Showing posts with label nature. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nature. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 8, 2017
Tuesday, July 22, 2014
A Stewardship of the Heart
“…in any true sense there is no such thing as ownership of the earth and the shadow of any man is but for a time cast upon the grass of any field.” Henry Beston, Northern Farm.
It would be all too easy for me to fall into the trap of thinking that I own this land, this wooded five-acre hillside that slopes down from Grant’s Hill to Swan Pond. One of my neighbors has perhaps a better claim to that thinking, as this entire area, including my own humble parcel, once belonged to his father. So I’ve come to understand his attachment to it that extends even to my land, as it was once in his family, and he’s never stopped thinking of it as such. I, however, am a relative newcomer here, and unless I will the place to my own heirs, someone else will someday invariably take stewardship of this knoll.
But can any of us, no matter how long we’ve occupied it, truly own the land? Are the trees, hills and fields to be owned, or do they simply allow us the luxury of our imagined dominion over them? We’ve all witnessed the ravages of progress, how it can strip away acres of trees and replace them with shopping centers and apartment complexes. Yet, once abandoned, does the earth not take over again, with nature slowly but inexorably reclaiming what is hers? No legal proceedings are involved, no hand needed to sign deeds or easements. She simply moves in quietly, and over time, refashions the hills and fields into something more befitting her eclectic preferences.
Our history is full of stories of those who held unwritten rights to this land for centuries before the Europeans decided it was theirs simply to take. Who better to attest to the fleeting nature of ownership than those very souls who now eke out their existences in the places allotted to them by those with the power to decide such things? I think I know a little of how they must have felt as they left their ancestral lands, I, who have only been here a few years and who is hardly rooted yet can feel how tenuous my grip is on this place.
A good friend of mine once said that no one ever really owns the land, that we are all merely stewards, a reality that extracts from us a promise to leave it as we found it. He and his wife owned 80 acres of pine-studded wilderness not far from here, and he, too, had a healthy reverence for that wild place that held him in tenancy only. Even in death, whatever small space any of us occupies passes to someone else: heirs, new unrelated owners, even developers, and all perhaps thinking it is theirs, all theirs, to do with as they will.
None of us knows what lies ahead, and it’s perhaps better that way. If I should have to reluctantly leave this place someday, I hope that whoever comes after me will see the light golden in the pines at sunset and hear the wind approaching from the west on a stormy night. I hope they care for it, give back whatever they take from it, and not interfere too much with processes that have gone on long before any of us were here. But most of all, I hope they hear what it has to say and that they, too, take comfort in the truths it has to share.
It would be all too easy for me to fall into the trap of thinking that I own this land, this wooded five-acre hillside that slopes down from Grant’s Hill to Swan Pond. One of my neighbors has perhaps a better claim to that thinking, as this entire area, including my own humble parcel, once belonged to his father. So I’ve come to understand his attachment to it that extends even to my land, as it was once in his family, and he’s never stopped thinking of it as such. I, however, am a relative newcomer here, and unless I will the place to my own heirs, someone else will someday invariably take stewardship of this knoll.
But can any of us, no matter how long we’ve occupied it, truly own the land? Are the trees, hills and fields to be owned, or do they simply allow us the luxury of our imagined dominion over them? We’ve all witnessed the ravages of progress, how it can strip away acres of trees and replace them with shopping centers and apartment complexes. Yet, once abandoned, does the earth not take over again, with nature slowly but inexorably reclaiming what is hers? No legal proceedings are involved, no hand needed to sign deeds or easements. She simply moves in quietly, and over time, refashions the hills and fields into something more befitting her eclectic preferences.
Our history is full of stories of those who held unwritten rights to this land for centuries before the Europeans decided it was theirs simply to take. Who better to attest to the fleeting nature of ownership than those very souls who now eke out their existences in the places allotted to them by those with the power to decide such things? I think I know a little of how they must have felt as they left their ancestral lands, I, who have only been here a few years and who is hardly rooted yet can feel how tenuous my grip is on this place.
A good friend of mine once said that no one ever really owns the land, that we are all merely stewards, a reality that extracts from us a promise to leave it as we found it. He and his wife owned 80 acres of pine-studded wilderness not far from here, and he, too, had a healthy reverence for that wild place that held him in tenancy only. Even in death, whatever small space any of us occupies passes to someone else: heirs, new unrelated owners, even developers, and all perhaps thinking it is theirs, all theirs, to do with as they will.
None of us knows what lies ahead, and it’s perhaps better that way. If I should have to reluctantly leave this place someday, I hope that whoever comes after me will see the light golden in the pines at sunset and hear the wind approaching from the west on a stormy night. I hope they care for it, give back whatever they take from it, and not interfere too much with processes that have gone on long before any of us were here. But most of all, I hope they hear what it has to say and that they, too, take comfort in the truths it has to share.
Friday, June 6, 2014
Straining to Hear
Despite the noise and the chaos here, nature makes herself seen, heard and felt. And whether she welcomes the instrusion or not, I have once again insinuated myself into her workings and persist in moving ever deeper into the heart of her many mysteries. From the wild vine that sways in the breeze outside my bedroom window to the remnants of last night's rain dripping from the roof and tapping just certain leaves, she makes her presence known to me.
Early in the morning, I strain toward the all-too-brief silences between the cars and trucks that disturb what would otherwise be a blessed calm of the sort that once was most likely the norm here along this road that runs along the river. And in between the hissings of rubber spinning endlessly on asphalt and the grinding of gears as large trucks downshift toward the town center, I hear the songs of creatures who insist on being heard no matter what. Birdsong comes to me at sunrise, the generic crow's call and the cardinal's bell-like melody, assuring me that all is well at least in their part of the world.
Humans are a noisy species, arguably the noisiest in all of nature. Just yesterday, I stopped at a store where a portable compressor sitting in the back of a truck was running full-bore. Several people stood not far from it talking, or rather shouting, to make themselves heard to each other above its din. As if that hadn't been enough to push the decibel level beyond any healthy limits, not to mention my own level of tolerance, two all-terrain vehicles pulled up and sat idling near the gas pumps for some time. The humid August air quickly filled with the smell of exhaust, and I could not exit that scene quickly enough.
Availing myself of nature's gifts, particularly the way in which she insists upon silence in all of her processes, has not always been easy since I left the woods a few months ago. But I remain ever vigilant of her presense in the random places, and I still do not allow my gaze to wander very far from her green respites that exist simply as backdrops here for the trappings of the human experience. This enables me to be privy at times to the sight of a hummingbird harvesting nectar from the flowers in a neighboring yard and to appreciate the weeds that insist on growing up through the cracks in the back-porch steps. If I honor that flurry that catches at the corner of my eye and turn toward it, I might see a flock of female house finches scratching at the dirt in the back yard or a chipmunk perched on top of a wide fence post surveying the limited landscape. I am grateful for the single sunflower that emerged unannounced from seed scattered by the birds beneath the feeder, and I make it a point to go outside if I so much as hear the sound of a leaf rustling in the wind. I look often to the skies here and am rewarded with spectacular cloud formations and glorious sunrises and sunsets. While none of these experiences come close to providing me with the deep sense of kinship with nature I once enjoyed, they are nonethless reminders of what is still out there for me to savor if I remember to stop, look and listen.
At this point in my life, I'd be fooling myself to think there is any chance that I will ever again find myself wrapped in nature's arms on a wooded hillside. So I wear her like a charm on my wrist now and keep her tucked in close to my heart. And wherever I go, I leave myself open to her ministrations, be they in the form of a stroll along a hiking trail or a climb along a rocky beach head. Fortunately for me, she is never far away, and she never fails to hear my cries for help.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Early in the morning, I strain toward the all-too-brief silences between the cars and trucks that disturb what would otherwise be a blessed calm of the sort that once was most likely the norm here along this road that runs along the river. And in between the hissings of rubber spinning endlessly on asphalt and the grinding of gears as large trucks downshift toward the town center, I hear the songs of creatures who insist on being heard no matter what. Birdsong comes to me at sunrise, the generic crow's call and the cardinal's bell-like melody, assuring me that all is well at least in their part of the world.
Humans are a noisy species, arguably the noisiest in all of nature. Just yesterday, I stopped at a store where a portable compressor sitting in the back of a truck was running full-bore. Several people stood not far from it talking, or rather shouting, to make themselves heard to each other above its din. As if that hadn't been enough to push the decibel level beyond any healthy limits, not to mention my own level of tolerance, two all-terrain vehicles pulled up and sat idling near the gas pumps for some time. The humid August air quickly filled with the smell of exhaust, and I could not exit that scene quickly enough.
Availing myself of nature's gifts, particularly the way in which she insists upon silence in all of her processes, has not always been easy since I left the woods a few months ago. But I remain ever vigilant of her presense in the random places, and I still do not allow my gaze to wander very far from her green respites that exist simply as backdrops here for the trappings of the human experience. This enables me to be privy at times to the sight of a hummingbird harvesting nectar from the flowers in a neighboring yard and to appreciate the weeds that insist on growing up through the cracks in the back-porch steps. If I honor that flurry that catches at the corner of my eye and turn toward it, I might see a flock of female house finches scratching at the dirt in the back yard or a chipmunk perched on top of a wide fence post surveying the limited landscape. I am grateful for the single sunflower that emerged unannounced from seed scattered by the birds beneath the feeder, and I make it a point to go outside if I so much as hear the sound of a leaf rustling in the wind. I look often to the skies here and am rewarded with spectacular cloud formations and glorious sunrises and sunsets. While none of these experiences come close to providing me with the deep sense of kinship with nature I once enjoyed, they are nonethless reminders of what is still out there for me to savor if I remember to stop, look and listen.
At this point in my life, I'd be fooling myself to think there is any chance that I will ever again find myself wrapped in nature's arms on a wooded hillside. So I wear her like a charm on my wrist now and keep her tucked in close to my heart. And wherever I go, I leave myself open to her ministrations, be they in the form of a stroll along a hiking trail or a climb along a rocky beach head. Fortunately for me, she is never far away, and she never fails to hear my cries for help.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Villages
If a man walks in the woods for love of them half of each day, he is in danger of being regarded as a loafer. But if he spends his days as a speculator, shearing off those woods and making the earth bald before her time, he is deemed an industrious and enterprising citizen. ~Henry David Thoreau
History books recount the tales of how the world's great cities took shape, how men with vision came in and swept whole sections of countryside clean of vegetation and wildlife in the name of progress. In other cases, the sprawl happened gradually, with cities extending their reach until it was impossible to even guess at what had been there before. In both cases, architects, engineers and builders painted over nature's great canvas, obliterating her work for all time in places such as New York City, Chicago and Boston. Yes, the city planners incorporated parks and other green places in their sprawling cities for residents to enjoy. But there is no question that nature has taken a back seat in many areas of this country, and one is hard-pressed to find her in any but the least-populated places.
Thanks to citizen resistance to sprawl and development, nature maintains her hold on the vast spaces that exist between the smaller towns and among the great swatches of terrain that divide them. Two years ago, the residents of Shapleigh voted against a company that had plans to test, tap and sell the town's water, thus ensuring that no bottling plant, such as the one that now takes up a huge area on the Killock Pond Road in Hollis, would suddenly pop up on their own pristine land. To economists and others who insist on placing a dollar value on everything, this translated into lost jobs and lower revenues. But to naturalists and others who appreciate nature's presence, it was no small victory. For to drive through Shapleigh is to pass through a place of incredible beauty, from its gently rolling hills to its densely wooded areas. How sad it would have been to disturb that land for the purpose of extracting the very water that makes its lush existence possible.
