Plum trees in full bloom and a history of our garden

The plum trees are fully flowering. This biggest one which was planted at the western corner of the property almost 40 years ago has been suffering from mold and won't bear so many fruits for the past years. It seems, however, much better this spring. Every branch has beautiful flowers.

As reiterated in the past posts, it was first only a couple of meters high thin sapling when planted by my father. It had not started growing until it was given chemical to prevent something like mold in spring. 

My father liked trees bearing fruits. Possibly, because he has experienced the time of hunger during and after WWII. This was one of the fruit trees he had planted in addition to a chestnut, a few umes and a few persimmons. Later, we have added apples, blue berries and a fig. Most of them are not well cared for, though. This might be a story I have already told in this blog.

In close up. Amazing tiny twigs are growing from the trunk and even making flowers bloom.

We have planted a small partener plum at the opposite side of the lawn garden. Over 10 years ago, all of sudden, it had borne a lot of fruits without it. We thought bees might have brought its pollen from another tree far away. But it turned out to thank to this tree also planted by my father at the eastern side of the property hidden with the barn or the storage house. I found it fully blooming a few days ago. Writing about it, I have remembered of a goumi tree planted just next to this plum. In spring, my mother picking up its fruits and cramming them into her mouth came out from that corner with a big smile. She was already in dementia state by then.

Again, a series of trivial history in our garden. Investigating about it in this blog, I have found a lot of posts regarding it. I have already forgotten some of them. I have realized how our garden had grown for the past decades. It is surely a history for us.

 

Chris NW6V and his book "The CW Way of Life"

There used to be, or probably still is, a group of CW lovers around 7026KHz, who have showed up there around 13Z every day. It has started spontaneously about 10 years or even longer ago. Not a club but only a number of close friends through Morse QSOs. Most participants are in the Midwest US. There are a few joining from the Eastern Asia. The main guy was Don WB6BEE in Colo. then. Everyone in the US have had morning coffee while we in Asia were relaxing before going to bed. 

It was around 2013 when Chris NW6V showed up like a comet into the group. He told he had been in QRT for many years. His fist won't sound like that long absence on CW at all. He was handling a bug proficiently like Don etc. He was 64 years old then, a year older than me. 

It was 2019 when I first heard of his project for writing a book on CW. He was going to NJ, his mother state, to investigate on the history of CW. He was looking forward to seeing his, possibly, younger sister there.   

He asked me to review a part of the manuscript one time. It seemed it was intended for new comers on this mode. I have been interested in the neuropsychological process of CW reception. From my own standpoint, I guess, I have replied on my impression to him. 

Several days ago, a friend of mine, Takeshi JA4IIJ let me know of the following book being published and he has found my name/call sign in the acknowledgement in it. I was surprised to know that he did it so fast. A few days later, a copy of this brand new book was sent to me from Amazon in the US. I believe it was a gift from Chris. I have read only the table of content and the few pages in the beginning. It was still written for Morse code learner to give a perspective of Morse code and communication with it. The subtitle, "Learning, Living, Loving Morse Code (in a digital World) says Morse code seems to have occupied a large part of his life, despite of the modern trend in digital communication.  

In the beginning of this book, an episode seeing his sister in his trip in 2019 is depicted. When he told her what purpose he had had for that trip, she said to him "Dah Di Dah Di   Dah Dah Di Dah, isn't it?" While Chris and his father talked with Morse code over the table half a century ago, she was linstening to it and still remembered of the code. It was an impressive episode in fact. Things we learned in youth won't go away even in half a century and Morse code is such a complete system to be remembered easily.    

This book could be a handbook for a Morse code learner and also maybe a autobiography of a great CW lover.

I feel I am inclined to come back on 7026KHz some day, not too soon but in the future for sure, before the group is gone.  

