The garden farm is my office now

I could not help grinning but my garden farm is the place I spend most of my life now. Only chance to go out is driving to a supermarket for groceries once two days.

Pulling the weeds is a bit hard work for me. It could cause back pain. I still enjoy doing that stretching my back from time to time.

Soon, in a week or two, potatoes will be ripe and are to be harvested. Sweet potatoes are planted now in stead. And many more vegetables are growing.

Tomatoes are bearing fruits now.

The gardener whom we have asked to care for the big trees etc for tha past years has brought some tiny seedlings named tomapi in Japanese. It is a hybrid between tomato and piman, that is, green pepper. It will be like green pepper at first and will be more like tomato when ripened. The seedlings look like that of green pepper. I should protect them with grass mulching later.

This year, roses are quite successful. It is my wife's territory. We are wondering what factor governs its growth. 

It will be another day to concentrate on those plants. It won't be too long before we get into the rainy season. 

A breeze has brought me a thought

When I worked in the garden yesterday as usual, a breeze has blown through there. It has touched my forehead which I felt so comfortable in the heat like in mid summer. I thought I had heard leaves rustling with it. Was it the magnolia tree in the garden? It brought me back to the same experience I had had a few years ago. At the garden in almost the same season in a year. I left a short article about that in this blog as follows; here.

A friend of mine, Sugi, JA1HMK used to give me a short comment to a post in Japanese blog depicting the same experience in the summer of 2016. I have written, listening to the sound a breeze making the leaves of a magnolia tree rustling quietly, I recalled of the people who had passed away. At such a moment, I felt I was involved in the eternity. That was what I had written. Sugi commented to me he would like leave this world quietly as I expressed in the post. He was several years older and was a gentle as well as kind person. In less than a month, he has passed abruptly due to aortic dissection. It may be only a coincidence. It is, still, a fact that I felt more than a coincidence between his comment and his death.  

It is a mysterious consequence that this season, most vivid and lively, brings me such a feeling. Is it related with the work I am doing? Again, I still have had that sense I am connected with the eternity. In midsummer, we used to have an event named Bon in Buddhism culture, which meant we welcomed the soul of ancestors at home. In the season, when lives are most vivid and lively, they must have had the same thoughts for those who passed away.    

From the veranda of our house on the 2nd floor, looking south to the woods over a farm of a neighbor. The magnolia tree in front.　

Arleen Auger sings Four Last Songs by Strauss

 I have made a short post regarding a soprano singer, Arleen Auger, in 2013. Here.

Later, looking up for a source of Matthew's Passion, my 1st experience with this music at a concert in my life, I found she had sung there also. It was a concert of Stuttgart Bach Collegium conducted by Helmut Rilling in Tokyo in 1974. I have mentioned about it a few times in the past posts.

A soprano singer other than Auger has cancelled the concert closing in then. Auger seemed to be chosen for the substitute by Rilling. It was her 1st debut for this great music. An article told Auger had practiced her part on the airplane bound for Japan.

And I was heading to NHK Hall where it was performed after practical study in human anatomy at the school. Their performance has overwhelmed me as I reiterated. I am sorry I could not recall how Auger had sung at that time. The whole performance, especially the Baritone having sung the part of Jesus, has given me an impression indescribable. Literally overwhelming performance. Ever since that experience, my journey for this music has began.  

I have listened to Auger singing this music even twice at different concerts in 1970s without knowing of the 1st one until recently. 

I have got a CD of Four Last Songs by Strauss. The soprano singer is Arleen Auger. I believe this is one of the best renditions of this music. She sung with translucent and warm touch of voice. This music is the swan song of Strauss. He has been accused of support or even participation to Nazis after the WWII. When things were settled down for him, possibly foreseeing of the end of his life, he composed of these four songs. 

I felt as if I had met an old friend with this performance.

My heart could not help trembling when I listen to this performance, especially the last two songs. Synchronized with the idea, I feel deeply relieved with it. And the singer is that Auger.

She has died several years later from this recording.  

The 73rd birthday

It was pretty hot in the daytime yesterday. Unusual for this season in a year. It was still crisp and dry. Humidity won't stick to us like in our mid summer. If it had been a bit cooler, it could have been a perfect day. Still it was my 73rd birth day. 

I am always honored to be given birth to this world in such a beautiful season. My sister has sent me a birthday card, which told me our mother used to tell her that I had not made excuse. I don't know at what situation mother had mentioned that to my sister. It must have been an exceptional case. Rather I have made excuses many times and have even committed errors in young days as well as in later years. 

