Last Saturday, in the rain, I traveled to East Wareham to a marsh to see which birds were also braving the weather.  As I got out of the car, I realized it wasn’t just raining - it was cold.  I wasn’t sure I was going to see much except for a few gulls.  But then a red-breasted merganser flew into the marsh area.  After that I saw my first great egret for the year.  If you haven’t seen a great egret before, they are tall and white.  They’re hard to miss.  After the egret, I turned around to find an osprey sitting on a rock along the bay.

After the marsh, I traveled to Lyman Reserve, a reserve I pass everyday on my way to work to see what I could see there.  Although it is a small reserve area I did see a few things of note.  I saw an osprey hovering over the river trying to find breakfast.  And although I didn’t see much besides a few song sparrows looking for food, in a small island along the river a mother goose was on its nest.  Other birds I saw that day:

Canada Goose, Osprey, American Crow, Black-capped Chickadee, Tufted Titmouse, Song Sparrow, Northern Cardinal, Red-winged Blackbird, Red-breasted Merganser, Great Egret, Ring-billed Gull, Herring Gull, American Goldfinch

Bird of the week: Great Egret

First sightings of the day: Great Egret

(Life) Birds I want to see this year:
American Kestrel (seen on 2/27/2010)
Horned Lark
Eastern Meadowlark
An owl

trash day

Earth Day, much like Earth Hour, is meaningless if we don’t do anything about it. Whether you believe in global warming or not, the idea of Earth Day is important. Just take a walk (or a drive) around town and look for all the random trash that is splattered along the road, or in the park. Drive along a major thoroughfare or a highway and you begin to notice all the McDonalds bags, Dunkin Donuts cups, Shaw’s bags, and cardboard boxes along the road. If we do not take Earth Day seriously, not just on April 22 but every day, the trash will not just be in the dumps and splattered along our roadways, but will continue to build up in the places we visit ever day that do not have trash.

For now, it is easy to turn a blind eye to the Earth. The ice caps are melting thousands of miles away. Last year’s cold summer caused even the biggest combatant of global warming to second-guess himself. Water pollution is covered up, or towns make unsubstantial excuses to as why waste treatment plants or paper companies (etc.) had to dump their excess into the local river.
Trash, for now, is nearly contained in dumps and for the most part those dumps are contained away from the rich and left in poorer areas (i.e. Chicago’s South Side). But, the land will run out eventually. The trash will begin to show. How long will it be until someone notices, until someone cares?

growing arugula

The seeds are really starting to grow and sprout now.  After a couple weeks, the herbs are coming along and some of the cucumbers and pumpkins are ready to be transplanted into bigger containers. All of the arugula and carrots are really starting to sprout, and it's exciting to see how much they have grown in such a short period of time.  The onions on the other hand (for the most part) did not make it.  Except for a few, the onions will have to be replanted. 

Cucumber

Pumpkin

Arugula

Carrots

The few onions to make it

demanding apologies, demanding history

334 years after King Philip's War, a war which killed 3,000 natives (or 15% of the population) and was the beginning of the end of a forced expulsion of the natives from Massachusetts land, some residents of Middleboro are demanding apologies from local Native American tribes.  The demand is over a casino building plan in Middleboro.  For a few years now, the casino planners have been going back and forth on deciding whether or not to have a casino in Middleboro.  Residents are apparently fed up and don't care either way if the casino goes up or not – they just want a decision. 

Now they are demanding an apology from the local tribe responsible for the casino development.  It takes great audacity to demand an apology from a group of people that were forced off their own land.  But nevertheless, some residents have neglected and ignored the past and are demanding it. 

This is just another reason why history is important and has such an impact in today's society.

42

Today, if you didn’t know, is Jackie Robinson Day.  In 1947, Jackie Robinson re-broke the color line into major league baseball.  That’s right, re-broke.  After the Civil War, during the reconstruction period, African Americans and whites played on the same field.  But as more and more teams began to exclude black players from their teams, the league became exclusively a white sport.  By 1890 the league was completely white.  The baseball field reflected what was going on in towns all across America.  Not only were baseball fields becoming exclusively white, but stores, jobs, housing, and even whole towns were as well.  Jackie Robinson - in 1947 - shows a glimpse of the progression towards equality after decades of regression in the United States.

for the birds: lifebird!

