We finally moved into town on a wooded lot overlooking a lake. Imagine our surprise and delight when one night in the light from our windows, we saw a pair of raccoons, of possums, of armadillos, and even two very small red foxes all eating peaceably together under the bird feeders. It was like a scene from a Disney movie. If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I don’t think I would have believed it. The next Spring, three momma raccoons each brought three babies at the same time every day to picnic under the feeders and drink from the birdbath. The babies were just cuddly balls of fur with masks and couldn’t climb into the birdbath at first. For about six weeks they came each day to tumble and climb, and eat in safety. The moms brought them out in the daytime because they were small and vulnerable, and large male raccoons are often dangerously aggressive toward babies. But the male raccoons come out only at night. I guess as nocturnal animals this is the raccoon moms’ equivalent to new human moms being awake at night taking care of their newborns. Sometimes adult raccoons would climb out a limb and grab hold of the wire attached to a feeder and walk the feeder back to where a branch came out of the trunk. There, comfortably ensconced in the notch, they would happily stuff themselves. One time they even managed to get the wire loose from the limb and drag the whole feeder off into the woods. Meanwhile beavers helped themselves to trees at the edge of the lake to build condominiums in the bank. The lake also attracted migratory ducks and geese, a blue heron, and finally even an eagle began to call it home. A pair of red tailed hawks got our attention by building a large nest that could be seen from our screened porch. The year before we planned to sell the house and downsize to an apartment, we began to replace the large sections of screening on the porch. But before we could finish this, a hawk swooped down to grab a bird at the feeder. He missed the bird, but went at high speed right through part of the old screen into the porch. At first we thought he was dead because he was lying completely still on his back with this feet and talons in the air. But when my husband opened the door to the porch to check on him, the hawk came to life, so my husband beat a hasty retreat. Even though the hawk began to move around the porch, it became clear that he wouldn’t be able to get out the tear he had made. This porch was my playpen for small grandchildren, so the only door opened into the kitchen area. There was no way for the hawk to get out. The porch was high off the ground that sloped down steeply from the house. So my husband climbed a ladder and as the hawk watched him closely, used a rake to tear more screen loose. Once he tore a fairly large hole, he decided to let the hawk figure the rest out for himself. Which fortunately, it did.
Next: Wildlife Encounters Part 6 Apartment Wildlife
Category Archives: Nature
Moments of Wonder
An illusion haunts us, that a long duration, as a year, a decade, a century, is valuable. But an old French sentence says, “God works in moments.” We ask for long life, but ’tis deep life or grand moments that signify. Let the measure of Time be spiritual, not mechanical. Life is unnecessarily long. Moments of insight, of fine personal relation, a smile, a glance–what ample borrowers of eternity they are!
Ralph Waldo Emerson.
The Commandments: Humanity’s Keys for Survival/The Beatitudes: Our Handbook for Freedom to Love
I’m pretty sure that law and the concept of sin and consequences were created to try to help us live in the groups we need to survive and prosper. Society is a two edged sword. It keeps us from having to do everything for ourselves from fighting off wildlife, planting, harvesting, to creating clothes and shelter, thus giving us time to think, create, explore, and ask questions about the why, not just the how. But, since humanity is a work in progress…..the old adage, that there’s both a goody and a baddy to everything, holds true for society. Society helps us survive physically, but it also challenges us to learn to love.
The commandments were first of all, simply practical. The laws were aimed at keeping us alive, both as individuals and humanity, long enough to become loving. Whatever the Intelligence called God is, that created and nourishes life, it lives within each of us. It is a source of grace to become more loving, than competitive and combative. And we are like cells in a body. Each of us not only affects those closest to us, we affect the whole for better or worse, even the generations following us.
Self-honesty and understanding, rather than guilt, are the beginning of learning to love. And those take courage and grace. The divorce rate makes it obvious we haven’t become enough like Jesus to even love those closest to us, never-the-less those different from us or even “against” us. The commandments are the basic tools of survival for society. But, Jesus showed us the next level through teaching and living the spirituality of the Beatitudes. They call us beyond the fundamentals of the Commandments and just survival. They call us to freedom, the freedom to love others.
Caring is prayer. Prayer is in the intention, whether expressed in words, thoughts, feelings, candles, symbols, acts of kindness, or forgiveness. There is power in prayer. But both wisdom and love are needed to use the power for others, to understand that all creation, without exception, is one.
Jesus is a turning point in humanity’s journey. He fleshed out a love that sacrifices for not only the weakest physically, but the weakest spiritually. This is not survival of the fittest.
His resurrection also illustrated that this life span isn’t all there is. Jesus is the living example of the potential of God’s grace even within our own humanity.
His resurrection shows us death is simply a door to eternity. When we believe this, it gives us a very different value system than death as the finish line. And His openness and love for all show us the way to overcome the finality of death.