I was grateful to mother dealing with me in that way. I have not deserved that at all, I know. This memory my sister has let me know encourages me not to make excuse or even not to do anything I need apologize until I could see my parents if it is possible. 

The healthy life expectancy of men in Japan is 72 years of age. I have gone through that age and will come into the really last chapter of life. I could end our journey of life any time from now on, either with being conscious of it or without it.  

Recently, at every opportunity, I tried to get ready for the end of this life journey. The healthy life expectancy is only a milestone for most of us, or average people, to have certain health issues. It was a good chance to let me consider how to spend the rest of my life again.  

The other day, when listening to Matthew's Passion by Bach, I realized that I had not known of the drama it depicted in the middle of the story. I was sure I had understood all the story all after listening to this piece repeatedly since young days. I was kinda shocked. It could be, I thought, a purpose of life to study German again and to understand of the story of this music. I still have an effort goal to read novels of Albrecht Goes in German as well. With my memory being lost, it may remain a goal not achieved at the moment when I leave this world. It is, however, worth challenging it. I need to spend everyday as a treasure.

A magnolia tree, which had been cut bluntly every branch a couple of years ago, has fully blown with beautiful branches full of leaves. It seems to tell me to live lively even if the same time and same season won't be repeated.  

 

I am most relaxed and pleased when I concentrate working in the garden/farm. These roses please me as if a real friend beside me.

I have received greetings for my birthday on facebook or e mail from a lot of my friends. I am just thankful to all of them remembering of my birthday or even if they realized it on the page of facebook! I would stop being grumpy before you know of it.

 

Farming not a hobby but a way for survival in the near future

Without being conscious of that, the garden farm has kept me quite busy. Working for an hour or two in a session and a break between sessions. Later in the afternoon, I go for shopping grocery and/or prepare for the evening meal. A day passes so quickly. 

German and Japanese Irises are in full bloom. They have proliferated at various places in the property. There are deep purple ones at the other place in front of the house my parents used to live. Their color is unforgettable... even though I have forgotten taking their photo this year. Roses and other flowers are starting to come out. They may given us pleasure being with them during the coming summer.    

The same kind of flowers along the entrance. The lawn is half replaced by weeds. I should hustle to mow them and hopefully plant, actually transplant, fresh lawn there in this summer. It will be a hard and big project. I have purchased a motor driver hand held mower. Imagine, carrying it, this old man is cutting the lawn under stinging sunray. It is a work for me. 

Various beans have been harvested and used for material of dishes. A couple of dozens of onions are also ripened. Potatoes are growing as well. Two kinds. One for growth in spring and the other for spring/fall. Hundreds of potatoes will be cropped. Sweet potatoes and other vegetables are going to grow next. 

This is a melon seedling. For the past weeks, it could get even cold at night, which is not favorable to it. I have enclosed it with a vinyl bag like this in order to avoid the damage from the cold atmosphere. I have done the same thing for water melon and pumpkin seedlings when they are small. 

As reiterated in this blog, the world is going to suffer from inflation and food deficit. It may cause serious problems in the society of developing countries. Sadly, so does it in our country. Foods are getting more expensive since last fall. The effect of the war in Ukraine may become a fact in this fall, they say. Our country depends on import of not only foods but also materials of fertilizers and forage for livestock. Possible deficit of the latter may make it quite difficult for our country to convert dependence on import to farming crops by ourselves. Organic or natural farming without chemicals could not yield so much crop as we have right now even if it could be realized. On going inflation and drop of the value of our currency in the market won't let us go on depending on import any longer. Even if foods are available in the fall and after, they may cost so much that we have never experienced in the past, I am afraid.

Unfortunately, our government is not serious at the problem. They are focusing on expansion of armaments. Mass media are informing about it from time to time. But it is not widely shared by the people. They are approving the plan for increasing armament budget. But they don't care for where the budget comes from. Further issuing deficit financing bonds and/or reduced budget for social welfare. 

All those mess will show up before us by this fall. I have never expected experiencing such a mess in my life. All I could do is to prepare for that as much as I can. Farming is not a hobby any longer but my own work to shield ourselves from the disaster. Am I too pessimistic? 

A Memory of a Tiny Ground Rod

Yesterday when I was plowing a tiny farm in the garden preparing for spinach, I found a kind of metal rod in the soil, rusted away as shown on the photo. 

In a few seconds, I remembered that it had been buried in the ground as a ground earth peg for a vertical. It has deformed almost beyond recognition of its original form but still brought me back to the old time.

