Frog Blog, by Lea Ann Robson

One of the orchids on my porch

How many times in your life have you cut a corner, knowing the probable outcome but somehow feeling you’ll be exempt…because you’re a good person?  You answer your cell while you’re driving…or you wear heels in weather only suited for boots.  You rock back on two legs of a chair…or you floor it to catch an orange light (yellow that changes to red while you’re under it).  You write a check to pay a bill, hoping the one you deposited has cleared & you’ll have funds to cover it. 

 

Just as it is human nature to tempt fate, we try to distance ourselves from preventable disaster…after the fact.  We pass a fender bender & think somebody involved did something WRONG (in all caps, whereas we never do anything more than wrong, all lower case).   You slip & fall flat of your arse in a snow bank, those impractical heels sticking out like an inverted turtle’s flippers.  You NEVER saw it coming…except of course you did.

 

Last night I awoke from a sofacoma, & dragged my still half asleep body around the house setting things up for my early morning today.  I washed the dinner dishes I had left in the sink, squinting to read the time on the microwave display:  3:20am.  Ugh. I set up the coffee maker, getting a short-lived boost from sniffing the freshly ground espresso roast.  I filled my dog’s food & water bowls.  I picked an outfit.  I was stepping into the shower when it hit me—I had forgotten to water the plants on the porch.  Most are orchids & several have buds, & long & short, I couldn’t ignore them.  So, clothes back on & out I went. 



One of the orchids on the porch

 

I didn’t bother to flip the switch for the porch light, thinking the less my neighbors could see of my hasty dressing job, the better.  I was happy to find my watering can full.  When I finished with the can, I uncovered the bucket of water I keep to dunk the beautiful cascading orchid that was a birthday gift for my 50^th from my best friend.  The makeshift lid doesn’t really cover the top of the bucket entirely, but I did it to discourage the frogs from setting up housekeeping & having babies in there. 

 

I have NOTHING against normal frogs.  I’m grateful they eat mosquitoes.  I even make ‘Christmas Coqui’ ornaments—styled to look like Puerto Rico’s beloved frog mascots.  Unfortunately, we don’t have normal frogs, and I’m not alone in my disdain for them. 

 

We have light sandy-white colored frogs that burrow in potting soil around your plants, or hide atop the roof support pillars of your house.   That isn’t so bad, but couple it with their attitude, & you’ve got an evil reptile.  When startled, our frogs spray liquid at you with the zeal of a department store perfume girl, trying to meet a quota.  I won’t go into what frogs spray, but trust me it isn’t perfume, & it stains. (Pause for inevitable “ICK.”)  

 

And so last night, just like the caution-light runner, or in-car texter, or inadvertent ice dancer, I pulled the lid off the bucket in the dark, knowing what might happen, but believing somehow that it wouldn’t…couldn’t…and then there was a frog on my face.  He landed with a wet, suctiony ‘SCHWAP’ on my right cheek as I slung my head violently to send him sailing off the porch & into the bougainvillea.

 

Fortunately, I didn’t think he had time to squirt at me (no doubt because I am a good person).

 

I ran back inside, dropped my clothes in a pile & stepped into the shower.

And then the power went off.

The Breakfast Club, by Lea Ann Robson

As a kid I judged the quality of vacation days by the number of wet bathing suits draped over the porch furniture by sundown.  Now I’m 50, & happy to say I judge weekdays that way. 

The sea was a little too riled up to snorkel this morning at dawn, but I wore my mask to try to avoid large rock & coral formations that might prove dangerous when coupled with the surge. Even trying to pick glass out of the shallows before I got in, I was nearly knocked on my fanny.  I took some comfort in the presence of the ‘breakfast club,’ the gang of retired people who gather to bob in the surf & talk politics & current events most mornings.  Some of them move slowly or may need a cane to walk on land, but they take their ritual soak in the sea even when it is rougher than I like.  I suppose they’ve been through hurricanes & rougher things than the surf that gives me pause.

What I do with my Quarry (sea glass pendants)

It was too rough to stay in the shallows next to the rocks, so I swam out a bit, past the coral formations I know by heart.  Today they were shrouded in opaque aqua surf & the only thing I could make out startled me—a large spotted eagle ray.  He had a full length tail unlike a lot of the rays who have had close encounters with boats, & I initially noticed him because he tipped to the right & a ray of bright sunlight hit his white belly. 

