Danon, glad ya splain'd. <smile>
sumac, posted at your thread, and yep - ocean deterioration a reality that only Mother Nature will resolve. <yikes> Recalling the movie "Day After Tomorrow"! <good film btw>
Well ya all, the weathers cooled a bit, and i'm goin' outdoors for serious yard work.
all clicked
First: my best wishes to Aa, who is an inspiration to me. Oh, and I use her name about four times in every Scrabble game I play.
Second: I grew up next to the Bigelow Brook woods and every spring we swung the birches. Climbing up the smooth white bark higher and higher until we thought we had reached the right point, then throwing our legs out wide and holding on tight as the tree delivered it's pilot safely to the ground. In our little world the guys and I believed that we had invented the sport and so we were more than shocked when Ms. Boyadis, our fourth grade teacher, hearing us talk about it on the schoolyard showed us this Robert Frost poem.
I think that I loved words before that day, but that day cinched it.
Birches
When I see birches bend to left and right
Across the lines of straighter darker trees,
I like to think some boy's been swinging them.
But swinging doesn't bend them down to stay.
Ice-storms do that. Often you must have seen them
Loaded with ice a sunny winter morning
After a rain. They click upon themselves
As the breeze rises, and turn many-coloured
As the stir cracks and crazes their enamel.
Soon the sun's warmth makes them shed crystal shells
Shattering and avalanching on the snow-crust
Such heaps of broken glass to sweep away
You'd think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.
They are dragged to the withered bracken by the load,
And they seem not to break; though once they are bowed
So low for long, they never right themselves:
You may see their trunks arching in the woods
Years afterwards, trailing their leaves on the ground,
Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair
Before them over their heads to dry in the sun.
But I was going to say when Truth broke in
With all her matter-of-fact about the ice-storm,
I should prefer to have some boy bend them
As he went out and in to fetch the cows--
Some boy too far from town to learn baseball,
Whose only play was what he found himself,
Summer or winter, and could play alone.
One by one he subdued his father's trees
By riding them down over and over again
Until he took the stiffness out of them,
And not one but hung limp, not one was left
For him to conquer. He learned all there was
To learn about not launching out too soon
And so not carrying the tree away
Clear to the ground. He always kept his poise
To the top branches, climbing carefully
With the same pains you use to fill a cup
Up to the brim, and even above the brim.
Then he flung outward, feet first, with a swish,
Kicking his way down through the air to the ground.
So was I once myself a swinger of birches.
And so I dream of going back to be.
It's when I'm weary of considerations,
And life is too much like a pathless wood
Where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs
Broken across it, and one eye is weeping
From a twig's having lashed across it open.
I'd like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over.
May no fate wilfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
Not to return. Earth's the right place for love:
I don't know where it's likely to go better.
I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,
And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
But dipped its top and set me down again.
That would be good both going and coming back.
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.
-- Robert Frost
Pretty heavy stuff for fourth graders. Oh, I know, yes, there were some trees we swung that never rose again, but not many, and as soon as the mud on the ballfield dried up we left them all to themselves until the next Spring.
There are still birches there by Bigelow Brook that are over 150 years old, maybe over two hundred, nobody's cut anything down in those woods since the Revolution.
Joe
aktbird57 - You and your 283 friends have supported 1,951,482.6 square feet!
Marine Wetlands habitat supported: 51,851.1 square feet.
You have supported: (0.0)
Your 283 friends have supported: (51,851.1)
American Prairie habitat supported: 36,608.0 square feet.
You have supported: (10,276.8)
Your 283 friends have supported: (26,331.3)
Rainforest habitat supported: 1,863,023.4 square feet.
You have supported: (162,104.6)
Your 283 friends have supported: (1,700,918.8)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1 Aktbird57 .. 1175 44.796 acres
I have always been a little skeptical (who? you joe? No!!) about "clicking" on something to save anything. So, now I'm interested in knowing how you know that your clicking is actually doing something. You've supported a little over an acre of Prairie, where's the acre? In the Osage?
What I'm asking is who monitors the funds and maintains the records of how they are spent?
Joe
JoeN - you can get a reasonable amount of info from the Care2 site itself.
I'm off to try and reach Aa again.
Will see if I can find some links for you when I get back.
It is a very reasonable question, Joe, and one that I have asked myself. ehBeth and others here are more knowledgeable than I, and perhaps the discussion has come up in the past. Then someone can fill us both in.
from the innards of the site (this bit is specific to the rainforest race - there are different dealios for the other races)
http://rainforest.care2.com/race_info2.html
<some of the stats need some updating on that page>
Thanks, e. Still seems a little too easy.
J
Thanks for that good information. Very pleased indeed to read it.
ehBeth, Thanks for the info and link. Good to know stuff.
clicked..................
ehBeth, good info, thanks.
have a good day wildclickers
clicked
Clicked.
