Life as a track event

I thought to make an extended metaphor about how life resembled a track event or maybe cross-country, how most of us spend the first 18 years getting in shape. When the gun sounds at 18, though, I ran into trouble because not all of us have those lovely first splits where the race seems to be a breeze and you think you could run forever. By 21, when I envisioned the first little twinge of pain, I realized that many couldn’t say that—for them the race becomes an endless drudge to be run, not at the front of the pack, but at the end of that solid bunch of runners who know they’ll never come close to winning this thing. And then I saw it isn’t a race anyway, and the metaphor petered out. If I apply this metaphor to myself I…

changed my event almost as soon as I signed up for it…
sat out the second lap…
signed up for a different event and changed that one twice before quitting the race again…
entered the original event chosen by 17-year-old me…
ran that race until I realized I just wasn’t suited for it…
trained for a different event and ran that one for a decade…
left that race, dreaming of the Perfect Event…
and fell into a nondescript event only to find my innate talents bloom

And that’s just the metaphorical telling of my career. What about love? Family? The experience of life? No matter. It was fun playing with that photo of my brother running cross-country when we both were young and naïve.

Carpenter bees

Eastern carpenter bee on scarlet beebalm. June 2025.

For a good handful of years I fought a war against carpenter bees. These large bees (1.0-1.5 inches long) bored perfectly symmetrical holes in the decking of our house. First I attempted to plug all the holes with caulk, twigs, anything that came to hand. Then I bought horrendously over-priced traps, only one of which did its job and for only one year. This year I gave up, waved the white flag, said, “you win.” They are vigorous pollinators: that beebalm looks long past its prime, but they keep working the blossoms for that last speck of pollen. They’re only antagonistic to each other, although they’re scary in the spring: imagine a bee as big as your eye and flying right toward it. They still leave little piles of sawdust around my deck here and there in the spring.

And I still have the trap up. It’s a sign of self-respect. I don’t want to appear as if I’ve cravenly capitulated to them. Call it a fighting retreat.

Another day older

Every minute and every day you’re older. Any time you wish to, shout accurately, “Hey! I’m another year older!” to passersby. Their strange looks betray their misunderstanding: you are another year older from this same time one year ago.

Even so, humans seek meaning like water seeks its level. Today as I write this marks the time 71 years ago my mother labored to get me out into the world. It’s about an hour and a handful of minutes until that moment in the Pacific time zone where I was born. I’ve been pleased she did so about 99% of the time, which given its +/- 1% accuracy should be good enough for anyone. You can search this blog for the tag “aging” to see how I feel about these so-called twilight years. If death is sundown, then I don’t think I’m actually in twilight yet, but the sun has lowered itself toward my horizon of being. Despite attempting to live in the moment, I’m aware each day of the end of my life nearing, something which seemed nebulous just ten years ago. Perhaps I’m just seeking my level also.

Like the wild geranium which promises big things with those hand-sized leaves, then proffers flowers barely bigger than a 25-cent piece, we burst onto the scene, become self-aware, and agitate to “get out there” in our late teens, to make our marks on the world. What things we’ll accomplish! We flower, most of us, with little blossoms of achievement then spend the time between fruitfulness and the killing frost just…being big, green, and leafy, secure in our memories of having flowered at all.

On this day…

One of the few things I miss about participating in the Facebook platform is On This Day, where the app would push up photos and posts you had ‘published’ in the past. The photos were a nice blast from the recent past. Unfortunately, they encouraged participants to repost much like the boorish cocktail party guest who wanders from group to group telling the same overly-extended anecdote which bores each group equally.

But y’all haven’t seen these, I think… (photos are from any June 4 through June 6)

The last of the roses. Choked out by invasives and my indifference, they haven’t appeared since. June 2021.

Some red lilies ready to bloom. Frustratingly, they disappeared only for one to appear a year or two later in the midst of a garden nightmare. I blame squirrels. June 2020.

These two white lilies bloomed for three or four years, through the date of this photo. After that they disappeared, but behind this location the RED lily suddenly appeared. Squirrel atonement? June 2020.

Houston, my second time to work at the same client. It’s a flat landscape. The sun sets and everything wallows in a beautiful light. Taken from my hotel window. June 2019.