 

As I swam back, I was able to grab a couple of pieces of glass before the surf tried to yank them out of my hands.  I realized as I struggled back onto the beach that though my collection bag was lighter than it had been in ages, I’m glad I came to the beach.  I’m ALWAYS glad I come to the beach, no matter what the conditions.

A Tale of Two Turkeys, by Lea Ann Robson

Mu, who is thankful for a nap spot

Yesterday was Thanksgiving, which makes today the infamous Black Friday.  Though I’ve never been much of a ‘joiner,’ I toyed with the idea that getting up at 4am to be in line for the 5am opening of Home Depot might be fun…for a lark.  And then I woke up.

 

Let me preface by saying I LOVE HOME DEPOT.  Oh, & by the way, did I mention how much I care for HOME DEPOT?  In September of 2011, we did join the crowd thronging (whatever that actually means?) in front of the new HD here on St. Croix.  We stood in the sun in the parking lot, listened to the speeches, watched the ribbon-cutting, & got caught up in the excitement.  Excitement, I’m happy to say, that hasn’t yet worn off.  I quip to friends that I’m going to Home Depot…where (as at Tiffany’s, according to Holly Golightly) nothing bad can ever happen to you. 

 

They were kind enough to build the store just over the hill from where I work, enabling me (in the addictive sense of that word) to make an excuse to stop there two or three times a week on my way home.  I might have something on my list to legitimize the trip or more likely not, but I rarely leave without something in hand guaranteed to improve my home, my yard, or my life.  (Did I tell you how I feel about Home Depot?)

 

This morning, the lure to leave my bed at 4am was strong, as they were chumming for me with $2.50 potted poinsettias (limit 12).  Visions of red danced in my head, in window boxes on my porch railing, mounded on my stoop, EVERYWHERE I could fit a plant.  I tried to con friends into going with me to buy their ‘limit 12’ & sell them to me.  I studied the ad & made a list of other things I ‘needed’ to make me seem less silly than if I did what I was really doing— just going for poinsettias. 

 

I had a lovely plan wherein I would get up at 4, arrive at HD at 5, coffee in hand, & then be at the beach by 7 for a swim…all before work.  And then I started watching “Please Don’t Eat the Daisies” last night & when I finished at 2:30am, the plan was history. 

My Herb bed (At the far left & right edges are poinsettias)

 

And then I realized the SHOULD spell was broken…just as it had been the day before when I ignored Thanksgiving ‘peer pressure,’ worked, swam, & ate (Lost Dog Pub) pizza instead.  My one concession came from a thoughtful co-worker who brought me slices of pumpkin & apple pie.  They were wonderful, & still I’m not plagued with the guilt of a fridge full of leftovers, turkey or otherwise.    

 

As for tradition, I held to one for this holiday.  I GAVE THANKS…but then again I do that daily here.  At sunset my friends & I were in the sea watching a gorgeous raspberry-tinged sunset…& we gave thanks.  And for the freedom to think & act as we want, not as we ‘must’ here on this island of misfit toys, I give thanks again & again. 

Bounty (No Threat of Mutiny), by Lea Ann Robson

My sink, brimful of mangos...again

This morning, like most mornings here in St. Croix, produced much for which I’m thankful.  Regardless of my GPS locale, I’m still an American & so I’ll make a short list (because that’s what we do).  I am thankful for, & in no particular order:

FAMILY, both by birth & by choice.  For my Mom & Dennis in Florida, & my other ‘chosen’ family here on the island (& in Texas for the moment—fill up on turkey & tortillas & get your tuchas home!), I am grateful beyond words…all evidence to the contrary!  I know how lucky I am to be surrounded (near & far) by people who ‘get it,’ & who make every day interesting & goofy & worthy of a little sappy sentiment, so there!  Living this far from the mainland for two decades means I get to ‘choose’ my island family, & I’m fortunate to surround myself with a fascinating group of kindred souls with divergent interests.  We get called down in restaurants for having too much fun, & manage to make mundane tasks like shopping into events simply by going together.  We bob around in the surf & show each other our finds like big kids on a treasure hunt.   IMPORTANT NOTE here:  I’ve been verbally groveling to my much loved real family, my Mom, trying to squeeze a visit out of her.  Maybe if I write it here, she’ll consider it?  (Shameless huckstering acknowledged.)



