IT'S IN THE BLOOD

Spring has sprung in this part of the world, and as usual, it's mighty fine, aside from the pollen and the water in the basement. Just stepping out the back door is a revelation.

"My God, where did all the birds come from??"

Against all odds, a mad race to propagate is well under way: starlings demonstrate the disadvantage of having no oral or written traditions by building yet another doomed nest in the hollowed out redbud branch where the big blacksnakes always look, sparrows pretend I won't find their ragged homes under the eaves, and flightless brown mice make nightly attempts to set up housekeeping on the warm radiator under the hood of my Nissan 240SX. (The little bastards! They always find something else to chew on, you see, besides the sunflower seeds, grass stems, and dried earthworms they haul up in there. They've got some nerve, too, pooping and pissing all over my new Diehard.)

I'm a bit more predisposed to be kind to the chickadees trying to sneak their cute little moss-beds into the bluebird boxes. (Almost makes you wish you were 4 inches tall so you could take a nap.) What's not to like about chickadees? They're the only birds that don't fly away when I refill the feeders in the winter: they just sit on a branch a few feet away and cheep at me until I'm done. I've been known to leave their early nests alone, because they're usually out of there before any bluebirds show up. If they show up, that is. If you're a bluebird, the worst things you have to fear besides loss of habitat are other birds!

Those English sparrows, innocent-looking little creatures, are the real killers. I've seen whole families of chickadees, bluebirds, and martins wiped out by one or two sparrows. Talk about ethnic cleansing! These birds must be really paranoid, because they are truly vicious and spare no one. "No, wait, save the children!" Peckpeckpeckpeckpeck. . .

(Missed one. Peckpeckpeckitypeckpeck!)

I guess it's just their nature, something in the blood. Or did this behavior evolve over a long period of time? I don't know. A lot of questions along these lines are running through my mind these days. . .

Yesterday I was in a Barnes & Noble bookstore, one of those mega-mart places with plenty of books, bathrooms, and stale bagels served up by sullen slaves with pierced body parts.* In the middle of a large display in the middle of the computer books section was a stack of what appeared to be a new book by Bill Gates. You may have heard of him. The book had an appropriately cold, forbidding, vaguely metallic-looking steely gray cover, and the title said something about "business." I'm much too sensitive a soul these days to let such things filter unimpeded into my consciousness, so that's all I remember. All I could think of was (a) "Sweet Mother of God, does the man need even more money?" and (b), what poor pathetic souls would add their shekels to the pile, and why, to learn how to succeed in "business" from such a teacher?? It's true that Guy Kawasaki's latest book, the excellent Rules for Revolutionaries, does point out all the things Microsoft has done right, and you have to figure they can't accomplish what they have through evil coercive means alone. (You have to be loveable some of the time. All God's chillun got shoes, as I've been known to say.)

But learning about "business" from a source like that, geez! We've all seen how those folks protect and expand their nesting grounds: Peckpeckpeckpeckpeck peckity peck. . . And have you ever seen a sparrow's nest? Man, everything is in there: shed snakeskins, bits of paper, sticks, twigs, grass, leaves, feathers, you name it. If that reminds you of something else related to this topic, give yourself a prize!

Oh well. Maybe it's just in their nature to be nasty little peckers. Fortunately there are other ways to measure wealth, things that not even billionaires can put into a book.

When we returned from the bookstore and pulled up to the garage out here in our country paradise, with all the birdies singing and fighting and the sun shining down on the fresh green jungle, I knew a certain singular moment had come: Tme to Cut the Grass! Yes, the first grass-cutting of every year is a kind of religious ceremony. (By July it will be a hot, stinking, deerfly-swatting chore, but for now it has special significance.) You have to approach the task in the right frame of mind and only after going through all the required exercises, such as Raising the Deere from the Dead.

Yes, first you have to resurrect the tractor. This is accomplished through three days of battery-charging, tire-inflating, and prayer. When you're sure it will start, you have to prepare yourself by donning the appropriate dedicated clothing and partaking of your choice of intoxicants, because 2.57 acres are not to be approached soberly! This is a special occasion, after all. In my case I had already started the resurrection ritual earlier in the week, and the machine fired right up, belching blue smoke with a roar and and a rattle. I put on my shorts, an expendable long-sleeved shirt, an old pair of running shoes, tossed back a couple shots of tequila, and backed out of the garage.

