{"id":10424,"date":"2014-04-20T10:10:59","date_gmt":"2014-04-20T17:10:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/?p=10424"},"modified":"2014-04-27T15:16:37","modified_gmt":"2014-04-27T22:16:37","slug":"flashback","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/?p=10424","title":{"rendered":"Flashback."},"content":{"rendered":"

When we moved out to this piece of property it was almost all wooded.\u00a0 Walking to the pond with infants or toddlers was like choosing between a quick death by cedar tree spike to the chest or slow expiration by entrapment in inescapable underbrush.\u00a0 Not to mention heart-stopping encounters with spider webs (if the web is on your face, where is the spider?) and humiliating strip-down tick checks on the deck before reentering the house.\u00a0 So one of my first landscaping plans was to make a clear path to the pond and back.<\/p>\n

And every day while the children napped, I stumbled around in the woods—-trimming branches, rolling fallen trees, cutting back briars, moving rocks—-until I created a meandering pathway.\u00a0 I simply piled the brush on the sides of the path because there was no way I was hauling it all up to the house and it would still be 12 years before Big was old enough to be FireMaster and in charge of burning anything and everything that we could fit into the fire pit.<\/p>\n

Also, I imagined the brush piles would be excellent habitat for the local population of adorable critters.\u00a0 I pictured birds and bunnies, chipmunks and field mice, safely ensconced in the piles and nibbling back the undergrowth for me.\u00a0 I pictured me and the kids strolling through the picturesque woods and communing with nature.\u00a0 Let’s be honest.\u00a0 I pictured this:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Oh, there were some errors.\u00a0 One year I actually raked the path clear because I discovered the leaf debris covered a variety of ankle-spraining holes.\u00a0 I spent hours and hours raking leaves in the middle of the woods.\u00a0 Raking.\u00a0 In.\u00a0 The.\u00a0 Middle.\u00a0 Of.\u00a0 The.\u00a0 Woods.\u00a0 And hauling those leaves to a different section of the woods.\u00a0 Which sounds stupid and mind-numbing.\u00a0 But consider that at the time I was staying at home raising four children, aged 5 and under.\u00a0 Stupid and mind-numbing is relative.<\/p>\n

Of course, the first heavy rain storm proved to me that ankle-spraining holes hidden under leaf debris are actually more appealing than a huge mud sluice washing down the hill and through the woods to the pond.\u00a0 Especially when that mud sluice contains all the topsoil from the front yard.\u00a0 And a good part of the dirt from the foundation of the house.\u00a0 Oh, and the pond is not so appealing when it’s filled with dirt either.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Another year I decided the paths needed a moss makeover.\u00a0 According to lots of landscaping books, moss is a no mow, no erosion, low water solution to having green groundcover in shady areas.\u00a0 I spent days blending moss<\/a> from the front yard and then spraying it onto the path in the woods.\u00a0 I didn’t have any ridiculous expectations.\u00a0 I was just picturing something simple, you know, like this moss path in a professionally landscaped botanical garden with full time staff:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The process produced awful smells, but no moss.\u00a0 Apparently, if your woods have suitable conditions for growing moss, then moss will already exist there.\u00a0 Which was fine because I learned later that moss can be smothered by leaf debris.\u00a0 So it has to be covered with netting in the fall or dutifully raked.\u00a0 Raking in the woods.\u00a0 Again.\u00a0 Wouldn’t really make me feel like I was making landscaping progress.<\/p>\n

Even if the path had its ups and downs, the brush piles did turn out to be a haven for wildlife.\u00a0 As a matter of fact, once we started raising Muscovy ducks, several ducks made their nests in the brush pile.\u00a0 Muscovies are naturally cavity nesters, but some were quite content with a hidden spot among the old brush, lining their nests with leaf debris and camouflaging the whole thing with loose sticks.\u00a0 It was private, dry, comfortable.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Oh, and extremely deadly.<\/p>\n

Eventually we’d wake to find a duck staggering around in the woods, her nest destroyed, her eggs eaten, her injuries anywhere from minor to life-threatening.\u00a0 Because a natural habitat doesn’t only favor the birds and bunnies, chipmunks and field mice.\u00a0 There’s an entire category of critters that feeds on the cute and adorable.\u00a0 And living out in the woods is less like this:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

And more like this:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Or this:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Or this:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

