Just a Crush

"What keeps me entertained out here is watching Yogi stalk Molly(our neighbors Scotty dog), through the little holes in our fence." Field notes 11/2.

  

As I sit in the sun, I can't help but just laugh and make fun of my dog Yogi almost every day. This is something that I didn't even think of writing about because I've seen it almost everyday for the past year. Right behind my pond there's the fence that separates our home from the neighbors. Yogi has found a hole in the fence that he looks through about a few times a day. He loves looking at what is on the other side of the fence. Molly, whom makes my dog either look like a sweet dog with a crush, or a little stalker.

To get a humorous image of what this looks life, I like to see it as the story of Romeo and Juliet. Where two people who love each other have to speak to each other through a wall. This has kept me smiling on the not so good days. It's funny that my dog will just run to this spot if he even hears the jingle of her collar. My dad and I joke around wondering if Molly ever likes to tease Yogi, since we only see her looking back only once in a while.

If you can see the spot he looks through

 Can dogs actually develop crushes on other dogs? If they did, my dog has a major one. A poem that makes me think about how simple a dogs life is, and how simple it could be for us. 

Shy Crush

Every time I see your face

I wish that I could just erase

Do you even notice me, or know my name?

How would I even know if you feel the same?

You might be waiting for an out-cry

From someone who’s just too shy,

Maybe false hope has me waiting by the phone

Seeing love that isn’t shown,

Something has to make you mine

Or have I just run out of time?

There has to be a way I can still win your heart,

Because from mine you’ll never part.d out so much.

                                 -Literrius Miller

This may seem just a silly poem with a silly meaning behind it, but it brings me just a warm smile every time he runs to look through that fence. Dogs do have feelings, whether their like humans or not. Its what keeps him happy, so it keeps me happy. That's what surrounds my pond. A little dog that runs right past it, living his life as he does. As I sit there, living my life as I do.  Watching the little things that bring it all alive. That bring me alive.

Works Cited

Miller Literrius. "Shy Crush." Love Poems and Poets. N.p. n.d. Web. 9, Nov. 2014.

Luck; even if it's not there

I find myself becoming quite lost in trying to stay focused on finding new things and making new connections. That's how I find myself thinking about who knows what. I've been out a lot lately while the wind is doing the same thing I am. It's cold and not as pretty outside. Time is weirdly going by. This year, summer, fall, all of it is seeming as though they didn't really happen. Too much has been going on, life can't just pass by. 

Just this year, my dad's friend and his wife came over to see our house for the first time. Remembering what his wife Flo had said right when she saw our pond, has my mind running. She had come from the Philippines, and her Asian culture would show once in a while. "Those Koi you have, their suppose to bring you and your home all good and keep you lucky." She's right. Coming from the Asian culture, comes many symbols to the Koi. It can symbolize many such as, good fortune, ambition, success, courage, and most common seen as lucky. This comes from the story of a fish that climbs a waterfall on the Yellow River, who then has to keep going to the Dragon's gate at the top of the falls. If They reach it, they should be granted to be turned into a dragon. The Brave are the ones who made the journey. The amount of bravery that takes, is amazing. 

A Chinese drawing of the lucky Koi  https://www.google.com/search?

q=koi+being+lucky+myths&espv=2&biw=1366&bih=624&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=hPlWVPigLdGvogTGtoGADg&ved=0CAcQ_

AUoAg#tbm=isch&q=koi++fish+being+lucky+

myths&facrc=_&imgdii=_&imgrc=wqm2e-5EzjVVoM%253A%3B7QvnFdT7zOMTBM%3Bhttp%253A%n

 Koi Represent courage, strength, and are suppose to bring luck. Where was any of that this year then? My home should be filled with joy, and courage, if only myths were true. My house has had very little luck this year, too many devastating moments. Kitty passing away, house getting broken into, and having a raccoon come and eat almost all my fish but on! That's where I think the luck got flipped around. They took two of our kois that we had since they were babies, about a few years ago. Two of our koi that we were excited to see grow, and were attached to.

Since then, reality is kicking in, which is making things easier to deal with after time. Have to stay positive about it all tho. Have to. No one else is going to make that change, so just trying to make things okay again. It's not the end of the world, even if it seems like that at the moment. Maybe, just maybe, the Koi are still giving us good vibes, trying to put the pieces back together

What my Koi would have looked like today If a raccoon hadn't gotten it. http://feng-shui.lovetoknow.com/What_Do_Koi_Fish_SymbolizeAdd caption

Being happier about anything, is better than being down about everything. That's what happens during one of my random zone outs while I sit there trying to observe what ever is left of the lifeless pond.