Those who choose to live in small towns and villages do so from personal choice or, in some cases, because they've been there all their lives and it just never occurs to them to live anywhere else. There is an inherent sense of freedom in such places, where nature exists close by as a constant reminder that boundaries are a human convention and that no such concept exists naturally in woods and fields. Again, the open areas are preserved and left to their own devices, imparting to small settlements an aura of non-intrusiveness and resignation. Nature rules, and those who live in such places do so out of deference to her and with great respect for her processes. The appearance of wildlife in a rural back yard is an everyday occurrence in many small towns and is never an intrusion. There is an intrinsic acceptance among a populace that has learned to live in harmony with its wild neighbors that involves never forgetting who was here first.
It's always a pleasure to drive through the smaller towns and villages that dot the landscape away from the larger metropolitan areas. I never tire of seeing the family farms, weathered outbuildings, apple orchards and vast gardens coexisting with other modest homesteads and small businesses that know their place in the scheme of things and that keep the local humble economy going. The eye travels easily across such landscapes that offer few, if any, detractions to their flowing harmony. For mercifully, the human touch has been gentle and respectful in these places where nature's imprint is still the deepest.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
History books recount the tales of how the world's great cities took shape, how men with vision came in and swept whole sections of countryside clean of vegetation and wildlife in the name of progress. In other cases, the sprawl happened gradually, with cities extending their reach until it was impossible to even guess at what had been there before. In both cases, architects, engineers and builders painted over nature's great canvas, obliterating her work for all time in places such as New York City, Chicago and Boston. Yes, the city planners incorporated parks and other green places in their sprawling cities for residents to enjoy. But there is no question that nature has taken a back seat in many areas of this country, and one is hard-pressed to find her in any but the least-populated places.
Thanks to citizen resistance to sprawl and development, nature maintains her hold on the vast spaces that exist between the smaller towns and among the great swatches of terrain that divide them. Two years ago, the residents of Shapleigh voted against a company that had plans to test, tap and sell the town's water, thus ensuring that no bottling plant, such as the one that now takes up a huge area on the Killock Pond Road in Hollis, would suddenly pop up on their own pristine land. To economists and others who insist on placing a dollar value on everything, this translated into lost jobs and lower revenues. But to naturalists and others who appreciate nature's presence, it was no small victory. For to drive through Shapleigh is to pass through a place of incredible beauty, from its gently rolling hills to its densely wooded areas. How sad it would have been to disturb that land for the purpose of extracting the very water that makes its lush existence possible.
Those who choose to live in small towns and villages do so from personal choice or, in some cases, because they've been there all their lives and it just never occurs to them to live anywhere else. There is an inherent sense of freedom in such places, where nature exists close by as a constant reminder that boundaries are a human convention and that no such concept exists naturally in woods and fields. Again, the open areas are preserved and left to their own devices, imparting to small settlements an aura of non-intrusiveness and resignation. Nature rules, and those who live in such places do so out of deference to her and with great respect for her processes. The appearance of wildlife in a rural back yard is an everyday occurrence in many small towns and is never an intrusion. There is an intrinsic acceptance among a populace that has learned to live in harmony with its wild neighbors that involves never forgetting who was here first.
It's always a pleasure to drive through the smaller towns and villages that dot the landscape away from the larger metropolitan areas. I never tire of seeing the family farms, weathered outbuildings, apple orchards and vast gardens coexisting with other modest homesteads and small businesses that know their place in the scheme of things and that keep the local humble economy going. The eye travels easily across such landscapes that offer few, if any, detractions to their flowing harmony. For mercifully, the human touch has been gentle and respectful in these places where nature's imprint is still the deepest.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Summer in York County
Roaming the York County countryside means seeing fields shorn of their tall grasses and corn standing knee-high right about now. Raspberries are filling out on their canes, and blueberries are ripening a little more each day. Birds linger longer on tree branches, particularly among the flowering varieties whose blossoms have given way to yet another year's-worth of seeds. It's July, the seventh month, which means that we are over half-way through yet another year. The heat rests heavily on the land, and the sun shines down more intensely than it will at any other time.
I'm not a big fan of hot weather, so when I do venture out, I try to get as early a start as I can. Driving along with all the windows down, I bask in the still-cool morning air that, by noon, will feel more like the heat pouring from an oven. On hot days, even the trees seem weighed down by it, their leaves barely moving in the moisture-laden air moving in from the south and the west, completely resigned to the elements that constitute summer in southern Maine.
Much has been written of late about conservation and the actions of many dedicated individuals geared toward protecting unspoiled land for future generations to enjoy and appreciate. While their efforts are indeed commendable, it occurs to me that conservation can take different forms and that it can be deliberate or simply the result of of land being left undisturbed for many years. The long swaths of open field and meadow that I see in my many travels illustrate what I like to call passive conservation. Such acreage emerges from beneath the snows each spring, sprouts a full component of grass that is eventually cut back to ground level. That is about as much as ever happens to such land, and year after year, it is wisely left in nature's domain. The hay or straw harvested from these lands fills many needs, but such undisturbed lands provide another benefit as well by enhancing the countryside and making a lot of lovely scenery possible. Visual beauty, as well as the survival of relatively untouched places, are indeed valuable components of conservation, passive or otherwise, that sometimes get lost in the shuffle of providing areas for people to enjoy in other ways.
We all owe a debt of gratitude to those landowners who quietly, and without much ado, leave large portions of their land in nature's care. Because of them, we have many places to escape to in this part of the world where life's busy-ness and the wilderness live in close proximity to each other. And although much of this land is private and, in some cases, posted against trespassers, I feel that just having it to look at as I drive by or stop along a road somewhere to enjoy is a gift.
I sometimes park my car and walk along the by-ways that border such properties, camera in hand, always on the lookout for that special something that would be missed if I'd just passed by without a second glance. From such a limited vantage point, I am still able to gaze out upon rolling pastures and deep into dense woods where the leaves split the sunlight into glimmering beams. I can gaze down from a bridge into flowing water or look up at clouds that break up a rich blue sky above a field of golden grasses bending in the breeze, thankful always to those wise landowners who know that, when nature is given full rein, nothing short of the spectacular will do.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
I'm not a big fan of hot weather, so when I do venture out, I try to get as early a start as I can. Driving along with all the windows down, I bask in the still-cool morning air that, by noon, will feel more like the heat pouring from an oven. On hot days, even the trees seem weighed down by it, their leaves barely moving in the moisture-laden air moving in from the south and the west, completely resigned to the elements that constitute summer in southern Maine.
Much has been written of late about conservation and the actions of many dedicated individuals geared toward protecting unspoiled land for future generations to enjoy and appreciate. While their efforts are indeed commendable, it occurs to me that conservation can take different forms and that it can be deliberate or simply the result of of land being left undisturbed for many years. The long swaths of open field and meadow that I see in my many travels illustrate what I like to call passive conservation. Such acreage emerges from beneath the snows each spring, sprouts a full component of grass that is eventually cut back to ground level. That is about as much as ever happens to such land, and year after year, it is wisely left in nature's domain. The hay or straw harvested from these lands fills many needs, but such undisturbed lands provide another benefit as well by enhancing the countryside and making a lot of lovely scenery possible. Visual beauty, as well as the survival of relatively untouched places, are indeed valuable components of conservation, passive or otherwise, that sometimes get lost in the shuffle of providing areas for people to enjoy in other ways.
We all owe a debt of gratitude to those landowners who quietly, and without much ado, leave large portions of their land in nature's care. Because of them, we have many places to escape to in this part of the world where life's busy-ness and the wilderness live in close proximity to each other. And although much of this land is private and, in some cases, posted against trespassers, I feel that just having it to look at as I drive by or stop along a road somewhere to enjoy is a gift.
I sometimes park my car and walk along the by-ways that border such properties, camera in hand, always on the lookout for that special something that would be missed if I'd just passed by without a second glance. From such a limited vantage point, I am still able to gaze out upon rolling pastures and deep into dense woods where the leaves split the sunlight into glimmering beams. I can gaze down from a bridge into flowing water or look up at clouds that break up a rich blue sky above a field of golden grasses bending in the breeze, thankful always to those wise landowners who know that, when nature is given full rein, nothing short of the spectacular will do.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Songs of the Past
Every so often in my ramblings, I come upon a place that sings particularly loudly of the past. Along with trying to be more attentive to the details in my surroundings that are overlooked during a cursory glance, I also try to discern what a particular area might have looked like before progress, if you will, forever altered its profile.
It might be something about a stand of trees or the way the land dips before being cut off by a paved road. It is also sometimes simply in how a ray of sunlight is interrupted in a spot where it shouldn't be by something that just doesn't seem to belong there. I've come across certain markings in forgotten places, ancient remnants of other times, other lives. Chunks of granite blocks poking up through grass and weeds or the sad remains of what was once a fence that delineated property boundaries, crumbling now and making its way, molecule by minute molecule, back to the earth from which it came.
I noticed, one day last week, a long row of tall regal old pine trees lining one side of a road in Arundel. As I drove slowly past, I wondered at how that tract of land might have looked a century or more ago before a road even appeared there. Oh, there might have been some sort of trail or way to negotiate the area, as most rural roads were once nothing more than paths before the advent of the automobile or lanes composed of pairs of ruts worn by wagon wheels. As more and more of them were widened, graded and paved, the landscapes abutting them changed forever, leaving us now to wonder at what might have been lost in the process; and it's always a comfort to come across an area that appears to be relatively untouched by human hands or affected in some way by the human touch.
I chatted yesterday with several ladies who live in Springvale, and they shared their memories of living in the area. Dorothea, or Thea, as she is fondly called, who is in her nineties and has spent her entire life in the Oak Street area of Springvale, remembered when "all the streets were dirt roads," and "you could walk along the railroad tracks to get to Deering Pond." Peg and Cora, originally from the town of Alfred, playfully reminisced about Mouse Lane, a narrow road that branches off from the Kennebunk Road and whose name has always amused them. "The Kennebunk Road was dirt," said Peg, and added that Mouse Lane was also just a "small and curvy dirt road." Peg also reminisced about the many wildflowers that, as a young girl, she saw growing there. Cora said that Lady Slippers and Lily of the Valley grew everywhere. The ladies collectively spoke of other flowers that grew wild at every turn-Queen Anne's Lace, Oxeye Daisies, Indian Paintbrush, and wild strawberries. "Wild strawberries grew everywhere," Peg said. Thea also shared her memory of a time when elm trees were familiar sights along the streets of Sanford and Springvale. "You should have seen them on Oak Street," she said. "Their tops met over the road."
Cora lamented the disrespect for natural beauty that she sees everywhere in the form of litter and trash. "I don't know why people do that," she said. "It's awful. Empty cans and cups are just thrown on the ground. They just don't care." Thea added that she admires the efforts of local conservationists to preserve the wild places in Sanford and Springvale for future generations to enjoy; and Peg wistfully mentioned how her parents had taken steps to formally preserve some of their land, but that subsequent owners had removed the protections that they had put into place.
Talking with seniors gives us a rare glimpse into the past, when life was slower and, they all agreed, less complicated. Through their eyes, we can travel back in time and imagine what the busy streets we now take for granted looked like as dirt roads, how trees, fields and wildflowers dominated the landscape, and what it was like to travel everywhere on foot or in a horse-drawn wagon.
