It's been quite a while since I've shared anything about the great outdoors. And that's a shame because so much is going on. The delicate pink tree peonies are in bloom, as are my gorgeous bearded irises worthy of Van Gogh. The hay-scented ferns are up, the butterflies are back and the herb garden is already bursting with thyme and chives. The angelica, now protected behind a fence is big and bushy, sending up tall shoots topped with lovely, frothy blooms. I'm spread so thin, I've barely been out other than to take a cursory glance and do some much-needed weeding. Thankfully, G is able to get up on his crutches for long enough to do the daily watering required in this heat, and he goes around on his butt planting new acquisitions. Yesterday, from inside the house he heard a noise or somehow sensed a strange presence in the yard, and hobbled out to find this fellow propped up against the garden fence. An enormous, prehistoric-looking snapping turtle, all fierce and armored.
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Is this not the cutest thing you have ever seen? A baby hedgehog! I was beside myself. Could not resist posting a couple of photos from nephew Stan's 4th birthday party. Aside from baby hedgehog and the enormous (20+ lbs) python below, there was an angora rabbit, a skink (very cool), a tortoise, a chinchilla, some guinea pigs, giant cockroaches (gag) and various other lizards. A good time was had by all, big and small.

I was minding my own business, sitting in my little study, and happened to glance out the window in time to see this dude ambling across the lawn. Naturally my heart began to pound like mad! I was actually on the phone at the time (with a client) but threw it down and went charging to the front door with my iphone. I actually opened the door and stepped out as I wanted to get a good shot for G (diehard bear fan, I knew he would be crushed to miss this) and the bear—a teen, and male, I think, for no good reason—locked eyes with me and froze for a good 30 seconds before turning and loping down the hill. I'm not ashamed to say I was deeply thrilled.
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Have you heard about the plight of the bats here in the northeast? They’re suffering from something called white-nose fungus, a scourge that has killed more than a million bats since it was first noticed in upstate New York in 2006. The sugary looking smudges of fungus that accumulate on bats' noses and wings seems to thrive in cold, damp hibernation caves. It disturbs the bats’ hibernation sleep, waking them up and sending them out, confused and disoriented, into frigid temperatures. This dangerously depletes their stores of fat and they frequently die of starvation. The fast-spreading disease has already been detected in nine states, and biologists fear it could wipe out certain bat species entirely. Because bats can consume their own weight in insects in a single day, their decimation could have serious consequences. A rise in the number of agricultural pests could mean that farmers will react with more pesticides, which would find their way into the water table.
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On my way out to snowshoe this afternoon, I came across this poor mourning dove at the bottom of our drive. Her head was nowhere in sight. Yet another mystery of nature I cannot solve. As you can see, she had just dined on some of our delicious birdseed. I hope this isn't too gory for you. (If it is, you may not want to read on.) At 35 degrees, it seemed almost balmy outside today! Within minutes of commencing my 90-minute trek, I had to shed my hat and gloves and tie my jacket around my waist. Despite all my good intentions, this was my first exercise in a week. There were those 3 days in the city, and a few days where it was barely 13 degrees but, still, I'm a weak woman and one who needs to work off a large and indescribably delicious helping of soft-serve green tea ice cream from Mitsuwa. (Yes, we paid a visit to Edgewater, NJ, on our way back from the city and stocked up on all manner of wonderful Japanese ingredients, including fresh bamboo shoots, yam noodles, taro and chrysanthemum leaves.) So there I was, huffing and puffing along, thinking about how it had been months since I'd seen any evidence of the coyotes that used to "mark" the path when what should I come upon?
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photos by george billard

It's been two months since we closed the door on the Bowery loft and made the move up to our little 1935 cedar-shingle cottage in Sullivan County. I moved to New York City on June 6th, 1985, right after graduating from Harvard. I remember seeing Rubén Blades at the Village Gate that first night in town. It was quite a wild ride for nearly 25 years (with a 4-year hiatus in Los Angeles), but the time just felt right for something else. G and I had been spending increasingly more time upstate, and loving it. To date—and winter has not kicked in yet—I have no regrets. Living in nature is magical, inspiring, relaxing. I was working for Johnson & Johnson last year on the launch of a new product and came across some research that said just being in nature reduces stress. Your eye alights upon a wildflower or a monarch butterfly or a bald eagle—not on a homeless person or dog poop or a steaming manhole. Don't get me wrong, I love the city. It's just that this suits me fine right now. A couple of days ago, when our nature-loving friend Philip was visiting from the city, we went to check out the nearby Basha Kill. This beautiful wildlife preserve lies in the valley between the Shawagunks and the Catskills, once inhabited by Native Americans and then, in the 1700s, by European settlers.
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How jealous are you that we saw this amazing lynx while driving back from the city on the Palisades Parkway the other night?! (OK, maybe not this very one. It was dark and we were going 6o miles an hour, so stopping for a photo really wasn't on. But I swear, it looked just like this.) Suddenly, there it was—standing stock still at the edge of the road, illuminated by our headlights, a halo delineating the little tufts at the top of its ears. We were both gobsmacked for a moment and then turned to each other and said WTF was that?! As soon as we walked in the door, we googled it and it was immediately clear that we had seen a Canadian lynx. It is extremely rare to see them in this area but evidently there was some attempt to increase their population in these parts about 20 years ago. I can't really describe to you how beautiful it was: silvery, majestic, sleek. I will carry this vision with me forever.
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