Life...Its all about the Details

Looking west towards the restaurant

I sat in my usual seat, on a normal day, in a restaurant a mile down the road from where I work in Montana.  A mile being a close place to visit considering that the grocery is 30+ miles away.  We all have gotten to be friends, the waitress knows me as Vera and when I eat there it feels comfortable and familiar.  That's Montana for you...it really does feel like home.  But familiarity has nothing to do with the wonder that eating here brings.  I sit in this seat, my favorite chair at my favorite table because the hummingbirds are 4 feet away on the other side of a window.  Watching these guys flit about, bobbing and weaving, literally, dancing in the air is a joy I've never experienced before ...being so close to these aerial acrobats makes me feel incredibly connected to nature.

Female Rufous Hummingbird - not taken by me

The Rufous Hummingbird is all of about 3 inches long and according to Cornell is "one of the feistiest of all the Hummingbirds".  Its 3,900 mile trip from Canada to Mexico is a feat incomprehensible to me.  How is it such a small bird can make that journey twice in a year?  Beating its wings uses so much energy, its metabolism so high, that if it did not go into a state of almost suspended animation when it sleeps, it would die.  Lowering its heartbeat to almost nothing, it manages to survive each night.  Living on such a thin edge between survival and death to us would be so stressful, yet for the Rufous Hummingbird, nay all Hummingbirds, it is normal. 

There is a bee in there somewhere

I ponder the lessons this little bird brings to me as I watch it compete with a large black bee or wasp.  They are both after the nectar in the feeder; the bee staying underneath the feeder lapping up the sugar that has leaked from the feeder while the Hummingbird laps directly out of the feeder.  Both are seeking the same source of nourishment but from different spaces and are not really in each others way.  However, they feel threatened at certain times by each others presence enough to chase each other around for what seems like no reason to me and burning vital resources. Useless waste of energy, I think to myself.  What is amazing to me is that the Hummingbird is intimidated by this bee.  I guess the bird fears the sting also.   

Life living on the edge of a gravel pull off

So, the wisdom of the Hummingbird to me, is this: 

1) Life is short yet full of movement and flights of fancy
2) When you need to rest then do it completely, shut down and relax
3) Things that are smaller than you can be intimidating but if you dodge and weave enough or even distract it, you and others can get what you need
4) Sharing is good but sometimes you need to just stand your ground 
5)  Beauty comes even in the smallest of packages
6) Size doesn't matter when it comes to being strong.  What does matter is your attitude, your ability to endure, knowing where your resources are, waiting/resting at the right times and persevering, all are the keys to being strong and surviving the long haul
7) Refuel often and then remember where you found it because you'll need to revisit it again while on this journey
8) Shine like the sun, show off sometimes and fly with quick wings; remember you are beautiful
9) You're going to lose some friends along the way but you have to keep flying even through the disappointment and pain
10) Live like there is no tomorrow because life is short and full of danger; enjoy the moment 

Sometimes you don't make it

 Nature has so many lessons to teach us if we just stop and think about it.  Surrounded by the beauty of the natural world, I find that often I just take a picture to record the moment, instead of stopping to ponder my part in the whole.  I do not remember that I am a participant in the turning of the circle, thinking I can stand apart from it all.  The greatest moments of clarity, I've found, come when I find my true place amongst all the other animals.

Disclaimer:  Of course, I did not have my camera with, so I'll use a picture given to me by an amazing photographer of a Rufous Hummingbird.  This was one of our Hummingbirds at the Izaak earlier this summer.  The rest of the photos are mine, just a few of the amazing things I've seen this summer.



 

Its All About the Weather!