The ladies all agreed that nature was much more visible back then and played a much greater role in their everyday lives. I truly enjoyed my trip down Memory Lane with them, from Thea recalling how farmers built walls from the rocks they coaxed from the soil as they cleared the land, many of which are still there today, to Cora fondly remembering the garden her family grew that helped put food on the table during lean times. As the conversation was winding down, Peg thought a moment and, with the characteristic twinkle in her eyes, spoke of spending a lot of time outside as a child. "We were always outside doing something," she said, then added with a chuckle,"and sometimes, believe it or not, even getting into some sort of mischief!"
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
It might be something about a stand of trees or the way the land dips before being cut off by a paved road. It is also sometimes simply in how a ray of sunlight is interrupted in a spot where it shouldn't be by something that just doesn't seem to belong there. I've come across certain markings in forgotten places, ancient remnants of other times, other lives. Chunks of granite blocks poking up through grass and weeds or the sad remains of what was once a fence that delineated property boundaries, crumbling now and making its way, molecule by minute molecule, back to the earth from which it came.
I noticed, one day last week, a long row of tall regal old pine trees lining one side of a road in Arundel. As I drove slowly past, I wondered at how that tract of land might have looked a century or more ago before a road even appeared there. Oh, there might have been some sort of trail or way to negotiate the area, as most rural roads were once nothing more than paths before the advent of the automobile or lanes composed of pairs of ruts worn by wagon wheels. As more and more of them were widened, graded and paved, the landscapes abutting them changed forever, leaving us now to wonder at what might have been lost in the process; and it's always a comfort to come across an area that appears to be relatively untouched by human hands or affected in some way by the human touch.
I chatted yesterday with several ladies who live in Springvale, and they shared their memories of living in the area. Dorothea, or Thea, as she is fondly called, who is in her nineties and has spent her entire life in the Oak Street area of Springvale, remembered when "all the streets were dirt roads," and "you could walk along the railroad tracks to get to Deering Pond." Peg and Cora, originally from the town of Alfred, playfully reminisced about Mouse Lane, a narrow road that branches off from the Kennebunk Road and whose name has always amused them. "The Kennebunk Road was dirt," said Peg, and added that Mouse Lane was also just a "small and curvy dirt road." Peg also reminisced about the many wildflowers that, as a young girl, she saw growing there. Cora said that Lady Slippers and Lily of the Valley grew everywhere. The ladies collectively spoke of other flowers that grew wild at every turn-Queen Anne's Lace, Oxeye Daisies, Indian Paintbrush, and wild strawberries. "Wild strawberries grew everywhere," Peg said. Thea also shared her memory of a time when elm trees were familiar sights along the streets of Sanford and Springvale. "You should have seen them on Oak Street," she said. "Their tops met over the road."
Cora lamented the disrespect for natural beauty that she sees everywhere in the form of litter and trash. "I don't know why people do that," she said. "It's awful. Empty cans and cups are just thrown on the ground. They just don't care." Thea added that she admires the efforts of local conservationists to preserve the wild places in Sanford and Springvale for future generations to enjoy; and Peg wistfully mentioned how her parents had taken steps to formally preserve some of their land, but that subsequent owners had removed the protections that they had put into place.
Talking with seniors gives us a rare glimpse into the past, when life was slower and, they all agreed, less complicated. Through their eyes, we can travel back in time and imagine what the busy streets we now take for granted looked like as dirt roads, how trees, fields and wildflowers dominated the landscape, and what it was like to travel everywhere on foot or in a horse-drawn wagon.
The ladies all agreed that nature was much more visible back then and played a much greater role in their everyday lives. I truly enjoyed my trip down Memory Lane with them, from Thea recalling how farmers built walls from the rocks they coaxed from the soil as they cleared the land, many of which are still there today, to Cora fondly remembering the garden her family grew that helped put food on the table during lean times. As the conversation was winding down, Peg thought a moment and, with the characteristic twinkle in her eyes, spoke of spending a lot of time outside as a child. "We were always outside doing something," she said, then added with a chuckle,"and sometimes, believe it or not, even getting into some sort of mischief!"
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
The Nature of the Sea
The cure for anything is salt water - sweat, tears, or the sea. ~Isak Dinesen
No catalog of nature's wonders would be complete without mention of that element that covers roughly 71 per cent of the earth's surface-the ocean. According to the National Oceanic and Atmosphetic Administration (NOAA), that percentage contains 97 per cent of the planet's entire water supply and is home to nearly half of all the species of living things on earth. And like all of earth's other wonders, it doesn't come to us. We go to it to enjoy what is has to offer from the recreational to the aesthetic, from the adventurous to the poetic.
It's been my own observation that the sea, like all else in nature, is never static. It is always moving, changing, altering itself as it shapes, not only the shoreline's characteristics but all that exists along its ever-shifting boundaries. Years of its washing over rocks wears them gradually away, resculpts them, alters their hues and their textures much as rainfall erodes hillsides and imbues them with new complexions as time goes by. Nature, the great reconstructive surgeon, is ever at work reshaping the marine landscape so that it, like so much else around us, never looks the same two days in a row. Blink, and what you just saw you will never see again. Such is the great mass of moving water that lures us to it for reasons as varied as we are.
While the wooded places display their energy more subtly and in much slower fashion, the sea exhibits hers openly and unabashedly. Calm one day, in an uproar the next, it defies our hold over it and never fails to remind us of its power and ability to reduce our lives to debris in a very short time. As yet another aspect of nature's insistent presence among us, we have no choice but to stand in awe of it, respect its awesome power, and allow it full access into areas where it has proven fruitless to try to stop it.
On a smaller scale, the sea provides us with so much pleasure. From wading in its frigid waters to scavenging for the myriad forms of life which it deposits along the shoreline, it never disappoints. For what bored child cannot have his or her focus shifted and held by simply walking along the sand gathering stones, bits of wood or glass polished smooth by the sea's movement or wading in tidal pools in search of those small creatures who scuttle under rocks at our approach?
We flock to the shore to relax and are drawn to its majesty during storms. We gaze out at the full moon's reflection across the rippling waves and marvel at the feats of surfers who enter into a particularly intimate dance with them. We take boats out and cast fishing lines into the depths, and we here along the Maine coast think of the sea as a natural part of our lives. For those of us who live in some degree of proximity to it, it has always been there and will always be there. Its tides will continue to answer to the moon's pull, and its waves will still form to an intensity dictated by wind and weather.
Many years ago, I went with my family often to Fortunes Rocks, and it is still my favorite spot in York County along the Atlantic coastline. Facing the open ocean, the bracing cold waters are still my favorite way to cool off, and I try to get down there as often as I can. Back then, I'd always wander off to my favorite perch on the rock outcropping that juts out into the tide. I'd get out there as far as I could go and sit for hours, or at least until my father would start shouting and waving to me to return before the tide came back in and made that impossible. There was nothing about the experience that I didn't love...the smell of the seaweed baking in the sun, the water lapping at the lowest rocks, and the seagulls bobbing on the waves in the distance. And of course, the walk to and from the outcropping was always a joy as well, the air crisp and clean and invigorating even on the hottest days, for only during the rarest heat waves is true relief not to be found close to the water on that beach.
The sea is where it all began, and I like to think that all else around us, wood, field and flower, are extensions of its magnanimity. Of course, that's just me waxing sentimental again about the big wondrous world around us that we simply call nature. That tree across the street really is a part of the process, for at some point this summer, moisture will exit its leaves into the atmosphere and fall as rain on the land where it will drain into a river and eventually make its way to the sea in one great cycle that never ceases to amaze.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
No catalog of nature's wonders would be complete without mention of that element that covers roughly 71 per cent of the earth's surface-the ocean. According to the National Oceanic and Atmosphetic Administration (NOAA), that percentage contains 97 per cent of the planet's entire water supply and is home to nearly half of all the species of living things on earth. And like all of earth's other wonders, it doesn't come to us. We go to it to enjoy what is has to offer from the recreational to the aesthetic, from the adventurous to the poetic.
It's been my own observation that the sea, like all else in nature, is never static. It is always moving, changing, altering itself as it shapes, not only the shoreline's characteristics but all that exists along its ever-shifting boundaries. Years of its washing over rocks wears them gradually away, resculpts them, alters their hues and their textures much as rainfall erodes hillsides and imbues them with new complexions as time goes by. Nature, the great reconstructive surgeon, is ever at work reshaping the marine landscape so that it, like so much else around us, never looks the same two days in a row. Blink, and what you just saw you will never see again. Such is the great mass of moving water that lures us to it for reasons as varied as we are.
While the wooded places display their energy more subtly and in much slower fashion, the sea exhibits hers openly and unabashedly. Calm one day, in an uproar the next, it defies our hold over it and never fails to remind us of its power and ability to reduce our lives to debris in a very short time. As yet another aspect of nature's insistent presence among us, we have no choice but to stand in awe of it, respect its awesome power, and allow it full access into areas where it has proven fruitless to try to stop it.
On a smaller scale, the sea provides us with so much pleasure. From wading in its frigid waters to scavenging for the myriad forms of life which it deposits along the shoreline, it never disappoints. For what bored child cannot have his or her focus shifted and held by simply walking along the sand gathering stones, bits of wood or glass polished smooth by the sea's movement or wading in tidal pools in search of those small creatures who scuttle under rocks at our approach?
We flock to the shore to relax and are drawn to its majesty during storms. We gaze out at the full moon's reflection across the rippling waves and marvel at the feats of surfers who enter into a particularly intimate dance with them. We take boats out and cast fishing lines into the depths, and we here along the Maine coast think of the sea as a natural part of our lives. For those of us who live in some degree of proximity to it, it has always been there and will always be there. Its tides will continue to answer to the moon's pull, and its waves will still form to an intensity dictated by wind and weather.
Many years ago, I went with my family often to Fortunes Rocks, and it is still my favorite spot in York County along the Atlantic coastline. Facing the open ocean, the bracing cold waters are still my favorite way to cool off, and I try to get down there as often as I can. Back then, I'd always wander off to my favorite perch on the rock outcropping that juts out into the tide. I'd get out there as far as I could go and sit for hours, or at least until my father would start shouting and waving to me to return before the tide came back in and made that impossible. There was nothing about the experience that I didn't love...the smell of the seaweed baking in the sun, the water lapping at the lowest rocks, and the seagulls bobbing on the waves in the distance. And of course, the walk to and from the outcropping was always a joy as well, the air crisp and clean and invigorating even on the hottest days, for only during the rarest heat waves is true relief not to be found close to the water on that beach.
The sea is where it all began, and I like to think that all else around us, wood, field and flower, are extensions of its magnanimity. Of course, that's just me waxing sentimental again about the big wondrous world around us that we simply call nature. That tree across the street really is a part of the process, for at some point this summer, moisture will exit its leaves into the atmosphere and fall as rain on the land where it will drain into a river and eventually make its way to the sea in one great cycle that never ceases to amaze.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Inexorable
This is as good a time as any to reflect on the things I've seen, heard and felt here these last few months. I feel that the accumulation of impressions garnered here in these woods has a perpetually calming effect, as though each layer of wondrousness superimposes itself over all the others that came before it, but not completely obliterating them. It's as if some days I could pick them up and riffle them to create a moving picture of all that I've experienced here and to which I hope to continue to add as another year unfolds before me.
