Night visitors and subtraction

I have known for a long time that possum and raccoon come to the yard at night. There is a path from the woods and past the compost heap, where it merges with the path through the back yard that I have worn with the wheelbarrow. The possum digs little holes in the path, looking for grubs and worms, which is annoying because the wheelbarrow snags in the holes. Sometimes the night visitors trigger one of the motion sensor spotlights and I can see them moving around. They look around under the bird feeder for seeds and peanuts. They dig for worms because with all the hulls falling on the ground there is plenty for worms to eat. They go to the bird baths for a drink. Sometimes they come around the side of the house by the garage. They dig in the soft wet areas where the air handlers drain. Last weekend, I saw the turkey during the day, and she went to the air handlers too. A couple of nights ago I fell asleep on the couch and went up to bed later than usual. The lights out back had come on, and I could see two shapes moving around the bird baths.

Out in the yard today, I took up three sapling buckthorns, sadly, because they were not in good places. They are not strong until they get quite big. There are buckthorns growing in the woods. It's one of my favorite trees. The birds go crazy over the berries. I also started digging up a large stand of firespike in the front yard. It grows out over the driveway, it blocks the view of the house from the street, it was crowding the purple crinum lilies, and it blooms so late in the season that most of the hummingbirds are gone. I will replace it with pentas, most likely, and some other low growing favorites of the butterflies and hummingbirds. It was easier than I thought it would be to dig up the firespike roots. There are some orange justicia family bushes I will also be subtracting from the yard, because I planted them in places where they get too much sun. I will keep the ones that get enough shade. The hummingbirds really go for them.

The visit and the dream

On the last night of the children's visit, Nick came down when we settled in to watch half a movie after dinner as usual. He circled and nobody except me noticed. After a few minutes of circling, he jumped up into my lap and stayed there snuggling for quite a while. So, real progress for Nick.

Here's the dream from last night. I tell my husband Trump has just attacked Ireland for staying in the EU, because this is disloyal to the British. My husband says, oh, it's in his book. He gets out a book from the 90's called something like Aphorisms for Living. The cover says it's by DONALD TRUMP and two other authors in a smaller font. (It's a collection of other people's writing, sort of like Ivanka's book of favorite inspirational quotations, you know the one where she didn't ask permission to use copyrighted material.) He turns to a page with a quotation about Ireland. It's something out of "A Modest Proposal", to the effect that the Irish can't take care of themselves so the British have to do it for them. That tired old argument. I'm so deeply resentful that it's been a year and that man turned up in a dream, not in person thankfully, but in name and illogic.