Quickening Moon

Some cultures refer to the second full moon of the year as the "quickening moon". I heartily agree with the name. Thawing has begun in Dragonwood. All the beasts and birds are becoming more active. We hear lots of birdsong, owl hooting, and woodpecker knocking. This past weekend, the Lord of Dragonwood started to feel better. I helped him strip wires and prepare for running speaker wires. One of the nice things about building your own house is that you can build in surround sound! The kids helped clean and clear the spaces that we are finishing up. Over the past week or two, I've observed the robins and the geese returning. Branches I brought into the house have opened into soft green leaves. The Lord observed a hawk on its kill right at the end of our driveway! All this melt is making me antsy to begin laying out our garden beds for the coming year. It's hard to be patient when you know warmer weather is coming!

Leeches and a Musical Moment

It's been a wet Spring. The forest is lush and green, and so are the weeds in my garden. I can barely keep pace with them. Leeches stretch across the driveway, black and glistening. They look like giant earthworms as long as my hand from wrist to longest fingertip. They are Annelids, segmented worms like their cousins. It is beautiful to watch them move, stretching and bunching with peristaltic action, blindly seeking their ways across the gravel. Above sits a now-hidden hawk's nest. I found a feather one morning, just as I was singing:

"Oh what a beautiful morning,
Oh what a beautiful day,
I got a beautiful feeling...
(here I stooped to pick up the feather I had just noticed)
Everything's going my way!"

Indeed, sometimes there ARE moments in life that are straight out of a musical.