I looked up from my book just in time the other day around noon to see a fox climbing up the small rise above the front yard. It seemed undecided, turning this way and that, its gleaming burnt orange fur refracting the midday sunlight. Moving to the window for a closer look, I saw the cause of its dilemma. One of my cats, Emmett, was sitting about 20 feet away, observing the fox, but not appearing to be too concerned. I wondered what each creature was feeling at that moment. Were they checking each other out, and in the process trying to decide if either posed a danger to the other? Once I appeared on the porch, Emmett came up to meet me and the fox ran off into the trees. Was he being cautious or did he simply think I had a treat waiting for him inside? I'll never know, of course, because neither cats or foxes communicate such things to humans.
The red fox, native to North America, is the species most of us are familiar with. It's a beautiful animal with reddish orange fur along its torso and face, creamy white belly and tail-tip and black feet. It has long pointed ears and a pointed snout, and it mates and breeds in the fall and early winter in this part of the country. This accounts for the barking I sometimes hear at night in late summer. It's a fox announcing its presence and warning other predators away from its den and is often quite close by, as that is also the time when foxes hunt for food. The red fox doesn't normally tangle with domesticated pets, particular if they are, like dogs, loud, or are equipped, like cats, with several defenses. Omnivores, foxes will eat whatever is easiest and puts up the least resistance to get at, be it animal or vegetable.
This is also the time of year when the deer population is once again on the move. Foraging provides decent yields as seeds, nuts, and vegetation are still abundant, so they move around a lot among all the choices available to them. Just last week, I saw a doe and a large fawn that had lost its spots cross the middle of my sloped driveway and disappear into the woods across the road. The fawn was half its mother's size, but it was still staying quite close to her, and I wondered if it was the tiny one that had paid a visit to my back porch just a few months ago.
As I look around me now, it's apparent how all the growing things continue to encroach upon this humble dwelling. On the north side, tree branches hang low over the roof, and I will need to trim them before the first snowfall weighs them down even more. On the south side, the space that once opened up just across the driveway is now full and lush, and a canopy hangs over the the other end that slopes down to the dirt road.
It happens in the merest of time lapses, nature's inexorable push toward reclaiming what has always been hers to begin with. We may make use of it for awhile, and even make the mistake of calling it ours. But she knows better and waits, always ready to slip in again when we're not looking.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
I looked up from my book just in time the other day around noon to see a fox climbing up the small rise above the front yard. It seemed undecided, turning this way and that, its gleaming burnt orange fur refracting the midday sunlight. Moving to the window for a closer look, I saw the cause of its dilemma. One of my cats, Emmett, was sitting about 20 feet away, observing the fox, but not appearing to be too concerned. I wondered what each creature was feeling at that moment. Were they checking each other out, and in the process trying to decide if either posed a danger to the other? Once I appeared on the porch, Emmett came up to meet me and the fox ran off into the trees. Was he being cautious or did he simply think I had a treat waiting for him inside? I'll never know, of course, because neither cats or foxes communicate such things to humans.
The red fox, native to North America, is the species most of us are familiar with. It's a beautiful animal with reddish orange fur along its torso and face, creamy white belly and tail-tip and black feet. It has long pointed ears and a pointed snout, and it mates and breeds in the fall and early winter in this part of the country. This accounts for the barking I sometimes hear at night in late summer. It's a fox announcing its presence and warning other predators away from its den and is often quite close by, as that is also the time when foxes hunt for food. The red fox doesn't normally tangle with domesticated pets, particular if they are, like dogs, loud, or are equipped, like cats, with several defenses. Omnivores, foxes will eat whatever is easiest and puts up the least resistance to get at, be it animal or vegetable.
This is also the time of year when the deer population is once again on the move. Foraging provides decent yields as seeds, nuts, and vegetation are still abundant, so they move around a lot among all the choices available to them. Just last week, I saw a doe and a large fawn that had lost its spots cross the middle of my sloped driveway and disappear into the woods across the road. The fawn was half its mother's size, but it was still staying quite close to her, and I wondered if it was the tiny one that had paid a visit to my back porch just a few months ago.
As I look around me now, it's apparent how all the growing things continue to encroach upon this humble dwelling. On the north side, tree branches hang low over the roof, and I will need to trim them before the first snowfall weighs them down even more. On the south side, the space that once opened up just across the driveway is now full and lush, and a canopy hangs over the the other end that slopes down to the dirt road.
It happens in the merest of time lapses, nature's inexorable push toward reclaiming what has always been hers to begin with. We may make use of it for awhile, and even make the mistake of calling it ours. But she knows better and waits, always ready to slip in again when we're not looking.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Interlude
Those who dwell among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life. ~Rachel Carson
I took a walk in the woods yesterday along the path I blazed last fall only to find it strewn with the debris of the most recent storm. So I picked fallen branches up as I went along and lay them to one side where they will soon be buried by falling leaves. Ferns have taken over once again in a spongy area just above where the natural spring exits the hill, and I was thankful I'd blazed a few trees to mark the way.
When I reached the main path, I turned left and headed up the steep slope that is now mercifully open only to those on foot. Several summers ago, I had a problem with someone tearing up and down it on a very loud all-terrain vehicle, and finally asked a neighbor to block its lower end with some huge boulders. It's off-limits now to all but those who walk these woods, and that is as it should be. The path slopes steeply down toward the dirt road and, as such, provides a natural egress for heavy rains and melting snows. The recent heavy rains have worn a deep rivulet in one side of it, so it's hard going up there, but I wasn't to be deterred. Two of my three cats weren't far behind, and we made our way slowly but surely toward the ridge where the land levels off.
As I neared the area, I discovered an enormous maple tree that had fallen and completely blocked the path with its thick branches and dense foliage. All I could see were the silvery backs of leaves against a deeper green background, color values not normally seen from this angle, an anomaly in this place of uprightness and tenacity. A bit of scouting revealed that it will be possible to regain the path by passing under the maple at its root end, but I will attempt this earlier in the day and will bring loppers with me to clean the area out a bit.
It occurred to me then that, had I not had my neighbor block the path with boulders, nature would eventually have resolved the problem herself, as was evidenced by this tree. While trespassers have, in the past, taken it upon themselves to cut and move branches out of their way, they could never have budged this great tree. There it will remain until someone decides to take a chainsaw to it. Its leaves will turn brown and fall off, and for awhile, it won't be an attractive part of the landscape. But time will solve that as well, and at some point, it will look like it's been there for years.
As I headed for home, I looked up at the treetops tinged with the setting sun's light, and blue jays flew over crying out to each other as they went. A squirrel scolded my cats as they passed through what must have been its territory, and it sat in that tree for quite some time chattering away and venting its irritation at them. They seemed not to notice as they made their way through the weeds and grasses, tall now as summer nears its end. My garden, too, has that wild tumbled eclectic look that I love, with black-eyed susans smiling above long stalks of mint bearing their spent blossoms.
It's no longer summer but neither is it fall quite yet, and one of my favorite times of year. I like to think of it as an interlude as nature readies herself for the spectacular display of color that's just around the corner.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
I took a walk in the woods yesterday along the path I blazed last fall only to find it strewn with the debris of the most recent storm. So I picked fallen branches up as I went along and lay them to one side where they will soon be buried by falling leaves. Ferns have taken over once again in a spongy area just above where the natural spring exits the hill, and I was thankful I'd blazed a few trees to mark the way.
When I reached the main path, I turned left and headed up the steep slope that is now mercifully open only to those on foot. Several summers ago, I had a problem with someone tearing up and down it on a very loud all-terrain vehicle, and finally asked a neighbor to block its lower end with some huge boulders. It's off-limits now to all but those who walk these woods, and that is as it should be. The path slopes steeply down toward the dirt road and, as such, provides a natural egress for heavy rains and melting snows. The recent heavy rains have worn a deep rivulet in one side of it, so it's hard going up there, but I wasn't to be deterred. Two of my three cats weren't far behind, and we made our way slowly but surely toward the ridge where the land levels off.
As I neared the area, I discovered an enormous maple tree that had fallen and completely blocked the path with its thick branches and dense foliage. All I could see were the silvery backs of leaves against a deeper green background, color values not normally seen from this angle, an anomaly in this place of uprightness and tenacity. A bit of scouting revealed that it will be possible to regain the path by passing under the maple at its root end, but I will attempt this earlier in the day and will bring loppers with me to clean the area out a bit.
It occurred to me then that, had I not had my neighbor block the path with boulders, nature would eventually have resolved the problem herself, as was evidenced by this tree. While trespassers have, in the past, taken it upon themselves to cut and move branches out of their way, they could never have budged this great tree. There it will remain until someone decides to take a chainsaw to it. Its leaves will turn brown and fall off, and for awhile, it won't be an attractive part of the landscape. But time will solve that as well, and at some point, it will look like it's been there for years.
As I headed for home, I looked up at the treetops tinged with the setting sun's light, and blue jays flew over crying out to each other as they went. A squirrel scolded my cats as they passed through what must have been its territory, and it sat in that tree for quite some time chattering away and venting its irritation at them. They seemed not to notice as they made their way through the weeds and grasses, tall now as summer nears its end. My garden, too, has that wild tumbled eclectic look that I love, with black-eyed susans smiling above long stalks of mint bearing their spent blossoms.
It's no longer summer but neither is it fall quite yet, and one of my favorite times of year. I like to think of it as an interlude as nature readies herself for the spectacular display of color that's just around the corner.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Childhood Wonder
We all have our share of worry and care, but nature is there to console us. From a fluttering wing to the greening of spring, she never neglects to restore us. ~Anonymous
It's just after 10 a.m., and the sun in its altering path is, at the moment, flooding the trees across the dirt road with light that glints upon each leaf. Through them the dark trunks rise and stretch their many arms, providing a sort of basting that binds this whole incredible tapestry of vegetation. Layer upon layer of rich color move the eye away from the most prominent surfaces toward infinity, that place deep in the woods where sunlight is a rare visitor and the wind has little effect.
I am reminded of the hemlock grove not far from here that I discovered one day on a walk when I noticed that the path to my neighbor's pond veered off into a much shadier area. Not being sure at the time of just what land belonged to which neighbor, I passed it by at first. Then one day, I veered off my usual course and suddenly found myself in a deep dark wood that allowed precious little sunlight in, and that only in the sparest beams that managed to force their way through tiny breaks in the canopy. It was so quiet in there, for not only are trees useful as windbreaks and air purifiers, but they muffle sound as well. It was like stepping briefly into another world, into a dark tranquil place where even my footsteps were muffled by the thick carpet composed of many years-worth of fallen hemlock needles. Despite the fact that others have surely been there, I still insist on thinking that it's my discovery and that no one knows about it, or at least no one looks upon it in quite the same way that I do.
It is such a short leap in this busy world from the wonders of childhood to the sensory wasteland that is often the adult experience, from feeling a genuinely innocent awe at a new-found flower to not even knowing or caring that it's there. What happens to dull this wondrous ability, or is it just that it seems silly when an adult feels that ancient thrill at coming upon something new and beautiful? It's hard not to when you live surrounded by trees and when the day's first sign of life isn't generated by another human but by a bird at the feeder or a chipmunk scurrying into its den. It's refreshing to see that wild energy devoted entirely to mindful pursuits and to the very task of living. Nothing in nature is wasted, for every move each animal makes is geared toward its survival, just as is every process going on unseen in those trees across the way. They're all still green for now, with just an odd reddish or prematurely yellowed leaf poking through here, the first to succumb to the shortening days and lessening light.
