Tag Archives: Arizona landscape

by | April 29, 2024 · 5:15 am

Arizona Blue Sky

Yesterday when I started on my walk, before I even left my driveway, I encountered several critters. First, a very light green plump lizard with smooth skin ran into the bougainvillea. I can’t find him on Google, so I don’t know what kind he is. Then a male and a female quail ran across the drive down into the wash. At the end of the driveway, on the little pony wall, a mourning dove took off in flight.

It could be the mother who has a nest in the hanging pot outside my house. My son took this pic of one of the babies with the mother.

Here’s a pic on my walk of a cactus in bloom and the brilliant blue sky above. This is the color of our Arizona sky. I still can’t get over it, and I’ve been here seventeen years now!

It’s getting warm here, but if I walk early enough it’s not yet a problem. That may change in a month or two. But I have another issue. At least six months ago I started getting a painful leg. it was weird because last year my other leg was so bad that for two months I couldn’t walk at all. Now the symptoms are somewhat different, but getting worse. My entire lower left quadrant, so to speak, is very painful and sometimes can be a NINE in pain. Most of the time it fluctuates between 2 and 7. I saw a pain doctor, who diagnosed me with a pinched nerve, so I will get a back MRI. In the meantime she wants me to start PT and take Gabapentin on top of my Extra Strength Tylenol. I’ll hold off on the Gabapentin as long as I can because I can’t afford to add more dizziness (a side effect) to my Vestibular Migraines. (Gabapentin brings up sad memories of my dear Pear Blossom’s cancer before she passed away several years ago).

Because the worst of the pain is while lying down and walking, the pain doesn’t prevent me from taking care of my cutie pie grandson while his parents are at work. He turned three months on Friday and has been stacking up a big list of “firsts.” First time he rolled over onto his stomach himself. First time he reached for me to pick him up. First time he started trying to form sounds with his mouth. First time he held a stuffed toy and rubbed the fur on his skin. Yes, I’m obsessed.

Yesterday I did a little art because I hadn’t in months and wanted to do something creative with my hands. I feel bad because I have cute fabric for a book cover to make a junk journal for the baby’s parents, but taking care of him has made that impossible at this point.

53 Comments

Filed under #writingcommunity, Arizona, Flora, Garden, and Landscape, Grandparenting, Health, Writing

Tagged as , , ,

by | April 15, 2024 · 5:20 am

Spring Walk and Grandma-ing

I’m writing this blog post on Sunday, although I don’t intend to publish it until early Monday morning. I want to write about my walk this morning while it’s fresh, but I have stuff going on after I write it.

Now that it’s warmer in Phoenix, it’s more refreshing to walk in the morning, so I went out at ten, wearing a sundress and brimmed hat. It’s already getting too warm for long pants, and I don’t wear shorts. The temperature, slight breeze, and all-around perfection made me feel so grateful to be living in this climate at this time of year. Nothing more beautiful than April and October in Phoenix.

Green and purple hummingbirds were flying in and around the yellow-blooming sweet acacia trees. The palo verde trees’ blossoms are just wiggling out. A songbird slid into a little round hole in a giant saguaro to visit her nestlings. Everywhere I walked I heard various sections of the symphony of birds making music together. I recorded some of it on my phone so I can try to isolate what type of birds I was hearing. On my way back, a family of quail ran quickly across the street to safety, and on the wooden gate to my yard, a baby lizard sunned itself.

In my yard, the cacti are in flower. Each one is spectacular, but my favorite is the coral one. Of course, since coral is my favorite color!

I’ve been taking care of my baby grandson each week for four days of 9-10 hours each (with a wonderful baby sitter who gives me a short break in the middle of most days). It’s very confining and exhausting at my age, but I love knowing he’s safe and learning. Perry has grown to love him, and will nap with him on the baby’s activity gym (which is on the ground and where he also practices “tummy time,” a phenomenon that wasn’t around when my kids were little). Baby Hudson’s favorite activity is swinging in his little mechanical swing.

