Such a long gap of time between posts. But now this year’s Mendocino Coast Writers Conference is over and, as I always do after a major project is completed, I am attempting to clean up my midden of a desk. I’m reminded of a novel I read back in the 1960s. The author was Michael Frayn, and the somewhat forgettable plot was about a bunch of hack journalists in London who were bored with their jobs.  It’s the title that stuck in my mind: Against Entropy. The notion that our lives are a constant struggle against disorder and decay.

The surface of my desk is now visible in parts. I still have files to sort, both computer and paper. But I no longer despair of restoring order.

The conference was a success. Not financially,  in this economically troubled year, but in the quality of instruction and the spirit of community the participants felt. Their glowing evaluation comments made our efforts worthwhile.

Now on to planning the 2011 conference…

Countdown to the Mendocino Coast Writers Conference, which starts next Thursday, July 29.  Amazingly, I’m caught up for the moment on co-director tasks. Time to take a deep, relaxing breath and think about the wealth of wildlife with which this place is blessed. Last evening, on the hill behind our house, we saw our first California gray fox of the season.  A cottontail scampered out of sight as a pair of angry scrub jays attacked the fox. Later, the stags emerged, two of them, both with magnificent six-point racks of antlers. We’ve been watching the new season’s fawns gradually lose their spots. A jack rabbit family shares the front garden with the quail family. Hummingbirds and bees have discovered an exotic treasure from my native New Zealand: a young Metrosideros excelsus.  It is commonly known as New Zealand Christmas Tree because on the northern coast of New Zealand its spectacular clusters of red flowers bloom in December. Here on the other side of the world, where summer is on the other side of the calendar, it has been brightening our gray July.  We call it by its Maori name, Pohutukawa.

A beautiful image from an old friend, who recently scattered the ashes of her late husband:

“… as I threw the handfuls of ash into the water—they made circles ever widening which explains  why I dislike the term closure— it is not one circle, of life  with a beginning and  ending, but one circle making many concentric  circles which widen as a life enlarges, and sometimes the circles intersect as one life touches many and adds meaning  to other lives forever…. ”

My new great-niece came to visit this week. At ten weeks old, Baby Jessica smiles and gurgles. “Being a mother is different from what I expected, my niece Angela says. “I thought I’d spend all my time looking after a helpless baby. I didn’t realize I’d be getting to know a little person.”

I watch the two of them as they gaze into each other’s eyes, and am overwhelmed by the miracle of that mother-child bond.

Thirty-five years ago, a bunch of hippies in Mendocino started a tradition of getting  together to read their poems. Many of the original group were at the Hill House last Sunday, to reminisce about the old days and to read their work at the 35h Anniversary Mendocino Spring Poetry Celebration. Produced by Gordon Black and hosted by Sharon Doubiago and Dan Roberts, the event drew 46 poets, of whom I was privileged to be one.  I felt I was part of history.

My March gardening enthusiasm was a flop. Of all the seeds I planted, only lettuce, peas, fava beans and a few chard came up. Creepy-crawlies quickly demolished the chard. The weather stayed cold and wet. Weeds flourished. I turned my back. Then May arrived with its soft days, and I was tempted once again. This time I hied me to my favorite local nursery, North Star, where I found lovingly grown organic vegetable starts. I brought home chard, red cabbage, kale, basil,  parsley, and two tomato plants, Oregon Spring and Sweet 100.  The peas are coming in to harvest. The garlic looks happy. For now, optimism triumphs.

It is one thing to know as a fact that high rainfall tallies in California’s rainy season result in more spring wildflowers. It is quite another thing to feel with your whole being that exuberant burst of fecundity.

At MacKerricher State Park this morning the air is misty and the sea is calm. Out by Laguna Point, swathes of Goldfields (Lasthenia chrysotoma) dazzle the eye. Up close, I see that among the Goldfields are patches of Purple Butter & Eggs (Triphysaria eriantha ssp. rosea) whose complementary color makes the gold even more eye-popping. Scattered among them are California Poppies (Eschscholzia californica). Not the orange poppies we coast dwellers snobbishly refer to as freeway poppies, but our own coastal variety, the leaves more fleshy to resist the salt wind, the flowers a prettier yellow.

