Poults

 

May 11, 2024

Cold, clear. Had to turn the thermostat down to avoid waking the furnace.

Downtown last night to see night 2 of A God in the Waters. As I pulled up to park in the street, a scruffy lad knocked on the widow and asked if I could spare him $20. I gave him $20. The theater brimmed with friends and acquaintances, and on that account I was happy. My problem with Ben & Angela was that almost nobody I knew bothered to see it. Already that anxiety is gone with this one. The performance was satisfying in every way. The labor  people put into realizing my work is a constant source of gratitude. Anyway, great praise from the audience. B and J said I’d hit everything musical on the nose. Stopped for a drink in a new bar beside the BeBe. When I got home, a Shakespeare-in-th-Park version of Hamlet played on PBS. It was quite good– the best Ophelia I’ve ever seen–and I heard myself thinking THIS is the company I want to keep. 

Nicolas the tree hombre came with his wife and son to right my dangerously tipping mulberry. Spent $400, but loved saving my beautiful tree.

Planted a new rose and dug out what I recognize now to be resuscitating English ivy when there was agitation on the street, and a car stopped behind my hollies. Checked to see what it was. A woman had seen a turkey hen (probably MY turkey hen) trying to cross Lakeshore with her perhaps twenty chicks. The babies, for the most part, couldn’t get over the curb. So she and I were out there lifting turkey chicks off the road and into the lawn while traffic labored around us. In the midst of it, a hawk zoomed down aiming for the babies. The turkey took flight and saw the predator off. People around here habitually identify all hawks as “osprey,” as did the lady in the street. She remarked that it was like a nature show on TV, Mother Turkey in various sorts of peril. But we got all the babies rescued and disappeared into the lawns west of here. I wished they were coming into my yard, where they would be safe and there is no curb. I forgot the woman’s name, but she lives at the end of Red Oak where, she says, all sorts of wildlife abound, and she takes on the task of looking after them.