I have a tin telescope--painted nail polish red--made at the Five & Dime and passed on to me by an old flame's nephew. I wish I could figure out the thing: you look into a small sighting lens on top, when you zero in on the object of your desire you immobilize the apparatus and look through the larger lens. Piece of cake, right? I have never been able to see squat through it; I have advertised on EBay to sell it to someone with more mechanical acumen than I; but there it sits. One more dustcatcher in an apartment which has needed a good spring cleaning for far too many springs.
But when I leave the bus and come up the hill, ducking under the linden trees on the side of the road which construction has stood still--when I stand up with the trees that persist and breathe in their oxygen, I now hear katydids and smell acrid composting leaf smell. Fall on its way, as best as it can in these troubled times.
I love my top floor eyrie that looks out over the treetops of my small corner of the city--New York City, mind you. That the god of war is swooshing closeby is not news. Better the planet, though; not its cruel avatar.
then click on "Nature Journal"