mumma yaga

 Oct. 30 This rainbow seemed to plunge right into the valley below us, and then the sun dropped below the ridge and the rainbow was gone.   Where has October gone? The days have blown away like the leaves and we are suddenly at its end! I have been caught up in caring for this baby. I had forgotten, not mentally, but viscerally, what it is like to have a toddler in the house, and how, as with a new puppy, you follow them about all day. Or they are in your arms while you do the things that need doing, or you are feeding them, then putting them down for a nap. All the time the two of you talk to each other, babble about what you are seeing, hearing, feeling. It is hard to find time for my own interests, they trickle to the bottom of the box.  Here is our little person, examining the condition of the dry-stone wall. His father and grandfather are dry-stone "wallers". The rabbit hat is cute yes, but more importantly it seems to be comfortable and so it stays on!  At the ...

Oct. 18 Rain says to Fox, "Purses are private, we don't go in them." This is exactly what I used to say to Rain and her sisters when they were children. ***** It rained again last week, over 90 mm. in 24 hours. There is water everywhere on the hill; all the ponds are full, the streams are running, carrying the burden of leaves along with them.  At nightfall we heard the water, hundreds of streams running down, like we heard in the spring.  Saturday morning clouds are asleep in the valley.  Rocky sits and waits while I watch the valley. As the morning warmed, mist formed and flowed up the hills as the running water became clouds once more. ***** I can never decide if the yellow trees look more amazing against a grey sky or against the blue. When it's grey the leaves seem to throw off light, as if they are lit up inside!  ***** Certain stones in the woods stay bare and unmossed. They are often granite carried down from the Canadian Shield by the glaciers. The quartz, w...

Oct. 11  A fox in the sky: ... a fox in the farm yard! ***** Moon almost full (on the 9th), with a red halo, against the blue and grey clouds, and trees, still in leaf,  black against the pale sky. Coyotes sang and another creature wailed, near, just in the valley. A few days in, October became real, lifted itself off the flat paper calendar and became falling leaves, autumn chores, and turning out winter wear.  The late-season sun is still warm; the nights, though cold, seem to call one out, to see the moon rising, to look for stars, to listen. The red, red-yellow, and yellow leaves, suddenly underfoot and on the hills, painted or woven or sewn like rags together, are lovely, because they fall with abandon, letting go, letting fall, like sighing and laughing at once. ***** Since we returned in September, Rain has come to the vineyard some days to work; she works on-line for a small shipping company. I care for Fox while she is busy; she is nearby if he needs her, but he ...