Reflections on the Sixth Week of Winter – Pursuing Frozen Bubbles 

    Bubble wand in hand, when temperatures dropped between 10ºF and 16ºF (-12ºC and -9º C), I hustled outside in pursuit of freezing magic. Could I capture the soft colors and grandiose crystals of the Internet images that created more awe than firework finales?

    My first chance came on a frigid, sunny December morning when the Internet weather reported 10ºF for our zip code. I pulled on three layers of indoor clothes and another of outdoor then hurried onto the deck with my camera and a half full vial of bubbles from my nephew’s wedding. I dipped the wand and blew. Bubbles, varying in diameter from dime to quarter size, drifted through the air, landed, and popped.

    Patience. I needed patience.

    Dip, blow. Dip, blow.

    A bubble landed intact on snow. I aimed the zoom lens, but the camera refused to focus on the clear bubble against white snow.

    Chickadees scolded. They didn’t dare dart to the feeder while I tramped on the deck.

    I ignored their raucous protests.

    Dip, blow. Dip, blow till a bubble landed without breaking at the base of a flower pot. The camera focused, and the clear bubble collapsed.

    Dip, blow. My bottom numbed. Dip, blow.

    A bubble wobbled on a tomato cage wire. I raised the camera. Rainbow colors shimmered on the liquid surface. I pushed the shutter button and hoped.

    When my fingers froze, I trudged inside, peeled two layers of clothes, and checked the temperature on our weather station. Just 3ºF. Oops. I should have checked before frustrating the chickadees.

    Perhaps the photos worked anyway. I downloaded them.

    Pleasing blue, gold, and pink swirls encircled the bubble on the tomato cage wire, but the bubble lacked crystals. No magic.

    I ordered solution for “long lasting bubbles” on line, read the camera manual to increase the number of pixels in photos, and waited for the temperature to drop to arctic again.

    The first week of January gave me a second chance. When I bundled for the the 12ºF temperature indicated on our weather station, Spence said, “Blow the bubbles by the evergreen trees. You’ll have a better background.”

    Better?

    White pine and spruce needles popped bubbles faster than the pots and snow on the deck. When a bubble finally nestled intact in spruce needles, patience switched to a race.

    Ready–place the bubble solution jar in snow so it didn’t tip.

    Set–point the camera.

    Go–snap the picture before the bubble popped.

    I persisted till the bubble solution froze in the jar. Then I crunched through the snow to check if I’d captured any crystals.

    Feather like crystals did form in photo spheres, but no colors.

    Sigh.

    Spence set his computer on the table, walked behind my chair, peered over my shoulder at the photos. “They’re great! That one looks like a moon in the tree, and the other one has eyes staring at you.”

    I didn’t want a moon in a tree or eyes staring at me.

    I wanted spheres with majestic palaces or golden sprays of stars.

    This week, while I waited for another bitter day, I oohed and aahed at frozen soap bubble images on line. Google nudged me into reading an article about freezing soap bubbles inside. The directions emphasized “gently.” Figuring I had more “gentle” than “patience,” I reached for the bubble solution.

    No more “blow and burst” for me. I aimed for “blow and catch.” Literally. I titled my head backwards, held the wand four inches above my lips, and gently exhaled. Bubbles zipped into the air while solution dribbled onto my chin, rolled down my neck, and soaked my turtleneck collar. I caught a shimmering bubble and gently transfered it to the solution coated paper plate. The bubble popped, a repeating outcome. The few bubbles that didn’t break sunk into domes.

    I could deal with domes.

    I gently moved the plate into the freezer where the dome promptly broke. The rare domes, that lasted till I closed the freezer door, vanished before I put the next dome inside. Would I ever get a bubble to stay intact for thirty minutes inside the freezer? Probably not. I wiped bubble solution off my chin and pulled off the sticky turtleneck.
    I’m waiting for another bone-chilling day. Whether the soap bubbles freeze or burst, the pursuit brings the magic. My spirit soars with each bubble . . . exhilarating fun for a sixty-eight year old kid.

Reflections on the Fifth Week of Winter – Enticing Cats to Party 

                                                          Photo by Anita

     For the past thirteen years on January 16, I’ve told our cats “Happy Birthday,” patted their heads, and mentally added one to their age for the inevitable question, “How old are they?” This year I wanted to make George and Emma’s shared birthday special.

    My sister Anita inspired this change. She’d thrown a party for her Tibetan Terrier Lexi’s eighth birthday in August. With butterfly wings strapped to Lexi’s back and a silver party hat on her head, Lexi munched a dog cookie shaped like a bone and decorated with “Happy Birthday” in white frosting. Anita’s other five dogs chomped cupcake shaped cookies at the party.

