4 years after discovering Dolores, I made the difficult yet correct (-feeling) decision to leave. reluctantly I admitted the solitude of rural living had spent my resources skint; Mary Oliver I am sadly not. luckily the folks I’ll miss most really showed up to soften the edges and take on to-dos. beyond grateful for communal emotional processing, I left it well. here are a few snippets from the last dawn spent in a place I (will always) love.

“I’m not an ambi-turner!” I whine to Deets while she darts behind me and left, as I’m holding her leash in my right.

how absolutely smattered in spring clingers!pollen to petal, all seeds stuck about, amidst! the fluffy fur feathering this little kitty

last night Deets rushed into an Antelope Bitterbrush: woody, most tangly undergrowth, low to the ground, and fiercely fence-like. Deets had been wearing her “night necklace” which makes her look like the tiniest animal at the rave and helps me locate her without difficulty. she dashed into that matted tangle of sticks though and lost the necklace in their depths. on leash, this was quite the annoyance. (today she is roaming free to celebrate: Sunday, sunshine, springtime, mother’s day, our last Sunday just we two in this beautiful broad high desert garden home.) Bitterbrush cannot be approached simply; it spreads wide and stout, a mass of sticks. there is no stepping into or toward Antelope Bitterbrush, only on, and against. I attempted to place my feet strategically to prevent destroying too much of this plant which I assume all the neighborhood farmers loathe. I managed to get one foot all the way to the ground as I wondered how my pants would fare; better them than my bare legs, I thought gratefully. luckily I was also wearing my most durable jacket! so I slipped my sneaky hand between, among, through, slowly reaching as if through a sinister puzzle box, again finding gratitude when I realize that although spiky and tough, this bush is pricker-less. the night necklace is still glowing when I finally wrap my hands around it. I am delighted with myself. Antelope bitterbrush doesn’t give to breaking the way Scrub Oak chips and cracks and chunks off as soon as one bumps it. oh no, Bitterbrush holds firm, scrappy, gets up every time and never taps out. somehow, as I grasped my plastic goal, a little spry branch of this pudgy fierce bush swung out of nowhere to whip across my face. once again I felt mercy as this slash of brush missed my eye but barely. I had been holding the glowing ring, ready to make my escape, until I reacted to that smack by losing my footing completely and flopping over from my crouched stance, crashing heartily into the breadth of brush. poked from all angles and sides now but laying quite comfortably considering, again: gratitude. even that short of a fall onto the unyielding desert floor would have smarted. instead, I found myself bolstered cozily, and a little stuck. therewith followed a bit of rolling while my hands searched for purchase amidst a nest of stabby sticks. this whole time by the way Deets is waiting not super patiently because her leash is also tangled in this undergrowth: the next problem I plan to solve after I get my heavy-feeling bottom out from the grasp of this fiendish flora. I rested like that for a moment before using mostly willpower to launch my body out onto the freedom of solid ground and standing. I replaced Deets’ necklace while I held her harness, unhooked the leash, and easily dragged it back through the tangle—so small and sleek compared to my body—to us. reattached and well-lit, Deets led us elsewhere.

on a startlingly familiar timeline / unplanned but predicted / delayed and inevitable / unsurprising until its unbidden early arrival: another departure approaches. reluctance abounds and I want to say it’s the hero’s journey except to save myself now feels out of step: a better plan had been. precise, promising, beautiful. amidst the seep and stretch of an alone that isn’t lonely so much as marooned. a culture strange (/estranged?), not new. purpose shared and celebrated. the earth invitational. a pair of mini donkeys, pen full of piglets, playgrounds for goats, Great Pyrenees at work, freshly shorn scrawny lambs. the deer who lately routinely fold us—human and kitten—into their herd, unannounced, calmly curious, wary. communal healing of high school hearts. inadvertent temperance, unsolicited calm. contemplation unaccompanied. years without witnesses. years spent growing a best friendship worth its name suffering brutally beautifully now. and how. another departure approaches: an unbidden early arrival / inevitable and immediate / predicted but unplanned / on a startlingly familiar timeline.

Mercury is back in retrograde and it probably doesn’t matter but maybe it does? so the advice is to lead with humanity

thumps and swishes. dry grasses, hooves against dirt. tufts of white, fluffs at height. each a sussuruss springing up round zig bounce, thump thumping against the ground. several bright rumps now at this, otherwise perfectly blended brisk blurry browns through tall frail brush. sweet evening thu-thump swish hush.

I would like to know the overlap of folks who found new life/strength/confidence via Bad Bunny as well as Heated Rivalry, and then I want us to become pen pals

in a matted tangle of winter-dried grasses I spotted the reddest red. so red I thought “let me get that trash”, but reached toward the opposite. a tiny hearty ladybug crept up my thumb to remind me that spring always comes

loving to hurt I painted myself sad. a tragedy uncovered only when I celebrated as my heart broke as I danced when I wept as I laughed as I sang when I grieved and laughed again

no matter how much time I spend under moonlight, my body still reaches toward it from the nighttime shade for warmth

did I tell you about the mole who fought back? proud Deets attacked and carried it a while, mouthing gently her new toy with the guilelessly proud sadism of the natural predator. the mole, now situated on the ground far from where Deets grabbed it, turned to face her. Deets leaned toward the rotund mammal who it turns out was preparing itself, steeling for the moment when it could lunge directly at the face of its attacker. neither Deets nor I had ever seen this level of fearless moxie from something that had been in her mouth. Deets did a startled little hop, stepped back, and took a lap around the silken creature. this little soft pudgy blind rodent never let its back face Deets as she moved. it waited, vigilantly and repeatedly, for Deets to close in before launching itself onto and up off its meager haunches toward my cat’s curious face. I stood idly awestruck, witnessing dumbfounded as the mole strategically confused Deets and backed itself into a tangle of sage underbrush, all the while baring teeth. Deets gave up more easily than I’d have expected. mole ftw.