Where to make the First Cut? I decided on the "back forty," actually just the lowest, most distant patch of field, next to the woods. This would truly be an afternoon of blood sacrifice, because of the freshly-greened arcing multiflora branches around the perimeter: if you're too lazy to trim them first, you get lashed! (I got lashed. . .) Dripping more blood than an Aztec priest, I churned my way around the once-more familiar plot of ground, reconnecting with the earth and the spirits of the place. It was pretty. It smelled good. The John Deere didn't skip a beat, the drive belt didn't slip in the tall grass, and by the time I was finished I was sorry that it was too late in the day to cut any more. I was once again in love with this small corner of the world, a place I would soon be leaving!

Reality Check: yes, leaving. Moving to where the thick grass and soft dark soil would be a distant memory. Not that there wouldn't be a chance to end up in another lush spot like this, but sagebrush, piñon, and rocks were even more likely. I love all that too, but I had to ask myself: was this my real nature, to be at one with with the damp green jungle and the perfumed air? Did I need this as much as I needed, say, my wife and my PowerMacs? The truth is, it's in my blood (literally!). I first realized that when I came back years ago to this part of the country I had visited many times as a child, and I thought of it again as I mowed. The thing is, I simultaneously realized that this wasn't all there was in my blood.

For one thing, there was Texas. I was born in College Station and spirited away as an infant, but that's where I drew my first breath. My teenage years in West Texas were a paradise of a different sort: huge skies, vastness, and the freedom of the open road. And Big Bend! What a thrill. If you've never been there, you just can't imagine a place so far away from anywhere else, a world of mountains and deserts unmarked by malls and golf courses, the kind of place where a friend of mine would say you have to PAY ATTENTION or you'll simply disappear. That's all part of my nature, too, as is good ole Austin. If you went there today you might miss what I experienced, unless you're fortunate enough to spend time in the older neighborhoods where mystical gracklebirds squawk their way through the live oaks and hippies still burn incense. (Ambience may be a French word, but it had to have been invented to help describe the feeling in certain backyards and alleys in that town.)

And so it goes: git along, little dogeys! There are plenty of birds and mice (and other things) where we're headed, and it's spring out there too, even if the locals are still praying for more snow in the mountains so their wells won't run dry this summer. We'll make a new home, I'll find other ways to cut myself, and the seasons will come and go. Other as yet unimagined miracles will be added to the database in my veins. My heart will pump, the corpuscles will go 'round and 'round, and the Inside will grow larger than the outside, glory halleluja! It's gonna be a good year, folks, despite the Balkans, Y2K, sunspots and all the rest. There's a lot of exciting stuff circulating out there, I can feel it. We aren't going to have a lot of money, but we just might buy an iMac, by God! It's spring, isn't it?

There's even an Apple dealer where we're going, wonder of wonders. Speaking of which, there's a lot going on at Apple these days, with rumblings about Big Things just over the horizon. People all over the place are dropping big hints about QuickTime 4 and things Robert Morgan dares not speak of but does anyway. (The Linux camp is feeling its oats, too, and so far that's good. Read John Martellaro's latest Warp Core column and check out the commotion he raised over at Slashdot if you don't believe me.)

Spring has sprung, all right. Time to take a few pecks and slashes in stride and give the ole prayer wheel a whack and spin. . .

And keep those mousies off your motor!

John H. Farr also edits the Apple Computer News for Applelinks.com and will gladly answer your comments. His own Web site, the ZOO ZONE, is an animated GIF wonderland. (He has even been known to design other Web sites from time to time, given sufficient time and incentive).

The Farr Site Forum has a new URL!

Every column ever written (67 so far) is preserved until the next solar flare or H-bomb at the Farr Site archives .

*Sigh. . .literary license, I'll admit. My coffee and rubber bagel were served up by a very nice fellow named Everett. If you're ever in Annapolis at the Barnes & Noble in a certain mall, I hope he waits on you.

February 10, 2012