    Treats would work for the cats, but forget the costume. If I tied wings on George’s back, he’d gouge bloody rivulets in my hand then sulk under the table. Planning ahead, I stowed the treats and two of the many toys Anita sent the cats for Christmas.

    When I woke January 16, Spence reported he’d already started the celebrations.

    Whispering so he wouldn’t wake me, he’d sung “Happy Birthday.” George opened one eye to check if Spence was okay, yawned, and went back to sleep. Emma never woke.

    A less than inspiring start.

    When the cats lounged in the great room mid morning, I fetched Anita’s party items and opened the treat package. Emma wiggled her nose, evidently detecting chicken aroma. Since the treats were smaller than cat food nuggets, I gave her two. She gulped both and rose on her hind legs to beg for more. George gobbled his then pushed in front of Emma to see if she’d left any. I gave them seconds, thirds, and fourths.

    Too much celebration.

    Not wanting to ruin their vet prescribed diet, I put the treats away and offered Anita’s straw catnip balls. Emma sniffed hers. George glanced at his then focused his eyes on my treat-empty hands. I rolled the balls. The cats left to nap in the bedroom.

    Without the food, my party flopped. But I had other ideas.

    Early afternoon, I unplugged my new laptop and called, “George.”

    He looked up from the food bowl.

    I walked to the stairs and called again.

    He followed.

    In the loft, I settled on the bed beside napping Emma.

    She merrowed a complaint.

    I had two plans in mind. I’d sit between the cats and pet both like I had when they were kittens. At the same time, I’d celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr. Day by watching a YouTube video of Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech. I put the laptop on the bed by my feet.

    Emma merrowed a second complaint and waddled behind the computer.

    I picked her up and put her by my left side. Her third complaint dissolved into purrs when I stroked her from head to tail.

    She set her chin on the edge of the computer and waited for another pet.

    I picked George off the floor and set him on my right side.

    He didn’t complain. He just jumped off the bed.

    I picked him up four more times with equal success.

    Dr. King spoke in his vibrato voice. “When will you be satisfied? We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality.”

    “That hasn’t changed,” I said and scratched Emma’s chin.

    She stretched her legs.

    George clomped downstairs.

    Dr. King continued. “We can never be satisfied, as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities.”

    “That has changed,” I told Emma.

    Her purrs increased to coffee-grinder loud.

    Partial success.

    Later, determined to involve George in birthday fun, I opened the bubble solution jar, dipped the wand, and blew.

Emma’s eyes followed the first group of bubbles from the tip of the wand to splashdown on the kitchen tiles. Unimpressed, she left.

    I said, “George look” and blew five more times before he noticed the floating bubbles. His head moved with one bubble’s flight till it splatted. He sniffed the soap residue then walked to the food bowl.

    I cleaned the sticky tiles with wet rags.

    Emma returned and watched each swipe.

    I should have scrubbed the bathroom for her.

    How could we engage George?

    By slicing white cheddar, Spence did. George followed Spence and the cheese plate to the sofa. Spence gave George three nibbles. George gobbled the cheese and promptly vomited.

    Not a celebration.

    Sporting his you-guys-are-crazy frown, George sat by the front door until we let him onto the porch. Twenty minutes later, he hadn’t scratched the door to come back. Why would George stay out so long in thirty degree weather?

    Spence stepped out to check.

    Beside the workbench, George pointed his taut body at the fat field mouse he’d cornered. George twitched his tail and waited for his birthday entertainment to move.

    The mouse shivered in place.

    Spence grabbed George around the middle and carried him inside.

    Next January 16, I’ll bake cookies in cat shapes and eat them by myself.

Reflections on the Fourth Week of Winter – “I Can’t Get Home”

 

    Rain, that began at nightfall Wednesday, still pounded our metal roof Thursday morning while we ate breakfast. A female voice drifted out of the bedroom. I left my hash browns to investigate. A message flashed across my cell phone screen. “Flood warning in your area until 10:30 a.m.”

    The warning reminded me of the day in June 2015 when I couldn’t get home because the culverts under the road on both sides of our house had collapsed. Torrents of water, from streams that dried up in the summer, dug car-swallowing trenches across the road. “Will I be able to get home today,” I joked. The flood warming was for the morning. I wouldn’t be returning till mid afternoon.

    “The culverts should hold,” Spence said.

    Under umbrellas and sharing the load of my purse, lunch, water bottle, Learning Center bag, swim bag, and an empty sunflower seed bag I wanted to match to webbing for handles to make a large tote bag, we walked to the garage. Muddy Deer Creek roared in the valley and rushed over the flood plane.

    Spence stared down West Creek Road. “The culvert’s holding. You’ll be fine.”

    With windshield wipers swishing at top speed, I drove the half mile up a grade, around the bend, and down the slope to Route 173. Along the wet state road, I wound my way to the bridge into Cochranton then glanced at French Creek. Groves of trees, that usually lined the water, stood in a sea of brown waves.