Early each day around 6 a.m., as sounds of traffic begin to reach me from the distant main road, a new sound greets me, that of a rooster crowing somewhere. And if I close my eyes, it's the 1950's again, and I am back on my grandfather's small farm watching my mother pull eggs out from under the brooding hens. Certain sounds have the ability to do that, to take you back to another time that awakens, if only briefly, old sensations that prove that you are not so different after all from the child you once were.
I don't venture out often enough, but I will as autumn moves in to cool and dry the air and discourage the insects that rule this place in summer. Everything is reaching its peak, from the tall tomato plants sporting their reddening orbs to the phlox that wave in the breeze. The hydrangea blossoms have greened, and the wild grape vine beyond the back slope has reached the road. It rarely bears fruit now, as it hasn't been pruned in ages, and its runners now cover the low vegetation below the sumac. I will also check on the witch hazel, as this may be its flowering and fruiting year, and I am always fascinated by its unusual blossoms that are not unlike tiny sunbursts.
Is it possible that, as we age, the things that once provided us with such a thrill evolve into things that bring us comfort? I know I find tremendous solace in these woods at all times of year, from winter's deep silence to summer's sunrises and autumn's riot of color. Maybe nature knows this and continues to inspire the more artistic among us to paint, dance or sing of those things that, as children, we considered treasures.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
It's just after 10 a.m., and the sun in its altering path is, at the moment, flooding the trees across the dirt road with light that glints upon each leaf. Through them the dark trunks rise and stretch their many arms, providing a sort of basting that binds this whole incredible tapestry of vegetation. Layer upon layer of rich color move the eye away from the most prominent surfaces toward infinity, that place deep in the woods where sunlight is a rare visitor and the wind has little effect.
I am reminded of the hemlock grove not far from here that I discovered one day on a walk when I noticed that the path to my neighbor's pond veered off into a much shadier area. Not being sure at the time of just what land belonged to which neighbor, I passed it by at first. Then one day, I veered off my usual course and suddenly found myself in a deep dark wood that allowed precious little sunlight in, and that only in the sparest beams that managed to force their way through tiny breaks in the canopy. It was so quiet in there, for not only are trees useful as windbreaks and air purifiers, but they muffle sound as well. It was like stepping briefly into another world, into a dark tranquil place where even my footsteps were muffled by the thick carpet composed of many years-worth of fallen hemlock needles. Despite the fact that others have surely been there, I still insist on thinking that it's my discovery and that no one knows about it, or at least no one looks upon it in quite the same way that I do.
It is such a short leap in this busy world from the wonders of childhood to the sensory wasteland that is often the adult experience, from feeling a genuinely innocent awe at a new-found flower to not even knowing or caring that it's there. What happens to dull this wondrous ability, or is it just that it seems silly when an adult feels that ancient thrill at coming upon something new and beautiful? It's hard not to when you live surrounded by trees and when the day's first sign of life isn't generated by another human but by a bird at the feeder or a chipmunk scurrying into its den. It's refreshing to see that wild energy devoted entirely to mindful pursuits and to the very task of living. Nothing in nature is wasted, for every move each animal makes is geared toward its survival, just as is every process going on unseen in those trees across the way. They're all still green for now, with just an odd reddish or prematurely yellowed leaf poking through here, the first to succumb to the shortening days and lessening light.
Early each day around 6 a.m., as sounds of traffic begin to reach me from the distant main road, a new sound greets me, that of a rooster crowing somewhere. And if I close my eyes, it's the 1950's again, and I am back on my grandfather's small farm watching my mother pull eggs out from under the brooding hens. Certain sounds have the ability to do that, to take you back to another time that awakens, if only briefly, old sensations that prove that you are not so different after all from the child you once were.
I don't venture out often enough, but I will as autumn moves in to cool and dry the air and discourage the insects that rule this place in summer. Everything is reaching its peak, from the tall tomato plants sporting their reddening orbs to the phlox that wave in the breeze. The hydrangea blossoms have greened, and the wild grape vine beyond the back slope has reached the road. It rarely bears fruit now, as it hasn't been pruned in ages, and its runners now cover the low vegetation below the sumac. I will also check on the witch hazel, as this may be its flowering and fruiting year, and I am always fascinated by its unusual blossoms that are not unlike tiny sunbursts.
Is it possible that, as we age, the things that once provided us with such a thrill evolve into things that bring us comfort? I know I find tremendous solace in these woods at all times of year, from winter's deep silence to summer's sunrises and autumn's riot of color. Maybe nature knows this and continues to inspire the more artistic among us to paint, dance or sing of those things that, as children, we considered treasures.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Stormy Weather
As I write, nature is unleashing her power with rare ferocity as my neck of the woods experiences the latest phase of the storm called Irene. Appearing to be tracking northwest and toward upstate Vermont and the Adirondacks of New York, the storm is still wide enough to be expressing itself here in southwestern Maine via tossing trees and roaring wind. While I hope she remembers to practice wind economy, I am aware of what could happen were nature to vent her full fury upon this wooded place, a fact of which she is reminding me over and over again at the moment...
Such was my journal entry for Sunday, August 28, 2011. Craving a change of scenery and relief from the stale close indoor air, I went out to the potting shed at one point during the afternoon with my book and journal and sat awhile observing the storm from another angle. I realized quickly that this provided me with too alarming a production, and after seeing the trees dip down to the roof more times than I'd expected to, I went back inside and contented myself with a more narrowly framed view through a window. Once darkness settled, there wasn't much left to do without electricity but to light a few candles and, well, listen to the wind.
Earlier, around 10 a.m., I took a walk up and down the road and out through the woods to my neighbor's small pond. On the way back, I looked up and realized how close the trees hold me to them, evidenced by the branches that seem to hold my humble dwelling in a sort of embrace. A neighbor who occasionally flies over in his plane told me recently that he can no longer see the roof as it's now completely obliterated by the trees. While that did present me with a cause to fear during yesterday's storm, it seems that they did, after all, protect me. Most of the wind activity occurred in the outermost smaller trees, while the old nearby faithful oaks, pines and maples stood their ground, creating a barricade of sorts between the tempest and me. As low as a couple of them dipped at times, I just knew they would persevere.
What a welcome sight was the sunlight this morning after a long dark and uncertain night, as was feeling a wind that is now more friend again than foe. In my journal today, I will mention the sweet scent of the air at the height of the storm as the trees, their bark taxed to the extreme, exuded their fragrant sap at every turn. I'll devote a few lines to the sound of chainsaws in the distance as residents clean up and, in the process, benefit from debris left in the storm's wake that will warm both hearts and hearths in the cold months to come. And I will touch upon the frenzied dance the treetops did as they gave themselves totally over to the wind's lead. I notice quite a few leaves today dangling precariously from their stems, their bonds already weakened long before the trees are due to discard them. I wonder if this will hasten their fall and if I will see them turn crimson, orange and yellow sooner this year than they normally would. When I looked up into the maples in the back yard early this morning, it appeared that their topmost leaves have already started to wither and dry. Not surprising, considering what they endured yesterday.
There is laundry to hang out and plenty of kindling on the back porch to sweep into a pile. Here in the woods, one must wait till dawn to see the effects of a late night storm, and daylight now reveals the causes of some of the loud thumps I heard when there was no light to shed on them, larger branches that came to rest in odd positions against the porch railing, others piercing the earth where they fell. I look at them this morning and think of how much worse it could have been.
I will indulge today, too, in whimsical thinking, of how, because I insist on giving nature her due and never question her strength, she spares me time and time again. I will ponder, too, whether these trees and I have some sort of unspoken agreement whereby I afford them a slight edge by never tempting them to prove their might by falling on me. It's a delicate balance, this compromise between animal and plant, one of which I am reminded anew as the storm clouds part and the sun reappears.
Mere hours ago, this place was a dark maelstrom, and now, the sun-washed leaves float on the gentle air as though nothing had ever been amiss. Peace has returned once again to this green world, and though slightly altered for the experience, is yet still comfortingly familiar.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Such was my journal entry for Sunday, August 28, 2011. Craving a change of scenery and relief from the stale close indoor air, I went out to the potting shed at one point during the afternoon with my book and journal and sat awhile observing the storm from another angle. I realized quickly that this provided me with too alarming a production, and after seeing the trees dip down to the roof more times than I'd expected to, I went back inside and contented myself with a more narrowly framed view through a window. Once darkness settled, there wasn't much left to do without electricity but to light a few candles and, well, listen to the wind.
Earlier, around 10 a.m., I took a walk up and down the road and out through the woods to my neighbor's small pond. On the way back, I looked up and realized how close the trees hold me to them, evidenced by the branches that seem to hold my humble dwelling in a sort of embrace. A neighbor who occasionally flies over in his plane told me recently that he can no longer see the roof as it's now completely obliterated by the trees. While that did present me with a cause to fear during yesterday's storm, it seems that they did, after all, protect me. Most of the wind activity occurred in the outermost smaller trees, while the old nearby faithful oaks, pines and maples stood their ground, creating a barricade of sorts between the tempest and me. As low as a couple of them dipped at times, I just knew they would persevere.
What a welcome sight was the sunlight this morning after a long dark and uncertain night, as was feeling a wind that is now more friend again than foe. In my journal today, I will mention the sweet scent of the air at the height of the storm as the trees, their bark taxed to the extreme, exuded their fragrant sap at every turn. I'll devote a few lines to the sound of chainsaws in the distance as residents clean up and, in the process, benefit from debris left in the storm's wake that will warm both hearts and hearths in the cold months to come. And I will touch upon the frenzied dance the treetops did as they gave themselves totally over to the wind's lead. I notice quite a few leaves today dangling precariously from their stems, their bonds already weakened long before the trees are due to discard them. I wonder if this will hasten their fall and if I will see them turn crimson, orange and yellow sooner this year than they normally would. When I looked up into the maples in the back yard early this morning, it appeared that their topmost leaves have already started to wither and dry. Not surprising, considering what they endured yesterday.
There is laundry to hang out and plenty of kindling on the back porch to sweep into a pile. Here in the woods, one must wait till dawn to see the effects of a late night storm, and daylight now reveals the causes of some of the loud thumps I heard when there was no light to shed on them, larger branches that came to rest in odd positions against the porch railing, others piercing the earth where they fell. I look at them this morning and think of how much worse it could have been.
I will indulge today, too, in whimsical thinking, of how, because I insist on giving nature her due and never question her strength, she spares me time and time again. I will ponder, too, whether these trees and I have some sort of unspoken agreement whereby I afford them a slight edge by never tempting them to prove their might by falling on me. It's a delicate balance, this compromise between animal and plant, one of which I am reminded anew as the storm clouds part and the sun reappears.
Mere hours ago, this place was a dark maelstrom, and now, the sun-washed leaves float on the gentle air as though nothing had ever been amiss. Peace has returned once again to this green world, and though slightly altered for the experience, is yet still comfortingly familiar.
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Night Sounds
Some nights I have trouble falling asleep, and it has nothing to do with not being tired enough or having too much on my mind. I can't sleep because I don't want to miss a single thing that is going on out there in the dark woods just beyond my bedroom window. It's particularly bad on warm nights when the window is wide open and my face is just inches from it. While it's too dark to see anything, there is plenty to hear especially now as summer is winding down and many woodland creatures are putting on their best performances of the year.
