Eric’s been journaling during our adjustment to these rapidly changing times, so I’ve created a page on The Way to the Clearing for him to post his thoughts.
(For Patti’s blog posts, visit the homepage or click here.)
After we all got up and took the poodly boys out back for their morning constitutional, the temperature felt nothing like spring: 12 degrees Fahrenheit.
Between the writer’s cabin and the driveway extension we put in a couple of summers ago, there is a small, oblong spit of land. On the other side of the driveway extension the woods are dense and wild. On this side, you can count the number of trees: 20 yellow birch, 3 red maple, 4 balsam fir, 1 white (paper) birch, 2 eastern hemlock (I think), 3 black cherry. There is also an impressive rhododendron bush, wild blackberries, and, come to find out after I had traipsed the woods far and wide last spring looking for them, a nice clump of fiddlehead ferns, right there fifty paces out the red door. Did I mention rocks? There are lots and lots of rocks. In the lawn in front of the writer’s cabin, between the house and the oblong spit, there are three apple trees: one I planted three years ago (Mac Free), one I planted last year (Frostbite), and a flowering crab, which I hope to ultimately graft with something more “useful” (I’m thinking “hard cider” here).
I always feel a pang of guilt when taking a tree down, no matter how thoughtfully I justify doing so. Peter Wohlleben’s recent The Hidden Life of Trees details how trees feel and communicate. My remorse is well founded.
I’m looking at that spit of land as a mini orchard to plant those apple trees I ordered a few days ago. While considerable firewood will result (always a good thing), the amount of work that needs to be done between now and when the apple trees are ready for pickup is a bit daunting. But that’s the effect spring’s anticipation has: one must plan and do. A lot of times, if you wait until spring arrives, you might have waited too long. Spring will come.
Eventually.
(Pictured above: Our Red Baron last September—the only apple tree on the property when we bought the Clearing in 2014, and the only one that produces fruit. Eric now has twenty-two more apples trees planted, still in fairly juvenile stages, and we can’t wait to make hard cider with them once they start producing! ~ Patti)
Guess we’ll soon be dubbing you “Johnny Appleseed”! 💖
And you’ll have to come up and try our hard cider, Maureen!