Hiker enjoying a walk on Sun Point Trail - St Mary's Lake

"Sweet days of summer the jasmines in bloom, July is dressed up and playing her tune.....Summer breeze, makes me feel fine, blowing through the jasmine in my mind."  Seals and Crofts

SNOW in May - traveling to Kalispell, MT

It's almost July and I am still wearing fleece and wool slippers.  Last week I finally gave up, I got so cold, that I turned on the electric heater in my basement grotto.  My housemates long for summer.  They wish for the bone-warming sun of the Midwest and South..places most of us hale from.  They yearn with every fiber of their being for the heat-filled days and the rivulets of sweat running from their forehead, dripping off their noses that typify July and August.  At this point in our Montana summer, they sit engulfed in blankets on the porch staring into space imagining the oppressive humidity, roiling clouds and tornado warnings, rain and rainbows of typical summers in the center of the country.  All of us throw on short pants when the temps rise above 65 degrees and also, out come the flip flops.  We stand in the sun wishing for tans when the clouds finally part.

Logan's Pass - June 25, 2013

I consider that a summer like that will never arrive here in the north country.  This land will not see those things except for during a small window of the year and even then it will not be the same.  I no longer worry about the lack of tornado sirens in the hinterlands where I live.  Yes we've had thunder, thunder snow, rainbows, rain and lightening, even had some wind but not humidity or heat.  Those 2 things together for me hallmark summer along with LONG days of sunshine, light and heat.  Now, there are some crazy long days here.  The sky starts getting light around about 4:30 AM and gets dark again about 10:30 PM give or take a few minutes each day.  

View of St Mary's Lake as sun sets on cloudy night about 8 PM

Summer here in Montana will be moments of heat and sun and big sky clouds.  I've heard that someday soon the rain will stop and we'll have some endlessly beautiful, sunny, warm days.  But they'll be followed by cool nights full of fleece and wool socks.  That I do not mind.  It'll be a summer like I've never seen before; nights of 37-ish degrees followed by 70's or maybe 80's without humidity so we'll dry up during the day like mummies without sunscreen.  Lord the wrinkles but I've got all my favorite hats.  These warm days will continue to be filled with wildflowers covering rocky outcroppings in a proliferation of color.  Life holding on by the roots, showing us that beauty is constant and tenacious. 

Life clings and thrives on a rocky outcropping

These wildflowers are hardy.  They are able to handle the cold nights, the snow within days of blooming, the heat, the short season, the high alpine meadow winds and storms.  They release clouds of seeds and fuzzy things my friend calls, puhk, I think, which makes you sneeze and your eyes water.  All so that they can assure the new will arrive next year and the year after in an endless cycle of enduring beauty.  They are ache-ingly stunning, cascading over the rock faces towards the open air, open water, open sky....all of them last many weeks until they start to fade with the approaching winter.  Two to three short months is all these tough plants have to complete this process.  It seems to me that the mountains laugh as all this life bursts forth from every crevice that can hold dirt. They exalt at the eagles who raise their young from perches on their heights and the sky stretches above is all like a canopy that fills with sunshine and pollen.  What a summer display.

Sometimes death

But my housemates wish in vain for what they have known.  I, instead, am trying to embrace the fullness of what is and in this hug, find all the joy that is reflected around me as this place fulfills the natural cycle we are all part of...nature renewing itself as best it can.  

Blanket Flowers beginning to bloom

Thus, standing on the edge of a high mountain lake, eyes drinking in the greens, blues, purples, whites and yellows of a Monet canvas on a beautiful day, wind blowing briskly through my hair, I laugh into the wind and think....dang do I love this country.

 

St Mary's Lake - View of Citadel Mountain?

Confusion

View of the Izaak Walton Inn from the trestle bridge over tracks

I have been in Montana now for several weeks and have yet to set pen to paper to write about my journey west or what it is like here.  Life has been a whirlwind of learning, lack of sleep, excitement and wonder over the beauty that now surrounds me.  Aside from the fact my internal compass no longer works due to crossing the Great Divide; there should really be no reason for my lack of creativity.  There are abundant sources of inspiration from the continuous serenade of the birds which sing from the tall, tall pine-y tree tops to the mist which rises from the feet of the mountains each morning as the cold air turns warmer. 

