Seaside walkabout

Come to the seashore and walk with me.

Hide from the world awhile among the beach roses.

Stand atop these standing stones and watch the surf slide in.

Sit in sand by the water's edge and listen.

Explore the ocean floor laid bare.

Walk into the waves and wade.

Feel the caress of God's great blue Heaven above.

Summer is sweet

Fuchsia beach roses bloom in the sand, flowers in the desert.

Driving to the summer house, I have a hard time keeping my eyes on the road. Bright green vegetation has sprouted everywhere, and flowers in a spectrum of colors line the countryside and spill from cottage gardens.

“June in New England is like a lover’s dream made tangible. Color and scent and sound; the hills indeed sing,” wrote Gladys Taber in “The Book of Stillmeadow.” Dawn comes so fresh and cool, and dusk flows like a still river into the deep sea of night. Noons are tranquil gold. There is nothing stern or sober about our Northern countryside now; even the grey rock ledges are gently blurred with silvery green lichens, and in the great cracks time has chipped out, a thousand tiny plants get a precarious hold.”

Indeed, this is the kind of day that comes to mind in the heart of winter: a benevolent sun, brilliant blue skies, gentle winds and tranquil seas reflecting the Creator’s handiwork.

Fuchsia beach roses bloom in the sand, flowers in the desert.

The huge maple tree in our front yard is so heavy with new growth that walking beneath it is like entering a deep forest shrouded from sunlight and carpeted with thick spongy grass.

Inside the summer house we throw open all the windows, as the salty air comes streaming in.

Then we head out to the shed in search of garden tools to contribute to the abundance of nature around us. The pitchfork is missing a tine, but we begin overturning the earth in the tiny kitchen garden at the back of the shed. The fertile soil comes alive with pink earthworms disturbed from their hiding places. We rake, hoe and plant the tomatoes, while the purple chive blossoms wave in the wind.

Medieval anchoress Julian of Norwich wrote: “Be a gardener. / Dig a ditch, / toil and sweat, / and turn the earth upside down / and seek the deepness / and water the plants in time. / Continue this labor / and make sweet floods to run / and noble and abundant fruits to spring. / Take this food and drink / and carry it to God / as your true worship.”

We sit in the shade, read and chat while we listen to the music of birdsong and the distant sloughing of the surf. 

Summer is sweet.  

Rose-colored beach days

The beach roses are in bloom.

Today is the kind of day you dream about on long, sunless winter days.

Awaking to bright sunshine, I stare out the window at a world that sparkles clean and fresh after yesterday’s rains.

I remember my husband gently brushing his lips across my forehead before he headed out early this morning to go fishing with our son and his friend.

Hours later, I lay in bed and smile.

Sunny weekends at the summer house in mid-August – it doesn’t get any better than this!

For my birthday my best friend gave me a blue glass token imprinted with the words: “If you’re lucky enough to be at the beach, you’re lucky enough.”

Life is better at the beach, where a magical world enfolds.

Under intense blue skies, I walk along the tiny streets to the beach, passing our neighbors’ colorful cottage gardens.

Down at the rocky shore, I admire the Creator’s handiwork. The Sakonnet sparkles like diamonds reflecting the heavens.

Bringing bright splashes of color to this sandy oasis, the beach roses are in bloom and their heady scent carries on the wind.

The beach rose, which is also known by its Latin name rosa rugosa, is a flowering plant that thrives in seaside thickets, dunes and salt marshes along the Rhode Island coastline. Tolerant of spray, they bloom from June through October.

The dark green bushes or hedges, ranging from three-to-six feet tall, produce white, pink and red flowers, as well as orange-red fruit called rose hips. Their brown bark is densely covered with straight, sharp thorns.

They are also home to a menagerie of animals, including many birds that nest within its dense foliage. The fruit, which resembles small crab apples, provides sustenance to all sorts of creatures.

Although rose hips tend to be bitter and contain an abundance of seeds, they can be eaten raw, preserved in jellies or brewed for tea.

Beach roses are so common and such a familiar part of our landscape, yet they are not native to New England. The species was brought to the United States from eastern Asia in the mid-1800s.

Surrounded by hedges of fuchsia beach roses, I sit by the water’s edge, watching sailboats glide past.