Piano Quartet Nr2 in g minor OP45 by Faure

 Only 3 or 4 years have passed since I started learning cello when I dared ask friends at the university orchestra to play this piece, Piano Quartet Nr2 in g minor OP45 by Faure. The pianist was a younger colleague in the cello section, who used to debate himself if he should major in music or in medicine before coming in the med school. He has chosed the latter and has been involved in the research for oncology at an institution. Possibly already retired. I asked the violin part to a guy who had been playing it since young days and would take the position of the concert master of the orchestra for a few years later. The violist was the part leader in viola at the orchestra, who was a student in chemistry at a women's university. The best members conceivable at the orchestra at that time except for me. It was a really pleasant ensemble at least for me. All of us were absorbed in Faure. 

We have played it at a coffee shop managed by the orchestra in the annual festival at the women's university. What excitement I have had when listening to the arpeggio by piano in the beginning of the 1st movement. It sounded as if luring us strings for the decisive theme in unison. Viola sung the elegant 2nd theme in a while. Both themes would be developed in complexity and finally the 1st theme would be recapitulated in fortessimo. Again in unison. I could recall how they have played each phrase and theme. The other movement we played within limited time was the 3rd. Slow movement regarded as the best part in this music. It started with something like ringing bell at a countryside church, possibly, knelling death of someone. Around the time Faure composed this piece, he has lost his father. It is just a guess. Peaceful as well as nostalgic world would be evolved to the audience. It won't stop calming down our mind of sorrow. I was again deeply moved while participating its performance. We had to cut the other movements due to limit of performance time and also lack of technique in the cello player! How are they doing right now? Most of them must have retired. If I should have a chance to see them in person again, I would ask them how they have lived their lives. I have dreamed of making ensemble, that is, one of the deepest communication for us, again sometime somewhere. But it seems not to happen. Listening to this chamber ensemble, I always recall of the company and the performance at the coffee shop late in fall.

This is one of my favorite Youtube videos by a piano quartet named Aurora Quartet. Each player, so young as we used to be, seems to enjoy playing it. They are soloistic in a sense but still keep the ensemble. The violinist, a japanese Polish, sounds quite charming. They all play each phrase thoroughly. The last note in each phrase sounds beautiful with ample vibrato. Unfortunately, this violinist has been changed to another chinese player later.

 It is the time of his mastership in composition achieved in his life when he composed this one. One of the best pieces in this genre in modern French music. I was lucky to have had a chance to play it with such great company. Though I wished I could have conquerred all the movements possibly with the same members, I should be satisfied to have such a good memory with them. 

Tomato and broccoli

As I wrote somewhere in the recent post, I have failed making seedling from seeds of tomato. They have been induced to sprout on wet paper but have not grown in the pots. They were on a electric carpet or at the window sun shines into. But it must have been too cool for them to grow. It was an important experience. I would try it when it gets a bit warmer. It is early in May when those seedlings in pots are planted in soil. There are a few more weeks to start with the cultivation.

This is a successful growth of broccoli in one of the pots where I have planted the seeds. 

I have treated these broccoli in the same way as with tomatoes. Broccoli are originally from Mediterranean area while tomatoes are from the high land of Andes. Too much watering has caused it? Or still a problem of temperature control? I have got another theme to learn. Interesting.

A few plants of broccoli which I have planted last fall are growing to bear flower buds. Harvesting one of them, I have cooked salad with avocad with olive oil dressing. 

It is the time for me to plant vegetables for spring now. A lot of work. It is worth working hard and watching new lives growing. 

Mowing and Lent

There are two different flower beds for azalea lining along the street. Yesterday afternoon, I have mowed the lawn there and pulled weeds between azaleas. They were bearing fresh buds on the tips of branches, which may come out soon. Kids, elementary school pupils, were coming home yakking like birds behind me sitting on a small chair and doing the work. A few of them were saying hello to me.  

I have also cutting lawn/weeds in a larger area in the garden east of there. A bit of hard work for me. Expecting much work in the garden like this, I was already feeling as if worn out with it. I heard the property my mother's folks used to live for a long time was going to belong to another soon. This place might be the last property my mother's anscestors used to own. I don't value much with owning such an old property and won't care for who would take it over. So far as I could care for this place by myself, I would only do it. It's just an anti-aging exercise for me as well.

