A Small Backyard Drama...

...and a few larger ones.

Today we're at Meg's daughter Kristin's house building raised beds for her backyard. I use the royal we, since I've been a little under the weather today so I'm sitting in the shade watching everybody else work.

The backyard is a work in progress--a hundred foot tall palm tree, too expensive to cut down, wavers dangerously above us so the garden will have to evolve around it. Kristin has spent weeks digging up half the lawn which is now a sea of dirt clods. There are cement block walls on either side and a fence across the back. Sitting here, I decided that it would be a challenge to see what kind of picture I could take in a somewhat barren environment.

Settling in with my camera, the following things happened:
1) My camera battery died
2)My case full of chargers was in the car, which had gone on a trip to Home Depot
3)A squirrel appeared on the telephone wire above the back fence

Thinking his profile on the wire might be interesting, I grabbed my phone and snapped the squirrel just as a bird, with nesting material in its beak, appeared to chase the squirrel away from the nest in the tree under the wire.

By the time the battery was recharged I set about documenting the building of the raised beds. Small dramas over the lame battery life of the drill, the length of the screws, the amount (and weight) of dirt in the trash can and the levelness of the completed boxes ensued. The dialog was interesting, but pictures of four people standing around staring at some wood--not so much....

There is an interesting soundscape--a mockingbird in a nearby tree, distant sirens, planes taking off and landing almost at eye level at nearby Burbank Airport, and the endlessly repeated musical ditty played by the ice cream truck as it makes its rounds through the neighborhood, but these cannot be recorded on filmdigital whatever-it-is either.

The squirrel drama it will have to be. Tomorrow I'll be feeling better and can become part of the action, instead of annoying all the workers with remarks from the peanut gallery....