Morning. Chayo eats her waffles, then shows me around the garden, explaining how bees enter the plant to enjoy the nectar, and the male parts of the plants put the pollen on the bee so when the bee goes to the female parts of the plant, the pollen will "crumble off" and make a "root" that will fall out when the flower dies and make a new flower. Close enough. I wonder how she knows this stuff at seven years old and at seven in the morning. Not liking to be stung, she is concerned about "bumblebees, wasps, and hornens." Those pesky hornens!

Today's med comes from our new friend Sharman Apt Russell, from her gorgeous and even sexy book, Anatomy of a Rose. I think writers could learn soulful things from this book, but so could gardeners and rose lovers and people who like good writing. (Being a lifelong bug-maniac, I was happy to get her An Obsession With Butterflies.) You know how it is when you get these writing sweethearts--you just get giddy and walk around with them, holding hands and smiling a lot. I was busy courting Annie Dillard and May Sarton and Joan Didion andDiane Wakoski and Linda Hasselstrom and Sue Hubbell and Mary Oliver and Diane Ackerman and Lisa Chavez and... Now I'm all crushed out on Sharman Apt Russell.

She says:

"We get up every day, surrounded by mystery and marvel, enthused by all the things we do not know. Life on earth has had four billion years to get this far. We woke up this morning to try and figure it out."

I'm working on that cipher on a daily basis; it feels like I'm in first grade, right along with the Chayonator. It's quiet now. Everybody's gone to school. Cinderella's still with grandma, who seems--remarkably--to be feeling better. Just me and the dogs for long glorious hours of silence. Books.

Watch out for the hornens.
L

# posted by Luis @ 7:51 AM