Three Crow Pepper

Day 128: It should come as no surprise that I have a wealth of crow-related items decorating the shelves and walls of my home, some items purchased by me but the bulk of them gifts from friends who know my love of the corvid species. Most of my collection is modern, including this made-in-China reproduction of a white pepper tin. The Three Crow line of seasonings was produced as late as the 1930s by the Atlantic Spice Company, then headquartered in Rockland, Maine. The crow silhouette is metal, its legs designed to with garden placement in mind. I let the crow stand guard in a flower pot indoors.

My association with crows (particularly crows, and to a lesser extent ravens) goes back to childhood when my father dubbed me "Wings" for my coal-black hair which I always wore swept back. As I would help him with planting corn in the spring, he would recite a rhyme to me as he placed four kernels in each hill: "One for the worm, one for the crow, one to die and one to grow." I seized upon the reference to crows in the assurance that that one individual seed would be the one to produce the corn put on my plate in autumn. When my dad tied the cut stalks in shocks to put beside the gate at harvest time, I would wait for the crows to search for the immature ears Daddy left for their enjoyment.

As an adult, my study of the corvids took a more scholastic turn and friends joked with me about being one of the flock. "Crow" became my nickname, and now hardly anyone calls me by my given name.

Hello, Lads!

Day 127: "Hello, lads!" Thus it was that Morgan Corbye addressed the captain and first mate, having obtained with all due stealth the interior of the captain's own cabin where, with the crew taking leave ashore, the two men sat in private council. She had boarded the vessel under cover of darkness, her approach to the ship made on a makeshift raft of barrel staves lashed together in such quantity as would bear only her slight weight. The Winged Adventure and her crew stood ready for her signal, hidden in a narrow estuary the larger ship could not navigate, tucked away amid a screen of verdure which masked the river mouth. The element of surprise was ever Captain Corbye's trump card and she played it well on this occasion, passing a small oil-filled bomb from hand to hand in the manner of a jongleur, casual in spite of the rapidly shortening fuse. "And where will ye be 'avin' this, now?"

Her reputation preceded her, but that did not stop the mate's foolish flinch toward his pistol. He found his sleeve pinioned with a black-bladed dagger before the motion could be completed and wisely took note that its counterpart had sprung to Capt. Corbye's free hand. The pirate relieved him of the pistol and applied it forcibly to his head and, in the very next instant, had her second knife in the small of his captain's back, urging him onto the deck as the fuse of the bomb sputtered dangerously close to ignition. Upon arriving topside, she threw the grenade overboard and watched it explode just before it touched the water. As always, her timing was impeccable. The watch of the Winged Adventure called all hands to stations at the signal and soon the barque hove to alongside. A score of men swarmed aboard to pry up hatches, removing to the graceful ship cases of tinned meat, fruit and flour, supplies sorely needed by those who spend their lives upon the sea.

Yet Morgan Corbye was not done with the captain and his mate who by that time had regained a semblance of consciousness. She ordered them to strip and bound them, naked, to the spars where indeed their crew found them on the following day, the Winged Adventure long since beyond the horizon. "'Tis not fer th' wealth I be a pirate," says she of her modest commerce. "'Tis fer th' freedom o' bein' me own self, an' that be th' truth o' it."

Let Me Reference Brodo

Day 126: Irwin M. Brodo's "Lichens of North America" could easily be called "the field guide from hell." If you wanted to carry it on a field trip, I would strongly recommend hiring a fair-haired boy with a stout back. It weighs at least seven pounds according to my bathroom scale (possibly eight) and its encyclopedic size is matched by its content. Photos by Sylvia and Stephen Sharnoff appear on every page and for almost every species. It is the most expensive single-volume field guide I have ever added to my collection.

While I will not be bringing specimens home for chemical testing, I trust Brodo will increase my accuracy as far as identifying lichens from photos and field notes, and since my study of these fascinating "non-plants" is one I have long hoped to enlarge, I may have to build a stand for "Lichens of North America." It certainly isn't going to rest lightly on my chest as bedtime reading!