Mu, pondering her yard

If you’ve met me, you know I also count among my ‘family’ my delightful Tasmanian devil of a dog, Mu.  And you know how grateful I am for how she improves every day of life, as all our mutts do for all of us. 

 

I am thankful for the ridiculous bounty of nature here on the island & more particularly in my yard.  I was filling my watering cans from the overflowing cistern this morning (rain barrel is already brimming) & tromped around the wet grass to check produce progress.  Both little Carambola (starfruit) trees are chock full of waxy fruit in hues from chartreuse to pumpkiny orange.  The one that produces larger fruit also supports a water lemon vine (passion fruit family, small fuzzy fruit that look like lemons wearing scalloped green ‘hats’ (sepals or calyx?).  The pineapple plants are growing by leaps & bounds & the ones in the ‘nursery’ (potted, but not in the ground) are begging to be planted.  Four big bunches of various types of bananas & plantains are hanging, fat & happy & growing by the day.  And the Julie mango tree has a stray, off-season mango hanging there ripening (& no doubt beaconing stray horses that will hang over my fence & try to ‘prig’it, ie. grab & run). 

But the surprise of the morning was cherries!  I have been busy making jewelry & ornaments & obviously wasn’t paying attention to the giant Surinam Cherry bush below my porch.  I vaguely remember smelling some sweet something on the breeze one night when I was watering the orchids, but the source didn’t register at the time.  So there they were this morning, looking like little squishy red pumpkins.  One fell off in my hand as I was inspecting it, which is the test for ripeness.  If you have to tug to get the fruit free, it isn’t ready & for the most part isn’t edible.  Like a lot of tropical fruit, Surinam cherry has an acrid taste that only dissipates when the sugars overwhelm it, ie. when it is almost overripe.  The cherry bush is taller than I am & willowy, with an appearance a lot like what we called Bridal Wreath bush back in Maryland & West Virginia.  The white bloom isn’t as showy as Bridal Wreath, but the cherries are stunners.  The first one lived up to its promise, too, dissolving on my tongue with that unique flavor somewhere between that of a cherry & a cherry tomato.  Bliss!

After checking all the fruit, I looked at the ornamentals.  Three different white orchids with magenta throats are blooming in the frangipani & sugar apple trees.  Each presents a long spray with parallel rows of big blooms, like a white-gloved sommelier offering a great vintage.  It is even more wonderful when you realize these plants were ‘goners,’ & would surely have croaked if my friend hadn’t advised me to tie them in trees.  He says when an orchid is showing signs of stress it is time to give it what it really wants, which is to live in a tree.  (Wonder if that would work with people?)

And the last oomph from the yard as I got in my car & headed for my other job was that in addition to their usual prolific periwinkle trumpets of bloom, the other variety of Thunbergia against my kitchen door was in full glory.  Three enormous white flowers against the steroid-looking (all natural though, as I don’t water or fertilize those plants at all) giant dark green leaves on the vines.  Obviously those plants are as happy & well-suited to where they are planted as I am, & for that I remain, truly thankful.    

I Cry at Jumbies, by Lea Ann Robson

On ship days, as soon as we set up our seaside booths I get to watch the troupe of three Moko jumbies ‘assemble’ themselves on the wall by Fort Frederick.  These young & lanky guys sit atop the wall & start the transformation process by using rag strips to bind the stilts to their legs.  Then they go through the detailed ritual of covering all portions of their bodies with their costumes, piece by piece.  When they are finished, the only parts remaining uncovered are their eyes. When they rise to full height & lope past my tent, all I can see is the bottoms of their stilts & legs, with the rest carried high above the sightline.   If they know I’m in the tent, one will dip down & wave a gloved hand at me. 

 

Moko Jumbies are the elaborately costumed stilt walkers you’ll see in Frederiksted when the ships are in.  Remarkably agile & well-schooled in their art, they represent vestiges from the West African traditions fused with our usual Caribbean twist.  The lore behind them says they are protectors of the village, scaring off evil as it comes.  We could all use a little more of that.  I’ve been watching these marvelous performers for twenty years now, & it wasn’t until a few years ago that they started affecting me oddly.