Misty, mountain morning greets eastbound AmTrak train

I have decided that it is this sensory overload which is the cause of my fumble fingered photography these last weeks and my lack of words.  At first almost every picture I took was awful, words came to my head yet would not cross the great divide from mind to paper.  Ideas would start then wander away down some greening trail and then up the hillside to stand at the crest breathless and unable to come fully formed to the pad.  I found myself open-mouthed and crying more often then not stupefied by how long it had taken me to find this place.  For now this feels like an end to a long journey, like home almost and overwhelms me often.

The view as you walk on Essex Rd.  Rt 2 and the Middle fork of the Flathead River are below

The difference between east of the Divide and west are numerous.  Snow in May, Grizzly Bears up on the mountain about 3 miles away, Mule deer much less eating plants outside my front door, no need for air conditioning or TV and it's OK to wear fleece year round.

First May snow (yes there was another one mostly up on the mountains)

Supposedly, the Mulies will go up the mountain when the Grizzlies decide to come down the mountain and wander around in the parking lot.  We know there is at least one up near Almeda Lake but now scat has been sighted up on Dickey Creek Road.  Again not much more than 4 miles away.  At this time the Mulies are gone but no bears have decided to visit...I carry bear spray with me on the 100 foot walk to the Inn each day. 

Mule Deer - Can you count them?

I want to bring everyone here....to see this wondrous place before it is gone, melted, fracked, greeded into oblivion and I feel so lucky to have come here to see it even as it stands in the balance.  Pictures do not do this land justice. I have come to believe that there are those who do and those who don't and those who don't never know what they have missed but those that do will always understand the value of wilderness.  It is our job to try to translate what a thrill it is to live in this place.  I will paraphrase a friend who said that essentially for some there is a primal need to be somewhere where you are challenged in ways you never dreamed you would be and the fact that you are not at the top of the food chain is one of the thrills.  

Man-eating Snowshoe Rabbit....my that looks tasty

  So, I will continue to attempt to share with you all my thoughts about my life here and to do my very best to encourage you to challenge yourself no matter where you are. It is, after all, the adrenaline flowing through your veins which reminds that you are alive. 

Sunset over the train yard

Westward HO!

 *First written on April 23, 2013 as I was leaving Ohio for Montana. Sorry for the long delay. 

 It seems fitting to me that as I pack the car to move from Ohio to Montana, leaving on what has become an epic adventure, that spring in all its glory is bursting out all over.  For all endings are actually just new beginnings and spring is just that...evidence that all is not lost but actually just dormant and waiting for a little sun.  My home in Ohio is 2 acres of natural loveliness, me being the fine horticulturist that I am, flowers run together with wildflowers and weeds in a combination of color and confusion.  I love it.

As most of you know, I've not found a full-time job in Ohio in 5 years of looking,  Lately, I've applied nationwide which produced some positive results in that I did make it to the top of 6 job searches.  Meaning, that I was 1 of 20ish or so to get a phone call or two in a selection process that started with 200 to 300 people.  Ok, so I'm flattered but still am without a job.

In March, I had decided I might move to Florida.  My friend, Cathy, spoke to me of how HOT the summers are and stated that, "You really have to feel called to move to Florida!"  So, I reconsidered.  I've been to Florida in the summer, its more than hot.  In stating to her, several times, that we should find a cool summer place to go to, I had a head-slapping moment when I realized that I knew someone who worked in such a place. 

I sent my resume, to a cool summer place, I waited over the weekend for Monday to come thinking all the while about seasonal jobs and what I might do after it ended if I was not asked to stay.  At 10 AM Monday, the phone rang, it was the owner of the Izaak Walton Inn calling to talk.  His manner was easy, he was exited about the possibilities and at the end of an hour long call, it was on me to read the Employee Handbook and decide if this non-smoker could adhere to the "no Crack smoking" rule.  I giggled and in an email later that night told him I thought I could live with this. 

Then the next day another call came, an offer, a virtual handshake over the phone occurred and the next thing I new I had agreed to spend at least the summer in Montana.  Not just normal Montana, but Glacier National Park area, Montana!  Compared to all the other job searches had been a piece of cake.  