One evening I found a duck thrashing around in the woods with a large black snake wrapped around her body.\u00a0 In her desperation to free herself, she kicked out her eggs, which was apparently the whole point of the attack.\u00a0 When the snake slid off her, he began gobbling up eggs as fast as she tried to roll them back into the nest with her beak.\u00a0 I’d like to say I helped her out but I just stood there in complete disbelief, shock, and fear.\u00a0 Because at first I thought the snake was trying to eat the duck.\u00a0 Then I thought if I tried to help the duck gather her eggs I might get bitten by the snake.\u00a0 Then I realized there was nothing to keep the snake from returning and repeating the horrifying process!\u00a0 Welcome to the woods, Snow White.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Eventually we became quite skilled at pulling black snakes out of the ducks’ nests.\u00a0 Even I was able to do it.\u00a0 As long as I had a hoe or rake or shovel.\u00a0 To steel myself for the task, I reminded myself that every lost egg was a $40 duck that wouldn’t make it to market.\u00a0 And I screamed as needed.\u00a0 (Screaming was always needed.)\u00a0 Not everyone was afraid to grab snakes by the tail, though.\u00a0 The kids made quite an effective snake patrol unit.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Eventually the majority of the ducks nested in the barn.\u00a0 Landscaping goals moved on to lawns and vegetable gardens and perennial beds.\u00a0 The path to the pond remained.\u00a0 But it relied upon the kids going trekking back and forth to the pond to fish….<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

or visit their fort.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The pony rolling down to graze the greens on the dam.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Or the pig headed for a swim.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The goats did their share of keeping the trail clear, too.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Over the years the brush piles along the sides gradually disintegrated.\u00a0 Eventually nothing remained of them but the largest of the trunks or the indestructible cedars.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

But then, this happened:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

When the ice melted, the paths to the pond were gone.\u00a0 Obliterated.\u00a0 Buried.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Which is how, 12 years after I started the job, I was right back to clearing the woods.\u00a0 Hauling branches, rolling tree trunks.\u00a0 Trying to avoid ankle-spraining holes under the leaf debris.<\/p>\n

In the beginning I had the adorable antics of the goats kids to watch as I worked.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The piles of brush began building up.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Once the goat kids were gone, my own kids made a brief appearance.\u00a0 So brief that I don’t have a single picture of them helping out.\u00a0 I do vaguely recall some grumbling and complaining, hiding and sneaking off, while I picked up limbs and The Other Half used the chainsaw to cut up the largest downed trees.\u00a0 And even after all that help, even with the brush piles increasing in size, the progress was not exactly noticeable.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

So the goats got in on the action, too.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

As I settled into the job, I noticed my path-clearing ways had changed over time.\u00a0 Hanging branches were left alone.\u00a0 I remember standing on cracked or broken limbs like this, jumping up and down in attempt to break them off so I could haul them out of the way.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

But now I just looked at them and shrugged.\u00a0 No need for all that effort to tear them down when time would do it on its own.\u00a0 If I know one thing after 4 kids and 40 years of living, it’s that gravity pulls everything down eventually.\u00a0 Trust me on this.<\/p>\n

I didn’t fuss over the outline of the path either.\u00a0 Originally, I took a shovel down with me and dragged it through the leaf debris, making 2 roughly parallel lines all the way to the pond.\u00a0 Then I carefully hauled everything to those lines.\u00a0 This time I eyeballed the largest, heaviest, hardest-to-move limbs.\u00a0 And I decided that where they had fallen was the perfect place to make the side of the trail.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

That’s because time makes you older<\/span> fatter<\/span> lazier<\/span> tired<\/span> smarter.\u00a0 Work smarter, people, not harder.<\/p>\n

And I left branches this size right where they fell.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Yeah, the first time around I actually picked up small branches and moved them off the path or, even worse, picked them out of the surrounding woods to add to the brush pile.\u00a0 I can’t recall my thinking exactly, but I think those twigs threw off the clean look of the path.\u00a0 Or were used to add symmetry to the piles so they were equally high on each side.\u00a0 Oh, Snow White.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Why????<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The main path to the pond is restored now.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The goats and sheep continue to nibble at the brush piles, peeling the young bark off the branches and giving it an interesting variegated appearance.\u00a0 There’s no professional landscaper or paid garden staff that would bother to turn brush piles into works of art like that.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Huh.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Well, no one who gets paid with hay and a scoop of grain anyway.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Walking on that path, amidst the towering piles of brush is like walking back in time for me.\u00a0 Including the muddy pond, full from melted ice.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I suppose there’s something profound about finding yourself right back where you started.\u00a0 Or pathetic.\u00a0 But not everything is the same.\u00a0 Losing all those trees let quite a bit more light in the woods.\u00a0 And there’s moss growing everywhere.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Time heals all wounds, people.\u00a0 Time heals all wounds.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When we moved out to this piece of property it was almost all wooded.\u00a0 Walking to the pond with infants or toddlers was like choosing between a quick death by cedar tree spike to the chest or slow expiration by entrapment in inescapable underbrush.\u00a0 Not to mention heart-stopping encounters with spider webs (if the web […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10424","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10424","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10424"}],"version-history":[{"count":54,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10424\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10579,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10424\/revisions\/10579"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10424"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10424"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10424"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}