#wild plums

[bluebelly-sun-serpentine]

Caught this coyote hunting wild plums on wednesday – too far away for a good photograph, but I wanted to share their little face anyway. Started out as a colored pencil sketch on A5 Fabriano paper in my journal, scanned, some textures added in procreate. I almost never draw anymore and it felt so good to get zoned into this little scene, especially since seeing it in the first place made me so happy. Plum 'yote was not really bothered by watchful eyes up on the hill; it was a lazy evening and we both knew it.

[balkanradfem]

I found a wild plum tree, and it already had the plum formed, so I grabbed one to try. It tasted acidic but ultimately really good! I was thinking I should gather some and make a juice out of them, when I bit right trough the pit, because it was still so soft I could just bite trough it.

I was trying to figure out which part was the plum, and which was the pit, but I was somehow chewing them both, and then I remembered that stone fruit had cyanide in their pits and I should not be eating that, so I quit eating that plum and got it out of my mouth.

There! I just needed you all to know that opportunity to get mildly poisoned presented itself and I didn't do it.

[allium-girl]

Sweet and sour spiced venison stew flavored with dried wild plum leather

[morethansalad]

Austrian Wild Plum Compote (Vegan)

[summerwages]

overnight success..

[illustratinghan]

Wild Plum ~ Independence 🌸

- a recreation of Charlotte Fairchild’s flower card -

characters by @cassandraclare 🫶

follow me on instagram - @/illustratinghan

[chitaka45]

京都　清水寺　🐲青龍会🐉　2024年３月15日

kyoto kiyomizudera templ 🐲seiryue🐉

[firstlawcedarprairie]

Brown-eared bulbul and Plum blossoms

[pinkshadesofshame]

got a new bubble bath 🫧

[gradienty]

Ripe Plum Wild Strawberry (#590263 to #f93899)

[bluebelly-sun-serpentine]

[alexandraadavies1996]

These little blooms always make me smile, the woods near my house are filled with with these cherry plum trees and their blossom reminds me the winter is ending and the wheel of the year is turning

Ig: alexandraadavies1996

[possibilistfanfiction]

argument pt 2?

[here's argument pt 1 (i guess lol); u don't need to read it for this to make sense fully but if u are so inclined & haven't read it yet it might be helpful context.]

//

you don't know what else you expected. upon a very quick reflection — once your brain reorients itself from beatrice is so hot — you realize you were foolish to think anything else, especially not without a discussion. but, still —

'what are you doing?'

it's clear what beatrice is doing, standing with jillian in one of her fancy labs. she's dressed in all black, a t-shirt delightfully tight on her biceps (focus, ava) tucked into loose pants reinforced at the knees, boots that are tougher than normal but lighter than those you would typically wear in combat — ones she prefers when fighting because it allows her quiet, stealth, full range of motion. 'trying on new armor,' she says, and if it was years ago, the spike of anger that starts in your gut and shoots up your spine — anger, and sheer panic — would have set the halo off.

jillian looks between the two of you — your fists clenched; beatrice's arms crossed over her chest — and says, 'well, i'll be looking over some specs in... another room,' and excuses herself.

wisely.

it hits you, all at once, when you look at beatrice — your fiance, your life partner — that, right now, maybe more than ever, she looks like a soldier. it's not been lost on you over the years, not with her nightmares and the quiet, chronic pain she bears with little more than a tender wince some mornings, the way she loses herself after loud noises or too many people in a crowd, her usually steady hands trembling — it's not been lost on your that beatrice has been fighting for a long time.

'you can't seriously be telling me you're not going to stop.'

'i'm fine, ava. i was cleared by my surgeon and my physical therapist to return to all normal activities.'

you're so used to gentleness, now, even with demons to fight on occasion and the lingering affects of a holy war too great to fully comprehend. you're used to beatrice's loose cotton crewnecks you like to steal; the rust-colored linen pants she loves, light in the breeze off the water. you're used to her whining for posterity about couples halloween costumes, her afternoon naps with her kitten purring on her chest softly. you're used to dates she plans meticulously that you don't even try to mess up because she's so intentional with how she loves you, full of thought and care. you're used to your big house on the beach and her laugh in the afternoon, the freckles on her shoulders, her hand in yours.

'i don't understand.' you release your fists with the progressive muscle relaxation you've worked on in therapy, then take a deep breath. 'you — you want to keep fighting?'

you're the one who changed her dressings after surgery, who took her to months and months of painful and slow-going, steady physical therapy. you're the one who washed her short hair with the gentlest hands you could, even that hurting the bone bruise along the back of her skull. you're the one who filled the prescriptions for her pain meds, who held her hand when she woke up. you're the one who loves her the most. you're the one who thought she was going to die.