What really strikes me about the baby is that he only cries to communicate. Luckily, he doesn’t have any chronic issues that cause crying (like colic). If he cries, I need to figure out what’s wrong, remedy it, and the crying stops. So while I was a bit concerned ahead of time that he would cry so much it would annoy me or especially the cats, not so.

As it gets warmer out, I intend to go for my walk very early (right after I give the cats their breakfast) and take Hudson in his stroller.

I’m getting zero art done and not enough writing, but I wouldn’t miss this experience for anything.

###

I have a flash of menstruation lit in the hilarious anthology Bloody Funny.” Thank you to Editor Sophia McGovern. Hope you like it!

39 Comments

Filed under #amwriting, Arizona, Flora, Garden, and Landscape

Tagged as , , , , , ,

by | April 12, 2021 · 5:20 am

Arizona Spring

This has been a three-snake week. All kingsnakes. A baby, an adult of moderate size, and a huge one. Although I’m not a snake lover, I do love that the kingsnakes protect our yard from rattlesnakes. Kingsnakes are not only pretty (black with cream stripes), they are pretty deadly to other snakes–even bigger snakes. What helps is that kingsnakes are immune to rattlesnake venom. Kingsnakes kill their prey by constriction, and they are powerful constrictors. As long as I don’t accidentally get too close to a kingsnake, I enjoy having them here, protecting us from other snakes.

Kingsnakes hibernate in the winter, so I know it’s spring when I see them roaming after months of absence.

I saw Perry watching the biggest snake from the window. He didn’t look very concerned, but I imagine he sees all kinds of animals outside that I don’t even notice. New cuteness about Perry: I am doing exercises at home for my shoulder on the days I don’t go to physical therapy. He copies me by lying on his back on the floor next to me. I hit the floor. He hits the floor. I get up. He walks away.

It’s been difficult to work on my memoir because my vision is so blurry. I’ve been trying to push forward, but it’s getting next to impossible. I have my next eye doctor appointment in a week and half, and I can’t wait.

This week many of our cacti bloomed. Click on the pix and use the side arrows to move from one to the other.

The flowering cactus is on the right, near the gold wall.

Make it a great week!

 

86 Comments

Filed under #AmWriting, #amwriting, #writerslife, Cats and Other Animals, Flora, Garden, and Landscape

Tagged as , , , , , , ,

by | September 7, 2020 · 5:20 am

The Heat is On in Arizona

The heat is up again in Arizona, but that just brings the birds out more as they scramble for water. The gardener has a fountain obsession, so we have plenty of water for these guys.

Here’s the little fountain with the little birds.

And here’s the big fountain with the big bird–in this case a roadrunner.

It’s labor day, and I am going to take a nap today. After all, I wrote a poem and babysat my daughter’s cat this week. Love and hugs and all!

 

53 Comments

Filed under #amrevising, #AmWriting, #amwriting, #writerlife, #writerslife, Arizona, Cats and Other Animals, Flora, Garden, and Landscape

Tagged as , , , , , ,

by | July 20, 2020 · 5:20 am

The Year I’d Like to Return: Refund, Please

I hope you and yours are all well, and that you are handling all this chaos and sometimes isolation.

We had some sad news this weekend. My cousin’s son passed away after all those weeks in a coma/on a ventilator/ on dialysis. He left behind a 6-year-old son, wife, mother and father, sister, and grandfather. I feel very sad for him, as well as for his son and wife. And my cousin and her husband have had a lot of tragedy in their lives before this, so it’s just too too much.

I have to stretch to find something positive right now to share as I want to retreat to my couch with an ice cream bar. I saw a cute hummingbird and took a couple of lousy pix and a short movie. And today is my birthday, by the way. A big one. Woohoo. Heh.

I can’t figure out what kind of hummingbird this one is. We live in Maricopa County, so I looked up hummers in this area, and he/she doesn’t really look like any of the ones pictured. The closest would be a male black-chinned hummingbird.

My mom got me this book of cute poems by kittens. It was written by the same author of I Can Pee on This.

Leave a comment

Filed under #writerslife, Arizona, Cats and Other Animals, Flora, Garden, and Landscape, Nonfiction, Writing

Tagged as , , , ,

by | October 14, 2019 · 5:20 am

Could A Cat Do What I Do?