So, that chain of events is why I'm leaving Ohio and moving to Montana.  I'm moving for a job, seasonal at the least.  I'm moving into spring, a new beginning.  I'm moving into the unknown towards the sun.  I'm moving because my heart says maybe I"m going home.  Stay tuned everyone.  I'll post more later about the journey. 

Moving on...

Today marks the last Sunday of my residency in Ohio.  I have loved you Ohio and you have loved me too.  And so for a time, we lived together you and I.  But now it is time for me to move on, out into the big world again.  I will remember you with love and friendship, Ohio.  

I came here by accident it may seem but in my belief system nothing in the universe works particularly randomly even if it seems to be.  Yet, even if my coming here was a random decision it was a good one.  Though it has not turned out to be an easy choice emotionally or financially, the things I've learned about myself, the confidence developed, the friends made will stay with me into the future.  Most of all, I've valued the pressure, can't explain it any other way, to continually discover and refine what and who I am.  The constant nudging to THINK about what is important to me to accomplish, to find my talents and pursue them and to leave all else by the wayside has been tough at times but mostly a comical head scratch.  My long-suffering family and friends who have chosen to ride the waves of life with me truly deserve a medal.  I cannot guarantee that the future will not hold challenges but Ohio, you have done your job and helped me along my path. 

I cannot speak of family/friends without becoming slightly misty eyed as they are the stuff of life.  I've made some good ones here, lifetime ones.  Kick me in the ass friends who when I was being silly would do just that.  Creative friends who have encouraged me to let my words shine brightly and friends who have been both.  Thank you.

So, these last few days will be bittersweet.  Thank you, Ohio, for sharing with me both your best and your worst. 

GACK! Its a Spider!

I was driving along today on a road which I drive at least 4 to 5 times a week, sun shining and all is well with the world.  Suddenly, as I rounded a bend I see movement on the dash!  I try to take tiny little peeks at whatever is moving up there while negotiating the curves of the road.  As the road straightens, I straighten up in my seat and realize that what I am looking at is a Jumping Spider, all of 1/4th of an inch long, running back and forth on the dash in a frantic attempt to exit the car.  

 

Now, being an ex-Naturalist, I am not normally afraid of spiders but at that moment in time the primeval fear of spiders hit me in the gut with a sucker punch that took my breath away and with every inch of me alert, my brain yelled, "OMIGOD, I"M TRAPPED IN THE CAR WITH A SPIDER!!"  

The spider was at this point panicked.  Spiders you know can read your mind and having heard my brain yell, knew that I was on to him and he was not long for the world.  He ran back and forth in front of the steering wheel, bobbing and weaving, he'd run towards my hand and then run back into the corner of the windshield.  At the same time, I'm looking all over the car for a piece of paper for him to 'jump' onto so I could throw him out the window.  I had slowed the car to a crawl, dumped my purse's contacts on to the seat next to me.  People were passing me, giving me evil looks and one guy even shook his fist at me.  All I could do was look at him, eyes begging for understanding and wave.  Why do we feel we have to be polite when in the midst of a personal crisis?

Up until this time I'd managed to keep him at bay with little waves of my hand but suddenly he decided that it was time to make a stand.  Planting his tiny little feet, all eight of them, he crouched....I KNOW that he was about to launch himself at my face...spiders know that by landing on our faces we will become totally incoherent thus allowing them to either gnaw our faces off or escape.  I was hoping that he'd decide to escape.  Needing to do something quickly, I rolled the window down creating a -10 degree vortex of rushing air and with the other hand shoved him over close to the window hoping that a twister would grab hurl him out.  And no, I do not have 4 arms but was at this time steering with my knee.  The spider to his credit hung on to the dash for just a moment before the wind caught him and with a passing hand gesture of a disturbing nature flew out the window free to fly at last.  

Now to the truth of all this.  This story is true and I did for a moment become panicked with the idea of being in the car with a spider.  Spiders neither read minds nor gnaw faces off.  However, the primal response they elicit is real.  Even I was subject to a few moments of upset upon finding this little guy in my car.  These primal fear responses often keep us from fully understanding the importance of certain animals.  

