When I think of foxes in a suburban environment, I think of my house in Jefferson City. My immense backyard ended at a creek that you could follow all the way to the Missouri River.
Through the years I lived there, sometimes at night, I would hear an unsettling cry. Like a woman crying out in pain. Or maybe even a child.
Finally I tracked it down to a fox call. A "vixen's scream" to be precise, although it's not only female foxes that make this call.
A sample of this call below, which actually tells an entertaining story:
St. Alphonsus Liguori "the Rock" Catholic Church, St. Louis, Missouri. November 2017.
When I visited Toronto a couple of years ago, it refreshed me to hear a common theme on various public platforms: "We cherish our interculturalism, our varied complexions, our diverse languages."
Is it Kumbaya Land in Toronto? Of course not. But at least there is the public embrace of interculturalism as a national value.
Would that it were so in the United States. Instead, we apply the phrase "political correctness" as a sneer, a smirk. As if being inclusive is a bad thing.
My nonagenarian aunt attended St. Alphonsus Liguori High School way back in the day. Then, the church was predominantly white. In 1945, the Archbishop Cardinal Ritter directed the integration of all Catholic churches in the St. Louis Diocese. Today "the Rock" is predominantly African-American. (A brief history of the church here.)
Knights of Peter Claver (established in 1909) - and wonder why I never knew about this organization until I moved to Louisiana, despite my having been raised Catholic; and
We crossed Lafourche and Jefferson Parishes and flew over Barataria Bay and then crossed the long umbilical cord of land extending into the Gulf known as Plaquemines Parish, the old fiefdom of Leander Perez, a racist and dictatorial politician who ordered a Catholic church padlocked when the archbishop installed a black man as pastor.
Note: Unable to find this precise historical datum, but here is a similar situation that involved Mr. Perez and an African-American priest in Placquemines Parish.
Anyway, on this particular Sunday in July, I attended Mass at St. Alphonsus Liguori "Rock" Catholic Church, and:
The entrance processional walked to the altar to the accompaniment of the church choir, which sang a version of the Truthettes' Can't Nobody Do Me Like Jesus:
The entrance processional was a fusion of our Americanness. It included the ceremonial fragrance of smoking frankincense from East and North Africa and the Middle East, held in a round, wooden, tasseled bowl of African influence, carried by an African-American woman, barefoot, dressed in a caftan that bespoke traditional African dress.
The choir covered New Direction's song, When All God's Children (aka What a Time) during the preparation of the gifts:
During communion, the choir sang Dorothy Norwood's and Alvin Darling's Somebody Prayed For Me:
Ask Freedom Singer Rutha Mae Harris, and she'll tell you plainly: You can't just sing "This Little Light of Mine." You gotta shout it:
"Everywhere I go, Lord, I'm gonna let it shine
Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine!"
On
a Monday morning, Harris' powerful voice fills the small church right
next to the Albany Civil Rights Institute in Georgia. She's showing them
how she and her fellow Freedom Singers — a renowned quartet that raised
money for student activists during the civil rights movement — belted
out songs to get through dangerous protests.
..... a unifying affirmation that gives the crowd a taste of
that feeling from the 1960s. She says the song helped steady protestors'
nerves as abusive police officers threatened to beat them or worse.
And later in the article: "Last year, Reverend Osagyefo Sekou used 'This Little Light of Mine' to
curb passions during a counter-protest, before a crowd of white
supremacists and alt-right supporters gathered for the Unite the Right
rally in Charlottesville, Va."
This is yet another example for me of how we are surrounded by history in our everyday lives. A song. A mural. The style of earrings a woman wears; the width and arch of her eyebrows. The waistband on a pair of jeans. How we do our hair. A flag. The name of a street. The route of a road. The cluster of volunteer irises on the side of an empty stretch of road. Why Monday was wash day and red-beans-and-rice day.
Luchadora play, Theatre Nuevo, Mustard Seed Theater, St. Louis, Missouri. June 2018.
June 2018
When I saw the promo for the play, Luchadora, it was a must-go-see for me. A connection between my current home in Ferguson and my most recent home in El Paso, by way of my new guilty pleasure, lucha libre.
Luchadora play, Theatre Nuevo, Mustard Seed Theater, St. Louis, Missouri. June 2018.
It is high praise, indeed, for me to tell you that the play kept my attention for both of the 45-minute acts.
The main theme is the self-empowerment of girls and women both today and in the Vietnam War era. Where girls and women literally fight, albeit incognito, for their places at the grown-up table of the world.
It's a personal story that a grandmother tells her granddaughter, the former a secret luchadora and the latter, a hopes-to-be boxer.
It's about keeping secrets from family members who keep you back and from the larger society that would keep you boxed in.