If the woods belong to the woodpeckers, crows and hawks during the day, then the night definitely belongs to the owls. As early as 9 p.m., I hear them sometimes far, other times near, but never to be mistaken for anything but the mysteriously magnificent creatures they are. While I've never seen one in all the time I've lived here, I've certainly heard them plying the night air with this distinctive calls. If my research serves me right, I'm hearing the barred owl a lot these nights, as well as the great horned and the long-eared owl. And not to be outdone are the loons, whose calls exhibit a new sense of urgency as though they are giving it all they've got before it's time to leave for another year. It always begins with their first haunting notes, then builds to their more insistent tremulous calls as they move from place to place.
This is also the season of the cricket and other insects that fill these woods with sounds both high-pitched and insistent. I hear the coyotes barking and yipping from deep in the woods and a nearby dog barking its response or its distress. Sometimes I hear something come crashing down among the trees, as I did one night not long ago when something screamed before the crash came. I suspect that one of my cats had approached a raccoon and it scrambled up a tree only to find a branch that wasn't strong enough to hold it. I went out the next day to inspect, but with so much dead growth interwoven along the forest floor, it's always hard to tell if anything new's been added to the pattern.
Last night, the rain came down steadily and heavily for several hours, and this morning, the residual raindrops sparkled in the sunlight as they slipped from the leaves. I lay awake a long while listening to it and feeling the spray coming in through the open window, of hearing the rain bearing down on the roof. At one point, it was hitting the ground so hard that my room was bathed in the rich earthy smell of the soil as its particles were being displaced by the insistent raindrops. It occurred to me then that, along with all the others wonders that nature keeps presenting to me, it now seems that she also has the capacity to turn and aerate the earth simply by raining down upon it. It's a scent that I always eagerly await in the spring and that touched a somewhat bittersweet note in me at this point in the year.
Which brings me to this, the fact that I have now been sharing my thoughts and observations here for nearly a year as the seasons once again come full circle. I began last year around this time to put down what I see and feel here, what I've learned and what realizations I've arrived at simply by looking at things such as leaves and by listening to what the wild creatures have to say. As I end this today, a crow is cawing from a nearby tree, announcing its presence in this rain-washed sunkissed place I call home, where I hope to continue, at least for a little while longer, to find new things to write about. Somehow, I don't think that will ever be a problem.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
If the woods belong to the woodpeckers, crows and hawks during the day, then the night definitely belongs to the owls. As early as 9 p.m., I hear them sometimes far, other times near, but never to be mistaken for anything but the mysteriously magnificent creatures they are. While I've never seen one in all the time I've lived here, I've certainly heard them plying the night air with this distinctive calls. If my research serves me right, I'm hearing the barred owl a lot these nights, as well as the great horned and the long-eared owl. And not to be outdone are the loons, whose calls exhibit a new sense of urgency as though they are giving it all they've got before it's time to leave for another year. It always begins with their first haunting notes, then builds to their more insistent tremulous calls as they move from place to place.
This is also the season of the cricket and other insects that fill these woods with sounds both high-pitched and insistent. I hear the coyotes barking and yipping from deep in the woods and a nearby dog barking its response or its distress. Sometimes I hear something come crashing down among the trees, as I did one night not long ago when something screamed before the crash came. I suspect that one of my cats had approached a raccoon and it scrambled up a tree only to find a branch that wasn't strong enough to hold it. I went out the next day to inspect, but with so much dead growth interwoven along the forest floor, it's always hard to tell if anything new's been added to the pattern.
Last night, the rain came down steadily and heavily for several hours, and this morning, the residual raindrops sparkled in the sunlight as they slipped from the leaves. I lay awake a long while listening to it and feeling the spray coming in through the open window, of hearing the rain bearing down on the roof. At one point, it was hitting the ground so hard that my room was bathed in the rich earthy smell of the soil as its particles were being displaced by the insistent raindrops. It occurred to me then that, along with all the others wonders that nature keeps presenting to me, it now seems that she also has the capacity to turn and aerate the earth simply by raining down upon it. It's a scent that I always eagerly await in the spring and that touched a somewhat bittersweet note in me at this point in the year.
Which brings me to this, the fact that I have now been sharing my thoughts and observations here for nearly a year as the seasons once again come full circle. I began last year around this time to put down what I see and feel here, what I've learned and what realizations I've arrived at simply by looking at things such as leaves and by listening to what the wild creatures have to say. As I end this today, a crow is cawing from a nearby tree, announcing its presence in this rain-washed sunkissed place I call home, where I hope to continue, at least for a little while longer, to find new things to write about. Somehow, I don't think that will ever be a problem.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Making Hay
It's been my observation that haying takes place in installments, the first being some time in June followed by another round in late July or early August. The tall grass lies in winnows in the fields, its greenness fading a bit more with each passing day, the air around it redolent with its sweet aroma. The oblong bales are quickly loaded onto the hay wagons pulled slowly along the country roads by the veteran farmers who've been at this for generations. The somewhat recent innovation of wrapping the round bales in white plastic caught me off-guard the first time I saw a field off Route 35 dotted with what appeared to be enormous marshmallows.
Each season brings with it its own rituals that have nothing to do with what appears on the shelves in local department stores. In these parts, talk of county and regional fairs is filtering into some conversations as local growers and their families prepare to display their year's best bounty either in the form of livestock or other fruits of their labors. Cases of canning and jelly jars appear on discount and hardware store shelve, and it won't be long before the 'pick your own apples' signs begin appearing on roadsides and at back road intersections. The sound of chainsaws is becoming more frequent now, as there isn't much summer heat left to coax the dampness from newly cut maples and oaks and to build up the woodpiles that are surely a boon when the cost of other ways to heat a home become prohibitive.
There was a time when I spent such days canning tomatoes and making pickles and other preserves. At no other time does a housewife feel as close and as intimate a kinship to the growing things as when she is putting foods by. Taking what the earth provides and storing it against hunger and need are ancient practices that date back to a time when sustenance involved so much more than a quick trip to the corner store. My own grandchildren look at me in innocent wonder when I tell that just about anything they find in a jar or package at the store can be made at home. The pleasure of slicing cucumbers and watching them turn golden in a sweet brine defies explication, as does hearing the pop of the canning jar lids as they seal themselves while cooling. And there is nothing like the aroma of bubbling fruit destined to turn a lowly cupboard shelf into a cache of preserves that provides the extra satisfaction of knowing you made them yourself.
Another sign of the seasonal times is the sound of acorns leaving the oak trees. As with so much in nature, it's a progression, beginning with just one or two and building to the torrent it will become once the squirrels start knocking them down. Walking across the yard will be like walking on marbles, and if I don't rake them up, many will quickly take hold and establish themselves as seedlings before the first frost. As it stands, I never get them all, and I spend most of the spring and summer pulling up oak seedlings, their large pale green gently lobed leaves obvious interlopers among the blades of grass and lemon balm stalks.
Aside from her occasional bursts of energy in the form of storms or high winds, nature takes her time with just about everything, pacing herself so as not to disturb the gentle rhythms that rule all that lives and grows in her vast domain. In the spring, the peepers start slowly, first one then another until the spring night air is filled with their song. And then, just as methodically, summer's end slips in, and I awaken to the sound of acorns hitting the roof. Not as pleasant a sound, yet a necessary element of the endless cycle of life in these woods.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Each season brings with it its own rituals that have nothing to do with what appears on the shelves in local department stores. In these parts, talk of county and regional fairs is filtering into some conversations as local growers and their families prepare to display their year's best bounty either in the form of livestock or other fruits of their labors. Cases of canning and jelly jars appear on discount and hardware store shelve, and it won't be long before the 'pick your own apples' signs begin appearing on roadsides and at back road intersections. The sound of chainsaws is becoming more frequent now, as there isn't much summer heat left to coax the dampness from newly cut maples and oaks and to build up the woodpiles that are surely a boon when the cost of other ways to heat a home become prohibitive.
There was a time when I spent such days canning tomatoes and making pickles and other preserves. At no other time does a housewife feel as close and as intimate a kinship to the growing things as when she is putting foods by. Taking what the earth provides and storing it against hunger and need are ancient practices that date back to a time when sustenance involved so much more than a quick trip to the corner store. My own grandchildren look at me in innocent wonder when I tell that just about anything they find in a jar or package at the store can be made at home. The pleasure of slicing cucumbers and watching them turn golden in a sweet brine defies explication, as does hearing the pop of the canning jar lids as they seal themselves while cooling. And there is nothing like the aroma of bubbling fruit destined to turn a lowly cupboard shelf into a cache of preserves that provides the extra satisfaction of knowing you made them yourself.
Another sign of the seasonal times is the sound of acorns leaving the oak trees. As with so much in nature, it's a progression, beginning with just one or two and building to the torrent it will become once the squirrels start knocking them down. Walking across the yard will be like walking on marbles, and if I don't rake them up, many will quickly take hold and establish themselves as seedlings before the first frost. As it stands, I never get them all, and I spend most of the spring and summer pulling up oak seedlings, their large pale green gently lobed leaves obvious interlopers among the blades of grass and lemon balm stalks.
Aside from her occasional bursts of energy in the form of storms or high winds, nature takes her time with just about everything, pacing herself so as not to disturb the gentle rhythms that rule all that lives and grows in her vast domain. In the spring, the peepers start slowly, first one then another until the spring night air is filled with their song. And then, just as methodically, summer's end slips in, and I awaken to the sound of acorns hitting the roof. Not as pleasant a sound, yet a necessary element of the endless cycle of life in these woods.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
The Wonder of Plants
Once again, the haze and humidity have cleared, and I am left with a sharper brighter image, as though nature washed her windows clean. Every growing thing is renewed, and the early morning light smiles in bright yellow-green on the leaves of every tree and shrub.
Plants are remarkable things, and I've learned so much about them lately from all the research I've done for various online content articles. Here, in these woods, I'm literally surrounded by more varieties than I can count, and I doubt I'd be able to discover them all, considering how playful nature is in forever introducing new varieties into the landscape. From the tomato plants that I myself so lovingly put into the ground each year to the tallest pine that grows up on the ridge, all share growth characteristics all the while possessing features that are unique to each species.
Plants grow from the roots up, with the first cells originating beneath the soil, and it is almost magical the way they just seem to know to grow downward while the aerial parts of a plant know to grow upward. When a seed germinates, it simultaneously sends out both a fledgling rootlet and a pair of false leaves known as cotyledons. The root orients itself in the soil to seek out as much as moisture and as many nutrients as possible, while above the soil, the cotyledons eventually give way to the true leaves whose job it will be, with the sun's help, to manufacture food that the entire plant will need. Both parts of the new plant work in unison to support it toward the eventual goal of flower, fruit and seed production.
As I sat today looking at one of the tomato plants I have in a pot on the porch, I tried to imagine what is going on inside it. Is the process of cell development and enlargement actually visible, or does it happen in such infinitesimal degrees that it cannot be observed, and like so much else in nature, we simply have to believe that it's happening? For with each passing day, the plant's leaves are a bit higher against the railing and soon, they will surpass it entirely, at which point I'll have to tie it a little higher along the vine so it doesn't topple over. And then, without warning, I'll look one day and there will be the characteristic yellow blossoms indicating the spots where tiny green tomatoes will eventually appear, much to my eternal delight.