'i —' she seems at a loss, for a moment, and then, 'it's my duty.'

'your duty?' it comes out shrill; so much for your muscle relaxation. 'beatrice.'

she clenches her jaw.

'you're telling me that you're, what, just fine getting fitted for new armor because your last vest got punctured by shrapnel and almost killed you?'

'ava.' it's a warning, and a tired one — exhausted from over a decade. 'you're still fighting.'

'i don't have a choice.' you hate yelling but you're overwhelmed by the idea of having to go through what you did again and again. 'don't you want — don't you want to choose?'

she swallows and leans back against the counter. 'if i —' she shakes her head.

'bea.'

'i — i can't.'

'i want to live,' you tell her, an echo of one of the first things you knew years and years ago, and her lower lip trembles. 'for so long i have wanted to live so badly, bea.'

'i know.' her voice is laced with unshed tears.

'i — do you want to?'

she sniffles and tilts her head back to look at the ceiling; it's a sure tell she's trying to compose herself but you can see her shaking, holding it in. 'i never thought i would.'

you step toward her, wait until she offers her hand. you lace your fingers together and wait. 'did you want to?'

'i didn't think — i didn't think i deserved to. i didn't think that me living a good life would be nearly as valuable as, well —'

'dying young in a blaze of glory for god?'

it takes her a moment, because it's the hardest thing in the world to hold, this grief, but then she laughs a watery little sound. 'something like that.'

'okay, but — do you want to now?'

it hangs heavy in the air. you know that she goes to therapy faithfully and you've seen her cry multiple times watching the sunset; she touches you like a benediction. but the answer is impossible to come by, sometimes — worthiness, and belief. 'who am i, ava, if not... this?'

you remember a book you'd read a few months ago, one of mary's favorites, that had made you cry often — where does it all lead? what will become of us? these were our young questions, and young answers were revealed. it leads to each other. we become ourselves. it's easy, to kiss the faithful gold band on her ring finger and then take her in your arms, put a protective hand to the back of her head. 'you're a fucking miracle,' you pray into her skin. 'you're the love of my life. you're a genius, and a black belt, and someone who avidly watches reality tv and tennis, only one of which is worthy of that kind of devotion.' you feel her laugh, snotty, into your shoulder. 'you're so pretty, and so handsome, and really funny when you want to be and sometimes even when you don't. you're remarkably forgiving; an incredible friend, a wonderful sister. you're someone who surfs because the ocean is beautiful and you want to see the sunrise. you're a very hot lesbian, and you're my fiance, and you're going to be my wife. you're my life partner. you give the world so much more than it has ever, ever deserved.' you both back up, just so you can look into her eyes. you hold her face in your hands, as gently as you can, run your thumb along a cheekbone, the constellation of freckles there that have bloomed in the sun by the sea. 'you will always serve the world, i know that about you. you're a child of god,' you say. 'you're beatrice.'

it doesn't surprise you when she kisses you gently and then tucks her face into your neck and lets out a full body sob. you rub her back through it, hold her up when her legs grow weak. eventually, as she always does, she calms and composes herself, steps back and dries her tears, runs a hand along her hair. her eyes are red but she takes a deep, steadying breath.

'thank you.'

you kiss her cheek. 'you're also my favorite.'

'now that i do know.'

you grin. 'don't get me wrong, like, fuck the military industrial complex obviously, but this is kind of a look.'

she rolls her eyes but her shoulders settle and then she looks at you seriously. 'i want to live a long life.'

'yeah?'

'so badly.'

'it's a little scary, right?'

she lets out a shaky, honest breath. 'yeah.'

'well, we'll figure it out.' you kiss her, the first of a kind stretching out ahead of you, infinite. 'i have an idea?'

she sighs, and you can't help but laugh.

(you watch her slice a plum on the shore of the lake in the alps you used to train at all those years ago, the lake you knelt down in front of her and she agreed to be your wife. the fruit is juicy and a color you can't quite bring yourself to comprehend: blood, your favorite sangria at the beach, natal dahlias. the house you stay at now — a few quiet days before you head home — is small and gorgeous, with a giant bed and a wall of windows that overlook the mountains. i love you here, you tell her — i love you like this; i love you however you are meant to be — i love you in peacetime, and you watch her slice a plum, the juice red and sticky on her fingers. she puts it to your mouth gently and the taste explodes like a kiss. she smiles and you feed her too; she sucks your finger into her mouth and you close your eyes — there will be time enough to touch her later. the water is calm, and the flowers are in bloom, and the sun shines bright.)

[gammaraydeath]

>goes out bug collecting

>forages natures bounty instead

[summerwages]

rare ripe ossoberries..

birds usually keep a close eye on these as they ripen..with a taste that awakens prehistoric brain cells and a rather large seed..highly recommended