"Hmmm.  What's that gull over there?  It's got a dark back and it's head looks black too."  My hands grab the binoculars, and bring them up to my eyes to see the mysterious bird closer.  "Its taken flight.  What is it?  It is making a wheep sound.  That doesn't sounds like a gull.  It's coming closer."  A little rush of excitement comes as the three birds come close and I realize I will be able to identity the bird.  I shout, "Lifebird!"  My wife looks on in humored amusement as I punch my fist in the air.

The long, slim, flat red bill with a black head means that it can be no other bird: it is the American oystercatcher.  It is the first time I have seen an oystercatcher, and five of them at that.  The whole time as I watched the five of them, they flew in circles around the seashore, being very noisy – in keeping with their behavioral characteristics. 

Oh, and I saw a mockingbird for the first time, too.  It was just your run-of-the-mill day at the ocean. 

wandering unemployment

If you have been reading my blog for awhile you might have noticed that there was a long absence of new blogs.  And since February the blog finally has life again.  Of course this is no coincidence. Out of work for six months my blog was virtually frozen.  With more time on my hands than ever, the ideas were not flowing.  And now that I am back to work, the wellspring of ideas is finally starting to come back.      

This made me think of how other out-of-workers are doing around the United States and the world.  I was fortunate enough to have been supported while unemployed, but others are not so fortunate. How long until grief and depression set in?  When does pain become too unbearable to move from one day to the next?  Unemployment benefits may be one thing, but what about the psychological effect on individuals and societies?  Cycles of chronic unemployment and homelessness set in and the greater society has not been equipped to help them (if they even do).

Luckily, I have been carried by a greater support system.  Others have not been so lucky.   

garden blog: rain and sprouts

After we planted the onions, two nor'easters decided to come in and flood southern New England.  It created flooding problems in Rhode Island and parts of the South Coast of Massachusetts.  We managed to stay dry, although that is mainly because our house is on cinder blocks.  In any case, our onions look like they might not appreciate the rain and have not sprouted yet.  In the meantime we have added to the garden.

Of course some things don't get planted in the garden yet, but do need to be started in trays.  Over the weekend we planted cucumbers, tomatoes, and pumpkins in mini-seed trays.  We also started three herbs: basil, parsley, and chives in their pots.  The herbs will stay in their pots, but will continue to be out in our porch until it is warm enough to move them outside.  That goes the same for the cucumbers, tomatoes, and pumpkins until they are ready to transplant to the garden.  Outside - we planted carrots and arugula.

Not even a week later, the pumpkins, cucumbers, and arugula have already started to sprout.  For now the garden looks great – we just need to get those onions sprouting.

Herbs planted

Cucumbers, Tomatoes, & Pumpkins 

Cloche to help the newly planted arugula and carrotts

two worlds collide

Two worlds of mine have recently collided.  I am almost done with a book on the history of World War II.  And even though the book does not talk much about the holocaust (as it is a book on military history), you cannot help but hate the man in the book named Hitler.  It is not even hard to hate him without reading about the holocaust.  He was a fearful leader with few - if any - morals.  His hatred does not just come out toward Jews, but toward Russians, and anything he deems a worthy scapegoat.  There is even a wartime paradox as he allies with the Japanese.

My world of hate yesterday collided with the world of resurrection – Easter.  The world of resurrection is the Kingdom of God, and if we are to live the resurrection, then the kingdom of God has come.  If I am to live the prayer of “your kingdom come” then I must live a radical and loving life.  A life that is so radical that it can even love and forgive someone as vile as Hitler.  For if God not only sent Jesus to earth, but died and rose, then that is love that is extended to everyone.

Of course it is still easy to hate Hitler.  There is no sign he felt remorse, regret, or had any actions of reconciliation in anyway.  But, two worlds have collided.  The one we live in, and the Kingdom of God.  It is a world in which Jesus sat with sinners, talked to Samaritan women at wells, and did the impossible. 

new Jesus video uncovered in Qumran

Earlier today, in the same area that the Dead Sea Scrolls were found, an authentic video was discovered in a clay pot in cave 5 in Qumran of Jesus and his disciples.  The video sheds much life on what Jesus and his disciples not only really looked like, but also what they sounded like.  Archeologist say this could be the greatest discovery sinceÉ well the discovery that Jesus was not in the cave he was buried in some two thousand years ago.  The video, which is just over two minutes long, has Christians all across the globe proclaiming to the world, ÔHere is your long awaited evidence non-Christian worldÕ, while non-Christians are claiming that Jesus sounds kind of funny.  Found just days before Easter, the holiest of Christian holidays, it is more than mere coincidence.  To view the newly discovered video, click below.