A little silly ol' thought

We have officially got to that time of the year when it's too cold outside for my fish. That's what my mom thinks, so we take them to their  new home in a large bucket in the garage till the spring time. It's unnatural. My dad has tried to tell us that fish are supposed to freeze in the pond, and hibernate till the ice melts in the spring. Not sure if were willing to take that risk of them thawing before we know if their still alive.

The water has been drained, and the leafs had no problem taking over.

Just a side view

 It's starting to look like a ghost town, with the way it stands still with nothing but the colors fading into the winter.

How do the fish feel about this? Do they feel the sense of not knowing, and confused. They must be confused, their home has been moved and new fish have moved in. We have a smaller pond which is just a bucket with some small goldfish. They have never met before with the fish located only a few feet away from them.  Of course it would seem as though they don't really care whats going on, but do they care or notice that their home has completely changed? They go from natural sunlight, to having a light in the garage be their controlled sun for a few months. Different depths and a nice amount of space, to all being put together in a black boring bucket. It's a huge sized bucket, so don't worry thinking they're getting treated poorly or anything.

Do fish care? They must. I wonder if they feel stress when they get put in a different environment. As though would humans, feeling like their whole world just changed and they couldn't even control it. Some of this research can be found at http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2662297/Fish-feelings-Expert-claims-creatures-experience-pain-way-humans-better-treated.html. Within this article it speaks about how fish are very intelligent and do know whats going on in their lifes. Something I got out of the article was that they  have machiavellian itelligence such as cooperation and reconciliation. This means that they do know what's going on, and have as much feeling as anything else. Though there's no study saying how much they can feel emotionally. We have to stop and think. People see fish as just that... fish.  We eat them, kill millions everyday, and yet its like they don't feel any of it. Thats why i'm trying to make all of it a bigger deal.  By us moving the fish, is like taking where we live and locking us in a room with people we don't even know. What if we hate eachother? I love putting them back in the ponds in the spring, because I'd hope that they remember their long lost home.

Since we don't and most likely won't know what a fish or any other animal is thinking. It's just important to remember that it's living too, and even if they can't tell us how they feel.. we should always do the moral nice thing to do. I can't control whether the fish mind if they get moved homes for a little. But, I hope that they don't stress over the change. It wouldn't be a healthy happy life for them...I wouldn't want to deal with that guilt. Which i'm already starting to feel since things arn't going the happiest.

Now since seeing the fish outside, I've starte tort observing them a few times in the garage. I'v already noticed little changes in their behavior. We had to build a little wall on the outside ledges because one kept trying to jump out. One actually hit the floor, my dad had to hurry and swoop him back into the water. That makes me sad, why would they do this? They must be frustrated that they are there, and dont really think that they could end up dying if they jump to far.
 

Griffiths, Sarah. "Fish have feelings too: Expert claims creatures experience pain in the same way humans do - and should be treated better." Mail Online. Associated Newspapers Ltd. 19 June 2014. Web. 26 Oct. 2014.

Slowly dying

The grass isn't green anymore..

Its actually started to become depressing by looking at something that's suppose to make you feel bright and happy. It feels like just yesterday that I was looking out and it was all beautiful and just the vibe you got by being able to see the fish in within the rays of sunlight going threw the water.

Now dad isn't even watering the grass anymore, and is about to make the change of putting the fish back into the garage for winter. The colors are so gloom, and makes me realize how fast time is going. We don't even realize how fast its all going by us. The years before I would just look outside and see it as one day It being summer, then in a blink of an eye it was almost winter.. where did the time go? Since observing, that has changed for me.. I get to see the everyday changes that I might not even realize at the time. But as days keeping breezy by, I realized something major. That after the  climax of all of the beauty being the best it could be this year, came the slow changes. Everyday its slowly dying,

As the water is getting darker its harder to see the fish

Leafs are falling in the water, and rotting away before we get the chance to clean them out. It's making the water darker than normal, and makes it look colder outside. The trees are starting to gloomp down, why do they have to look so sad? We had to unplug the water pump for one of the ponds because it was getting plugged by everything that was getting into the water.

Its all happening so fast. I'm not ready for the pond to stand still for the winter.

It makes me realize that reality is kicking in.  It stands out to me very well that everything has its beginning, climax, and end. Sometimes the end gets restarted, and it goes threw the cycle as many times as it can. With the pond, we go through it every year. Its a guidance of what time of the year it is.. and depending on that determines the life I'm living at the moment. For the one's that aren't a cycle, like amongst other things in life. Those things that just end in life, that you never get to see again.. either be a shame or a blessing.  I feel blessed that for the past couples years I'v got to see the pond go threw its changes threw the years. I'm excited now that I'll be noticing other things about the pond that I haven't before. Since before I never really looked at the pond while it was looking not at its best.

