Thalia picks up a rock. The shape and texture remind her of something. “A tortoise shell!”

Calliope plucks leaves for legs.

Nią consults the World Wide Web, then signals halt with a perpendicular hand. “Those might work for a sea turtle. This is a tortoise. A small stick is what we need for landlubber legs. We can toss the leaves in front of the peanut shell head.”

“Every creature needs snacks!” Tal doesn’t care how many licks it might take to get to the center of her lollypop. Crunch!

"We must always remember…” Calliope watches her friends run and play, “that creativity comes standard on all models.”

“Quick!” Urania trips Thalia’s excitability switch when she spies the hot air ballon. “Get the camera! We can use an image of that flying machine in our current project.”

As Thalia races back into the house, Calliope repeats a short maxim she’s been practicing to rid herself of angst. “Never hurry; never worry. Never hurry; never worry. Never hurry; never worry.”

“Got it!” Thalia pants. “Knocked over a cup of coffee. We’ll have to clean that up later.”

“Go slow to go fast; go slow to go fast, go slow to go fast,” Cal murmurs.

Urania snaps several shots and stuffs the phone into the pocket of her shorts.

“You’re taking it with us?” Calliope queries.

“Just this once,” Nia slips a poo-pouri bag into her other pocket and the trio launches into the morning escapade.

On HiLo Drive there’s a ruckus in the treetops. “Sounds like a pinched baby — or an angry cat.” Thalia turns to Urania, “What bird is that?”

Shrugs all around… Nia remembers the phone in her pocket that has a bird ID app. Merlin identifies the call of a catbird.

“Makes sense.” Cal nods.

“Mmmmm-hmmmm. Uh-huh!” Thalia claps. “If the sound fits, name it!”

Nia has a vague recollection of following this curiosity in past summers. She pinches herself for not remembering. “Well, it seems we now have the makings of today’s 3musesmerge loveletter.”

Thalia begins crafting a visual to accompany the words in her mind’s eye.

“The key to creativity…” Cal takes a deep breath, “lies in using what you’ve got.”

Urania’s shoulders hunch and her back slopes as she pecks at the keys. Pausing to ponder whether her subjects and verbs balance on a plumb line, she notices Thalia’s twisted frame in the recliner. “We should really work on our posture.”

Thalia looks up from her sketch and replies, “I’m glad you said we because a pointed index leaves middleman, ring finger, and pinkie pointing back at you.”

Having learned that action is the only truth, Calliope lines up her head, shoulders, knees, and toes before walking through the room without saying a word.

“Should I yank it?” Thalia examines the small and weak looking plant with leaves nibbled nearly to the stem.

Urania wipes at sweat beading on her forehead with dirty fingers. “I hate it when things don’t make sense!” She points to a petaled pretty mere feet away. “These were planted on the same day.”

“I suggest we leave it… and watch.” Calliope trims back an exuberant petunia. “Sometimes the ones challenged to overcome… grow into the strongest beauties.”

“When in America,” Thalia grazes from a culinary assortment of baklava, French fries, and pizza, “behave like an American. Life, liberty, and happiness!”

“You forgot the most powerful word in that phrase.” Urania rests her cheek on her hand.

Calliope dips a fry in ketchup, “Happiness lives inside of pursuit… There’s no greater joy than love-in-action.”

Calliope comes in from watering flowers. She finds Thalia and Urania huddled at Studio’s table. Nia holds a pencil — Tal a paint brush. Cal peers between a short-and-sassy pixie cut and mounds of auburn curls. “A stroller?”

Nia checks her notebook. “The inhabitant might be named Max. Right now the idea is too fresh for certainty.”

“And the girl?”

“Emma!” Thalia waves her brush and paint flies. “She’s six! And she’s gonna be smart, and playful, and… a lot like me. Simply fabulous.”

Urania rolls her eyes and exhales.