A plant grows in much the same way as do other living organisms-by cell production and enlargement. As new cells are formed, they fill with water drawn up into the plant through the roots. As they swell, they push the cells above them higher, causing the stem to elongate and grow. Some cells store water and others starches, and it is water that gives a plant its ability to stand upright and not keel over, a characteristic known in botanical circles as turgor or turgidity, which is the pressure the engorged cells exert on each other and on the stem walls. That's why a wilting plant seems to magically right itself once it's been given a drink, as the water floods the cells deep within the stem.
From the tiniest moss plant to the gigantic California redwoods, all plants follow this pattern of growth and development, each according to its own genetic code. Here, in these humble woods, I am reminded of that fact each time I look outside at my tomato plant and at the trees beyond, that never cease to amaze me in their variety, their tenacity and their eternal capacity to look ever upward.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Plants are remarkable things, and I've learned so much about them lately from all the research I've done for various online content articles. Here, in these woods, I'm literally surrounded by more varieties than I can count, and I doubt I'd be able to discover them all, considering how playful nature is in forever introducing new varieties into the landscape. From the tomato plants that I myself so lovingly put into the ground each year to the tallest pine that grows up on the ridge, all share growth characteristics all the while possessing features that are unique to each species.
Plants grow from the roots up, with the first cells originating beneath the soil, and it is almost magical the way they just seem to know to grow downward while the aerial parts of a plant know to grow upward. When a seed germinates, it simultaneously sends out both a fledgling rootlet and a pair of false leaves known as cotyledons. The root orients itself in the soil to seek out as much as moisture and as many nutrients as possible, while above the soil, the cotyledons eventually give way to the true leaves whose job it will be, with the sun's help, to manufacture food that the entire plant will need. Both parts of the new plant work in unison to support it toward the eventual goal of flower, fruit and seed production.
As I sat today looking at one of the tomato plants I have in a pot on the porch, I tried to imagine what is going on inside it. Is the process of cell development and enlargement actually visible, or does it happen in such infinitesimal degrees that it cannot be observed, and like so much else in nature, we simply have to believe that it's happening? For with each passing day, the plant's leaves are a bit higher against the railing and soon, they will surpass it entirely, at which point I'll have to tie it a little higher along the vine so it doesn't topple over. And then, without warning, I'll look one day and there will be the characteristic yellow blossoms indicating the spots where tiny green tomatoes will eventually appear, much to my eternal delight.
A plant grows in much the same way as do other living organisms-by cell production and enlargement. As new cells are formed, they fill with water drawn up into the plant through the roots. As they swell, they push the cells above them higher, causing the stem to elongate and grow. Some cells store water and others starches, and it is water that gives a plant its ability to stand upright and not keel over, a characteristic known in botanical circles as turgor or turgidity, which is the pressure the engorged cells exert on each other and on the stem walls. That's why a wilting plant seems to magically right itself once it's been given a drink, as the water floods the cells deep within the stem.
From the tiniest moss plant to the gigantic California redwoods, all plants follow this pattern of growth and development, each according to its own genetic code. Here, in these humble woods, I am reminded of that fact each time I look outside at my tomato plant and at the trees beyond, that never cease to amaze me in their variety, their tenacity and their eternal capacity to look ever upward.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Mushrooms!
After extended rain events, these woods come alive with an amazing variety of mushrooms. Just yesterday, I was in the process of mowing my tiny back yard when I came upon clusters of a white variety that looked like they'd been made of papier-mache. While they were very similar to the cultivated button mushrooms one finds in supermarkets, these had knobby caps and an almost powdery consistency. I hated to cut them down, so I made the decision to forego those under my hydrangea bush and mow across just the one that happened to be right in the middle of the small lawn. Since then, more have popped up nearby, looking like golf balls strewn haphazardly among the blades of grass.
Farther back from the road, I saw larger bright yellow specimens and other exotic orange-red species with wrinkled edges and black streaks running across their caps. Of course, downed trees almost always sport some sort of fungus growing from their bark, and I think I read somewhere that these mushrooms are parasitic, as they drain dying trees of what few nutrients they may still have left. I also read another remarkable fact once about how, when we come upon a mushroom in the woods or some other damp shady spot, it is most likely just a small offshoot of a subterranean fungal system that can be as large as a mile or more in diameter. The term "tip of the iceberg" applies here, and that is an adequate description of this strange life form that is still somewhat veiled in mystery.
For days now, I've been hearing a Pileated woodpecker as it moves between the trees all around me. I finally saw it alight briefly on an oak at the foot of the driveway, but a passing vehicle scared it off. Its loud laugh is unmistakable as this large red-tufted creature forages for insects just under the bark of older trees. The only other large woodpecker is the Ivory-billed, which is a few inches longer than the foot-long Pileated and is now nearly extinct.
One evening last week, just after dusk, I observed a smaller Hairy woodpecker poking its bill into the hole that was drilled in the top of the dead maple trunk in the backyard. I noticed evidence of the hole last fall when large wood shavings began appearing on the ground among the fallen leaves. It took awhile before I discovered their source, and I knew that only a woodpecker could make such a perfectly round clean hole. It appears that there is now a nest inside it, and I will have to select a safe vantage point to make my observations in such a way as to not disturb the mother as she goes about her parental duties.
These woods never cease to amaze me with the gifts that they so often bestow upon me without warning. Yesterday, I spent several quiet hours painting the back porch, and I was starting to wind down for a lunch break when a movement drew my eye to the backyard. There, not 10 feet away from the porch steps, stood a tiny fawn. It poked around in the ferns for a bit as I stood there frozen in time and watching in total awe as it lifted its nose to sniff the air, making small mewing sounds not unlike those made by a newborn kitten. I finally moved very slowly toward the porch railing and spoke gently to it. It kept sniffing the air and mewing and then very slowly turned and headed toward the shed. I watched in wonder as it wandered into the woods, hoping that its mother was somewhere nearby.
I kept the magic of that moment with me for several hours and even awakened in the middle of the night wondering if that tiny wondrous creature had gotten safely to wherever its mother was. For the few moments that it had stood just feet from me, nothing else mattered. All my worldly cares vanished, and I felt closer to the natural world then I had at any other time. Even as I write, I wonder at the forces that brought that fawn to me at that particular moment when I happened to be in the right place at just the right time.
Nature is like that, always knowing what we need just when we need it most.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Farther back from the road, I saw larger bright yellow specimens and other exotic orange-red species with wrinkled edges and black streaks running across their caps. Of course, downed trees almost always sport some sort of fungus growing from their bark, and I think I read somewhere that these mushrooms are parasitic, as they drain dying trees of what few nutrients they may still have left. I also read another remarkable fact once about how, when we come upon a mushroom in the woods or some other damp shady spot, it is most likely just a small offshoot of a subterranean fungal system that can be as large as a mile or more in diameter. The term "tip of the iceberg" applies here, and that is an adequate description of this strange life form that is still somewhat veiled in mystery.
For days now, I've been hearing a Pileated woodpecker as it moves between the trees all around me. I finally saw it alight briefly on an oak at the foot of the driveway, but a passing vehicle scared it off. Its loud laugh is unmistakable as this large red-tufted creature forages for insects just under the bark of older trees. The only other large woodpecker is the Ivory-billed, which is a few inches longer than the foot-long Pileated and is now nearly extinct.
One evening last week, just after dusk, I observed a smaller Hairy woodpecker poking its bill into the hole that was drilled in the top of the dead maple trunk in the backyard. I noticed evidence of the hole last fall when large wood shavings began appearing on the ground among the fallen leaves. It took awhile before I discovered their source, and I knew that only a woodpecker could make such a perfectly round clean hole. It appears that there is now a nest inside it, and I will have to select a safe vantage point to make my observations in such a way as to not disturb the mother as she goes about her parental duties.
These woods never cease to amaze me with the gifts that they so often bestow upon me without warning. Yesterday, I spent several quiet hours painting the back porch, and I was starting to wind down for a lunch break when a movement drew my eye to the backyard. There, not 10 feet away from the porch steps, stood a tiny fawn. It poked around in the ferns for a bit as I stood there frozen in time and watching in total awe as it lifted its nose to sniff the air, making small mewing sounds not unlike those made by a newborn kitten. I finally moved very slowly toward the porch railing and spoke gently to it. It kept sniffing the air and mewing and then very slowly turned and headed toward the shed. I watched in wonder as it wandered into the woods, hoping that its mother was somewhere nearby.
I kept the magic of that moment with me for several hours and even awakened in the middle of the night wondering if that tiny wondrous creature had gotten safely to wherever its mother was. For the few moments that it had stood just feet from me, nothing else mattered. All my worldly cares vanished, and I felt closer to the natural world then I had at any other time. Even as I write, I wonder at the forces that brought that fawn to me at that particular moment when I happened to be in the right place at just the right time.
Nature is like that, always knowing what we need just when we need it most.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
More Blue Sky
A tree-trimming crew has been in the area cutting back growth that threatens the power lines. As I watched them here just on the edge of my property one day last week, I was amazed at how quickly the scenery changes with the removal of just a few saplings and shrubs, how more blue sky is let in, more light, more shadow.
One would think that, with all their layers of green upon green, these densely packed woods would be nothing more than a muddled mass of indistinct shapes, but that's not the case at all. Despite the tangled multitude of leaves, pine needles, branches and boughs, it's all a living breathing canvas of planes, surfaces, and textures, with distinct lines between each subtle hue and shape.
As an experiment, I selected a single low branch on an oak tree, and observed the small almost imperceptible differences between the leaves. While, at first glance, they all appeared to be carbon copies of each other, they were in actuality all quite distinct, each bearing its own unique qualities and coloring. Their position on the branch also contributed to the intensity of their appearance, as the topmost leaves blocked the light from reaching the lower ones, thus altering all the shades in between by infinitesimal degrees. I backed away a bit to test at one point if it would all become a blur, but it never did. Even from a much greater distance, each leaf stood clearly apart from its neighbors due to its slightly different position on the branch.
Air currents also manifest themselves in interesting ways in these woods. Whereas the trees and shrubs nearest to me often stand quite still, movement is seen through their branches as the more distant trees sway in the breeze, their leaves trembling at its touch. Yet the dense buffer zone created by the thicker stands of oaks and pines deflects this wind away from those trees that hold this place more closely in its embrace, the closest providing a framework of sorts through which I am able to catch a glimpse of something happening beyond.
The annual shedding of the pines is all but finished now, and a new carpet of reddish needles carpets the ground beneath them. But the deciduous trees, the oaks and maples and birches, have reached their fullness, which grows more pronounced with each passing year, and I cannot help but wonder at how so much perfection is arrived at so randomly and without any apparent plan. Nature seems not to worry much, if at all, about such things as boundaries and symmetry and neatness. Yet who can dispute the eclectic beauty of a tangle of tree branches overlaying a background of green moving shapes?
From the lowly forgotten shrub whose leaves lie flat beneath the more gossamer tufts of overhanging pine needles to the large leathery oak leaves that brush across my window, each of these woods' myriad shapes has a role to play, and each, I must say, plays it to perfection.
Bravo!
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
One would think that, with all their layers of green upon green, these densely packed woods would be nothing more than a muddled mass of indistinct shapes, but that's not the case at all. Despite the tangled multitude of leaves, pine needles, branches and boughs, it's all a living breathing canvas of planes, surfaces, and textures, with distinct lines between each subtle hue and shape.