That's exciting for me, because it's a small breakthrough. That even when something may be dying, you still have to give it attention.. Life is still with it, its not lost or gone yet. You cant give up on it. Because its still beautiful, you just have to look at in a different way now. That's what I'm trying to do. I don't want to be the person who stops looking just because its starting to look different.

One Less Little Bird

The last couple weeks have been different overall in my backyard. As I noticed that the birds were coming less and less to my pond I figured out why.

We got my dad a few months back a small bird feeder, which has been a huge hit for the birds.. but also is causing a big problem. They are getting fed everyday by mom, who thinks it's her obligation. We were getting 50 birds at at time over there in the corner of my backyard! Of course their very franic, when they see one person walking up they all fly away at the exact same time.  That makes me wonder.. do they all see one run, and join in trust and/or panic?

Now, we have a new bird hanging around. A small Hawk! 

This caught me off guard, why was a hawk hanging around? Until one day we found out why. As  I was sitting there, I hear a big whoosh of air go by. The hawk was on my fence clenching to a tiny bird. He was eating the bird. As I went to go get my iPod to take a picture, he flew away with the bird with him. No wonder he was here. Also explains the feathers we found around my backyard.

From http://jimgindorff.wordpress.com/2012/04/21/coopers-hawk-and-flicker/
Not my picture, but represents what had happened.

The sad part is two other little birds were hiding in a small bush too scared to leave.

So now my mom feels guilty saying she was the reason the bird got eaten. She now thinks that if no birds are there, that the hawk is going to get our fish in the pond. Can hawks even dive into a pond of water? Would they if they were hungry or not?

It's crazy that we have a food chain going on in our backyard. Of course that's always the case, it's nature. Just sad to actual see happen. 

 I will try to post pictures as soon as I can.

The story of a Leaf

As I've been sitting there in my backyard, I've been looking at all other parts besides just my pond. Which I would like to tie into some other blogs, and show some connections I've made. Of course as we know the weather is changing, and fall is now here. Well it sure reflects on the pond itself. It grow's into a different kind of world than it is in the summer. Leaf's on my mini trees are starting to turn into the yellow that brings warmth in these colds month's.

Something that I first noticed a few day's after my first observation, was a flower on a lily pad bloomed. This had me in wonder.. did it bloom because it had rained the day before? How can a flower seem to just grow in water with no soil?

 A flower  had bloomed around September 24

As I read about lily pad's are mostly good or ponds because they keep fish cool by providing shade during those hot days. Which leads me to the question do fish ever get hot? The sun ray's must still affect them.

Right next to the flower is some algae that had grown on my rocks with the water running threw them. It's not the most prettiest thing to be seen, but sure adds character to the rest of the pond. The reason why i'm even mentioning something that may seem pointless? You see the leaf that has attached to the algae and rocks? That's why. 

This remind's me of so many things, so many situations. The leaf  was just at the wrong place at the wrong time, now it's just stuck in a mess that it cant get itself out of. Or maybe, it got into it's own mess, knew what was coming but yet still wasn't going to save itself. Or maybe, just maybe, this is their safe place.. hiding from the rest of the dangerous world. It's silly to think about a leaf like it has it's own thoughts, but that's what i'm starting to get out of this observation project. Looking at nature and comparing it to my life, to other's life. Who are the people who hide, take risks, stay hidden, want to be noticed, and be something in this world. I'm going to keep an eye out, and see how long it stays stuck, and where it travel's to next.

 

Fall Just Around the Corner

With only living in my house for a few years, our backyard has changed a lot. We, but mostly my dad has spent a lot of time making a pond of our own. It's small but mighty as it comes alive. I had thought that I had just started observing, what I wanted to. That's not it at all. I have always loved watching it transform through the seasons, with the fish, birds, and other creatures that have stopped on by. 

Around 11 A.M Sept. 14

As I first started to observe I noticed that since it has been getting closer to fall less birds have been drinking out the pond, and been all going to the bird feeder only a few feet away. What I did focus on was my fish, and how they were all popping their heads out of the water begging for food. It's funny how fish know their routine. Do they really know based on the daylight? Or were they just randomly hungry and knew someone was their to feed them? Right now we have one Koi, and two goldfish. I took a video on feeding them that morning. 

I also heard one jump at of the water as my back was turned. Why do they do that?  

I'm looking forward into exploring what else I will discover. I would love to learn about the birds that come and visit, and how life forms even if it started by a man.