The Spartan set design was clever and effective. Granddaughter and grandmother, in today's time, sat in an upstairs alcove. Grandmother's story played out on center stage. A bridge between the modern-day alcove and a large staircase was a platform for real-time play action and as a mechanism for "unseen" characters to reveal their thoughts or the contents of their letters.
Luchadora play, Theatre Nuevo, Mustard Seed Theater, St. Louis, Missouri. June 2018.
The Mustard Seed Theater, within Fontbonne University, is petite. Very comfortable seats! And they are roomy. Plus each row is sufficiently higher than the one below it to assure all attendees a fine line of sight onto the stage.
Ticket prices are not inexpensive. Fortunately, it appears that plays are accessible to most for at least one performance of each play, when attendees can pay what they can afford if they also bring a canned good for donation to a food pantry.
Never Been Beat by Artist Joe Don Brave, Arrow Rock Historic Site Visitor Center, Missouri. May 2018.
The Arrow Rock State Historic Site's Visitor Center is very, very attractive. It is a space easy to miss, abutting the village, but tucked behind trees and a boardwalk. There's an expansive parking lot accessible from the rural highway that serves both the village and the state park.
Joe Don Brave exhibit, Arrow Rock Historic Site Visitor Center, Missouri. May 2018.
Given the diminutive size of Arrow Rock and its rural setting, it surprised and pleased me to see the permanent exhibit called Slavery, Racism, Violence: Justice and the Constitution -- the African-American experience in the Boone's Lick from Emancipation (1865) to the beginning of the Civil Rights Era.
History exhibit, Arrow Rock Historic Site Visitor Center, Missouri. May 2018.
For healing to occur in our society, it is imperative for us to look at our shared history, to gaze on it, to see it and to see the women, men, and children - our ancestors - who lived it.
History exhibit, Arrow Rock Historic Site Visitor Center, Missouri. May 2018.
The exhibit impressed me with its straightforwardness in presenting facts and the effect of slavery and post-slavery times on residents, both black and white.
History exhibit, Arrow Rock Historic Site Visitor Center, Missouri. May 2018.
History exhibit, Arrow Rock Historic Site Visitor Center, Missouri. May 2018.
History exhibit, Arrow Rock Historic Site Visitor Center, Missouri. May 2018.
History exhibit, Arrow Rock Historic Site Visitor Center, Missouri. May 2018.
The visitor center featured a beautifully-lit room of art work by Joe Don Brave, an artist of Osage and Cherokee heritage.
My sister and I sat outside on a sunny, warm afternoon.
Suddenly, a dark lumpy shape buzzed past me. Whoa, big fella! Let me get out of the way for you! Another body zoomed past.
I jumped.
However, neither had any interest in me or my sister.
These rotund carpenter bees had other fish to fry today.
Carpenter bees, Missouri. May 2018.
Carpenter bees, Missouri. May 2018.
Carpenter bees, Missouri. May 2018.
In the first photo above, the male did connect briefly with the female. Then they parted and the male began to hover near the female, waiting for her to take flight again, which is what he particularly enjoys seeing happen. My video of same below:
Males require female activity, specifically flight, in mating.
Occasionally before mating, the couple will face each other and hover
for a few minutes. When the male contacts the female, he mounts her back
and attempts to push his abdomen under hers. Copulation occurs at this
instant, and it is almost always followed by more mating attempts. If,
during copulation, the female lands, the couple will disengage and the
male will hover waiting for the female to take flight again;however, although the males almost always disengage and pause
copulation when the female lands, there have been instances recorded in
which the males will hold on to the female with all six legs and flap
his wings in an attempt to lift her back into the air.
I experienced a moral dilemma about my photo of this racoon, freshly killed on the road. The original photo was very, very graphic, and it prompted me to think what I wanted to achieve by sharing it or even keeping it at all.
Because I'm not entirely sure why I collect this gallery of animal carcasses to begin with, I didn't have a clear answer to the question of why I would censor one of the photos.
I do know that one reason I capture these pictures is because it is an act of seeing an individual that used to be alive, but which is now dead. So the way I edited the racoon picture is in that spirit. I can look at that small hand, for instance, and touch the leathery palm, in a way. I can see the animal as a whole and not get lost in its entrails.
Dead racoon, Arrow Rock State Park, Missouri. May 2018.
There is something odd about a carrion eater like this vulture being dead. Do vultures eat dead vultures?
Dead vulture, Arrow Rock State Park, Missouri. May 2018.
Dead vulture, Arrow Rock State Park, Missouri. May 2018.
I'm a bit of a camping Goldilocks, perhaps, in that I don't want to camp when it's too cold and I don't want to camp when it's too hot.
The first weekend in May was a splendiferous time for my first Missouri camping foray this year.
I chose Arrow Rock State Park. I've been there before. I like that the state park is tucked up against the village of Arrow Rock, and it's pleasant to poke around town.
Cold coffee fixings, Arrow Rock State Park, Missouri. May 2018.