And on and on they go… I cannot tarry or I will post all night. Each day brings a look at the past five years of retirement, the previous eight years of consultant work, and the mundane world of “home weekends/corporate trenches” that was my world before.

Swallowtail

Watching our newly landscaped front yard has become one of my particular joys this year. Where once there existed a lackluster lawn, pockmarked with chipmunk burrows—which I had to continually mow—now new plants take turns proffering flowers for the pollinators. The spicebush swallowtail butterfly shown above would have shown up better were not its wings fluttering madly as it sampled the scarlet beebalm flowers. Sharing the butterfly’s zeal were bees of all sizes: little ones that looked like flying sugar ants about a quarter-inch long to bumblebees and something larger which I haven’t identified yet.

As May ended and turned to June, fireflies appear at dusk to illuminate the plants. Shrubby St. John’s wort, below, seems to be a favorite of the Easter honeybee.

Ninebark

This spring has been a joy, watching our newly planted front yard bring forth blossoms we’ve never seen before. The one above, about the size of a standard marigold, tucks in by the front porch. Demure, perhaps, but eventually it can grow to small tree height if not pruned.

Amber waves of grain

To all those who served and gave their lives. They didn’t always know why, but they served anyway.

Surrendering…

…to the laziness of posting yet more cat photos because I haven’t been able to complete the pieces I’ve written this past week. Sigh. The late spring/early summer weather has Charlie and Benny enjoying the deck or any other place the sleep bug drops them…

Lately, Charlie sleeps with me, and Benny sleeps with my wife. This is because Charlie and I snore. I often sleep with a pillow between my ankles due to bunion and ankle pain. Looks like Charlie has taken a page from my book.

Like many “elderly” folk, my hips and back have bothered me a lot in the past few years. A lousy choice in recliners exacerbates the problem. Charlie thinks orthopedic cushions offer just the support he needs.

Charlie, using a lumbar support for (ahem) “gastric support”. May 2025.

On Easter Monday Benny went under the knife for removal of a neck cyst. It endured benignly until we had it drained earlier this year. He subsequently scratched it, tore it open, and surgery sounded like the best path. He surprisingly took the soft cone in stride, complaining little. Biggest issue? Drinking out of the cat fountain. He napped, waiting the ten days until its removal.

Sun-toasted decking makes a good nap spot. April 2025.

Guest poetry

Charlie, seen here two weeks into his stay with us, and letting us know that warm laundry out of the dryer is for sleeping and nothing else. January 2016.

A MOTHERS DAY GREETING
by Susan Pilcher

The cat blinked once,
The cat blinked twice,
'I love you, Mom.
That should suffice.'

Benny adds, “…and luggage…luggage is for sleeping also.” May 2021.

Cinco de Mayo visitor

Monday as we sat down to breakfast, my wife noticed a guy putting something on the parking strip in front of our house. I stepped out to see what he was doing, which turned out to be moving a box turtle off of the heavily traveled street. The turtle had been close to our side of the road, so he moved it along. Box turtles have five sub-species; at first this one looked to be a Gulf Coast one, strange as that may sound here in North Carolina, but I found photos of the Eastern which resemble this one. Apparently the shell wears as they age, and the shells will become the lighter, golden color seen in the pattern on the shell above. They fairly easily live to be 100 years of age.

Wondering “why the heck is a turtle up here about a full block and uphill from where there’s a creek?”, I learned something. Box turtles hang out in moist forests and wet meadows/pastures. I would like to think transforming our front yard from grass to a meadow facilitated this little visitor, but who knows? I do wish, however, I had just watched him/her from afar because I went back out five to six minutes later, and it had disappeared. I searched diligently around our front yard, near parked cars, even back on the other side of the street, but nope–gone. I worried. Drivers looking for a short-cut found our supposedly residential street a few years ago which makes it highly hazardous to slow-moving turtles. Heck, it’s become highly hazardous to humans. Despite a posted speed of 25 mph and that it’s only three blocks long, cars routinely hit 45 mph. I hope the turtle likes our yard and decides ranging from there to the drainage swale behind our property will be its new home. It’s safer and nicer.