“I see. Ideas are like babies… needing lots of care and attention.” Cal looks out the window and switches metaphors. “It’ll need sunshine, playful breezes… and storms to make it strong. It will also need time… and space to grow. Are you sure we’re up to it?”

“The only way to learn,” Nia returns to her notes.

Tal wiggles in her seat, “is to go for it!”

Heading down the drive for their morning exploration, Calliope slips a pebble into each muse slipper. “What do you love?”

Henrietta freezes, causing the trio to stop and scan.

“I love —” Urania ventures, “understanding. Like our awareness that Henny’s keen sense of smell exceeds our seeing, leading us to notice things we otherwise would miss. I love understanding how things fit together, or finding ways to fit them together.”

Cackling from the neighbor’s yard prompts Thalia’s response. “I love beauty. I love, watching love in action. I love witnessing six-year-old Waylon feeding his chickens. I also love — dessert. Can we have ice cream after our walk?”

“What do you love Cal?” Urania queries.

“I…” Cal pauses, “love courage. I love that we are willing to show up and be seen… imperfect muses in an imperfect world.”

A three part hum of discontent rivals the buzz of flies as Cal, Tal, and Nia pull weeds on the hillside. The trio has not looked at their work-in-progress for almost three weeks. The awareness feels heavier than a weed-heaped wheelbarrow.

“I guess we were wrong!” Mud flies as Thalia shakes an uprooted dandelion. “We just might die on this stupid hill!”

“Be quiet and keep pulling,” Nia commands. “The sooner we’re done with the hill, the sooner we can get back to working on the —”

“Isn’t this weeding,” Calliope questions, “just an avoidance maneuver?”

“Why bother?” Thalia howls. “Why bother, why bother, why bother? The weeds will just keep growing as our creations keep gathering dust on Amazon’s virtual bookshelf! Let’s go back to bed.”

“We will pull until we finish this bucket,” Calliope takes charge, “and then write our 3musesmerge love letter. Surely… that will make us feel better.”

Urania navigates the coffee machine.

Thalia hums a James Taylor song.

And Calliope? She strikes up a conversation with a retired NYC police officer who tells her about his experience on 9/11.

“Oh my…” Calliope diverts Urania’s attention while Tal slips frocks and heels into their suitcase. “That’s a big cherry!”

“You know it’s an apple.” Urania sighs. “Take the heels out Thalia.”

“Right.” Cal hands Tal another dress. “We’ll have more fun in flats because… we’ll be able to walk further than the elevator.”

Cheeks matching the poppies, Nia clenches her teeth and mutters, “That — Dog!”

Thalia follows Henrietta into the backseat of our neighbor’s car and winks at two pigtailed pixies who are on their way to school. “Well this sure has spiced up our morning, hasn’t it?”

Finding no snacks, Henny hops out.

Grateful that mom and grandma are laughing, Calliope clips on That Dog’s leash and grins. “Henrietta sure likes to bring color to our days.”

At the feed store, Nia selects a bag of raw shelled peanuts.

If all of life is an experiment, it’s surely worth eight dollars to see if the garden squirrels will fill their tummies with legumes.

Will they leave the birdseed for the birds now?

Within a minute of parking, Thalia tears through the plastic bag with her thumb and runs to scatter a handful at the base of the shepherd’s hook. In a flash of oh-how-the-worm-has-turned, blue jays descend from the treetops and take every shelled gem.

Next morning. New day. New experiment.

Calliope places a couple dozen peanuts on the red brick wall near the bird feeders. The trio watches from the window as a chipmunk approaches, nibbles, and proceeds to stuff three wholes (3!) into its expandable cheeks. A gray squirrel ambles up the stone staircase and stops cold. What’s this! Tail a-twitching, it eats one peanut and shell with the discernment of a critic at a five-star restaurant. Meanwhile, our new chippy character, who has a distinctive black ring on its tail, dashes between the peanuts and plants until the wall is bare.

What at first was funny turns toward fury.

“How rude!” Thalia yells out the window.