 

They are remarkable dancers, maneuvering on stilts in ways I couldn’t dream of on shoes.  They are silent as they perform, swaying & balancing to the DJ’s tunes, & drawing in visitors as audience or even to dance with them.  One of the best days was the perfect example of the cultural ‘mash up’ (Island speak for the collision of objects or ideas) that keeps me falling for this place over & over.  The lead Jumbie was line dancing to Electric Slide (we are a society trapped in amber, & I’ve yet to finish an event or party here without a finale’ involving line dancing).  One by one, ship passengers joined the party, until there was a sea of people at the base of his stilts, all going through the practiced moves & to a person, beaming.  Finally there were 50 or 60 people dancing with him, filling the clock tower park & drawing ‘paparazzi,’ or at least other visitors snapping great shots with their cameras & phones.  It wasn’t planned or staged, just a spontaneous thing (unlike our attempts at flash mobs.  We haven’t got the hang of that yet, & tend to announce them a couple of times before we ‘spontaneously’ break out in…whatever).

 

On another ship day a ‘chain gang’ (all linked together, hand to hand) of local kindergarten students, all wearing slightly oversized red t shirts, flowed past my booth.  Just to my right the Jumbies loped over, & the looks on the tiny kids’ faces were fantastic.  Visitors dropped to the grass on their stomachs to get perspective photos of the kids staring at the towering stilt-walkers, awed & thrilled into a stunned silence, as quiet as the performers.  Most of the students recovered themselves enough to dance a little with the guys, but some were still standing stock still, mouths open as the performers made their way down the street.  They must have wondered at the enormity of all they saw that day, from the willowy Jumbies to the giant ship in port.

 

Jumbies aren’t just born, they’re taught.  Some days when I pass the Education Complex on my way home from my other job, I see the Moko Jumbie class alongside the main road.  Smaller kids start with shorter stilts & bring up the rear.  More experienced students on full-height stilts lead the way with descending ages between them.  These are plain-clothes jumbies, just getting the hang of stilts without the added challenge of costumes.  It is an after-school commitment, so the students don’t have to wear their usual school uniforms.  The older boys wear their baggy jeans.  You haven’t lived until you’ve seen a fourteen year old boy, propped against a flag pole & trying to be cool while strapped to a pair of stilts.  Somehow the fourteen year old girl, still in her plaid uniform & walking past him at street level managed to look unimpressed. 

 

The Jumbies have very special flashy costumes for certain occasions, & they break out their best for our annual St. Croix Agricultural & Food Festival, President’s day weekend every year.  This is the biggest fair in the Caribbean, & I’m proud to participate & show my work there every year.  The event spans three days, but every year local bands and carnival troupes participate in the opening day parade.  And as with all the St. Croix parades (of which there are many), the troupe of Jumbies is front & center.  As the parade wends around the display booths & stage & finally comes to a halt in the center field, they play the National Anthem, followed by the Virgin Islands Anthem, and then there is quiet…followed by a sea of voices reciting the Pledge of Allegiance.  We are all at attention, & high above the crowd, the Jumbies place their gloved hands over their hearts & break their silence to recite.  By the end, they’re just a blur to me as I rifle through my bags to find a paper towel for my silly face.  It always affects me the same way.  

 

I think the evils Jumbies ward off for me are of being complacent & jaded to the unique place that surrounds us, to the traditions before, & to the promise of the future entrusted to us.

And they’re so tall because we’re not supposed to miss all that.  At least that’s my theory!

When Dawn Dawned on Me, by Lea Ann Robson

 

My Mu, who feels about mornings as I do!

My Dad loved to fish.  He had a 15’ army-green Sears Bass boat that I grew to hate long before it capsized in a Kentucky TVA lake & nearly killed him.  It was ugly, & drab, & parked on a trailer in our yard, but I didn’t merely hate its appearance.  I despised its sense of timing.  For some ridiculous reason, it always had to be taken out between 3:30 & 4 AM.  The excuse was that fish preferred this time of day to get caught.  I tried to wrap my head around this logic & as a seven year old, decided they must get hooked while they were yawning. 

 

I’ve always been abominable as a morning person & my parents eventually gave up on changing that, wrapped me in an afghan & bundled me into the back seat of the car on those mornings.   I would wake an hour later to the crinking sound of the winch lowering the boat off the trailer & slipping it into the flat & quiet water.  I had a white Zebco rod with a zebra striped reel, & they spent the day baited & dismissed, resting against the side of the boat.  I was wedged crosswise in the center of the boat, reading Trixie Belden books & ignoring my Dad’s pleas to cast my line at least once. 