Wildlife Encounters Part Five: City Cousins
You Are Loved, But You Can Bet Your Sweet Bippy, Bad Choices Still Have Bad Consequences
Just because God loves you, doesn’t mean that whatever God is won’t let you suffer the consequences of bad choices. And I would put money on the reality that God is not a Wizard of Oz with a carrot and a stick. Consequences to choices are simply built in. And, if you keep on ignoring consequences, you can bet your sweet bippy, they will become worse until you learn. Life is about learning to love. And love may not mean having to say you’re sorry, but it sure means you better be sorry enough to change, when your actions hurt others. And unfair as it may seem if you are now, were, or ever will be parents…..the way you treat other people will come back to bite you even through and on your children and your children’s children. I have seen this and suffered it. It’s a law of nature. It’s built into the system. It’s Universal. Smart/Inspired Hebrews figured that out and tried to pass that information on down. Unfortunately, we are too soon old and too late smart. Even though genes may in some way be related to patterns of behavior, that is not a “get out of consequences free” card. It simply means most of us have either inherited or chosen new ways to try to escape the normal pain of living, instead of going through it and learning from it. This is addiction! And it has to be overcome. The sooner the better, because addictions quickly acquire their own pain on top of what we used them to dull temporarily. This is the core course in the school of life. Learn it or weep, cause nobody’s sure there’s a do over.
Wildlife Encounters Part Four: The Funny and Delightful Kinds
Some of our experiences up close and personal with denizens of the forest were very funny.
One time around dawn when our kids and one of their friends and I were camping out near the house, a pack of baying hounds chased a fox right through our circle of sleeping bags. The friend from the city made it to the house without touching the ground.
Another year we had a small white poodle that slept inside, but ran around outside most of the day. One morning he decided to protect us from a doe grazing in the front yard. He raced right up to her face barking furiously. She not only didn’t flee, she butted him backwards head over heels and just went back to munching. He, however, streaked back to the front door with his tail between his legs and cowered there until I let him in.
One of the most delightful experiences was when a doe brought her new born fawn into the small clearing outside our bedroom window. For about a week she rested there watching it wobble about until it could finally gambol around happily. I was stuck in a wheel chair for a while just then, so watching them each day was pure grace.
An awesome experience was recognizing a Great American Horned Owl flying over our lower field. It had what looked like close to a five foot wing span. We rode in our jeep along the woods that edged the field that night with flash lights and found its perch. It’s eyes glowed in the light, but it didn’t fly away. We visited it at the same spot several times, but finally it left.
A day or so after snows, we loved to look for animals’ tracks after they came out of their burrows to search for food.
Wildlife encounters are among my favorite memories from the twenty-seven years we lived in our hundred acre wood.
Wildlife Encounters: Part Three, The Sad and Challenging Kind
My first sad wildlife encounter up close and personal in our Hundred Acre Wood was a baby rabbit our cat brought in. It had a broken leg, so I took it to a much amused local vet, who made it a splint out of a tongue depressor. But as the vet had warned me, in spite of my tender loving care for two days, the tiny bunny finally gave a loud cry and died. This was not an auspicious beginning for a Saint Francis wanna be. It was made even sadder and more disturbing by the timing of the bunny’s death; three o’clock in the afternoon on Good Friday. Honestly! I almost dug up its little box coffin to make sure it was still there.
It got worse.
A few months later I was just starting into town with my two year old in our truck. I had to stop suddenly, because there was a pitiful looking old fox standing right in the middle of the road. He wouldn’t move even when I honked my horn. He was trembling and obviously sick, so I backed up and went to consult with our nearest for “real” country neighbor. He informed me that according to country protocol, I needed to take the fox to the Health Department to be checked for rabies. When I looked at him like he had lost his mind, he explained that he would put the fox out of its misery and put it in a garbage bag in the back of my truck. So my two year old and I waited in the house while the neighbor shot the fox. When I got to the Health Department and told them what I had in the truck, the woman informed me that they would only accept the fox’s head. When I just stared at her speechless, I guess she pegged me as a city slicker. Because she finally explained in a tone that made it obvious she thought she was talking to a ding bat, that I needed to take the fox to the vet to get the head cut off. So, back to the vet I went once more. When he recognized me, the vet smirked a little as he inquired about the health of the baby rabbit. However, he obligingly delivered the fox head to me in a coffee can. He also gave me the rest of the fox back in its garbage bag, while informing me that he had no disposal facilities. As I drove back to the Health Department, I now noticed a very horrible and strong odor coming from the back of my truck. I tried to bring a little humor into what seemed to me a rather grizzly situation by imitating Salome doing her Dance of the Seven Veils as I delivered the fox head. They were not amused. In fact, they then informed me (I suspect secretly with glee) that it was up to me to get rid of the rest of the fox safely. It could not be buried in a shallow grave in case it had rabies and other animals might dig it up. So, sadly the rest of the fox and I finished my second country wildlife death without ritual or honors at the County Landfill. The Health Department eventually notified me that the fox had definitely been dying, but fortunately for us and our neighborhood wildlife, from distemper, not rabies.
No amount of cleaning agents could get the smell out of the back of my truck. It took almost a month of fresh air and rain.