As I wrote about it in a comment to Susan, the daughter of Dave N4DAG, being in the season of Lent right now, I was again listening to St. Matthew's Passion. It was a recording by Richter conducting Muenchen Bach Ensemble in 1958. Richter was only 32 years old up-and-coming conductor those days. With his spirit of ambition in it, it has been regarded as one of the best performances of this great music. Briskly energetic and played as if in block style. Of course, it has Richter's profound understanding in Christianity.

Every piece of this music is piercing our mind as well as soothing and relieving it. It is a mysterious consequence that a music could bring our mind such an impression, apparently contradictory each other. As told before elsewhere in this blog, I have felt this fact from most of Bach's works. In this Passion, the 1st piece, a grand prelude is typical for such a power in music. It is foreshadowing or even foretelling of the tragedy but also of the evangel to us at the same time. The theme is Christ's death on crucifixion and his resurrection, which are the extreme absurdity in the world. No wonder this explains ambiguity or rather dual meaning in this music.

Even in his instrumental music such as Suite in H moll, I am always overwhelmed at its dual meaning, emotion of sorrow and of pleasantness at the same time. Away from the religious context, this characteristics may be inherent to Bach's works. In Matthew's Passion, the two arias which are sung after the betrayal by Juda and Petros, respectively, are the other example touching our mind in the same way. Both of them are in H moll as well. H moll seems to be a special tonality for Bach, which has not been used in music prior to his. Those pieces deeply move my mind with their characteristic double meaning.   

Digressing to a trivial thing. I had learned German for a few years in university days, which I have never used in daily life ever since. Very few knowledges in it left in my memory if not at all. I find it quite tough to understand the lyrics of arias and chorus or the speech of the evangelist. I remembered I had had a resolution to read the novels by Albrecht Goes in German. No progress yet. It might be an unachievable project. But I would start learning German again. At least, what a fun if I could understand the messages of this Passion listening to it. 

Spring is rushing to arrive

It's getting quite warm for the past week, even warmer than usual. As an old proverb says, however, three cold days may be alternated by four warm days. And in each cycle of this weather, we might get closer to mid spring.

I have planted some 60 potatoes for now. They may meet frost within a month. I would protect their tiny sprouts with unwoven cloths against frost. I should be more careful about the weather forecast. It is a sign that tells I have become a real amateur farmer for now. I have heard old shrunk potatoes with buds could grow and leave some new fresh ones. Such ones have also been planted. I would add some more and send a portion of the harvest to my niece as promised to her the other day.

The green peas planted last fall are starting growing. Well survived through the last winter with almost unprecedentedly cold spell. Some of them in shady places were dead in the winter. These are lucky to have been planted at a sunny corner in the garden. 

A lot of daffodiles are blooming at different places. They are strong and fertile. They often suprise me growing at unexpected places. They are surely a symbol of early spring in our garden, though. Wellcome again.  

An ume with red blossoms are fully out. It is in front of the house my parents used to live. It comes out later than white ones. My parents must have enjoyed them through the window in this season. A big zelkova tree combatting sun ray with this smaller ume has been removed a few years ago and this ume is growing as if triumphed in the opener space.

The magnolia is also blooming. On only a few branches since the others were heavily pruned last year as told before. Looking up the previous posts on this magnolia in this blog, I could not help smiling finding a lot of posts with almost same photos. 

The difference from previous posts is that it is coming out earlier than ever. It used to be a flower in April in this area. Early in April, it used to make me surprised with almost all flowers coming out at the same time. Apparent cold spell in the winter might be only an extreme of the weather in this global warming era. Magnolia must know of the change of global warming.

Another difference is that mother has gone away, who used to tell me happily that this flowers were coming out as repeatedly told in the past. Needless to say.

