Face-off with Nature

Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience.
-Ralph Waldo Emmerson

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There’s a certain kind of joy I get from a close encounter with nature. I have had several face-offs in recent times and would like to extend a challenge to have some of your own. They’re thrilling and chilling and indeed, quite fulfilling.

First of all, when it comes to roses, I’ll lose that staring contest every time.

I am always distracted by roses. If they’re in the vicinity, they immediately divert my attention. I like to touch them, to feel the layers and test the firmness and health. I love a healthy firm rose face. But if I engage in a face-off, it’s always game over for me and I bow down and then out.

This rose is called “Neil Diamond” (obviously).

I sometimes impress Sean with my entomological knowledge. He pointed out a bug thinking it was a dragonfly. I said, “That looks more like a damselfly. They’re smaller and, you know, less dragonlike. You always know it when you see a dragonfly.”

Golden-Ringed Dragonfly

Driving out of a mountain canyon I saw something I’d never seen before in my life: a tarantula in the wild. Fortunately my companion felt the same as I did which = shock and extreme excitement. We simultaneously interrupted ourselves in the conversation to blurt out, “WHAAA IT’S A TARANTULA!”

We immediately pulled over to do…what? Run out in the street to look at it and get hit by cars? Yes, I suppose, if it came to that. I knew I had to get close. So while I faced-off with it and took a pic, she stood guard looking for oncoming cars. I hadn’t been so thrilled in a long time. Here we are:

A closeup of its face:

And of mine:

Seconds after I took this pic, a car came by and smooshed it. We cried out. It was so sad. We had stood grimacing, bracing ourselves every time a car came by as it slowly played spider-chicken (that is a horrible image. I’m sorry). The 4th or 5th car took it, in the end. I wished I had stopped traffic to let it pass or that I had a sign on me. Something. Anything.

Then there are less-desirable close encounters with nature.

Our kitten who is actually a full size middle-aged cat loves to romp and play outdoors. She prefers to have a buddy so she and I make plans every day. Some days I just can’t get over her.

Other days she is a wild cheetah and likes to hunt. Those who know, know the special cry of a cat returning from a hard day of hunting, especially if they have a kill in their proud mandibles.

She usually brings home grasshoppers and maims and plays with them which I find abhorrent. Sometimes she brings home lizards which is somehow less grotesque than a dismembered insect. Even so, while she eventually grows bored of it, we grow increasingly frantic in our own less-skilled hunt, knowing that we must find not only the lizard but also its tail that it shed. I do not enjoy this game and I do not enjoy this kind of face-off. However, I do enjoy the fact that it’s a face-off with nature that’s actually a tail-off.

In my typical early spring over-enthusiasm, I bought some wildflower seeds and raked them into some top soil. When planting things, I still have very little clue about it all and then get to deal with the consequences of my actions later on with humility. This time it is the super dense, kind of ridiculously tall flower-forest that has sprung up, completely overpowering and obscurring all the annuals I pointlessly planted and blocking sprinklers because they’re three feet high. However, they are pretty, and the bees love them.

But one day I went out to do some weeding, considering I could even find them in there somewhere and I saw the funniest thing. I wish I’d taken a picture even though nobody but me would care (that’s not true, Sean and Julian were into it but we’re all nerds) but in the middle of this thick patch of tall blue wildflowers was this single, crazy tall dandelion just trying to blend in, acting like it was one of them. Like it whispered to itself, hold very still, when I passed. I have never seen a dandelion so tall and I now have a lot of un-googled questions about plants evolving to adapt to their surroundings, like moths or octopi, but forgetting it was still bright orange in a sea of blue. Like the dandelion was like, what the hey? How am I going to strangle these? Better grow some.

Here is the monster:

artsy

We have a hummingbird feeder by the window and like everyone else in the human race, whenever we see one we shriek out in glee, “HUMMINGBIRD!”

Sean said the funniest thing one day and I’m determined to turn it into a cartoon. He said, “Do you think, when teaching their babies animal sounds, hummingbirds say, ‘Look, now that big pale animal is called a hummingbird, because that’s the sound they make!” Because that’s all hummingbirds ever hear us say.

Sometimes I sit out near the feeder and I always try to snap a pic and obviously I am too slow. But for some reason these birds love to scare the living daylights out of me by first darting right in front of my face, hovering, buzzing loudly, then dashing up to the feeder. Why do they do this?? It’s always such a journey going from sheer terror and revulsion thinking it’s a gross, jurassic-sized bug to delight that it’s a tiny bird I deliberately try to lure to me. I’ll be honest, my heart can’t take much more of that.

Did you know that a bumblebee can recognize a human’s face? I always suspected this but it’s lately been confirmed. Here’s a friend I found in a flower patch recently:

I love you.

Later that same day, when I ran into someone checking on their beehives I asked if I could join and he let me have an extra suit and I could not have been more thrilled.

Then, on a hike one day I was telling Julian how I read the big bumblebees (known, to me, as Aunt Bea) don’t mind if you pet them. Maybe after introductions?

Immediately after that, we saw an Aunt Bea busy on a flower and I bent down and stroked her back with my knuckle while she went on working and she was the fuzziest little bean and I swear I’ve never been so happy.

On the hike down, we came upon a snake curled up on the side of the path. Julian was sure it was a snake skin and we had a semi-heated debate about it for a good while:

JULIAN: It IS! I swear! Look at it!

JEN: Oh sure, wound up in a perfect spiral? Did it do that when it was finished to be neat and tidy? Look how solid it is! If that’s the molted snakeskin, what’s left of the snake?

JULIAN: It died, then. It’s dead. Is it? It looks dead.

JEN: It’s not dead, it’s asleep.

JULIAN: It’s not asleep. Where’s its head? Its head is gone! It’s dead.

JEN: What?? It’s right there in the middle! A headless snake curled up all perfectly?? Have you ever been outdoors?

We stared at it closely forever until finally it moved slightly (JEN: It’s aliiiive!) and Julian bolted and just about threw himself off the face of the mountain.

Some people with small kids were approaching and I, being one who never behaves appropriately to the real dangers of nature, casually pointed out that there was a snake there if they wanted to take a look.

The family was much more concerned with whether or not it was a rattle snake and I shrugged and said I didn’t know, but that it seemed to be snoozing. They all started screaming and—though it probably was a rattle snake (can someone confirm?)— somehow that didn’t seem to me like the best reaction to a sleeping snake. But it’s possible I was distracted by the concerning fact that I apparently need to get my kid out in nature more.

To close, and speaking of dragons, here is a song by Sean some snapdragons.

Happy summer!