Little by little, I’m settling in here. I have friends. I have a doctor. I have a dentist. My doctor is a little scary — she dresses to the nines, does not care to exchange pleasantries, and poses questions the way a lawyer would if the patient were on the witness stand. On the other hand, I feel like given half the chance, my dentist would have hugged me. She is a warm, lovely person. Every patient chair in the dental practice faces a big window, and outside every window is big bird feeder (that one of their patients built for them), and as you’re having teeth cleaned and examined, or getting xrays, you can watch cute little birds during breaks in the action. Love my new dentist, her friendly staff, and those bird feeders.

This is the time of year in El Dorado and Amador counties where the world greens up. (El Dorado County has an Instagram tourism account @visiteldorado, and Amador County has accounts for wineries, a craft distillery, gardens, and makers like @madeinamador.) If you look at the El Dorado account, you can see that every hill is turning green; my own space is getting green, and even the rocky dirt path that bisects the property is filled up with little green growing things. Miner’s Lettuce and baby lupines are popping up everywhere, and in a few months the whole world will be covered with flowers. I’ll be sowing more wildflower seeds this weekend, preparing for our future bees. My head is full of plans — too full, maybe. Though the trees remain winter-bare, the landscape is slowly waking up, I have to remind myself to slow down, that it is still morning-frost-on-the-ground winter. It’s winter, dammit. Spring is weeks away.

Greening up