You don't see squirrels or chipmunks down in South Texas.  There you will see black, hairy, tarantula spiders marching up the sidewalks, like school children on their way to a day of learning.  South Texas is largely below sea level and the spiders are genius at predicting floods.  I thought the nicest thing about Ft.Worth just might be it's hospitality to squirrels, they would eat right out of my hand at the zoo where I stopped almost everyday on my way home from classes.  Squirrels are fun to watch.  Then we moved here.  Our house is in a neighborhood, but the abounding wild life hasn't gotten the download on that yet.  They think it's a forest.  There are birds everywhere.  Pleasantly so.  I remember how rare it was to hear a bird from our home in Ft.Worth ... here, all I have to do is listen.  We have foxes, raccoons, something called a fox squirrel, used to have flying squirrels in the back yard, but they have moved on (along with the owl whom I miss).  We have deer, who I see less and less and only when there are babies ... sometimes they come away from the woods (zig-zagged with creeks) and meander on the big open front lawns that are usual in this development.  I've seen coyote and my son said he saw a wolf (in our driveway!).  When Sammy barks, I believe him.  Of course there must be tons of snakes,  I'm always looking for them, but thankfully, they are rarely seen.  This time of year we are over run with chipmunks.  I've never seen them any where else I've lived and I really enjoy them ... probably left over fun from the Chip and Dale days of my childhood.  Yesterday, as Four and I came out through the front door, my wonderful glass barometer fell from it's sturdy leather strap and shattered in to a gazillion shards ... and a tiny ball of fur hurled itself from the rose vine into the shrubs below.  I think I heard him say "Uh oh."  The strap was gnawed through.  Bummer.
I knew it was "chance-y" when I took it from it's protective case ... down from the top shelf ... I remember thinking, there is no pleasure in having something wonderful like this wrapped up and tucked away,  I encouraged myself to put it out there where I could enjoy seeing it everyday.  Those little bastards!  I laugh as I write those naughty words ... yes there is a more acceptable way to say that, but none so appropriate it seems to me this morning.  That's me.  I adore the chipmunks and then ... I don't.  I have a lot of sharp pieces to pick up today.  As soon as that's done I can go back to being mostly amused by their silly antics (they are pretty cute).  The flower bed that  meanders gracefully away and back along the front of the house has been shamefully neglected ... I didn't want to water every night this summer so I skipped planting the perennials ... I skipped planting, so I also didn't do any weeding ... it looks pretty rough!  Getting that lovely is my big job this week while I wait for my husband to build the headboard structures.  If he doesn't do that this week then I will give it a go next week.  I don't build things as well as an engineer, but I do have more time to put to a project like that ... and I am bothered by the roll of fabric leaning in the corner of our breakfast room.  I am feeling ... aggravated this morning ... I'll blame it on a sinus infection, but it's really just something that some serious weeding will probably fix.  The local nurseries are beginning to set out Pansies.  I think we need some sweetness planted in those front beds.

What else?  A sentence I've love to see these past few days:

I pressed this repeatedly and hard with the point of an old tool that was lying near, till at length it yielded inwards; and the little slide, flying up suddenly, disclosed a chamber - (here is my favorite part) empty, except that in one corner lay a little heap of withered rose-leaves, whose long-lived scent had long since departed; and, in another, a small packet of papers, tied with a bit of ribbon, whose color had gone with the rose-scent. ~ MacDonald (PHANTASTES)

And ... a couple of related ideas that I'm thinking about ...

"I am part of the part, which at first was the whole." ~ Goethe
plus

"So, then, as darkness had no beginning, neither will it ever have an end.  So, then, it is eternal.  The negation of aught else, is its affirmation.   Where the light cannot come, there abideth the darkness.  The light doth but hollow a a mine out of the infinite extension of the darkness.  And ever upon the steps of the light treadeth the darkness: yea, springeth in fountains and wells amidst it, from the secret channels of its mighty sea.  Truly man is but a passing flame, moving unquietly amid the surrounding rest of night; without which he yet could not be, and whereof he is in part compounded." ~ also PHANTASTES from MacDonald
This is a story told by one of the (dark) characters in the book to the main character as he journeys along.  I note it because I'm thinking about light ... and so, necessarily, also of darkness.  I like seeing a picture like this one(following) in the context of light and dark.  I like how the presence of a star pushes against the dark, how the heat of it warms the cold of dark ... I like that as I look out from here I can see light and I see dark only as it references or frames ... light.

"Let your soul stand cool and composed before a million universes."

~ Walt Whitman

all three of the photos I selected today were sourced from Pinterest ... posted w/o credit