Our house is noisy. It produces all sorts of odd sounds. We’ve had dogs up until now, and thus didn’t know this about the house. We have, it seems, attributed any small indoor disturbance to the dog. Now that Rascal is no more, that doesn’t work, leading to conversations along the lines of, “I didn’t hear that. Did you hear that?” “Not me. I heard nothing.” Our dogs-that-were probably find this hilarious.
A noise in the house yesterday was not at all funny. The house seemed too noisy when I first opened my eyes, and it turned out the mechanism that shuts off the dryer had failed. My sweetheart had tossed a load in the dryer and turned it loose sometime the day before. The dryer had not only been running all night but part of the previous day. Yikes.
The clothes inside the dryer were dry but not hot or charred. Who knows, maybe the part that turns off the heat still works. Or we’ve burned out the heater. There was no smell of burning. We are exceedingly grateful that the house is still standing, noises and all.
Outside, spring seems to be moving right along. We’ve had so much rain, it’s hard to keep track. One of the pleasures of this time of year is finding the bloodroot blooming. Usually, I make several trips to the places bloodroot like, keeping an eye on the plants in the lead-up to the big event. The flowers don’t last long, but they are great.
The woods were so muddy this year that I stayed away and missed the bloodroot entirely. I went into the woods as soon as the trails were passable, but that turned out to be too late. On the bright side, trillium are blooming, raising their showy heads above what’s left of the trout lily. Violets and spring beauty are still blooming, and cut-leaved toothwort is right on time. Doesn’t that name just make you like the flower even more?
Ornamental bushes and trees are doing their best, in a water-logged fashion. The flowering phase isn’t lasting long. A former neighbor who now lives out of state asked yesterday whether the forsythia had bloomed yet, and neither of us chatting with her had a ready answer. Barb checked her own forsythia and said, “I think it’s done.” This hasn’t been a spring for glorious forsythia.
What is glorious is the color green. Michigan tends to be green anyway, but it’s so green now it reminds me of my first glimpse of Ireland.
It’s also fun to see what the critters are up to. A pair of Canada geese are nesting on the no-name pond where geese and swans have quarreled before. The favorite nesting place there used to be a disused muskrat lodge, but that’s fallen apart now, and the geese have chosen a site along the far bank, nestled in the cattails. A mama mallard on another pond is now trailing five tufts of fluff. Turtles are starting to bask, their shells shining in the spring light. Bird chatter is still raucous. Tanya reported five male cardinals having a sing-off in her yard one day, and said the yard can’t support five cardinal families. We assured her we’d be happy to host any extras.
Janice and I went to a presentation at one of the branch libraries yesterday evening, and I picked up a useful pointer. From Janice. She informed me that the best place to park when visiting the Westgate branch is behind the building. It was news to me that there was parking behind the building. Now I can’t imagine parking anywhere else.
There’s plenty of room to maneuver, and there are plenty of parking spaces—two things really not true of the main parking lot. Furthermore, that library has a rear entrance. It made the simple act of entering the library feel like a VIP experience. A red carpet and photographers would not have seemed out of place.
Janice and I did brave the main parking lot on the way home, due to an irresistible lure. Mast Shoes had an enormous SHOE SALE sign hanging out front, and its neon OPEN sign was still on. We snagged a parking space and hustled up to the door. It was locked. The OPEN sign had been left on in error. We commiserated with another woman lured by the signs while we were there, and then toddled next door for a sandwich, as Janice hadn’t had dinner. Alas, the bagel shop was also closed. One thing’s for sure, though: when we go back, we’ll know where to park.
24 April 2026