“Deplorable.” Nią mutters into her coffee.

“People… and chipmunks,” Calliope considers, “are always showing us who they are… and what they are afraid of.”

“Let me get this straight —” Thalia stands with hands on hips, “free birds are going to willingly climb into a cage for dead, dehydrated worms?”

When Nia made the purchase she felt certain the feeder would solve their ravenous squirrel situation. “The promo video showed bluebirds feasting!” After more than a week, without a single mealworm eaten, she was no longer so sure.

“If they can get in, they can get out…” Calliope moves the feeder from the maple to the shepherd’s hook, then sprinkles protein-rich treats along the edge of the tray. “What we need is a courageous early adopter. Let’s give it some time.”

Calliope’s attention is captivated by a bumble bee that’s relationship-ing with tiny, yellow, spring flowers on the barberry bush. She invites Thalia and Urania to join her at the window with a whispered, “Come… come here. Look, look, look!”

Urania peers over Cal’s shoulder and wonders where Wisconsin bumblers spend the winter.

Having learned that wildlife is unnerved by her enthusiasm, Thalia suppresses a shout when a cardinal alights on a thorny limb carrying a piece of pliable plastic.

With mouths agape, the trio watches Mama bird disappear into the bush. She soon exits with an empty beak.

Calliope beams. “Looks like we have…”

“a front seat —”

“TO THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH!”

Led by Henrietta, the trio traverses HiLo Drive. The only traffic flies… or scampers on four legs.

“A blue jay and two robins meet in a thicket —” Inspired by a true event, Thalia puzzles for a punchline.

After a long pause Nia whispers to Cal, “Where is she going with this?”

“Not sure.” Calliope shrugs. “I guess she figures as long as we’re adding imagination to reality, it might as well be funny.”

“Terrible!” Urania moves to tear and toss the headless Northern Flicker.

“Not!” Thalia snatches their experiment from Nia’s perfectionist grasp. “I’m not finished.”

“Trying something new,” Calliope considers, “is an outside and an inside exploration.”

A note from LoveLetterist: I am very much enjoying Merlin Bird ID this spring. The free app can detect and identify the calls of birds within range of your phone. There are birds passing through my yard that I did not know existed… Brown Creepers, Yellow-Rumped Warblers, a variety of Kinglets, and more!

Urania steers past the exotics without a glance and heads directly for the tried-and-true grapes, apples, and honeydew melons.

“I want to try dragon food!” Thalia plants herself in front of the cart.

“Dragon fruit.” Nia can’t quell clarification.

Calliope picks one up. “The coloring is… delicious.”

Thalia heads for the trapeze.

Calliope cozies up to the big cats.

Urania studies the ring-mistress’ every move.

Welcome to the Big Top!

“Courageous!” Calliope estimates a five foot jump from nature’s floor to feeder.

Thalia moves to the window to survey the scene. “Creative! It used the hose reel as an intermediary jumping point.”

“Cripes!” Nia mutters as she slips on her jacket. “I’m going out to raise the bar.”

A note from LoveLetterist: Hours later the squirrel continues to catapult itself off the hose reel into the window. It must really prefer sunflower seeds to the abundant cache of last fall’s black walnut crop that’s scattered throughout the yard.

“Knock-knock!” Thalia calls from the front stoop after running outside to chase a fresh-from-hibernation chipmunk. “Knock! Knock!”

Urania rolls her eyes.

“I’ll bite…” Calliope grins, “Who’s there?”

“Beak.”

“Beak who?”

Thalia pokes her head through the open window. “Beak-a-boo!"

A note from LoveLetterist: The days are lengthening in the Northern Hemisphere. 🎉 In less than six winter-into-spring Wisconsin days, we’ve experienced a blizzard, a-full-melt-down, and today… 70+ degrees Fahrenheit.

Weather!
A metaphor for living?

Keep the jokes coming Thalia.
Get muses laughing and they can weather anything!