On the Night of the Super Wolf Blood Moon Eclipse

Around 6 -- the temperature is in the teens . . .

and there are lots of clouds . . .

I wonder how this image happened?

There's a full eclipse coming and the moon is supposed to look blood red at totality -- but will there will be clouds -- or will I will be awake and feel like going outside around midnight?

Hmmmm . . . I kinda doubt it.

I surprised myself. John woke me at 11:30 and I got a few shots of the beginning stages.

The moon was almost directly overhead and I was in my nightshirt and a jacket, leaning against a snowy railing and trying to steady the camera.. I got these two shots and  went back to bed  for about twenty minutes. When I went back out, I got one fleeting glimpse (but no picture) of the rather tarnished looking moon before the clouds swallowed her up.

 

Fading Beauty . . .

For almost a month the amaryllis have bloomed and bloomed -- thirteen blossoms on three stems -- and now they are fading.

Delicate petal edges crumple inward and colors grow more nuanced.

Another few days and I'll move the bulbs into the bed in the greenhouse in hopes of an eventual glorious resurrection.

Along with the pleasure their beauty has given us, has been the delight of hearing Josie say Ama-RILL-us!

Another Cold Wet Day with Josie

Mary Oliver -- Rest in Peace

She has left us so much . . .

Last Night the Rain Spoke to Me

by Mary Oliver

Last night

the rain

spoke to me

slowly, saying,

what joy

to come falling

out of the brisk cloud,

to be happy again

in a new way

on the earth!

That’s what it said

as it dropped,

smelling of iron,

and vanished

like a dream of the ocean

into the branches

and the grass below.

Then it was over.

The sky cleared.

I was standing

under a tree.

The tree was a tree

with happy leaves,

and I was myself,

and there were stars in the sky

that were also themselves

at the moment

at which moment

my right hand

was holding my left hand

which was holding the tree

which was filled with stars

and the soft rain –

imagine! imagine!

the long and wondrous journeys

still to be ours.

Water Like a Stone

The Miniaturist

The premise is fascinating -- a young woman married to a wealthy man she hardy knows, a man who will not consummate the marriage, who shrinks from her touch. A house of secrets, ruled over by the man's sister, outwardly ascetic but given to fur linings in her somber garments. As Nella tries to find her way in a puzzling household and in the rich but unforgiving world of 17th Century Amsterdam, the gift of a cabinet for miniatures and the filling thereof catapults the story into mystery. Who is making these exquisite miniatures that are tiny replicas of the troubled household -- that seem to either foretell or direct the future?

Much is left unanswered -- I found myself wondering if there might be a sequel. But perhaps the unsolved mystery is the point. Perhaps the miniaturist is God. 

No matter. The beauty of the prose and the lushness of description is reason enough to read this extraordinary book.

I'm told there is a television version . . .

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