 

So I had a pretty strongly-held belief that early rising was a waste of time, & I clung to that even tighter when I realized I had been duped.  Fish are awake all day. Snorkeling in the Caribbean, I have encountered endless schools of all manner of fish…at all times of day.  If my Dad were still alive, he’d tell me that was because I wasn’t fishing & they didn’t feel threatened.  He’d be making my argument for me.  I never had the stomach for fishing, not even for catch & release.  Ironically my Dad was a latent pacifist.  He even collected & refurbished antique guns, only to use them for target practice.  So somewhere, deep within his evolved older self, I think he’d understand (if not agree with) my hesitancy to put a hook in something I enjoy swimming with. 

 

He’d probably only concede this point if I give him the following ‘told you so’ opportunity:  Now I get up at 5am so I can be on the beach at dawn. 5am gives my pup time to roam the yard, & me time to do some yoga stretches & brew a big stainless cup of freshly ground Peet’s to take along.  Mu (my pup) won’t go with me because she hates the beach despite having been born on an island.  Go figure.  Maybe she hates 5 am? 

 

I even enjoy the twelve minute drive from my house to the water.  People are taking their plaid-uniformed kids to school, & I pass a very efficient, white-gloved veteran crossing guard on my trek.  If I’m early enough, I pass my favorite local farmer too.  Grantley has a small Jeep with a tow-behind trailer, & obvious pride in his life’s work.  He has the best-tended garden I’ve seen since my Grandfather’s in West Virginia.  His permanent produce stand is right by Queen Mary Highway (main drag) & he waves when he catches my eye.  Years ago we vended side-by-side, & his wife makes the best carrot cake imaginable—very dangerous to be next to all day!  I usually see him in one of three stances—riding his little red tractor, roasting ears of corn over a small coal pot, or showing an interested teen some facet of agriculture they won’t find in a textbook…and making it acceptable to be up at 5am. And then there’s the sunrise over the sea…

Technicolor Adaptation, by Lea Ann Robson

Aptly named Flambouyant

As a kid I vacationed with my folks on Sanibel Island, & I recall being completely enthralled with the improbable-looking flora there.  The plants had almost surreal adaptations designed to retain water in drought & salt conditions.  Then there were the sea grapes with their lilly pad-like leaves, purple to crimson veining & shiny chartreuse new leaf faces.  I marveled at how the red blooms on the crown of thorns formed perfect rows within a tidy grid.  They didn’t look real, not in the random way nature looked in West Virginia.

Mary Robson's (my Mom) pic of frangipani

Colors & shapes were bolder & flashier, too.  Spring in West Virginia & Maryland is a game of hide-&-seek, with spring beauties, trillium & may-apple, daffodils & crocus all getting their start under piles of winter compost, peeking out slowly lest they get stopped in their tracks by a late frost.  Tropical plants are fearless by comparison.  They have big bold leaves, incredibly saturated hues, & they seem unapologetically flamboyant.  We even have gorgeous red-orange blooming trees called Flambouyants (or Royal Poinciana, if you really like over-the-top).  There are other exotic names—Frangipani, bougainvillea, bird of paradise, jasmine, monsterra.  Tulip & Violet can hardly compete.  (Not to dis violets.  I still remember the joy of finding a carpet of them, & looking for the white ones in all that velvety purple.)

Thunbergia vining through bromeliads

When I look at my little house on Google Earth (two-dimensionally because no one has taken street views here yet) I can pick it out immediately by the magenta hedge of bougainvillea lining the front of my porch.  So bright you can almost literally see it from space!  I just painted the porch railing behind it a color between celadon & Tiffany blue (very close to capturing the color of the sea off our Frederiksted beaches), & the effect of the bougainvillea in front of that is arresting.  I have huge mounds of periwinkle blue thunbergia against my creamy Danish yellow house & despite friends’ warnings that I have to keep the aggressive vine in check or risk being housebound as it furls around my doors, I love it as it is (& I have a machete in case I get trapped inside).    

In the morning, I pass a house recently painted key lime with white trim.  It is a modest house within an area of similar houses, but that green has distinguished it & made it fresh & inviting.  I can’t imagine that color or the colors of my house in Maryland or West Virginia.  They are an adaptation to the tropics, like those bulges & bumps full of water on our tropical foliage.