Spring is here

My gardeners at work

It wasn't cold this morning for the first time, and tonight Elizabeth and I had the first dinner of the year on the front porch, so I'm sure spring is here. But the biggest sign: Greg, the neighbor who cares for my lawn and garden, took Jacob and me to the nursery shopping today. We got herbs, a hanging basket, another lantana--that on one side of the front steps is looking sad, fountain grass, sweet potato vines, parsley, a flowering blue plant whose name I can't remember, and a dusty miller. Jacob pointed to the dusty miller, and Greg said, "No, we're not getting that." Jacob asked why not, and Greg said, "Cause it's an ugly plant." But Jacob liked it, so we bought one for him and put it in a pot where it can't do much damage. We forgot sage (mine died) and a cherry tomato plant, which I really want. Jacob piped up and said he loves them, so I'll go back, maybe next weekend.
Then Greg put him to work planting, loosening old soil in pots, etc. Jacob loved it--so much better than an out-of-school morning spent watching TV. And my porch is beginning to look like spring again.
Elizabeth is gradually sprucing up the back yard, which I've pretty much left a dog yard all these years. She's added statues, including a Buddha, and bird feeders (she now fills the one I had too) and plans pots and hanging baskets. Let's hope Sophie behaves. We've also put a table (on extended loan from Jordan) and four chairs (from my storeroom) out there. Greg griped and moaned but admitted he can move them ever week to mow. I'm seriously considering a small deck at the back door.
Earlier in the day, Jacob and I went to get my hair cut. Out of the blue he asked, "Juju, when are you going to get married again?" Me: "I don't think I'm going to." Jacob: "Why not?" My first reply was inappropriate: "Well, I tried it once and it wasn't much fun." When he said "What?" I amended it to, "Don't you think I'm kind of old?" Matter-of-factly he said, "Yeah, you are old." Thanks, Jacob. Then later he picked up the stylus I used with my iPhone if I want to send a wordy text and said, "Can I take this home?" I said no, and he asked, "Can I have it when you die?" Little ghoul!
But it was a good day.

Of writers and agents--and spring

I sat on the porch tonight for a while, sipping a glass of wine and reading more of The Worst Hard Time. As one who writes a lot about the American West, I thought I knew the story of the Dust Bowl--but Tim Egan is opening my eyes to new facets of it. It's lovely to sit on the porch--the trees are about halfway green--some down the street seem filled out but the huge elm in front of my house still only has sparse leaves. It's an old tree, and periodically branches fall from it--mostly every time I leave town! I call the city, because it's in that easement between sidewalk and street, and I want to avoid huge tree trimming costs. But I always worry they'll just come and cut it down. The oak on the side of the front yard doesn't shed its old leaves until spring, but it has gotten rid of them now and sports new bright green leaves. And the redbud I planted two years ago has a few more blossoms this year, though they're already fading now. A bird--some kind of thrush I think, though I am not a "birder"--perched on one of my youpons, returning my look for a long time. Then, suddenly, he took off for the crape myrtles, which of course have not a leaf on them yet. It's fun, too, to watch the people who go by, most with dogs. One man came by tonight with a medium-sized black dog--the man walked with a funny forward lean, and I wondered if that was because of the dog on the leash. Would he stand more erect if he didn't have the dog or was he forever bent forward?
Someone once said to me that a relationship with a literary agent is worse than a marriage--and I believe it. My first agent was the man who first convinced me to write juvenile nonfiction about the West and whether he knew it or not launched me on a career that has given me "walking around" money over the years. He died before he should have, of cancer, and his wife took over--she oversaw the publication of my adult fiction but always said that she wasn't able to advance my career as much as she wanted. Then in the late '90s, she too died of cancer. Since then, I've danced with a lot of agents but married none of them. I am tired unto death of hearing them say that I write so well that they wish they could sell what I write. Which brings me to the mystery. I sent three chapters to an agent, a man I consider a colleague, maybe a friend, someone I respect as a good businessman. After long silence, he wrote that he had read it and worried over it, and his conclusion was that he liked it but didn't love it. It was too "genteel" for him. We mutually decided in emails that he wants hard-boiled, not an American cozy. I think I knew all along that the manuscript was wrong for him, but he was close and an easy contact for me.
I'm disappointed but not discouraged. I have a couple of acquaintances who write cozies, and I've written them to inquire about their agents. I'm moving on, determined to see Dead Space in print.
Tomorrow I'm going on a jaunt with my neighbor to a town about 30 miles away where a ranch has a butcher shop--boucherie, they call it--and sells grass-fed beef, pork, lamb, and poultry--no antibiotics, no hormones, and no crowded stinky feedlot. Plus eggs and cheese. Reading The Omnivore's Dilemma has made an impresson on me. One theory that made a lot of sense--cattle are the most efficient natural machines on the pasture. They were meant to eat the grass and fertilize it. They were not meant to eat grain (most cattle that are slaughtered from feedlots have diseased livers) and accumlulate huge piles of manure that we don't know what to do with. Once again, we've gotten the environment all wrong in the name of the dollar. Another thing I read--range-fed chicken is amisnomer. The chickens aren't allowed outside for the first few weeks, because they might "catch" something (or something catch them?)--then when the door is opened, they may be too timid to go. Even if they do, they are slaughtered a bare three or four weeks later. Michael Pollan, the author, is right--we can do a lot better with our food supply chain.
And I haven't even gotten to the vegetable meal yet, but Melanie tells me that the pesticides used to grow corn are polluting the surface water supply. Al Gore's "truth" is indeed inconvenient--but scary.