Nineteenth-century New England poet Celia Thaxter said it best:

“The jeweled seas and the deeps of air, / All heaven and earth are good and fair, / Ferns at my feet and the mullein’s spike, / And the soaring gull I love alike; / With the schooner’s grace as she leans to the tide / The soul within me is satisfied.”

 

                                                                          

 

 

 

 

 

Musings on sweet August

It is the best of times – it is the worst of times.

August is at its glorious apex, but we are in the waning days of summer.

Every year at this time, I drag my feet in Fogland sand, trying to hold onto summer before it slips away.

Nineteenth-century New England Poet Celia Thaxter described the season best: “The jeweled sea and the deeps of the air, / All heaven and earth are good and fair, / Ferns at my feet and the mullein’s spike, / And the soaring gull I love alike; / With the schooner’s grace as she leans to the tide, / The soul within me is satisfied.”

I buy blueberries on Pond Bridge Road and bake up a batch of muffins studded with blue orbs, nurtured in Fogland soil and ripened in salty air.

My husband cannot fish enough. When he is not at work, he is pushing his boat off the trailer into the Sakonnet, cranking the engine and puttering over to the sweet spot. He anchors, baits the hook and is happy, whether the fish are biting or not.

Last week he caught a large flounder, a rare catch in these waters. Flounder were as plentiful as scup when I was a little girl.

I remember the day Grandfather took us, his five grandchildren, to the coastline near Railroad Bridge where we had a fishing contest, the girls against the boys. There were two buckets, and Grandfather could hardly keep up – taking fish off the line and baiting hooks. In no time, the pails were filled with flounder.

I cannot remember the winners, but I guess we all were. My mother fileted them, her favorite fish, and we feasted on them.

Walking toward the salt marsh, I marvel at the reddish-orange rose hips, the fruit clinging to the beach rose plants. They are especially beautiful this year, the color reminiscent of a Fogland sunset.

Rose hips begin to form in spring but ripen now in late summer. Resembling a small crab apple, they provide sustenance to all sorts of creatures.

I grab a handful of sand and let it slowly trickle through my fingers.

I wonder how these grains can support the bushes that produce luscious hot pink flowers and an abundance of edible fruit.

The wind picks up and the Fogland Marsh Preserve mimics the sea, a rolling wave of green with red dots.

I walk away reluctantly, as each footfall sinks in the sand.

Home is where the nest is

Rising at dawn, I am never alone. Outside the window, I hear the long, pleasing, descending gurgles – “chuurr … chuurr … chuurr” – from the beak of my constant companion.

House wrens recently took up residence in a hanging pot of hot pink geraniums that I received as a Mother’s Day gift.

I discovered the squatters when I drizzled cold water on the flowers and an angry bird. I screamed as the mother wren exited her nest whizzing past me.

A common New England species, house wrens are five-inches tall and have a light brown head and back, dotted wings and cocked tail.

Couples build their nests anywhere handy, even in open mailboxes and flower pots.

Their nesting habits are poked fun at in the old limerick:

“There was an Old Man with a beard, / Who said: ‘It is just as I feared! / Two Owls and a Hen, / Four Larks and a Wren / Have all built their nests in my beard.’”

These days, our summer house at Fogland Beach is ablaze with hot pink beach roses.

Known by its Latin name rosa rugosa, the beach rose is a flowering plant that thrives in seaside thickets, dunes and salt marshes along the Rhode Island coastline. Tolerant of salt spray, they bloom from June through October.

The dark green bushes or hedges, ranging from three-to-six-feet tall, produce white, pink and red flowers, as well as orange-red fruit called rose hips. Their brown bark is densely covered with straight, sharp thorns.

They are also home to a menagerie of small animals, including many birds that nest within its dense foliage. The fruit, which resembles small crab apples, provides sustenance to all sorts of creatures.

Beach roses are so common here and such a familiar part of our landscape, yet they are not native to New England. The species was brought to the United States from eastern Asia in the mid-1800s.

Nineteenth-century New England-poet Lucy Larcom wrote about them in “Wild Roses of Cape Ann”:

“A rose is sweet / No matter where it grows; / But our wild roses, flavored by the sea, / And colored by the salt winds and much sun / To healthiest intensity of bloom – / We think the world has none more beautiful.”

Nesting for the past nine months, our daughter gave birth to a son this week. He is rosy pink, his hair is as soft as feathers, and we think there is none more beautiful.