I must confess that I have failed growing the buds of tomatoes. They sure have sprouted on pots but have not grown any more. The small electric carpet was not good enough to warm them at night, maybe. I should try to grow them in the end of next month on pots or should purchase the small seedling at store then. I would try "sauvage cultivation" for mini tomatoes described in the paper as follows. They say it is quite efficient for large amounts of harvest lasting until the end of fall. The only concern is that the fruits taste "less sweet". But they taste better when cooked, so far as I read in the internet. I may make another failure but may enjoy even that.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/318054570_Yield_and_Quality_of_Summer-autumn-harvest_Cherry_Tomato_in_Open_Field_Culture_Using_Sauvage_Cultivation

 

The 12th anniversary of Big Earthquake and Tsunami

It is the 12th anniversary of the big earthquake in Tohoku today. It was this time in a day when the quake hit Tohoku and the tsunami killed so many people. 

I am reminded of the people victimized. They had to pass away all of sudden. They might have a lot of things to do, dreams and family members left on the earth. Their loss should remain in the hearts of the family members, I believe.

A buddhist monk named Mochizuki has visited the disastered area as soon as it happened. There were so many lives lost and unfound along the coast of the Pacific Ocean. He has visited a number of places praying for the dead. It was very difficult for the people to have funeral and his prayer seemed welcomed by them. I was deeply moved by this photo which showed him walking around in the snowy weather praying for the vicitims. No socks but straw sandals with naked feet. It must be a style of pilgrim monk. He has been to the same area on the anniversary every year praying for those lost in the disaster. Sad enough, he has passed away due to COVID 19 2 years ago.

We have been paying an extra tax for the reconstruction of the disastered area since 2011. No argument against the taxation. The government has decided, however, to divert a part of that tax for the expenditure for military expansion. That military expansion would raise the tension in the Eastern Asia and cause the so called dilemma of military expansion.

It is not comparable with what that monk has done for the people in the disastered area. At least, it is heading to the contrary direction from him. 

Still on going disaster is due to the destructed nuclear plants in Fukushima. Over a thousand people were dead from causes related with the accident. More than 40,000 people, being still evacuated from the area, may lose their homeland forever. There have been more than 2000 people indirectly killed by the disaster in Fukushima Prefecture, which is much more than the adjascent prefectures. This high number of disater related death in Fukushima should mean there are lot of dead cases due to the nuclear power plant accident.

The road map for decommissioning nuclear reactors was planned, by the end of 2021, to bring out the nuclear fuel debris melted through the base of each pressure vessel of the nuclear reactor. They could not even reach those debris yet. Underground water is still coming into the reactors producing contaminated water by 150 tons per a day. They will have spent over 20trillion JPY for decommissioning. It is unpredictable by what time the operation is ended and how much it would cost to do that.

The government would re-run the other nuclear plants and even construct new ones to have the base load power. The requirement for the power has been filled with the other ways of power generation since the general population of this country turned to decrease in mid 2000s. The government and power companies are concerned on the expense to maintain the nuclear plants even out of operation, that is, amount up to 1 trillion JPY in a year. They would cut that expense and get venue from the power by the nuclear power plants.  

They are even going to protract the operating period, which was originally determined to be 40 years. As you know, there is a serious issue of neutron irradiation to the pressure vessel wall. It aggravates the fragility of the structure at certain rate. At certain time, there could be rupture of the vessel wall and susequently the explosion of the reactor if it is under operation. The risk hightens as the ractor goes on operation. It is hard for anyone to predict that event if they repeat testing it. They say they would run out the test piece for the fragilization.    　

So the ruling parties' politicians and the people in nepotism to them, while forgetting or neglecting the people in the disastered area, seem to pursue profits for themselves. By no means, I would stand on the side of those profit chasing people. It is not possible for me to do after the monk. But I would behave for the people in the same way as he has done.   

A big meeting with family members

 It was a quite busy day today. As soon as getting up, I started preparing miso soup featuring home grown radish and sweet potatoes for the material. Peeling apples and cutting strawberries. Placing the chairs around the table necessary for the members in this gathering, that is, 7 of them. Went for shopping something necessary and getting sushi for the lunch while cleaning the living dining room. Being sociable to others was a hard task for me. 