I had a little upswing there with the poem publications, but I am not the most prolific poet and then there are the rejections that do stack up, too, so I am one publication short of my 2019 goal. Yes, there are still 2.5 months left, but because there is usually a bit of time between acceptance and publication, it is getting squeakingly close. How will I treat myself if I don’t make my goal? Gently, but firmly. I will wonder what I could have done differently. Write more poems? Write more better poems? Read that as “better poems,” not “more better” hahaha. Do I need to use a better system for send outs? Do I need to send out more? Do I need to target different publications? Lower my standards for publications? Count each poem and essay separately instead of the number of publications? (That would be cheating!) This is called WRITER INSECURITY. No matter what, a writer doubts herself and questions herself over and over. At least I think most writers do.

What would happen if I just let my cat Tiger write a poem? She likes to walk back and forth on my keyboard. In fact, she frequently intrudes on my emails to reader jeannieunbottled and types her own little secret messages.

 

 

Tiger just saw “herself” typing away above and got very very interested!

What if I submitted a poem written by Tiger? What would happen?

Tiger, by the way, continues to get sub q fluids administered a couple of times a week. It seems to make her feel better, and she doesn’t get upset about it. She seems to realize that it’s for her health.

My Pear, who is 19.5 years old, lies comfortably on the couch all day every day. She seems content so that makes me happy.

And frees me up to worry about the others! OK, I am purposely in denial about my dear Pear.

Friday we traded out the summer flowers with new winter flowers. I’m not impressed with the quality of flowers from the local nursery, but too late to complain as they are all planted now. For the front flower bed, we decided on a simpler color scheme this winter: red geraniums and white snapdragons. Usually we go with 5-6 colors for a more dramatic effect, but we were too lazy this year.

Make it a fabulous week!

Even if I am sitting next to Pear or Tiger or another cat, Perry plops on top of me and wiggles around until I am holding him in my arm.

47 Comments

Filed under #AmWriting, #writerlife, #writerslife, Arizona, Cats and Other Animals, Literary Journals, Poetry, Publishing, Submissions, Writing

Tagged as , , , , , , ,

by | September 30, 2019 · 5:20 am

Fall into Autumn

Moving from September into October is a delightful fall into autumn in Phoenix. September is still hot. It’s a nasty remnant of summer hanging on past its prime. But October is one of the best months here. Still balmy, but not hot. Sunny days, but sometimes the sky is a little overcast. The snakes are getting ready to hibernate, and the rabbits and quail are old enough to watch out for predators.

The gardener thought it was a good time to put in a couple of new cacti. Within a day of planting one of the cacti developed black spots on it. He ended up agreeing to cut off the limbs with the spots, and they gave him some smaller plants to make up for it. I don’t think that was a great solution. I would have preferred a new plant because I worry about contagion and because now we have a maimed cactus. But he can’t let any plant go to waste. He treats them like the living beings they are.

Then his years-old barrel cactus (it’s not a regular barrel cactus, but some sort of barrel) fell over (it’s fall! it’s fall! sorry). He’s grown that baby into what he says is a $500 plant. But now look at it. So sad. He propped it up, and the man at the landscape store told him it might live. Looks pathetic to me.

What happened, I guess, is that the gardener planted it in the right spot years ago, but a new company came in and worked on the irrigation. They “fixed” it to the point where too much water was hitting that cactus. Because it was near the wash, we aren’t around it when the water came on, so we didn’t know that was happening.

But now that it’s getting cooler (70s and 80s), it’s much easier to work outside, so the gardener is happy about that.

Speaking of fall: pumpkin ice cream bars! I kid you not. I got them at Whole Foods. Vanilla wafers and pumpkin ice cream. That reminds me that I need to look for the pumpkin butter I got last year. That stuff was so good on the gluten-free bakery’s yummy bagels. Don’t try to make me feel bad about pumpkin. I was eating cold pumpkin pie and Cool Whip for breakfast long before you ever thought of it! (News flash: the bars are making me sick which shows me how bad my lactose intolerance is getting).

