What is up with being late every day so I can’t take the proper time necessary to write a proper Blog, I wonder? It is turning out to be most annoying I’ll admit, and I’m really going to need to do something about it in the near future. Perhaps I need to do this in the morning, rather than the evening? Hmmm. ‘Tis worth some thought.
Not today, however. Let’s get to all that has passed since the last Blog and get it over with, shall we?
So, my alarm shrills like a…well, something impolite twenty minutes past my usual time. Either I didn’t set it right last night, or it has been screeching for longer than I realize, forcing me to hurry through the morning rituals with my eyes pried open–just barely.
I arrive at the house not in the best of moods. I think that yesterday’s “lesson” left a bigger impression than I had realized, though I doubt it. It is the only thing I can think of, which could be the cause of my lousy mood, however.
Considering the plan of the day requiring several hours of intense labor in the garden again, I decide not to exercise. The work is hard enough to offer a proper substitute nonetheless. The only times when exercise should be required is when days are spent immobile, I’m thinking. Adding a rigorous training routine to the lifting, cutting and climbing would be a bit too much for my body. Hah.
Be that as it may, I set to the task of feeding Yadzia, some minor chores in the kitchen and then have breakfast while big brother puts on the coffee. We’re running late, what with getting distracted by talking with grandpa, but in the end we settle behind the computer to start editing again.
It doesn’t go well today, our minds are fuzzy, quickly distracted, and the words just don’t seem to make sense. Still we struggle through the agreed upon hours until the younger sibs arrive and the time of outside work has arrived.
One by one we all head down to the lower garden.
Since middle sister is finishing up in the courtyard with her daily task of hosing it down, and little brother is dragging debris away from the path, I arrive first in the place where we finished the day before yesterday. The cut apart pear tree looks miserable and thorny gray branches of the dead bougainvillea surround it like a macabre type of prison.
Looking around at the disaster area–at least that is what it looks like due to the work on progress–I stab my hands into my work gloves and pick up my hand scythe. The place where the bamboo we planted during our first year in Spain is as good a place as any so I start hacking through dead sticks and strangling vines until one by one living canes begin to appear.
It is a relief to find them, in particular since it all looked so horrid, but in the end, after removing miles of twining vines a decent sized cluster stands erect once more, now that vines no longer weigh them down.
By this time the others have joined me, and big brother is once again applying the chainsaw on dead conifers–these, much to our regret, didn’t survive the onslaught of the vines–and later on moves over to where I’m already removing large branches of the carob tree.
The poor bush has had a few hard years, due to a rat problem we used to have, and many of the massive growths need to be removed so there is room for the new to find their way up to the sun.
While we are working on this particular heavy task, middle sister is tackling one of the dead palm trees and the youngest sibs are further down the mountain fighting the relentless battle against the vines’ stranglehold on our oleanders, eucalypts, bougainvillea and even the reeds.
We work at a steady pace, and once most of the trimming has been seen to–my arms ache from handling the large shears–I join middle sister and start piling up the debris she’s removing. Soon we’re able to traverse on the terrace surrounding the old pool.
The dogs are constantly around us, lingering dangerously close to the edge of the empty pool, and roughhousing with such enthusiasm that at one point we hear a massive thud and see Chaos in a tangle of branches that have piled up on the bottom.
Luckily the pile broke his fall, and he is looking a tad chagrinned before interesting scents lure him to explore the piles of natural debris that surround him.
Once big brother has lifted him from the pool, we all continue with our tasks, starting on the arduous and somewhat hazardous transference of the dead and dried palm tree branches.
The spikes have turned hard and they are dangerously sharp, and I am reminded of that fact when one of them pierces straight through my leather glove. Blast! The spike sticks into the thin skin between my thumb and index, having penetrated a good inch of my hand before I yank it out and suck on the bleeding hole for a bit.
Though cautioned by my little mishap little brother ends up with a matching spike in his thigh. This earns him a quick first-aid session that reveals a broken off point of an inch and a half buried deep into his flesh. It hurts like heck, but it doesn’t stop him from continuing on until dusk finally arrives and the end of our work announces itself.
Little sister, who has spent several hours working alongside us, has returned to the house a little earlier and has dinner waiting for us.
We’re all dirty and starving, so after washing up the meal is rapidly devoured. At the same time the dogs attack the kibble waiting for them before they start dropping to the floor in apparent exhaustion.
Lazy little buggers. Sure they play a lot when out there in the yard with us, but after an hour of mischief most of them do little more than lounge about on their chosen vantage point to watch us (or get in the way) as we work out butts of, hah.
Their exhaustion does create a wonderfully peaceful atmosphere for us however, keeping the pack quiet throughout dinner and the hours that follow. We are forced to move over, around and through them to get from one place to the next, but it all happens without ever waking them.
After dinner and our weekly episode of “The Closer”, I drag myself from my seat to see to today’s laundry. Yesterday’s massive batch has dried during the wonderfully sunny day and needs to be folded, after which the new batch gets hung of course.
Since mom’s birthday is tomorrow, middle sister and I make two cheese/yogurt/cream cakes with a mixture of passion fruit, mango, raspberries, peaches and brambles for the occasion, finishing the task under an hour when it is time for cleanup. Together we manage this particular chore in record time, leaving me with about one hour to do some more editing.
It still doesn’t go well, but at least we get another page done before midnight arrives and I need to head on up to my cabin for the last few hours of the day.
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