Overcast and COOLish here.
Joe Nation wrote:Thanks, e. Still seems a little too easy.
J
Sometimes things just are easy - though it takes a hell of a lot of clicks to save anything noticeable. I'm not a huge fan of the Nature Conservancy. They're a bit, mmmm, right of centre for my general taste - but they do actually save some real land, so I'll take what I can get. Most of the other races have FAQ pages with details about their specific charities.
I also do the rounds at The Hunger Site and affiliates each day. Easy enough to click in between posts.
aktbird57 - You and your 283 friends have supported 1,953,660.0 square feet!
Marine Wetlands habitat supported: 52,155.5 square feet.
You have supported: (0.0)
Your 283 friends have supported: (52,155.5)
American Prairie habitat supported: 36,654.9 square feet.
You have supported: (10,300.2)
Your 283 friends have supported: (26,354.7)
Rainforest habitat supported: 1,864,849.7 square feet.
You have supported: (162,104.6)
Your 283 friends have supported: (1,702,745.0)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1 Aktbird57 .. 1176 44.850 acres
any little person who read Anne of Green Gables will always love white birches
http://pd.sparknotes.com/lit/anneofgreengables/
<chapter 13>
The Lady in White
A Czech Tale
As Retold by Cristy West
Every day, from spring until fall, young Bethushka took her flock of sheep to graze near a grove of birches. In her pocket was a spindle for spinning flax into thread. But she much preferred to roam and explore in the woods. Sometimes she went down to see what new wildflowers had bloomed in the meadow. And occasionally she would make up a little dance, just for the fun of it, and twirled about under the trees.
One spring day a beautiful woman suddenly appeared before her. She had long blond hair and was dressed in a silky white dress and she wore a wreath of flowers on her head.
"I see you like to dance!" said the woman.
"Oh yes," said Bethuska, "I could dance the whole day! But my mother had given me this flax to spin."
"Tomorrow is another day," said the lady, "Come, dance with me! I will teach you some steps!"
So Bethushka lept up and joined the lady. Laughing and singing, they danced through the trees and out into the field. So light were their steps that the grass was neither trampled nor bent. Near evening the lady vanished as suddenly as she had appeared.
Bethushka gathered her flock and headed homeward. When her mother asked about her spinning, she pretended to have misplaced the spool. She said nothing about the lady in white.
The next day Bethuska went back to the same place, this time determined to do her spinning. Again the lady appeared. "Will you dance?"
"I cannot. I must do my spinning. Or else my mother will be angry with me."
"If you will dance with me, I'll help you to spin."
So once again, Bethuska joined the lady and together they danced through the day. Near sunset, the beautiful lady smiled, waved her arms and lo!, like magic, the spool was filled with fine linen thread. That evening Bethuska's mother was pleased to see the thread. But still Bethuska said nothing about about the dancing.
The third day the Lady in White was waiting for Bethushka near the woods. They danced as never before - pirouetting and curtseying, skipping and swooping, whirling and laughing, skimming over the ground as lightly as the wind. When the day was over, the Lady in White spun the flax again.
"You are a fine dancer, Bethushka! I have enjoyed myself!" - and she handed Bethusha a pouch with a mysterious pattern embroidered on the outside. "Take good care of this," said the lady. Bethushka peeked inside and saw that it was filled with dried yellow birch leaves.
When Bethuska arrived home, she gave her mother the new spool of thread. This time her mother looked at it more carefully.
"Where did you get this from? Surely you did not spin it yourself?"
So Betushka told the whole story of meeting up with the beautiful lady dressed in the long white dress.
"Why, Bethushka - that was the Wild Lady of the Birch Grove! It's very good luck to meet up with her!"
"She taught me some wonderful dances!" exclaimed Bethushka "And look- she gave me this pretty little pouch filled up with old birch leaves!" But when Bethushka emptied out the pouch for her mother, her mouth fell open in astonishment. The birch leaves were made of solid gold.
Lovely story, Stradee-thanks!
Hey, Sumac- I just read your post re my computer "Get a new one" That's the trouble - I just did, about two months ago and it's been a nightmare ever since. Hope Aa is faring better with hers.
As you can see, I'm catching up, page by page.
Joe, what a love you are for quoting Frost's glowing poem. It's years since I've read it and it is so silvery beautiful. I wonder if it isn't his very best. The whole world could do well to be a swinger of birches.
pwayfarer,
yes, I know about new computers, sigh. I was just offline for 39 days (!!) when my new video card on my new computer turned up to be defective. But under warranty, and as soon as the problem was diagnosed, I was sent a new one. Keep on pushing with the responsible parties about your computer!! Demand action.
Birches,
I want to do some research on birches' role in regenerative forest development. Soon.