To keep things super easy for me, I decided not to cook a damn thing. Not even coffee. Whoa, wait a minute! Not that I'd do without coffee, for God's sake! Nope, I'd bring my favorite instant coffee, some sweetener, a flavored creamer, and shake it all up in cold water each morning. Damn good stuff.
Arrow Rock State Park, Missouri. May 2018.
When I arrived at the campground, I nabbed the second to the last available campsite. Hoo-wee, that was lucky! The Audubon Society was hosting a weekend birding event, so I got there in the nick of time. I saw a lot of big-rig camera gear. Impressive.
I took several walks over the weekend.
Arrow Rock State Park, Missouri. May 2018.
One of the coolest things I saw was this tree being consumed by beaver bites.
Beaver teeth markings, Arrow Rock State Park, Missouri. May 2018.
Beaver teeth markings, Arrow Rock State Park, Missouri. May 2018.
Beaver teeth markings, Arrow Rock State Park, Missouri. May 2018.
Beaver teeth markings, Arrow Rock State Park, Missouri. May 2018.
I had the thought to record morning birdsong at my campsite and see about adding that to a slide show for my youtube channel. Below is my result:
Northern Lights Christmas Market, Ferguson, Missouri. November 2017.
On the Sunday following Thanksgiving, Ferguson holds its Northern Lights Christmas Market and Parade. This is also when one can buy tickets to the Ferguson Christmas Home Tour.
Northern Lights Christmas Parade, Ferguson, Missouri. November 2017.
After a nature-infused weekend with family members in the Ozarks Scenic Riverways here and here, I hied home early Sunday so I could grab tickets for me and my mom for the Christmas Home Tour and also to see the parade that night!
Northern Lights Christmas Parade, Ferguson, Missouri. November 2017.
Northern Lights Christmas Parade, Ferguson, Missouri. November 2017.
Northern Lights Christmas Parade, Ferguson, Missouri. November 2017.
One of several videos here, a children's dance troupe:
Alley Mill, Ozark Scenic Riverways, Missouri. November 2017.
November 2017
Thanksgiving weekend I spent with two brothers, a niece, and my mom in the Ozark Scenic Riverways area. We slept at Echo Bluffs State Park, three of us at the lodge, and two of us in the same real estate as the wild horses.
On Saturday, we visited Alley Mill, one of the National Park Service's sites in the Ozark Scenic Riverways. Alley Mill and Spring is a gorgeous rural space with its eye-catching red mill, the spirit-quenching spring water, gracefully-branched trees, and inviting lawn.
Alley Mill, Ozark Scenic Riverways, Missouri. November 2017.
Alley Mill is picturesque, pleading for promiscuous picture taking (purple prose?), and we arrived at the golden hour for photography. Given the two, golden results should be practically guaranteed.
Alley Mill, Ozark Scenic Riverways, Missouri. November 2017.
There was even a group of traditional Mennonite girls and women who brought some old-timey realia into the frame! Divine providence!
Eh. I just couldn't get a magical shot of that mill despite all of its visual come-hitheriness.
Wild horse, Echo Bluffs State Park, Missouri. November 2017.
November 2017
I spent Thanksgiving weekend at Echo Bluffs State Park with my mother, two brothers, and a niece. My mom, a brother, and I stayed in the lodge; my other brother and his daughter camped in their camper truck.
Echo Bluffs State Park is a newly-minted state park that used to be a private youth camp, and there are many, many adults with fond memories of times spent at that camp.
The park is adjacent to Ozark Scenic Riverways, administered by the National Park Service.
There is a herd of wild horses at Echo Bluffs. The horses wander through the campsites at will. They poop there, too. Under normal circumstances, this might be an annoyance, but it's wild horse poop, so it has some panache.
Wild horse poop, Echo Bluffs State Park, Missouri. November 2017.
On my way to meet the family members, I drove by a dead snake. I, of course, turned around to take its picture. I like snakes, and this was an especially pretty one. Given that it was November, I'm guessing it had sidled up to the road for warmth from the sun.
Dead snake, Echo Bluffs State Park, Missouri. November 2017.
Behind the lodge and cabins is Sinking Creek, which flows at the feet of Echo Bluff.
Echo Bluffs State Park, Missouri. November 2017.
I saw a fossiliferous rock.
Echo Bluffs State Park, Missouri. November 2017.
A pretty sunset.
Echo Bluffs State Park, Missouri. November 2017.
Between you and me, I don't feel quite the same level of love that many express for Echo Bluffs, but I'm obviously not a reliable judge of fantastic-ness, given my ambivalence about Istanbul, which regularly hits top 10 lists of must-visits. And it's possible that a quick trip in November doesn't show the park at its best.
The Ozark Scenic Riverways area is beautiful, indeed. My camping brother, who's been to the area numerous times, directed our family quintet to his favorite spots.
One was Alley Spring and Mill, which is coming up in Part 2.