Felix seems to be ok, but I am taking no chances. I watch for his business on the potty cam every day. Tiger is getting sub q fluids to help her system deal with kidney disease. That makes me feel bad for Pear who is 4 years older and has had kidney disease at least as long as that, but gets no fluids. However, at 19, I think Pear would prefer to just lie in comfort on “her” couch, rather than be hauled off to the vet’s office twice a week. Sloopy Anne does not seem to be throwing up now that I put her on hypoallergenic food (we’ll see if that continues). Kana and Perry are ok for now.

I’ve been puttering (pottering for some of you) around with my writing lately. Continuing to tweak the memoir that looks WAY different than it did a couple of years ago. Revising poems and sending them out.  I might take a look at some old prose pieces, too, and see if anything can be done with them. This feels like where I am right now: refining, not originating. And that’s ok. It takes less energy, but is still rewarding. That is a good thing in this time of much busyness in business, as well as family and cat stuff going on.

There are only three months left to reach my 2019 publication goal. Luckily, I have a new poem up which I posted about on Saturday. Here it is: BEHOLD THE NEEDLE at Thimble Literary Magazine.

If you celebrate Rosh Hashanah, L’Shanah Tovah! If you celebrate fall, Happy October tomorrow. Friday is the Feast of Saint Francis of Assisi. He holds a special place in my heart. The animals and the environment, you know. Make it a great week.

***

Adding this fun update. Remember when I wrote about my music box? According to Robyn who blogs at Holding to the Ground it was in January. She took me up on my request that you guys write about the secret life of an object! It’s a wonderful piece–enjoy and see if you don’t get ticked off at her mom, too (by the way). The Secret Life of a Clock Radio

41 Comments

Filed under #AmWriting, #amwriting, #writerlife, #writerslife, Cats and Other Animals, Flora, Garden, and Landscape, Writing

Tagged as , , , , , ,

by | June 25, 2018 · 5:20 am

Saguaro Fruit Season

This was the first year that I’ve lived in Phoenix that all  the saguaros blossomed with white crowns. So this is the first year I’ve seen so many white blossoms all turn into juicy red fruit. An animal must have eaten some of this one!

Check out the bird sitting on the top. Birds seem to love saguaros.

Here’s a good article about the harvesting of the saguaro fruit.

A couple of the cacti in our yard, thanks to the gardener.

One of the most inspiring people in my life has been a gorilla–namely, Koko, lover of cats and poet of sign language. Sadly, she died last week at age 46.

This image by a fan of Koko was shared on Koko’s Facebook page with a request to share it, so here it is. RIP dear Koko. I just don’t understand how little her death has been on the news. The people whose lives we celebrate on national television when they die have not done as much for our future and our planet as Koko has done.

#amwriting #writerlife #writerslife I had two beautiful acceptances this week. One publication coming out in a day or so . . . .

HAPPY NEW WEEK!

57 Comments

Filed under #AmWriting, #amwriting, #writerlife, #writerslife, Arizona, Cats and Other Animals, Flora, Garden, and Landscape, Food & Drink, Writing

Tagged as , , , , , , , , ,

by | March 21, 2016 · 5:20 am

Between Arizona’s Dry Winter and Hot Summer, We Get an Ideal Spring

My latest short memoir piece was just published by Six Hens. This nonfiction story was very difficult to write and even more difficult to think of publishing. Called “Boundaries,” it’s about a time when my boundaries were invaded by someone else–and just at that vulnerable season of puberty.

“BOUNDARIES” AT SIX HENS

It’s a glorious spring here in Arizona, so I snapped some pix of what I see outside, just to remind me when I’m inside.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

All of these beauties survived the freezes this winter, with a little help from the humans. Hubby and I covered them with old sheets and freeze cloths every time the temperature dipped.

Starting to write again TODAY. Thanks for the motivation last week!!!

If you like the Arizona landscape, I do have a few poems that touch upon that subject in Doll God.  Haha, I haven’t plugged my book in awhile!

59 Comments

Filed under #AmWriting, Arizona, Literary Journals, Memoir, Nonfiction, Publishing, Writing, Writing Talk

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , ,