Tag: nature

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Welcome Wildlife

I’ve been reviving my bird garden for the coming winter months, for when the insects aren’t as plentiful and the shrubs all die down in the cold. We’re those people who toss handfuls of birdseed onto the blanket of pristine white snow, knowing the birds will make the seeds disappear faster than bags of bread when a hurricane nears. When the last of the hummingbirds have flown south, that’s the time I stock up on different seeds and fill the suet feeders with berry-laden block cakes.

And the salt licks, too, are fully replenished, sitting on the tree stumps the deer use like an office water cooler to gather and gossip about news of coyote sightings and Great Horned Owl conversations heard between the northwest and southwest corner trees. The foxes and bobcats haven’t been spotted lately, but we know they’re back in the thick trees on the dirt road side of the farm. The possums are welcome, keeping the lawn free of ticks that would travel inside on the legs of our dogs, but those armadillos are party crashers, showing up without an invitation, eyeing our new air conditioning unit like it’s a football player needing tackling. They succeeded, indirectly, in taking down the last one. And I don’t like them now for a new reason: they traipse across Fitz’s grave, and I just know if he could raise his little head up out of the ground, he’d take them down hard.

And so it’s time for the talk with Jay. I’m going to have Ollie, our dog who actually gets it, try to explain that back here in the woods on the farm, we welcome creatures and critters and yes, even the Slytherins. The Gryffindors, Hufflepuffs, and Ravenclaws must appreciate the dark art types if we are to fully embrace the wild things of the farm. We live by Aldo Leopold’s iconic line from A Sand County Almanac: There are some who can live without wild things, and some who cannot.

We are those who cannot.

What Jay Doesn’t Realize

curled up at my feet

on the living room rug

Jay watches small movements

at the bird feeder

outside the kitchen window

thirty feet away

huff-barking at the finches

he hasn’t yet realized

belong here too

he’s warned the herd of deer

to move along

because he doesn’t yet

understand

he’s no longer a city dog

and all creatures

great and small

just like him

belong here

deep in the country

on this Funny Farm

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A World With Octobers and Morning Coffee at F. D. Roosevelt State Park

“I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers.” – Anne Shirley,

from L.M. Montgomery’s 1908 classic novel Anne of Green Gables

Fall is, without any close seasonal competition, my favorite time of year. It’s cool but not cold, warm but not hot, and unlike springtime, there are fewer allergens and no pollen blanketing everything outdoors. And there is also no mad rush for holiday preparation, either. Don’t get me wrong – – I do enjoy holidays, but fall brings the peace before the chaos, the calm before the storm of Christmas shopping, baking, and gatherings. The dogs are still content and settled, not yet stirred up in all the changes in routine and visitors.

And the leaves. Nature’s masterpiece has matured from her springtime buds, ripened to her full bloom in the summer, and in fall has crisped to all the gorgeous shades of an artist’s palette. It’s stunning to step outside and look to a valley resplendent with fall colors for miles in every direction from the top of a mountain.

That’s why we love camping at F. D. Roosevelt State Park so much. It’s at the tip top of Pine Mountain, less than an hour west from home but feels like it’s a long way off, and the mountain gives us a taste of North Georgia without actually being there. This morning, it’s 45 degrees out, and that sweater weather I’ve been craving has surpassed the mark and gone to sturdy jacket weather for the first dog peeing window of the morning. You can still smell the smoke from last night’s campfires in the air and on your clothes, see the acorns someone before you left on the picnic table for you to enjoy, and feel the stirrings of cold wind brush your cheek and send leaves swirling to the ground all around you. Fellow dog walkers are out with their own camping dogs, and early birds are preparing to cook breakfast. Soon there will be the smell of bacon sizzling in every direction. For now, though, my coffee is brewing and its rich aroma greets me like the welcoming home of a family member from an it’s-been-too-long scolding. I’ll step inside and finish morning prayers a few hundred feet closer to heaven today than I am at home, in location and in mindset.

In a few minutes, I’ll slice fresh baked pumpkin bread and share a bite with three tiny waggy tail patient waiters with perked up ears and the cutest cocked heads, a trio of rescues who have never ever committed a single wrong in their entire lives and never will, if you ask them. One is on his first camping trip – maybe ever – but at least in the Wayfarer with us. He’s still learning how all this works, and the good Lord allowed him a quick lesson that putting his nose in my piping hot coffee cup and trying to steal a quick taste has its own consequence.

A while later, I’ll build a fire and cuddle up under a blanket in the padded chair to read out by the warmth where life is buzzing with relaxed morning enjoyment by the good-spirited folks who walk past in wrinkled flannel shirts and one-notch-above-pajama pants but way short of a matching sweatsuit, further still from social attire required anywhere but on a campground, everyone’s hair still tousled from last night and holding a dog leash in one hand and a coffee cup in the other. I’m going back and forth between Road Trip by Mary Kay Andrews and two of my favorite memoir-ish country living volumes by Gladys Taber: Especially Dogs and Stillmeadow Road. A good while after that, in between walking dogs and birdwatching with Merlin at the helm and pimento cheese sandwiches and few games of computer mahjong, I’ll change into actual blue jeans and bring out the real tiles and racks and light an apple cider candle while I play a couple of hands of Messy.

Camping days in the

fall are the best days of all

with a stacked woodpile

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Brothers on Bridges, By Fire Pits and on Couches in Blue Ridge

I call Bethany my sister-in-law because what’s his is mine and what’s mine is his, and since she’s married to his brother, that makes her my sister in law too. When we saw that we would not be able to complete Part 2 of our Route 66 trip from Santa Monica to Albuquerque this year, we booked a quick weekend getaway to the mountains of North Georgia a couple of months ago to celebrate their birthdays this month. We’d flown to Chicago and rented a car to drive to Albuquerque and fly from Albuquerque back to Atlanta in June 2024, and we still talk about all the great memories we made on that trip. I can’t forget that coconut pie at the Midpoint Cafe in Adrian, Texas, but that’s an entire story for another day. And so we found a VRBO situated just outside Blue Ridge on a winding creek where we could relax and lower our blood pressure.

That’s why it was so meaningful yesterday when Bethany shared that she knew God had this weekend in mind, prompting us to plan the trip when we did, knowing we’d need to get away more now than ever. Things got real a couple of weeks ago when Kyle had a heart attack. When he’d picked Bethany up from the airport, he shared he wasn’t feeling well, and she’d recognized the symptoms. She took over the driving and took him straight to the hospital, where hours later, after his heart attack, the doctor showed them The Widowmaker images and assured them that they had done the right thing getting to the hospital when they did. Following surgery, he was released a few days later as good as new – even better, actually. Doctor’s orders were to take it easy for the next few weeks.

Nothing surprises God. He had Kyle in his hand, getting him to the hospital so he could be here to celebrate another birthday. Here in these mountains, we’ve eaten delicious foods, sipped coffee in the early morning, taken walks, and sat around talking and laughing as we’ve shared family stories by the fire. Today, we’ll ride the rails of the Blue Ridge Scenic Railway along the Toccoa River to see if we can spot the first leaves of fall turning their glorious colors. And we’ll each say a prayer of thanksgiving for the beauty of nature and the time together to enjoy it.

We’ve always heard the popular phrase, “Life is short. Take the trip. Buy the shoes. Eat the cake.” But when someone we love has a close call, you realize it’s not just some random saying on a t-shirt. It’s true. We get one wild and precious life, and the poet Mary Oliver had the right idea asking us what we were going to do with it. Today, we answer: we’re going to live it to the fullest and thank the Good Lord for the gift.

They waited on us while we shopped in Elegy
They stood on the bridge of the creek that ran behind our rental, Trout House, and watched for….trout!
We explored our remote part of the mountain.


Our Husbands are Brothers

they waited on us

while we were shopping in town

being brotherly

later, they built us a fire,

roasted marshmallows

***

from the moment we’re

born, all our clocks are ticking

make the most of life


Bundled up by the fire

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Lookout Mountain Railway Incline

Chattanooga, Tennessee is home to the steepest railway incline in the world, and every time I’ve driven past the exit to go there, I always think I’d like to ride it someday.

That day was yesterday.

I was a little worried that the weird angle and any sort of strange movement might mess with my vertigo and send me into a tailspin, but it turned out that there was nothing off-kilter like strange turns or centrifugal G-force pulls to set me off. I loved the view of Chattanooga from the top and the supreme minus sausage, extra mushroom please at SoHi pizza and thought of a favorite Bible verse as I took my first bite.

For I was hungry….

Matthew 25:35

My husband studied the photos of the railway from the 1800s to the present; he loves photos that show progression of a place through time. What we didn’t know is that you can ask to be shown the machinery room and they will let you see it. We read this on a card at the bottom of the railway once we got back down to the bottom of Lookout Mountain. We thought our tickets might have worked to get back up there again but kept our pace for getting home to Georgia from our trip to Nashville with enough time to unpack and unwind before time for bed.

For I was hungry

and the pizza was there, Lord,

and I ate it all.

….but I managed to avoid the fudge counter with about twenty different types of handmade fudge including toffee and peach and peanut butter and dark espresso, so despite the temptation, I did show a little food control. And I didn’t even turn my head when I walked past all those Moon Pies.

One last stop was the Chattanooga Choo Choo, just to see the iconic building and its amazing architecture. This building is on the National Registry of Historic Places, and even the bricks on the facade are intriguing to study. We parked and walked around for just a few minutes before hopping back on I-24.

And just like that, when we finally made it home, our heads hit the pillow, exhuasted from a whirlwind trip that sapped our energy but left us with great memories. On this last day of my first full month of official retirement, I can confirm that retirement is a lot like a great trip in that way. You get up ready to go, you go, go, go, and then you crash and sleep on your bed (which is now your charging port) to recharge for the next thing you’ll want to do….whatever that turns out to be.

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The Long Run at Margaritaville

My post is later than usual this morning because I engaged in active birdwatching on Site 60 of Camp Margaritaville and got carried away. I can see why the birds all seem to flock to this place – it’s absolutely stunning, and gentle breezes blow balmy in the mornings across the water. The afternoons are a different story. More about that later in the week. We are here for one night for a concert, and it was fabulous. When you can’t always have The Eagles at The Sphere in Las Vegas, you can have The Long Run at Peachtree Pointe on Lake Lanier in Georgia.

We love to listen to all different kinds of music, but when it truly comes down to choosing a favorite, we’re Eagles fans. On days we are home and working around the house, we’ve got Pandora on the Eagles station, blasting it through Google Home as we work. If we’re traveling, same thing – it’s an Eagles station for us as we coast down the open road. We have our favorite songs, and even our favorite line from Take it to the Limit that will stop us in our tracks wherever we are, no matter what we’re doing, and where we’ll wait for that line and look to each other and answer “YES” after the question is asked: If it all fell to pieces tomorrow, would you still be mine??

We flew out to Las Vegas in February to see them perform at the Sphere, and that was as close to Eagles heaven on this planet as it gets. Nothing can touch that, but when I saw in our Georgia magazine that a tribute band, The Long Run, would be performing on Lake Lanier just a couple hours north of us and that the tickets were only $15 apiece to benefit the Georgia Mountain Food Bank, I snapped up two and booked a campsite at Margaritaville for a quick overnight getaway.

We set up on Site 60 and went exploring.
Boo Radley and Ollie loved the little trails leading to the lake.
We rented a golf cart to get to the concert, and I snapped this picture at dark on our way back.
This may be the most scenic outdoor concert venue in Georgia with boats covering the lake.

It was a beautiful evening, but we must go home today. We’ll stop and visit my Aunt Ann and Uncle Tom on the way through Atlanta. Uncle Tom, who turned 90 last December, has been itching to see the new RV and watch how we set it up. We can’t wait for some OK Cafe food and great company!

And we’re thinking of coming back in September for the magic of the Hot Air Ballon Fest. Check out Lake Lanier’s website and upcoming events here.

family, nature

birdwatching, outdoor concert

RV Life is grand!

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August Open Write Day 3 of 3 with Joanne Emery: Deep in Nature

Our host today for the third and final day of the August Open Write at http://www.ethicalela.com is Joanne Emery, who inspires us to write poems about being deep in nature and the sensory and inner feelings associated with it. You can read her full prompt, and the poems of others, here. My poem today will follow the photos of our trail walk we took on Saturday.

Over the weekend, we took our two four-legged sons Boo Radley and Ollie to F. D. Roosevelt State Park for a quick getaway in the Wayfarer. While there, we took a hike along Mountain Creek Trail, and even though it was hot, the shade provided a respite from the extreme temperatures and the heat advisory in effect.

We like to start the day at the top of the mountain with a picnic breakfast overlooking the valley below Pine Mountain. Where many campers cook full breakfasts on outdoor kitchens, we like to take the easy route and buy coffee and muffins at the registration center and find a picnic table. The boys expect bites of blueberry muffin, and sometimes we cave in to their pressure.

The hike begins with Briar and Boo Radley in the lead, and Ollie and I follow. We make sure they stay on leashes in case we encounter other critters – human, canine, or reptilian, or other – on the trails. On Saturday, we did not meet or pass one other person. In fact, the trail was eerily silent of birdsong, traffic, voices, and even rustling of leaves in the wind.

The different types of mushrooms are always fascinating to me, including this one that is a shelf/bracket fungus that is either turkey tail or a lookalike. We also saw several patches of bright orange colored chicken of the woods and oyster mushrooms as well.

F. D. Roosevelt State Park has a naturalist who offers foraging classes on occasion when mushrooms are bountiful, and I have always wanted to attend the session and learn more about mushrooms and their benefits. I would still be reluctant to eat a wild mushroom, but I’d love to learn more about them.

Getting across the bridges is always interesting. Boo Radley hesitates and sometimes decides to go around the side. Ollie never hesitates and always turns around to be sure I made it across safely once he’s on the other side (how your dog tells you you’re old without telling you you’re old). Even though they’re schnoodles, they have the sense of adventure of sled dogs sometimes – they put themselves in four-wheel drive and pull us along.

They like to play in the streams, and as long as the water is running clear, we let them. On Saturday, they took drinks and walked around to cool off when we took a short break to let them play in the creek.

The natural ferns speak to me in whispers of my mother, reminding me I’m fortunate not to have crippling anxiety, my father echoing her: stress is a killer, I can hear him say. But not in these woods, not on this trail, not deep in nature. Nature heals.

I’m surprised I remembered the fairy tree door, but I knew when I reached the top of one hill that it would be on the other side. Sure enough, it was there, protecting the forest treasures inside – fairies, woodland critters, swag for those who take one and leave one.

And I kept watching for signs of fall in all the heat. Here and there, dotting the trail, were red or yellow leaves. I picked up several fallen acorns and put them in my pocket. I reflected on yesterday’s post about Noah and his wife, and the hope God sends in leaves. Yes, my answer is clear: God does still send hope in leaves. Ask and ye shall receive.

On Mountain Creek Nature Trail, Saturday August 15

Boo Radley leads

Ollie follows

four-wheel drive kicks in

along the trail

splashing in creeks

crossing bridges

inhaling fresh air

underfoot crunch of pine needles

and acorns giving us

out-of-office peace

resetting the focus

to the moment

with each step

deeper and deeper

into the woods

red leaves bringing

the hope of autumn

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August Open Write Day 1 of 3

Our host for the first day of the August Open Write at www.ethicalela.com is Denise Krebs, who lives in the Mojave Desert. A retired teacher, Denise gets out in nature every chance she gets and continues to write. She blogs regularly at Dare to Care, is the co-author of The Genius Hour Guidebook, and has some poems published in anthologies, including today’s prompt inspiration Picture Perfect Poetry. I’m blessed to share time each month with Denise at Ethicalela and in a small group of writers with The Stafford Challenge.

Denise inspires us to write ekphrastic poems today. An ekphrastic poem is one inspired by a piece of art or photograph. She suggests looking through our camera roll and considering something in nature, possibly using the 2-4-6-8 form, explaining, “I wrote my poem in a form I call a 2-4-6-8 poem. It may be a syllable-counting form I made up. Each line increases by two syllables. Write as many stanzas as needed. Your choice of rhyme scheme is optional.” Hop over to the site to see her photos of Joshua Trees and read her poem about them.

I was inspired to write about our tree frog who lives under the Blackstone grill on our front porch. I’d purchased the small griddle to go on the road with us when we travel in the Wayfarer, but after seasoning it and testing it out, I noticed that two tiny tree frogs were making their home in the grill cover. I couldn’t bear to move it, so now we have a grill on our front porch coffee table (it’s okay, there are no neighbors to complain). They have become my front porch friends now, hopping onto the watering jug whenever I water plants and peeping out to say hello from the grill cover. Incidentally, one made an appearance on the loveseat with me last time we were in our Stafford Challenge Google Meet. I introduce you today to one of the Johnson Funny Farm Front Porch Frogs.

Front Porch Tree Frog

front porch

tree frog hops up

on my watering jug

like The Lorax, speaking for plants

he lives under the Blackstone grill

with his lady frog friend

(we shall not cook

frog legs)

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Family Pictures: Water, Water, Everywhere!

Water.

As I go through family photos this month in the process of digitizing to share with other family members, if I had to choose the most common motif of place and setting in terms of geography, it would be water. It seems logical since I grew up on the coast that there would be water in our activities, but even in places that weren’t all that watery, we still managed to somehow find the water of a place wherever we went.

As a child, I’d go with my parents and grandparents to Fernandina beach to camp and fish. After a number of years of doing that, my parents and grandparents bought a place on the Sapelo River in Georgia so they could go there instead – – they traded in tents and the camper for their own place on the river and built a dock so they could leave the boat right there instead of hauling it around all the time.

We threw cast nets and trawled for shrimp, fished, and set crab pots. We could have lived pretty much off that river. Fresh seafood was always what was for dinner. My favorite part was going through the shrimp net when they pulled it up. You never knew what was going to be in there, from squid to shrimp to crabs, eels, octopus, fish, jellyfish, and even horseshoe crabs and the occasional turtle. The critters we weren’t keeping got tossed straight back into the water quickly, and that was part of my job. I had a pair of long tongs that I could use to get these things.

The day the river property sold, I wrote about it here. I also wrote about Ootie the otter, who lived in this bend of the river and naturally seemed to take to other animals and made his home base the eagle rehabilitation center run by Emmy Minor a few docks down. I loved visiting that place.

My mother, late 1970s
My mother and her father sort through a net
My mother holding up a crab with a pair of long tongs like the ones I used
My dad with a crab pot

Lowcountry Boil was dad’s specialty, and it was sometimes what we had for holidays, too. It’s hard to eat turkey when there is fresh catch, all free straight out of the river, for the taking. And it’s tastier.

I miss those days of endless shrimp and crab.

Sapelo Cinquain

river

meandering

like life blood through the veins

it stays in the heart forever

calling

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Our First Harvest Hosts Stay

On Boondocking By Train Tracks

embrace the journey

for all it has to offer

(even the loud trains)

To prepare for The Next Chapter of travel in retirement, I’m learning a whole new way of wayfaring in our Tiffin Wayfarer 25 RW. My love of sleeping around the world in confined places started as a young child when my grandparents had a truck camper and went to the fish camp at Fernandina Beach for long weekends of camping and fishing. My parents came, too. Mom and Dad would pitch a tent, while my grandparents would put me to bed in their space above the truck cab and convert the dinette table into a bed for themselves. I think that’s where camping fever took hold of me, bypassing completely any love of fresh fried fish. I loved the cross-breeze of opening windows at night. Several tents, a pop-up, a teardrop and two bumper pull campers later, we decided to move to a Class C so we could blend more travel adventures into our lives.

