Three Things: Dead Things

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Winter is dry and glum. I have therefore been feeling dry and glum as well. But if you have been following my blog for a while you know that when I feel down I like to focus on a few of the things that make me glad. Funnily enough those things are dead or dying plants. I know, it does seem odd that dead plants are making me feel cheery. All winter I have been mesmerized by the colors and textures of the petrified plants around me. The colors are muted and everything seems clearer to me when it is cold outside. Or maybe things are clearer because I have been wearing my new contact lenses instead of peering through my smudged glasses. 

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1. I love dead grass. The color is "light tan", to quote Nacho Libre and it usually gets flattened by snow and rain, so because of that it gathers in wisps and swirls, like corse blonde hair.

2. I love the shriveled, red berries on a certain bush outside our dining hall. They are bright red and they are the kind of berry that clings to the branch even after all the leaves have fallen off and died. They are bright and cheery, even though they are shriveled and dead like raisins.

3. My absolute favourite is the decomposing pumpkin carcass that sits outside our neighbors' door. A group of boys live below us. In the autumn they set out a lovely pumpkin in order to herald the harvest. But they never removed the pumpkin after the season passed. They kept it outside where it has been festering for months. It has gone through many wonderful stages of decay. At first it started to sag. Lately it has gotten some black spots which look like the pumpkin version of the Bubonic Plague. Very recently it has begun to completely deflate like a balloon on the day after the party. As it sags a liquid has been oozing out from the side of it like pus from a wound. It is disgusting, but fascinating. I secretly wish that the boys will leave the nasty thing there until it turn into nothing but a dried out shell like roadkill animals that turn into dried, flattened paper.

Have I taken you too far into the darkness of my soul? By revealing to you the pleasure I find in natural course of entropy and mortality have I cased your faith in my sanity to waver? Don't worry, Guys. I am not a psychopath. Would a psychopath draw such pretty watercolors?