A few weeks back, I woke up in the dark, happy and grateful that I’ve managed to carve out two-plus hours of quiet self-time before the day lights up in earnest. I sat with my morning coffee, watching the first gloaming of the morning, realizing that as circumstance would have it, I had no agenda…
This is the time of year I always start worrying about the animals. It’s utterly foolish, I know, but when the cold winds start to overtake the land, I start wishing that the deer could have carport shelters from the ice rains. That the squirrels will have a warm nest. That the birds’ feet won’t…
These cold mornings, I make it a habit to walk up to my bee yard no matter what the weather and take a peek into the plexiglass viewing windows on each one of my hives. My hives are kept under a shed-type cover and this every-morning hive check is a precious new ritual here at…
I come from a family of wanderers. As a first-generation American, all the stories of my family were stories from different lands and different cultures. All of my aunts and uncles, grandparents and cousins came here in ships and then spread out to populate the east and west coasts. I don’t know how this wanderer…
Of course, I told the bees. Told them that my mother had died. It is an old custom, for beekeepers to let the bees know of events that touch the family, and so I walked out to the bee yard and told them that my mother was dead, and that I was now an adult…
It’s been quite awhile since I’ve done any presentations out in the world, and I’m doing one at this conference. It is another reason why I’m so busy lately, as I’m helping craft and coordinate the event. Whether you are a bee lover or not, this is a gathering of wonderful people in a wonderful…
I cannot believe it is already mid-July. This summer, more than any in my recent memory has fulfilled that old adage, “Time flies when you’re having fun.” So many stories have been in the making these warm months, but the telling of them may have to wait for the cold moons—my traditional writing time. So…
Lucy Lu, our Muscovy duck, has been in voluntary seclusion this past month and a half, patiently sitting on eggs. Duck eggs don’t take a month and a half to hatch, but it took me a couple weeks to decide to find her some fertile eggs to sit, so she’s been sitting extra long. Meanwhile,…