. The cold sets in and the crops die. In those days, if not enough food was preserved in the summer or not enough food is harvested, it could mean a hungry winter, leading to starvation (that means death). And as we're all pushed inside, in close quarters, sickness follows as we enter cold and flu season. This includes the flu that can kill the young, the elderly, the feeble, and countless of them. The times were dark, damp and cold once fall hit and it became a hell to survive rather than a season to enjoy.

Okay, so maybe that isn't the biggest of our worries from year to year as the smell of pumpkin spice fills the air and we ready our costumes for candy collection. In fact, the most death we see is probably on the Walking Dead. Still, I see the world dying, even as the leaves change.

As the days shorten, the leaves see less and less sun. This allows chlorophyll. the chemical responsible for photosynthesis in plants to die, ending the production of green pigmentation, allowing new and pretty hues to become present, but essentially killing the leaf (Helmenstine). It's like nature's own graveyard is at our feet, and for some reason, we enjoy it. Maybe I'm being morbid, but it can't be denied, we're surrounded by death--in nature, in innocence, reported in the media, around the world. It's there. Why we choose not to think about this is really just a matter of perspective; it we don't see the death, we can forget it's happening... but should we?

Let's take this fall, and not only drink lattes, carve pumpkins and dig out sweaters buried in our drawers, but also take a look at the world, the community, our own backyard and acknowledge the death. Take it in and except it. Then maybe, just maybe, we can live in a way to make up for the death and richly balance the world.

Work Cited

Helmenstine, Anne Marie. "Why do Leaves Change Color in the Fall?" About Education. N.p. n.d. Web. 19 Oct. 2014

A look from a litte further

This week was nothing spectacular in the ever so interesting life of my yard. The leaves were moved, and I saw no change. The cobwebs were swept aside, and I met no revelations. The lawn was mowed down and there were no miraculous discoveries to be found. Like putting makeup on a corpse before a funeral, we cleaned the back yard before the icy hand of fall sweeps down on it like a guillotine. I expected in all of this to find the strange and beautiful, but I saw nothing. My world has been shifting so slightly beneath me this whole time thatin my eyes it hasn't changed at all. The one thing I did see revealed this week was the familiar stark blue sky that we become so accustomed to in the summer, and along with it, my favorite color.
It's not just sky blue, it's when that crystal clear blue is sandwiched between two clouds, it's the blue that frames the sunset and hides on the opposite horizon, that drapes along the skyline like a lace lining. It's a delicate and beautiful blue that begs with all of it's being to blend in, wishes to live its days unnoticed and reflect the beauty around it. It's my blue, and I saw it this week, slung low in the sky to contrast every leaf, complimenting without wanting to be complimented.

Plum Tree and blue sky

(Field notes 10/4/14)

 



Other than the mysterious and rebellious blue hiding in plain sight, it was static in my backyard. That was until I got a little perspective on a trip to Apple Hill. I don't think if it's a commonly known tourist spot here, but its a lovely place just past Placerville, California with a series of farms that all boast a new and exciting fall adventure (i.e. pumpkin patches, hay rides, picking apples in orchards, farm animals, craft booths, fishing ponds, and some of the worlds best caramel apples.) The whole place has an atmosphere of comfort and ease, the sweet simple life we've all gotten a little too out of touch with.

I know the trip there and the farms themselves are riddled with gorgeous views and autumn dipped trees, I was expecting it.

Roadside Aspen Trees

(Field notes 10/4/14)

 

What I didn't expect was to see so many similarities to my own backyard: black widow webs, the very thin kind with no apparent pattern; soft grass littered with fallen leaves that have lost all their green and stir in the wind like the smolders of a dusty fire; my blue in the sky, framing the horizon speckled with far off pines. It was like realizing that this huge beautiful piece of the world, this oasis I glimpse only once a year is hidden underneath my nose in my own back yard. As the sun set that day and the clouds turned to wisps of pink against my mysterious blue sky, I watched out my window as a new world that I had known my whole life flew by. Under that cotton candy sky I finally understood--this view wasn't their place or my place, this place could belong to anyone who sees it. Anyone who dares to look at the sky and take a place beneath it with their head in the clouds; get their hands on their little slice of beauty.

Our perception of the world is not assigned to us at birth, we are not to be held in one place. We are free to roam this earth and find all of its little treasures, to stick our hands in the earth and our heads in the sky and say, "This is mine." This world is ours to love and appreciate, no matter how close in we get or how far out we see. We can all feel just as at home under the cotton candy sky.

A look at the lonesome

It takes a truly lonely person to see a truly lonely world. The more often I stare out and look at the world around me the more I see a beautiful yearning, a disconnect between each tree and bird and spider and rock in all of its interwoven isolation. I see each of these little entities as lonely, searching for a way to connect to the life surrounding it, just out of reach. Like the stars that shine all by themselves; a congregation of blinking lights laying haphazardly on the black blanket of sky, all completely oblivious that there are others out there.

I see this disconnect in the lonely heart of my plum tree. Its mottled branches stretch out towards the sun, the trees to both of its sides and hanging heavily, as though the ground would even be an acceptable friend. I call it my yearning tree; it stands day after day with arms open wide, asking and never receiving the love it sends out.

I see the ache of being alone in the first waking bird. I've never gotten to see him straight on, but he comes into my yard every morning. He lands in the trees heavy handedly--shaking the branches and squawking. He takes the sleeping world by the shoulders and begs it to wake up; begs the light and the warmth to come back to him. He waits to see the world he loves with impatience, waiting for that connection.

I see the lonesome lifestyle of seclusion in the black widows I find around my yard. They lay in webs, sure and ready killers, but in the light they run for cover, hiding in the dark crevices away from prying eyes. They long for the dark like a vice. Alone they wait through the berating day for the darkness to return. In my eyes they are the loneliest of all creatures because they do not even seek for a remedy to their estranged lives. There is no hope, there is no yearning, only emptiness. The passing of days in terms of when the dark comes back.

In a way, I see the things in my yard like people. We all are lonely creatures. We can consider ourselves a part of our families, our communities, our schools, and our friends in the same way that a tree is a part of a yard. At the end of the day though, my skin is my skin alone, my flesh is my flesh. I am not owned, I am not claimed or tethered. I am utterly alone. We all are. Whether or not we overcome this is our own choice. There is a choice to be a black widow and hide, see our disconnectedness as insurmountable and draw away from the world we know. Or we can be trees, open ourselves to the world, send love without being able to expect anything in return, beg the world we love to greet us the way the early rising bird does.

We can all choose the type of lonely to be, and if we all reached out, maybe we wouldn't be so lonely after all.