And that’s where Harvest Hosts comes in. We’ve been members for over two years, but this weekend is the first time we’ve actually used our membership benefits.

We’ve mostly camped in State Parks and other private campgrounds, but we’ve joined a unique movement that has been gaining traction over the past few years for its innovative and inexpensive mutual benefits for travelers and business owners. Harvest Hosts allows travelers to purchase a year’s membership that offers one night of free camping per stay at wineries, farms, breweries, churches, and other types of businesses with space to park overnight. With a membership, we get full access to the directory of thousands of free overnight options. We can request additional nights in the same place, but many travelers use Harvest Hosts to get to a place where they are camping or staying for multiple nights. So on a cross-country journey where we might drive a few hours a day and then pull in somewhere to sleep at 6 or 8 different Harvest Hosts along the way, we could use one free night in each place for just the cost of membership and a purchase of something they’re selling as a way of providing some business for them.

We picked a brewery just twenty minutes down the road for our first Harvest Hosts stay, and already we see the attraction.

I used the map to find a place close by – just to test the experience. It’s all part of the learning phase of knowing new and different ways to be an RVer. I requested a same-day stay at the place we chose, Towerhouse Farm Brewery, and we pulled in and followed their check-in directions for the space to park and set up. Then, we put out the slide, leveled the rig, and started the generator before walking over to their dine-in option to have dinner and sample their craft beer.

We ran into some friends who were there having drinks and bar snacks, and so we joined them at their table and listened to the live music and shared stories. I work with one of them in the same office, and have taught with the other. They, too, are camping folks, so our stories were of travel and interesting people we’ve met along the way.

After dinner, we walked the dogs and checked out the lay of the land before retiring for the evening, There is a fairground in close proximity on this 80-acre family farm-turned-brewery tract, where they grow their own hops.

An important thing I learned about Harvest Hosts sites is to read the reviews more carefully. We’d read on the reviews that this was near train tracks, but we had no idea that the train would come by every four hours and that we would be parked right next to the tracks. Despite a shift from our typical night of unbroken rest, we made the best of it and appreciated all the things we loved ~ walking to and from dinner, seeing a new place, having an impromptu dinner with friends, and of course the joy of having our two schnoodles there for the excitement. And the train wasn’t enough to be a dealbreaker for staying there again – – we probably would!

Boo Radley (L) and Ollie (R)

The best part of camping with dogs is that they show us it’s okay to find joy being in small spaces with those we love. They would want you to know that while they let us believe it’s us they really want to be with, it’s more about getting that one small bite of a powdered donut at breakfast that makes them true camping dogs.

Our overnight spot at Tower Farmhouse Brewery

We can’t wait to discover more places along the way as we journey out more frequently in retirement. It’s not the draw of the popular places that we enjoy most – – it’s the places off the beaten path that hold just as much gravity in their own GPS points that anywhere else holds – only quieter and less crowded, despite the occasional trains.

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VerseLove Day 2: Look Around

Our host today for the second day of VerseLove 2026 at http://www.ethicalela.com is Leilya Pitre, who teaches and coordinates the English Education Program at Southeastern Louisiana University. She inspires us to find meaning and poetry in small, everyday moments: You can read her full prompt here.

She explains her process: Look at the world around you—from your immediate surroundings inside to outside of your window or on your path. Somewhere close a poem is waiting for you.

Find the poem that’s hiding in plain sight. Let a road sign, billboard, or passing phrase spark today’s writing. Look for the poetry in the everyday little routines, your (or someone else’s) habits. You don’t need to go far—it might be right in front of you. 

Harlequin Home Invasion

where they all came from,

we don’t know

but suddenly there were

hundreds of them

lady beetles

Harmonia axyridis

called Harlequins

scaling the walls

hugging the lampshades

hiking the armchairs

watching our Netflix

like they belong here

living rent-free in

the place we call home