Spiders, bats, coyotes, raptors and snakes are a few of the animals who are categorized as scary or nuisance animals.  They are all top predators in their habitats, playing a vital role in the balance of prey species which would, population-wise, without these predators, become wildly out of control.  Spiders eat annoying insects, bats eat moths which eat crops, coyotes here in Ohio, help with deer and rodent control, raptors help cull the pigeon and dove populations, snakes eat mice and other small rodents.  Nature knows what she's doing and these relationships are important.   

So, next time you're stuck in the car with something scary, (your children don't count!) or out somewhere and see something scary, don't immediately panic, take a few seconds to consider how it fits in nature and how it contributes to its habitat before reflexively flattening it.  Think about how sometimes your journey takes you to unexpected places where you only want to get away or get back to something familiar and cut the little guy a break.  Let it fly free and live to see another day.

Flying Through Rocky

Written on February 26th as I was leaving Ohio for Florida.
So, today in an effort to escape the death throes of a northern winter, I am flying again to Florida.  Land of sun, sea and sand; its winds whisper my name and the ocean music sings its song to me even in my waking hours.  The Sea Gull's cry is a welcome home invocation.  Although, I am a child of the mountains, hills and forests, the wild coast touches my wild heart and I long to stand on an empty beach facing west, wind running fingers through my hair.  Oh, it can't come soon enough, that salty air.

Yet, Ohio wishes me to stay and with a grip like iron conspires with its sister states to the west to keep me here by hatching, Rocky.  I failed to realize, really, that winter storms are now being named.  It was with dismay that I started hearing of Rocky's approach.  Tough, hard, pummeling, blustery and bragging, this would be, in my mind what a storm named, Rocky, would be like, a fighter, unwilling to give up.  And so it is with this one, I've danced and dodged, lodged a jab or two myself, staying always ahead of it.  My steps always one ahead of him.  

What would have happened if we'd flown into Midway.

At first, my departure was set for afternoon out of Akron/Canton but by mid-day those plans were cancelled with the knock-out punch to the chin of Chicago.  That mighty city's Midway airport felled; closed to air traffic, dealt a blow by Rocky's snowy glove.  Lovely Southwest Airlines scrambled to find me another flight out today, so off I went to Cleveland Airport, whose selection of flights to Tampa, Florida is more generous.  Connection through Baltimore was possible, away from the mighty fist of Rocky.  But his glancing blow is still trying to knock me out by delaying my departure from Baltimore.

As I sit here, waiting, watching for his approach, hoping that my plane boards and scoots out ahead of his arrival into the northeastern Ohio ring of snow, I wonder if he will get the upper hand.  But just in time the doors open we board the plane and off we go.  Rocky still has some blocks, slamming us with turbulence and that bottom dropping out of the plane feeling.  We fly to Baltimore with the fasten seat belt sign on for almost the whole trip.  Yet once up above 10,000 feet all is calm.  The stars shine brightly and only the cloud mountains below indicate any issues.  The almost full moon brightens the sky and is so beautiful.  It illuminates the tops of the clouds below putting their peaks and valleys in bright relief. 
 
Upon arrival in Baltimore, thinking I still had 40 minutes or more to kill I allow other passengers who have a tighter connection to de-plane ahead of me.  Searching for a board gate sign, I turn left and spy it ahead.  Well, all is still as planned, Baltimore to Tampa still delayed.  I head back towards my gate, looking for a bathroom, when I hear:  "Welcome to Flight so and so non-stop service from Baltimore to Tampa boarding at gate 8." Wait,  WHAT! 3 minutes after I de-planed, I was lining up to re-plane?! Yikes!  So, within 10 minutes of getting off 1 plane, I was on another waiting to head to my final destination of sun, sand and surf.  Rocky wasn't going to win after all.  He was successfully knocked out and I was going to win at least this round with mother nature.    

Final destination, feet successfully de-planed on to the beach!