Saturday, February 19, 2011

Day #130 Wild Bees

Last week we had one of those gorgeous sunny afternoons that tempted me away from my writing. I threw on a jacket and headed out to the creek that runs through my back yard.

While I stood on the bank, I glanced up the hill on the opposite bank, through the tangle of discarded branches and stumps from the (former) trees my neighbor had cut down five years ago. Lo and behold, above one vine-entwined thicket I saw a cloud of bees, careening ecstatically around the stump, apparently on one of those cleansing flights that bees engage in as soon as a warmish day turns up after a winter of confinement in their hives.

If I’d been a Neanderthal, I would have seen that bee-cloud as a harbinger of sweets, and I would have gone after it with my bare hands.

I’m happy indeed that I’ll be able to gather honey from a civilized box on my back deck, having first puffed smoke into the hive to calm the bees, instead of trying to fight my way through the brambles to tear open a fallen log.

I would have made a lousy Neanderthal.


BEEattitude for Day # 130:
       Blessed are they who keep our hives intact, for we shall remain in one place instead of swarming away.

One thing Fran is grateful for right now:
       The daffodils beginning to poke their way up through the leaves 


2 comments:

AggiePete said...

What a great way to spend an afternoon - on a bank by a creek and looking over at bees - life doesn't get much better! Sounds like heaven .....

Fran Stewart said...

You're right. Of course. heaven is what we make of it. I've known some people in the past who would have found the ground too muddy or the breeze too breezy or the sun too bright. What a waste...