Dog Shit and Tweakers

    During the first several months of the COVID-19 pandemic, I took many, many walks.  I would often cross the river on the pedestrian path on the side of the freeway.  The bridge was built a few years ago, and the walkway is nice and wide.  

    There has always been a population of homeless people living out there.  Like many people in the US, situations like these pit my sense of compassion against my need for safety.  They often stole the apples off my fruit trees.  That didn't bother me all that much, since I figured they were hungry and needed them.  One year, they stole my hammock.  I saw later in one of their camps and decided to just let them keep it.    

    There is certainly a fair amount of mental illness (I've encountered numerous people in the throes of psychosis) and drug use.  There is even a delightful (sarcasm!) amount of profane, obscene, and racist graffiti on the bridge.  The one below was accompanied by a lewd drawing.  At least it was in chalk, so it doesn't deface our new bridge.  The style of the letter S is an intentional Nazi reference that I've seen in other, more overtly racist, graffiti.  

 

        While everything was shut down during 2020, I had to quit going down to the bridge.  It felt unsafe to me.  People would sometimes yell at me for wearing a mask, or come up and get right in my face.  Before my vaccination, I didn't want anyone close to me.  

    Another lovely feature of those shut-down days was the amount of dog feces in the street and on the side walks.  That isn't something I'm accustomed to in North America.  It is pretty common in Latin America, where dogs run all over the place, shitting on sidewalks. I still don't know why people quit scooping up after their dogs.  It isn't pleasant to smell human and dog waste while you are out for a walk.

    In the past few years, the number of people who are homeless has exploded.  Over the past couple of weeks, I have been walking past a new camp.  My walking route takes me past their open latrine, where you can see paper towels, toilet paper, and lots of flies.  The people don't harass me or anything, so I don't feel uncomfortable with them being there.  What worries me, though, is the latrine.  Open defecation is a huge public health issue.  In countries where it is common, parasites and disease abound.  We don't have those diseases here because of our sanitation infrastructure.  But we now have a growing population living without modern sanitation.  How long will it be before those diseases become part of life here in this country?  

    I won't launch into politics here.  The actual reason for this post is to show what I found next to that camp.  There is an Oregon oak seedling that has no chlorophyll.  When the food from the acorn runs out, it will die, since it can't produce any sugars on its own.  I have seen cherry seedlings like this before.  I even tried to graft them to other seedlings without success. 

    I'm not inclined to torture this tree's short life by grafting it, Frankenstein-style, to another plant.  I have to fantasize about what an albino oak would look like though...  A tree like this would be so ghostly.  

    I will appreciate it while it lasts.  

Mosquito Hell

This year has been a nightmare for mosquitoes in my area.  It was a really wet spring, which allowed some species of mosquito to hatch out in unprecedented numbers.  In order to go out in my garden- even in the full sun- I have to keep myself slathered in DEET.  They bite me anyway.

I've taken to walking down by the river, as I do most summers.  I can usually keep the mosquitoes at bay if I don't stop.  Today, however, I had to pee, so I had to step off the main trail into the shade.  They were all over me instantly.  God, I hate those little fuckers.

I came back out into the sunshine, where there are lots of what I take to be Clarkias.  I know they are in the family Onagraceae, at least. I suspect they were planted there with a mix of wildflower seeds, since I don't see them growing in other areas. 

For the past couple of weeks, I have been thinking of collecting seeds from these plants this fall.  they are really pretty impressive.

Today, as I was cursing and fleeing the mosquitoes, I came across this plant:

The markings on the petals are really striking.  I will definitely be collecting seed from this plant, if not cuttings.  I'm not sure if this is an annual or perennial species, so I will try both.  The variation was not quite as unique as I had first thought, however.  I found a handful of other plants with similar markings- though not quite as dramatic as these.  I doubt this is a rare mutation that is one-of-a-kind discovery, but it will be a fun plant to grow in the garden.  

Now if only those fucking mosquitoes would die...

 

Close to Home

Today I was peeing in my garden (I mean...  why else would anyone have a garden- except as a a giant urinal??)

I happened to look up and saw a large double flower on my Asian pear tree.  The rest of the tree flowered almost two months ago, so this was quite a surprise.  I have no idea if it is a fluke- or a mutation that will persist if I graft it up and observe it.

If it turns out to be a good one, I can just imagine the tree covered in flowers like this.  Check out this photo from April when the whole tree flowered:

It might be incredible.  Just imagine all those flowers being double!   But as always, only time will tell!

I hate everyone.

 I wonder if anyone still reads this.  I rage-quit Facebook about a year ago.  Best decision I ever made.  While the new meme-vectors will continue to tear our world apart and replace it with some still-unseen order, I can at least keep my brain from being force-fed garbage.

I'm always tempted to write about my love life in these posts.  Sexuality is what drives so much life on this planet.  I look for mistakes that would otherwise end up in the trash-heap of evolutionary rejects.  I am one such reject, myself.  Sometimes it sucks to think about how my ancestors reproduced without fail for the past few billion years.  And I get to be a dead-end.  Yay.

But here in my little back-water of evolutionary accidents, I have created a place for us weird rejects to live together in relative peace.  I guess.

Yesterday I was walking with my friend Bobbi, ranting as I usually do about my failed love life, the perversity of Evangelical Christianity (where they take a religion that is supposed to be based on love and make it all about hate), and work stress.

This broom was literally right in front of me as we turned a corner.

It was in someone's Norway Spruce tree, hanging over the sidewalk.  Since it was easily within reach, I took a little twig.  I will be grafting it up today.  It is a tiny broom that might make a good rock garden plant.  I'm not super excited about the species (I tend to be more excited about our native trees) but I will give it a try.

 

I'm not going to change my negative attitude just now.  There is too much crap in the world for me to think positively right now.  But I will stop and appreciate a cool little treasure that pops up in front of my face during the shitty times.