This morning Tara slept a bit longer then usual. She woke us up at six in the morning. She wakes us up by nuzzling at our fingers or ears and purring very loudly. This morning David decided to get up at six too, in order to have the advantage of a fresh morning to work on the metal house.
I thought about getting up early too, but I fell asleep again until eight. Around that time the metal house seemed to be approaching its final shape.
After breakfast, while it was still cool enough in the attic, I spent some hours behind my laptop and worked on the online Pureland Buddhism course. One of the subjects of today's lesson was the great Japanese poet Saigyo (1118-1190). He is famous because of the bitter-sweetness in his poems, a quality that in Japanese is called Yugen.
I asked David if he has a book with poetry of Saigyo and, of course, he has. Wonderful to have such a library of Buddhist literature under this roof and... a teacher near by who enjoys telling me more about the poetry during the cappuchino break under the walnut tree.
It is quite amazing how this poet can create such strong images with so few words. I am a bit frustrated that my English is so limited that I cannot immediatly understand every word, every metaphor. I sense such a richness in these short poems.
Here is one poem I like (and understand)
Since I no longer think
of reality
as reality,
what reason would I have
to think of dreams as dreams?
After the coffee break it is soon too hot to sit in the attic so I go to work on one of my cleaning projects on the groundfloor. Donwstairs in the building it stays cool.
The little hedgehogs also keep me busy. They seems to be true orphans and are a bit upset and lost. Normally the hedhogs live by night and when you see them it is in the evening during dusk. Our three babies show up several times during the day and at different places. This morning one of the hedgehogs was stroling around in David's library with Tara for company.
Everytime I see one of the hedgehogs I feed one, but I am never certain about who is who and I worry that I may feed one of them maybe many times and another one never.... but in fact they only seem to eat as much as they need. This afternoon in the shadow of an apple tree while I was feeding one of the hedgehogs a second one joined the meal. David decided to make a hedgehog house in the shadow under this tree as it seems to be one of their favourite places. He used a pallet, dry grass, some cardbord and tiles. After their meal the two hedgehogs immediatly disappeard into their new house. I hope they will spend more hours in their new home during the day. They do seem to be sleeping more in the day time and becoming active in the evening and they have good appetite and seem lively so I think they are OK so far. Tam has given us some useful information and David looked up 'secours herison' on the French internet and got some more.
In the evening around nine while we were drinking tea, the hedghogs appeared one by one, all three of them. They all seems to come out of their new house and follow the same route besides a stone wall. They look all very vivid. I asume all of us will have a good night.
Replies
It is certainly rewarding to see the 3 little hedgehogs all come out in the evening and go about their business.