Charlie

Day 125: Meet Charlie, preserved via the medium of taxidermy in the museum at Longmire (Mount Rainier National Park) for those visitors who hopefully will never encounter one of his kin in the wild. In his day, Charlie probably weighed around 150 pounds and would have measured about 30" in height at the shoulders. His body would have measured about seven feet from nose to the tip of his tail, the tail comprising a third of the length. He could run at speeds in excess of 40 miles per hour, but his strongest hunting ability was stealth. A cougar is a stalker, quietly creeping up on its prey before leaping upon it and killing it with one quick bite to the neck. You'd never know what hit you if Charlie wanted you for dinner.

In my years of backpacking and hiking, I have never seen a cougar. I have come upon fresh kills (a situation which made me very nervous!) and I have seen cougar tracks in my yard. In the last two months, our rangers have reported seeing a cougar twice in the pasture across the road. We are cougar-wary here, and watchful whenever we go out.

Poor old Charlie does his duty these days as museum mascot and sentinel. He's getting a little moth-eaten and sun-faded, but he still puts the chill up my spine when I think sharing the trail with one of his relatives

Anti-Crow

Day 124: It pains me to have to put this in 365 Caws today, but I've been at my fishing buddy's watching the SuperBowl and didn't have a chance to take any other photos.

This is not me. This is the Anti-Crow. This is everything I am not, with the exceptions of "tiny" and the fact that I have a pirate ship tattooed on my right leg. I do not wear skirts or blouses. I do not carry a purse. I do not put powder and paint on my face. My real hair is grey and goes every which way, and I never wear anything on my feet except boots or moccasin-style shoes. My own mother wouldn't recognize me in this photo. So why do I have this outfit in my closet? I dunno. Maybe I'll find a need to be somebody else for a day, though I doubt it.

Hands Down

Day 123: Hands down, bobbin lace is a delightful form of needlework, and "hands down" is the key to being able to create lace quickly and efficiently. Although in beginners, there is a strong temptation to lift the bobbins from underneath, the palms of the hands should be turned to face the bolster, not upward. This allows the needlworker to quickly pick up and exchange the positions of two adjacent bobbins, either "crossing" them to the right or "twisting" them to the left. Occasionally, you will find an instruction book which reverses those two terms, so pick a method and stick with it while keeping that in mind. There are no knots in bobbin lace, only weaving of the threads over and under one another. Additional twists may be added to paired bobbins to give more stability to open areas of the lace.

Bobbins are most often made of wood and come in a variety of styles. Some artists prefer to weight the ends with beads to keep the bobbins from rolling on the bolster, as well as making it easy to identify pairs. The lace itself is formed over a paper pattern called a "pricking," and is held in place with pins at the centers of each stitch. Most pattern books simply provide pricking diagrams which must be transferred to cardstock or other firm paper. The paper is pricked before it is mounted on the bolster, making it easier to insert pins at the appropriate spots. Here I am working with sewing thread, "ship's hawser" by bobbin lace standards where finer threads are the general rule.

Vegscape With Crow

Day 122: Put away that desktop Zen garden and try some vegscaping! Ever since I saw my first diorama created with garden veggies as landscaping items, I have wanted to make one of my own. The problem is that our little country grocer doesn't carry the wide variety of leafy greens which you might find in larger urban stores, so my choices were rather limited. Celery and parsley stand in for background shrubbery here (the cilantro should have been removed from the shelf several days ago), with broccoli bushes growing among red potato boulders. The crow is perched on a mushroom. The marsh plants surrounding the pond are the ends of little green onions (scallions). The fence was the most fun to build. Both posts and rails are made of carrot, "nailed" together with bits of toothpick. I had intended for there to be water in the pond, but somehow I must have broken through the foil. It leaked out into the sand as soon as I filled it! Fortunately, I had a protective sheet under the diorama just in case that very thing occurred.

Art is not necessarily about creating something enduring. It is about the creative process. Let your imagination run wild the next time you're at the grocer's, and think about doing some vegscaping of your own!