As foretold in the previous post, 6 of the folks have arrived before noon. My sister, her two children, that is, a niece and a nephew, niece's husband, a cousin's daughter and her son. Luckily or unluckiliy, my wife was on her duty and absent at home. They have come here to visit my parents' grave as well as cousin's. I have never met the cousin's son, who is starting a university life this spring. As is the way with such a meeting, the main personality is my sister. A lot of talks of the past and the people who already went away. This is my sister explaining of the album she has made. The old photos showed the life at this place, an old sanatorium, and the people there. There were photos I have never seen before, such as those of my maternal grandparents. When I was four or five years, our family moved to Tokyo. Without that exodus, what life would I have spent here? Just a farmer? I am becoming an amateur farmer at present. Thinking of the fate, I could not help being deeply moved at it. 

So far as my sister told me today, our father was not very happy working at the sanatorium then. That was the real reason of the exodus. It was coincident with that anti tuberculosis med were developed and the tuberculosis was not necessarily fatal at that time. Whatever the reason why my father might decide to move to Tokyo, it was the good timing for us to go. Our country would enjoy the era of high economic growth that enabled this poor family could live on and their children including myself could attend to universities. Not a success story but a fate we could explore our lives all by chance.

A couple of hours have passed so quickly. They have left for the graves. When they have gone and our house has retained its quietness again, I felt I have not been socialized for quite some time. Preparation for such a meeting was a bit laborious. But it is still worth having another in some time. Not too soon, though.

In the sunny afternoon, I have planted dozens of potatoes in the small farm. A few more dozens of potatoes are waiting to be planted in the kitchen. Farming will keep me so busy for the coming weeks. A fun season has started.  

Camellia and a big get together

Time is flying away so fast. I have had topics to write here but have been too busy to do that. One of them is regarding the big earth quake we have had 12 years ago. Maybe, before the anniversary comes, I may mention about it.

Camellia is coming out. Such a big camellia tree. While I was doing things busily, the flowers won't come into my eyes. Around sunset today, it was shining so beautifully that I could recognize it.

In close up.

In further close up. An elegant and gentle flower.

Tomorrow, there will be visitors at our home, my sister, her two children, the spouse of niece, and a first cousin and her son. What a big company! Another first cousin was living at the old house of my mother's family. But he has passed away this winter. They have decided to break down the house. It was the place I and my wife used to visit for Christmas ceremony in our honey moon days. But no one would take it over. No choice other than giving it up. 

Only few are visiting this blog, I believe. But just to testify I am doing OK.  

Ume fullly out Farming plan

It will get warmer in March as the forecast says. It may get over 10 degrees C almost every day, even though it will be freezing once 2 or 3 days. 

I would plant potatoes in a couple of weeks after having them sprouting. Three kinds of potatoes will be planted. They have different characteristics like resting period or preservability. I may plant some of them in fall again. 

Sweet potatoes were not very successful last year. It might be due to the hot summer last year. Sweet potatoes are important material for boiled vegetables at our home. I should start growing stems from fruits. Sweet potatoes will be covered with nylon and/or non woven material when frost is forecasted.

I have been learning the method of natural farming. It teaches to keep 3 principles; no tillage, no pesticides and no fertilizer. The first two are not difficult to follow. But the last is a it tough when the soil is not rich with grass compost. They put cut/pulled grasses on the farming ridge. It would become compost in a year or so. They say it would take even 5 years to have the soil rich enough to grow vegetables without any nutrients. I have made much compost from weeds as well as vegetable scraps. It has been plowed in the ground. And I would use some organic fertilizer when vegetables won't grow well. Another season of experiment is being started. The result will be evident as the harvest in fall. Honestly speaking, I would do with farming as if it were or is the last chance for me.

Ume is fully blown. I wish I could have tea with my parents at the home they used to live. This tree is located in front of their small living dining. In a week, my sister and her two children with one spouse of the niece will be visiting here the grave of parents near by. We might have a fun lunch together recalling good old days. 

 

The magnolia, my mother's favorite, was heavily pruned last fall. We won't expect a lot of flowers coming out this year. Only some of them shown on the photo above.