Tree Frog Blog & Spring Into Summer!

 

Tree Frog on a Stick

        Mother's Day in the year 2022. Three years of continuing Covid and little contact with family my daughter-in-law came to celebrate along with her two sons. The grandsons  didn't start out strapping. Like all of us they began small red and wrinkled. Fresh out of the womb they'd begun crying to know why they had to leave such a snug home. Now nineteen and sixteen years later they've grown into strapping lads -- brothers two. 

    After a nice late brunch so that my wife and her daughter can talk we boys exited out the door. Our normal thing to do. When the lads were even smaller we'd leave mom and daughter to talk in a restaurant and go outside. We'd find something like pine cones to throw back and forth in the restaurant parking lot. 

    This time I lead the lads on a walk over to the nature conservancy nearby. As usual as we walked and talked these two brothers started teasing each other. The younger picked up a small branch and began whacking his big brother on the back of the legs. Big brother eventually grabbed a big stick and threatened to bash little brother if he didn't stop. After waving the big stick around a bit they settled down as the trail led us through a mixed grove of trees, white cedar, hickory, oak and cottonwood down to the spring. 

    With winter over, the frozen muck fully thawed had turned to oozing mud. We couldn't get too close without decorating our footwear with black.  I showed them the large cottonwood tree where owls like to sit, eat their prey then spit out pellets containing bones and skin. Then I walked them over to the bench with the great Camus quote. "In the midst of winter I suddenly discovered in me an invincible summer." To make a fairly long ramble short we walked back to our place. The oldest grand son then dropped his stick in a low lying naked shrub next to the walk. 

    The next morning early I went out for a short walk and thought I'd pick the stick up. Lo and Behold when I bent over to grab the stick I saw a most amazing and unusual sight. A tree frog perched on the stick seemingly asleep. Only half as large as my thumb the frog seemed to be a part of the stick. The frog's camouflage on the back even looked like a tattoo of a frog. I took some pictures but left the stick while I went for my walk. 

        After considering that the tree frog wasn't anywhere near a sizeable tree, I decided to help. I carried the stick and frog around to the large silver maple outside my bedroom window in hope the frog would take residence there and serenade me at night. I urged the frog onto the tree. That frog had a mind of its own, almost as if it had been endowed with free will. While taking pictures of  that frog on the tree it immediately leapt back onto my I phone. Once again I endeavored to help the frog find a suitable tree. I carried it over to an even larger silver maple. Urging it onto the tree instead the frog took a great flying leap onto the ground near the tree. Maybe that tree frog didn't identify as a tree frog or had a contrary nature. Or maybe the frog had just come out of hibernation from beneath the ground cover and wasn't ready to ascend a tree. Not being a tree frog psychologist I can only speculate. 

    Spring always seems suddenly here today then gone tomorrow. Turkey hunting in the first week of May the woods appeared wide open. No leaves. No underbrush. I'd sit down to make a call, trying to sound like a lonesome hen seeking a mate. While waiting hopefully for a gobbler to answer I'd then look at the ground around my feet to see all these teeny tiny little sprouts, little bigger than ants that had germinated from last years seeds. A seed remains hard to understand. For a seed itself appears lifeless. 

Apple Seed

Think of this as a meditation: Look at the apple seed pictured. Pretend that you don't know and have never been told what a seed can do. The seed appears lifeless inert. Now try to imagine that the seed can potentially sprout to grow into a tree that will blossom in spring to produce apples. All the information needed to grow into an apple tree rests inside that hard lifeless appearing seed. Proper conditions must be available to the seed in the form of soil, moisture and warmth for that potential to express itself into an apple. Something Sir Isaac Newton and Eve could eat if properly tempted and still conscious after the fall.  

    

    All life can be thought of as expressed preexisting potential. The frost and freeze brings the death or cold dormancy of winter to plants. But they bequeath their bounty of seeds for the coming spring. Seeds of potential that can and will blossom. See below the glory of this blossoming.   

        Here a couple of weeks later  in Brad's woods where I turkey hunted, wild geraniums in glorious full bloom. Spring all about warmth, germination and change. Spiritual growth follows a similar pattern. After the tragedy, great sorrow, a form of death, grief like an internal winter. Then warmth begins to stir the hard seed of potential inside the womb of the soul. Consciousness begins to expand as the seedling of hope takes root sends up a sprout from the dark loam of fertile night. The green shoot yearns for the promise then grows into the light. 

        See how long a Humming bird tongue is in the Walk with Me Video below which also includes: Video of my attempt to help said Tree Frog; Pictures of Grandsons, myself and some friends who have walked with me; Wildflowers taken at Magnolia Bluff and Blue Mounds; Forest while hunting morels; Live hen turkey gathering scattered chicks; a Hummingbird feeding chicks shortly after hatching; and a beautiful picture of a Rainbow supplied by Laura; Also includes background music I created on my guitar. Hope you too enjoy the serenity I find in nature. Peace my friends!

Anthony G. Hendricks, author, poet, nature lover -- naturally;  Buddha Blues, just published with a great cover created by his Sister Judith; available at Amazon as print on demand or as an e book at Amazon or Kobo. With formatting help on cover and interior by Woven Red. Other books The Wasteland Revisited, a book length poem about the dystopia causing global warming; available as an e book at Amazon; A Journey In The Human Dilemma, collected poetry and prose; trade paper back. 

Credits: Picture of Geraniums by Brad Begin;