As an experiment, I selected a single low branch on an oak tree, and observed the small almost imperceptible differences between the leaves. While, at first glance, they all appeared to be carbon copies of each other, they were in actuality all quite distinct, each bearing its own unique qualities and coloring. Their position on the branch also contributed to the intensity of their appearance, as the topmost leaves blocked the light from reaching the lower ones, thus altering all the shades in between by infinitesimal degrees. I backed away a bit to test at one point if it would all become a blur, but it never did. Even from a much greater distance, each leaf stood clearly apart from its neighbors due to its slightly different position on the branch.
Air currents also manifest themselves in interesting ways in these woods. Whereas the trees and shrubs nearest to me often stand quite still, movement is seen through their branches as the more distant trees sway in the breeze, their leaves trembling at its touch. Yet the dense buffer zone created by the thicker stands of oaks and pines deflects this wind away from those trees that hold this place more closely in its embrace, the closest providing a framework of sorts through which I am able to catch a glimpse of something happening beyond.
The annual shedding of the pines is all but finished now, and a new carpet of reddish needles carpets the ground beneath them. But the deciduous trees, the oaks and maples and birches, have reached their fullness, which grows more pronounced with each passing year, and I cannot help but wonder at how so much perfection is arrived at so randomly and without any apparent plan. Nature seems not to worry much, if at all, about such things as boundaries and symmetry and neatness. Yet who can dispute the eclectic beauty of a tangle of tree branches overlaying a background of green moving shapes?
From the lowly forgotten shrub whose leaves lie flat beneath the more gossamer tufts of overhanging pine needles to the large leathery oak leaves that brush across my window, each of these woods' myriad shapes has a role to play, and each, I must say, plays it to perfection.
Bravo!
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Dance of the Falling Leaves
Their earthbound journey began early this year, as did everything else, I noticed. Corn fields are already stripped, and my own tomatoes reached picking stage back in mid-July. Shortened days, the earth’s slight tilt, and drying southerly winds, leaching what little moisture the soil has managed to hold on to, combined to produce this premature dance.
The maples were the first to open the performance, their leaves pirouetting to the earth, a fitting curtain call to a summer spent in their rich green finery. Not to be too quickly outdone, though, they will end their days as a bright mosaic on the wilting grass and wooded paths, waiting to be joined later by the gold of birch, poplar and beech leaves. The oaks, mighty to the end, will be the last to fall, leaving behind their customary brown-clad retinue that insists on clinging to the branch well into winter and beyond.
I never tire of it, never grow weary of the yearly show. Beginning with a few forerunners, that poignantly fall to the earth, the extravaganza finally bursts into action when this quiet dirt lane becomes the final resting place of millions of leaves blown down by stronger winds. It’s a veritable leaf shower, and there is no stopping them then, bound as they are by the laws that govern deciduous trees in autumn.
The evergreens, too, experience a denouement of sorts each year, albeit sooner. For just a short time in June, pine trees don’t quite live up to their name as they briefly sport a blush of rust-colored needles that will eventually carpet the ground beneath them, making way for greener growth that will persist well into the following year. Hemlocks and firs follow suit as they rid themselves of old growth to make way for the new, an ancient process not unknown to us humans as well. Fall is an apt name for a season when so much of the natural world needs time to renew its hold on life.
Nature’s visual productions never disappoint. Each season has its piece de resistance, from the chartreuse yellows of the first birch leaves in May to the light shows when weather systems collide in august, and on to the autumnal waltz that sets the stage for yet another grand ballet. For the snowflakes, awaiting their wintry cues, are even now going through their paces in the vast back stage of the heavens.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
The maples were the first to open the performance, their leaves pirouetting to the earth, a fitting curtain call to a summer spent in their rich green finery. Not to be too quickly outdone, though, they will end their days as a bright mosaic on the wilting grass and wooded paths, waiting to be joined later by the gold of birch, poplar and beech leaves. The oaks, mighty to the end, will be the last to fall, leaving behind their customary brown-clad retinue that insists on clinging to the branch well into winter and beyond.
I never tire of it, never grow weary of the yearly show. Beginning with a few forerunners, that poignantly fall to the earth, the extravaganza finally bursts into action when this quiet dirt lane becomes the final resting place of millions of leaves blown down by stronger winds. It’s a veritable leaf shower, and there is no stopping them then, bound as they are by the laws that govern deciduous trees in autumn.
The evergreens, too, experience a denouement of sorts each year, albeit sooner. For just a short time in June, pine trees don’t quite live up to their name as they briefly sport a blush of rust-colored needles that will eventually carpet the ground beneath them, making way for greener growth that will persist well into the following year. Hemlocks and firs follow suit as they rid themselves of old growth to make way for the new, an ancient process not unknown to us humans as well. Fall is an apt name for a season when so much of the natural world needs time to renew its hold on life.
Nature’s visual productions never disappoint. Each season has its piece de resistance, from the chartreuse yellows of the first birch leaves in May to the light shows when weather systems collide in august, and on to the autumnal waltz that sets the stage for yet another grand ballet. For the snowflakes, awaiting their wintry cues, are even now going through their paces in the vast back stage of the heavens.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Late Summer Musings (First in the Series of Summer Essays)
The afternoon light has grown decidedly different once again, penetrating these woods at a slightly different angle from mere days ago. It dances on the low pine branches earlier now, and bathes the low-hanging leaves of the witch hazel as it sinks behind the taller trees.
The cricket’s music has replaced that of the wood and hermit thrushes that never stay much beyond the end of July, and owls are dominating the night woods again. They regaled me one night last week with a full-blown hooted conversation that went on for several minutes until the participants decided to move deeper into the shadows where I couldn’t hear them anymore. I lay awake awhile listening, but all I heard was a dog barking.
I have always enjoyed the sound of a dog barking from a distance at night. I am somehow comforted while going to sleep knowing that someone’s faithful pet is out there alert to the sounds and smells and also to any danger that might be lurking. That same alertness is to be found in another creature as well, and one that most people would least expect.
Several years ago, I was sitting in front of the fire with a book when I heard crows cawing close by. That’s a common sound here, so I paid it no mind. After a few more minutes, though, I realized that their cries had intensified and that other crows had joined in the chorus. Their cawing was now at a higher pitch and more frantic, so I got up to look outside. I reached the window just in time to see a large fisher run across the yard under some trees not 40 feet from my front door. It scooted across the rock wall that divides my property from my neighbor’s and disappeared into the woods.
I noticed then that the crows had stopped and had flown away, and I realized that they had been tracking that fisher on its way through the woods. In a very real way, those crows had assumed the role of sentinels, their uncharacteristically high-pitched cawing their way of sounding the alarm that an intruder was lurking.
I had the same experience again just a few weeks ago, but this time, a coyote skulked through in exactly the same spot the fisher had. Like the fisher, it had disturbed the crows’ peace, and they were once again frantic to let someone know. A bit of research revealed that crows actually band together to intimidate intruders, which was surely what these crows had been doing as well.
And so it goes in these Lyman woods, not that far from the beaten paths that lead to busier places. Each day brings new wonders, new sounds, new smells, new simple truths to learn, and all that is asked of me is that I be cognizant and open to it, not judging, but simply accepting a way of life that was here before I was.
Today, one of my cats scurried off into the low brush and made quite a noise in the process. She’d disturbed something, so I went off to see what it was. Through the low branches, a small flock of turkey hens were making their way toward the deeper woods. I watched them for a moment, and like my cat, gave them wide berth and headed home.
Tonight, I’ll listen again for owls. Raccoons will most likely visit the back porch and leave their muddy paw prints across the picnic table. And maybe, with any luck, that dog will bark in the distance, letting me know that all is well in these dark and wondrous woods.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
Introduction
A few years ago, I'd started another blog on a platform whose workings I just could not understand or work around. After awhile, I got very frustrated with it, and just abandoned it. But I have always wanted to start another one through which I could share my weekly newspaper columns with individuals who don't have access to that publication--the Journal Tribune. Unfortunately, online readers no longer have the option of reading the JT without first purchasing a subscription. So using it as a reference for my work is pretty much useless if interested parties can't get to them to read them. So that's the point of this blog--to get those essays out there--all four years' worth of them, not so much for the oohs and aahs they might generate, but more to keep people connected to nature, where it all began.
And that's why I started writing those articles in the first place--to honor nature by keeping her alive in the hearts and minds of as many people as I could reach with them. I think I've done that, judging by some of the emails of support I've gotten since I submitted the first ones back in the fall of 2010. It will take awhile to get them uploaded to this blog, but I will attempt to start from the beginning, and list the essays by season, which is how I have them filed away on my desk-top.
I hope they are as relevant now as when I first wrote them, but I suspect they will be. Because nature, and whatever we can say about her, is nothing if not always relevant and as much a part of our lives now as she has ever been.
Note to the reader: When I began writing these essays, I was living in a spot that was the realization of a life-long dream for me...an old mobile home on a small hill tucked into the woods of Lyman, Maine, near Swan Pond. I was to live there for 13 years before circumstances compelled me (foolishly, as I have come to realize) to sell it and move to what I hoped would be an easier lifestyle fraught with fewer worries. In so doing, however, I sacrificed the peace, beauty and serenity that I had so long cherished, and I ended up in a place smack-dab in the heart of a small busy town that was totally out of character for me. Now here I am back in Lyman, Maine, living in an apartment overlooking Wadleigh Pond. And while I have not reclaimed my sense of ownership, I have reacquired here much of the serenity and autonomy that I had in my own place. Ironically, I am just several miles from there, a fact which caused me some grief in the beginning. But I've come to love this place and to renew my special relationship with nature that I never truly abandoned.
While I composed these essays from three separate locations over the last four years, they all have one thing in common--words that sprang from my heart--one that was never at any moment very far from home.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
And that's why I started writing those articles in the first place--to honor nature by keeping her alive in the hearts and minds of as many people as I could reach with them. I think I've done that, judging by some of the emails of support I've gotten since I submitted the first ones back in the fall of 2010. It will take awhile to get them uploaded to this blog, but I will attempt to start from the beginning, and list the essays by season, which is how I have them filed away on my desk-top.
I hope they are as relevant now as when I first wrote them, but I suspect they will be. Because nature, and whatever we can say about her, is nothing if not always relevant and as much a part of our lives now as she has ever been.
Note to the reader: When I began writing these essays, I was living in a spot that was the realization of a life-long dream for me...an old mobile home on a small hill tucked into the woods of Lyman, Maine, near Swan Pond. I was to live there for 13 years before circumstances compelled me (foolishly, as I have come to realize) to sell it and move to what I hoped would be an easier lifestyle fraught with fewer worries. In so doing, however, I sacrificed the peace, beauty and serenity that I had so long cherished, and I ended up in a place smack-dab in the heart of a small busy town that was totally out of character for me. Now here I am back in Lyman, Maine, living in an apartment overlooking Wadleigh Pond. And while I have not reclaimed my sense of ownership, I have reacquired here much of the serenity and autonomy that I had in my own place. Ironically, I am just several miles from there, a fact which caused me some grief in the beginning. But I've come to love this place and to renew my special relationship with nature that I never truly abandoned.
While I composed these essays from three separate locations over the last four years, they all have one thing in common--words that sprang from my heart--one that was never at any moment very far from home.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530989876
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