A new month....

It has been almost a month since I last posted here. Almost a month since I last took a walk down my dirt road. Why so long? I don't really know. But Sunday changed my attitude. Or should I say Monday did. Sunday was a day full of rain as Irene hit Vermont as a tropical storm. I guess the problem is we aren't a tropical kind of state. By the time Monday morning came with its clear blue skies and fresh breeze the amount of damage done by this storm was starting to be realized. Land, buildings and lives had been lost. What was, was no longer. Our serene state was filled with the cries and tears of hundreds if not thousands. We were rudely jarred out of what might be called by some 'the Vermont state of mind'.
I was asked to take pictures of the road damage in our little town. So my husband and I got into our vehicle and spent the next 5 hours driving and walking the roads of our town. I walked were I have never walked before. I walked over gravel, stones and climbed over boulders. I walked up and down roads familiar to me only from the view through my windshield. Then finally today I walked my road. I had stopped and taken pictures of the damage to my road on Monday but I didn't walk it. Our road was still fairly intact on the west end so we were not completely cut off from the rest of the town or state. But today the road called out to be walked once again.
The damage is minimal relatively speaking. Bit and pieces missing, ferns, grasses, small trees and brush bruised and damaged by the swift flowing water. Our road crew will eventually get here and fix what issues need to be fixed. Our road is not on the top of the list as we still can come and go as we please. Our electricity will eventually be turned on and the sound of the generator will be silenced till the next time it is needed.
Today it was different. As I walked I could hear in the distance the 2 town dump trucks burdened with gravel coming and going on Herring Hill. Around me was the vague hum of generators. The air doesn't smell so strongly of dirt today. On Monday that was the pervading smell, dirt. Dirt from farms and yards. Silt that had followed the current through our beaver pond leaving an edge visible to the naked eye between dirt laden water and clear water. Marking its trail as it ran through the woods to catch up once again with creek in once was a field. Leaving behind a fragrance of dirt. Today the creek runs clear again unlike the rivers still carrying the debris and dirt further south.
I listened to the screech of the hawk, the call of the birds. I saw the bees and the dragonflies. I marveled how the world had changed yet stayed the same. My thoughts went to the survivors of Katrina and other disasters and I wonder if this was how they felt. Coming out and seeing that everything had changed but somehow, it was still the same.
Is this what makes us go on? Even knowing that it can all be wiped out. All the years, the work, everything can be gone in an instant. But yet we do it again and again. We pick up the pieces, move the dirt, get the hammers out and start again from nothing. In five years will a stranger coming into town have to be told of what was? Will this be the stories told in the future? 
I remember as a kid seeing a pole down on Rte. 47 in Hadley, MA. It stood in front of an old house and in very neatly lettered hand on small wooden plaques were dates and depths. For this is how they measured how high the Connecticut River had rose in that spot over the years. Will the date August 28, 2011 be neatly painted on a plaque in Brattleboro and place on a building benchmarking where the water rose to? Will there be a memorial in Wilmington, Grafton, Wardsboro or any of the towns so devastated by this disaster? 
I don't know any of the answers but I do know what I see and hear from the people of this town and the residents of this state. They will rebuild if they can. They will stay here if at all possible and they will help their neighbors without being asked. In some cases even before they help themselves.
It tears at your heart when you see so many suffer. But it also opens your heart to being able to care more for others. I am very proud to live in this state. And even though I am not a 'Vermonter' by birth I am by choice. This is where I have chosen to live and hopefully where I will end my days, in Vermont.

Geese!

I had mention how quiet our dirt road has been since the mysterious disappearance of our Canadian geese. Well this morning the silence was broken. Two geese flew overhead while I was taking my walk. I won't pretend to understand where they have been or why only 2 have come back, but I am glad to see and hear them.
The veggie gardens are in full glory right now. Yep, I'm one of those mad gardeners that spends the winters dreaming of fertile soil and seeds. I have a stack of catalogs for seeds, gardening supplies and books about gardening next to my bed. My bookshelves are filled with volumes of books on gardening, about gardening and anything having to do with growing plants. Yes, I love to garden.
The thrill of it I suppose, is the fact that during the winter I know it is all out there but somehow with the cold and snow I forget about how glorious it all can be. From the first blush on the maples till they drop that last scarlet leaf it is all somehow it is all magical. To think in April the sides of the road were bare. Brown dead grasses, leaves and assorted debris lay there. Now the grasses have heads nodding in the breeze full of seed for next years crop of plants. The trees are covered with leaves, large, small, sharp edged and lobed. Birds have come and raise their broods in and around my gardens. My ornamental grasses are four feet high or taller. Every day I am awed by the colors and different sizes of the daylilies. My 'Winky Pinky', a lovely conical shaped hydrangea has formed flower heads that although white right now will change to pink. There are pumpkins, squashes and beans. Gilfeather turnips are growing larger as I type this.
Of course with all this glory comes the weeds. I don't even know the names of half of them. Some are grasses, some have flowers but all are just ticking me off. I always have good intentions of mulching, keeping ahead of the weeds. But suddenly I look out and there they are, silently and stealthily creeping, crawling and winding their way into my gardens. Now some I don't mind. I have a lovely stand of 'Joe Pye Weed'. Tall and graceful and to me smelling slightly of baby powder. The golden rod just pops with it's bright yellow. But others like bind weed, jewel weed and crab grass just drive me nuts. Some areas it doesn't matter if a few weeds should pop in. There are so many perennials that they almost choke out the weeds. This is the part of gardening I could do without. Or at least I could do with somebody else doing the weeding.
But it is all good. Fall will come, the gardens will get cleaned up and out. The geese will leave (and this time I will know why). Winter will come, the ornamental grass will eventually succumb to the weight of the snow and disappear under it. The 'Winky Pinky' blossoms will turn brown and be blown away. I will forget promises made to myself about gardens and weeds and how much work it all is. Sometime in November the first catalog will arrive with pictures of veggies and flowers and promises of next spring. And I will fall in love with the whole idea again. And then I will wait to hear the geese. Knowing if they are here, spring cannot be far behind. And hopefully next year our dirt road will not have to endure that silence again. After so many years living here I have gotten use to the ebb and flow of life. And I expect that it will not always be the same. But the geese seem to be my constant. They reflect the rhythm of the seasons. I hope as long as I live on this dirt road the geese will continue to come and I will hear them and see them in their daily flights. It's one of the things that makes living out in 'the boonies' worthwhile.