    Just in case, I didn’t follow Route 322 along the French Creek flood plain and drove uphill to Mercer Pike along the ridge. The new Subaru Crosstrek splashed through driveway runoff. Emerging waterfalls cascaded off hillsides. Ponds formed in every yard and field. But, in the Crosstrek with higher road clearance than the old Impreza I’d driven in 2015, I navigated the wet roads into Meadville.

    After coaching children to read about a moose who wanted muffins, to match sounds with letters, and to write coordinates for points in line drawings, I swam three-quarters of a mile in a crowded pool, gulped my lunch while driving to Jo-Ann Fabrics, and bought webbing to make handles for the tote bag.

    Time to head home.

    Rain hammered then pattered. I imagined flooding over the back roads across Meadville swamp so headed home on Route 322.

    Turning right at the last stop light in Meadville, I had a tractor trailer ahead of me, a line of cars behind, and a steady stream of oncoming vehicles. I was stuck, and planted in the berm was a new “High Water” sign. But the next quarter mile of wet road reassured me. Maybe the sign meant high water was possible.

    Then the tractor trailer hit the water. Fountains of spray rose from both of its sides and arced higher than the trailer itself.

    Good grief.

    Since the water only covered our lane, I waited for two oncoming cars then drove in theirs. That worked until water pooled in both lanes and lapped over the yellow middle line.

    I steered the Crosstrek to straddle the higher middle and crept forward.

    Would the car stall? Would it wash off the road?

    When oncoming traffic came, I stopped and let them pass. Waves lapped against the tires. I followed behind and to the side of the tractor trailer for what seemed like an eternity but was probably only an eighth of a mile.

    Back on wet, not flooded pavement, I exhaled.

    Phew.

    The Crosstrek splashed, windshield wipers swished, and I took the cutoff into Cochranton. That road dipped, and what looked like wet pavement was actually two inches of standing water. The Crosstrek sprayed through and kept rolling all the way to Milledgeville.

    “I can get home,” I told the wipers and turned onto West Creek Road. “Only a half mile to go.”

    I paused to gape at the second mobile home. Water pooled from the front steps and driveway to the middle of the road. That family wouldn’t drive into their garage any time soon.

    I didn’t either.

    The culvert between the third mobile home and Flickenger’s horse pasture was too small to accommodate the volume of water. A surge, twelve feet wide, crossed the road and blocked my way.

    I called Spence on the cell phone. “I can’t get home,” I said in a wavering voice. “The drainage ditch by Flickenger’s pasture flooded the road.” I turned around in the driveway that hadn’t flooded, drove back to Route 173, and turned right.

    “I thought that culvert would flood,” he said. “It’s so close to the road surface. Just turn around and come the back way.”

   “I am,” I said with my signal clicking right to take Carlton Road which ran parallel to West Creek but higher up the hill. Water overflowed the drainage ditch and streamed across the intersection. “Oh, shoot.”

     “What?”

    “The drainage ditch is overflowing.” Because the overflow was only two and a half feet wide, I took a chance to plow through without damaging the car. The Crosstrek forded the stream, accelerated uphill, and wound around curves.

    Spence’s voice calmed me. Relief. I’d be home in six more miles.

    I chatted with Spence until, in the middle explaining my watery adventures, we lost connection.

    Then I headed down hill towards Carlton. Branches and clumps of leaves littered the road where water had washed earlier. At the bottom of the hill by the seed farm, a man in a pickup coming toward me had to stop until I passed because mud and brown water covered his lane.

    I turned right onto New Lebanon Road. The road surface was only wet, not flooded. I could handle wet. But driving up the grade to the bridge over Deer Creek, I met water pouring down the opposite lane and trickling across mine.

    Sheesh.

    The Crosstrek crunched tree limbs, splashed, and drove through. I turned right onto Deer Creek Road.

    Three miles to go.

    Water crept up the flood plain to the edge of the narrow country road. Deer Creek roared under the next bridge. At the top of yet another hill, runoff from Barb’s driveway pooled in my lane. I swerved to the avoid the water. Squeezing the steering wheel, I drove straight onto West Creek Road and approached the stream where a new culvert had replaced one that collapsed in 2015.

    Would the new culvert handle the deluge?

    It did.

    I took a calming yoga breath, honked my horn frantically when I passed our log house, and drove into the garage.

    Between the house and the garage, Spence, under his umbrella, met me under mine.

    “You didn’t have to come out in the rain,” I said. “I just honked to let you know I was back.”

   “I didn’t hear that,” he said taking half of my bags. “I was coming out to get the truck and go find you.”

    Back inside, I dropped my gear and, in a teary voice, whispered, “I’m home,” before collapsing in Spence’s strong, warm arms.