South along the headlands trail, I know a place where Coast Delphinium (Delphinium decorum) grows. Never more than a foot high, each plant has a head of deep blue flowers that glow with intensity. This year they are magnificent. As I crouch to admire, I remember renewing their acquaintance in previous springs.

This is the way an immigrant learns to belong: to come back and back to a place, to remember its varied moods, to remember where the flowers are.

My friend Diana, who lives in New Zealand, has a wonderful piece in her journal today about the “exotic” species in her garden. It set me thinking about where I live. The English sparrows and starlings that forage in town don’t have much chance here at the edge of the forest, where the native birds are so dominant. Our resident Red-Shouldered Hawk argues noisily with the ravens, an American Robin sings his heart out from the top of the tallest fir. A dozen quail putter through the garden, and the returning Violet-Green Swallows inspect their nest site in the porch.

Of plants my garden is a mixture: some natives, but more Mediterranean and Australian dry-summer species. My little apple tree is in glorious blossom. But the tree I treasure is a young and flourishing Pohutukawa, a New Zealand native that reminds me of the beaches of my childhood.

A disturbing mailing from my homeland. It seems the New Zealand government is considering a proposal to allow mining in some of the country’s high-value conservation land. Environmental organizations are horrified. Forest & Bird, one of the country’s major environmental organizations, noted in its online article:

Mining in any of these presently protected areas will further imperil our threatened species, destroy important habitat and leave us with contaminated waterways, scarred landscapes, subsidence and erosion problems and an almighty clean-up bill from ‘orphaned mines’.

Moreover, it will severely tarnish New Zealand’s ‘clean, green’ image.

The New Zealand Government has called for submissions from the public on its mining proposals. Submissions close at 5 pm (NZ time) on Tuesday, 4 May 2010. If you have visited New Zealand and seen what could be destroyed by mining, I urge you to learn more from Forest & Bird and other New Zealand environmental organization sites, and submit a protest. A good site for an overview of protest activity is 2precious2mine.

A soft spring day here on the Mendocino Coast, a perfect day for planting my vegetable garden. Every year this exercise is a triumph of hope against the reality of cutworms, earwigs, slugs,  snails, and the voles that have figured out how to scramble up the sides of my raised beds and lay waste to the crops.

As I hoe and rake weeds and sticks from the rough compost I spread several weeks ago, pictures come into my mind. My mother raking off hoed weeks with the same light touch I am using now. My father filling a deep trench with lawn clippings to make a hot bed for his asparagus. My grandmother bending to pick a harvest of chard. It pleases me to see myself in a line of people who grow their own vegetables.

The snow peas I planted earlier in the season are taking off, but there are gaps in the row where a bird–a robin, I suspect–nipped off the suculent new shoots. I pull out the seed packet and push more seeds into the spaces.

In another bed, garlic is about six inches tall. Nearby is a potato sprouted from one missed last year. I might as well add a few more from the pantry to keep it company: organic Russian Fingerlings, already nicely sprouted. I expect my grandchildren will have fun digging through the earth for the harvest this summer.

Another favorite harvest for kids is carrots. I like to grow a half-long variety. Next to them a row of shallots, since I read somewhere that carrots and onions like to grow together. Kale: I’m trying a mild elephant kale this year. A lettuce mix, of course, and chard, a colorful variety called Neon Lights that does well in this climate. A few fava beans left over from last year.  Against the wall of the potting shed, some pole beans, a French variety. It’s a more sheltered spot than where I tried them before, unsuccessfully. But I’m willing to gamble: if mildew doesn’t get them, the voles probably will. And if neither of these things happen, we’ll have elegant beans.

I’ve left a fallow corner in one of the beds. Maybe I’ll buy a tomato start and plant it there. Maybe not. Tomatoes are problematic here; the summers are too cool and foggy. I’ll decide another day. Meanwhile, a hot shower and that pleasant tiredness of a day well spent.