In early 80s, when coming back on the radio after over 10 years absence, all I could afford for an antenna at a two storied small resident dormitory at a med school hospital was a vertical on the roof. Maybe, neighbors must thought that young resident had become nutty to climb up on the roof and put up a long rod there. Being around a peak of solar cycle, I could enjoy working world wide with that simple antenna. But it was tough for me to compete with those with beams then. The bands were closing down for me earlier than beam owners. I was dreaming of a beam.

Moving here, my birth place, from that small dormitory, in mid 80's, one of my projects was to put up an antenna. Again, however, it was a ground mounted vertical for 40m. It took me a few more years before my dream of beam on a tower came true. A pole about 25 feet long was put up along a tree shorter than it. A quarter wave length wire was set along the pole. The remaining wire was curled randomly for circles at the top. It was intended to work not only as a top loading but also as a capacity hat. Mechanically poor structure. It was still working well.

The clue was the radials, I knew. I believe raw copper wires of random length were buried only an inch or two. They were only several pieces of wire and not extended to all the direction since the antenna was set at the border to a neighbor's place.

It was cold winter. In order to add more radials, I have bought a big soldering iron. It was a fun for me, expecting any better performance, to make more radials and to see how it worked. Like Yagi beams' elements, they have worked more efficiently until its number reached around 5 or 6. More radials than that have not given any better result so far as I noticed in the QSOs. More number of radials seemed to lower Q of the antenna and it used to be broad in resonance, even though I am not sure it was good from the standpoint of efficiency.

Those days, I used to talk to Tim VK3IM. In early evening hours, while I operated with this new antenna on 40m, he was heading back home from his office in the city of Melbourne to Mt. Eliza. It took him an hour or two to drive there. As posted before, he was using a whip with a huge top hat/loading coil on his old Mazda Van. His signal was always surprisingly loud with that antenna. When I told him my vertical's radials were of random length wire not sufficient for the quarter wave, he advised me to put a ground earth peg to each radial. A peg? I didn't know of that. It was a short ground rod which compensates the deficient length of a radial. It won't take me too long before getting the short rods and buried them in the ground at the ends of radials. I don't know how it has worked. But such discussion and conduct after that themselves were much fun for me. Tim was a great and experienced conversationalist on CW those days. 

It is a story, as told, before my beam project was materialized. But still most enthusiastic and passionate for radio those days. It might be most brilliant days for me in this hobby. Maybe, in my life as well. We could pursue crazily something only when we lack it in life. 
 

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to Chiaki on behalf of our children. Our daughter has presented a bouquet to her on this day every year. Without any gift from her this time, I wondered what had happened. She told me that she had asked daughter to cease that tradition the other day. It is a kind of preparations for the end of our lives, I believe, even if it is not impending at all.

I have given her a bit of cash, with which she hastened to a store and bought something for herself yesterday.

This is a photo of her with our son. Some 30 years ago. Time has flied.   

 

My name is Hikaru

My name is Hikaru. I was picked up on a street by the master on his walk almost 2 years ago when I was a baby kitty. Actually, I had tackled him twice before he decided to bring me home. Being friendly to any human being, I have luckily saved my life.

Hikaru means something shining. My outlook was tiger pattern with brilliant yellow. That may be why I was named that way. Someone told I looked like Picachew. But it's none of my business. It is important for me to be called Hikaru for meals. I sure recognize it.

In the morning, after breakfast, I go out for reconnaissance around our property. Without that routine, I could get quite nervous and easily upset indoor. There used to be a few cats invading here. I, sometimes together with the aid of my master, compelled them out. No one knows, except my master, that I often behaved in humble attitude toward them with ears bent behind and trunk sunk below. Yes, expelling them out was my goal however I might behave before those intruders.  

Soon after starting my daily routine, I get bored and sometimes hungry. Whenever I found my master working in the garden/farm, I could not help running toward him and rub myself on him. He often understands what I want to do...to come in the house and take something to eat. But, when it is too soon to go in, he just pets me on my back and lets me go. I always go after him and sometimes sit down before him not intending to bother him.

When I want him to pay attention toward me, I always climb a tree like this. Or even go up on the roof. And crying a bit there may be sufficient to get his attention. 

My trial to attract his attention always end with his glance toward me. At first, he was worrying about me thinking I might fall on the ground or might not be able to go down by myself. But, now, it seems he fully understands what I intend to do but won't do anything for me.

So that is the way I and my master spend a day here. I seldom go out of the property since I know there is full of hazard outside. I don't want to be uneasy and unreliable again like the time when I was discarded by the former master.