A dampness on the ground and in the air. The sky is, as always, unreadable to me with my lifetime of experience reading continental skies.
Off on my honeymoon to Eigg. Back on June 4.
May 2018
Thursday May 24, 2018
A brick lies in the dirt at the back of the garden, dislodged by the running of cats and foxes along the night-time labyrinth of walls.
Wednesday May 23, 2018
From one direction, the whine of a saw. From another, planks being dropped into a pile. A block of terraced housing is never finished.
Tuesday May 22, 2018
Somehow I’ve failed to notice till now that the small hydrangea next to the rosebush is also in bloom—one low, slightly absurd flower head.
Monday May 21, 2018
It’s in the blackbird’s alarm call that one best hears its cousin-ship with the American robin: that tut tut. Which is also so British.
Sunday May 20, 2018
A jet roars overhead en route to Heathrow. The rattling call of a magpie. An American gray squirrel lopes along the top of the back wall.
Saturday May 19, 2018
A wren sings in the garden of our Iranian neighbor, whose wisteria infiltrates the elder tree so that it blooms two ways at once.
Friday May 18, 2018
The clock says “early” but the sun says “late”. The distant cries of schoolchildren mingle with the birds.
*
I’ve decided to re-name this blog The Morning Porch/Patio — a bit awkward, I know — so that I can continue posting during the summer here in London, where I expect to spend an increasing portion of each year from now on. My partner lives in a terraced house (what Americans call a townhouse or row house) in Kensal Rise, with a walled back garden and patio where I take my morning coffee… unless it’s raining, which is of course why American-style porches are an inspired architectural innovation.
Thursday May 17, 2018
The rose bush in the garden has unfolded its first set of sexual parts. I’m dueting with a dunnock via an audio recording on my phone.
Monday May 14, 2018
A blue tit skulks around the bird feeder like a dapper, introverted chickadee. Nearly hidden in the elder, the blackbird turns on her nest.