Coming Next- Wildlife Encounters: Part Four, The Funny and Delightful Kind
Wildlife Encounters: Part 2 The Scary Kind
Once we had some young college age kids who were part of a Christian Ministry stay with us. They were mostly from places like Los Angeles and New York. So we tried to give them a taste of country living by bringing them down in our jeep to a nice sandy spot where branches of the creek came together at the far end of our valley. We gathered branches and built a fire to cook hot dogs and marshmallows. One of them played a guitar and we all sang soft sweet songs as the woods disappeared into darkness. It was picture perfect until we heard our local Bobcat scream near-by. That was a little too country for the New Yorkers, so we gathered up quickly. But it took two jeep trips to get us all back to the house. I waited with the last two city kids. They helped me make sure the fire was completely buried while we waited for my husband to come back for us. We had flashlights and we didn’t hear any more from the Bobcat, but those two big eyed kids kept looking over their shoulders until we got all the way back into the house. (And maybe I was just a tad nervous myself.)
But for me the creepiest wildlife experience was the time I was home alone, but fortunately talking on the phone, as a long line of about fifty wild turkeys started coming slowly our of the woods single file. It was like a funeral procession that eventually looped around the house. I told my friend if I disappeared or died, the turkeys did it!
Wildlife Encounters: Part 3 The Sad and Challenging Kind
Wild Life Encounters: Part One, The Curious and Unusual Kind
We moved from the suburbs of a large city to a Winnie the Pooh Hundred Acre Wood. This was six miles down a dirt road and through a creek from the nearest small town. Our love of nature led us into wildlife encounters of the curious, scary, humorous, sad, and blessed kinds. Part One is about the curious and unusual.
One of my first encounters was with a rather large possum who scratched noisily on my screen door. When I went to check out the noise, it stopped scratching, but stayed there staring at me. I stared back. It continued staring. I continued to stare back. Finally, it made what sounded like a disgusted grunt and waddled slowly back into the woods. I never knew if it was panhandling or what. We didn’t have bird feeders or an outside dog then, so I don’t know why it would expect food. But it never came back, so I’m pretty sure it wasn’t a Jehovah’s Witness.
An even more curious experience happened a few years later on a freezing February night. We had returned from out of town late that day and were now snuggled warmly in our bed watching a scary movie. Suddenly there was a tap, tap, tapping on the window next to us. We both froze and stared in horror at the curtained window. The tapping continued, so I followed my husband to the door nearest the window. As he stepped outside, he pointed in amazement and a Chickadee flew from the window ledge onto his hand. It stayed there a moment as we gaped in open mouthed astonishment. Then it flew to the nearest eave where it continued looking at us. We decided this must be one smart, hungry Chickadee, so we grabbed our coats and went to fill the empty feeders which were all the way on the other side of the house.
It still astonishes me, even freaks me out a little that something with, after all, just a birdbrain could be smart enough to know where we were, that we would respond to tapping, that it was safe to come that close, and that we were the ones that gave him food. Nature is an awesome mystery.
(Part Two is Wild Life Encounters: The Scary Kind)
Nostalgia
Since I have been recounting the hardships of 2016, I felt it only fair to share some of the many wonderful blessings we have had. I’m starting with our last house before moving to our current apartment. I had loved our 100 acre wood way out in the country, but as we aged the land with woods, a beautiful creek, cleared and fenced horse fields and a large house designed for five children and frequent house guests became too much for us to keep up. I balked at moving far longer than I should have, but agreed finally to move into the city if we could find a lot with some woods and a view of a lake. Miraculously we did. And since my husband is an architect, he designed it to suit me by bringing nature in through lots of wonderful walls of windows and open spaces inside. The house was small, but seemed much larger because of these.
The first photo is a spring night view through the woods to the lake. The back of our house was all windows. So there was a wonderful view from the master bedroom, the open combination of study, breakfast room and kitchen and the combination living room and dining room. It was like being outside in all seasons while being comfortable. There was also a screened porch with a cathedral ceiling that felt like a tree house because the land slanted down from the back of the house. The porch had no doors to the outside, only one into the kitchen/study area. This made a wonderful safe outdoor playroom for our passel of young grandchildren.
There was a circular drive entrance to our home through a tunnel of sweet smelling flowering shrubs and the woods had Redbud and Dogwood trees in the Spring. The house was half way down the hill toward the lake with the privacy of woods all around it. To be continued with more photos and memories to go with them.
Monet Refuses the Operation
by Lisel Mueller, from Second Language
Doctor, you say there are no haloes
around the streetlights in Paris
and what I see is an aberration
caused by old age, an affliction.
I tell you it has taken me all my life
to arrive at the vision of gas lamps as angels,
to soften and blur and finally banish
the edges you regret I don’t see,
to learn that the line I called the horizon
does not exist and sky and water,
so long apart, are the same state of being.
Fifty-four years before I could see
Rouen cathedral is built
of parallel shafts of sun,
and now you want to restore
my youthful errors: fixed
notions of top and bottom,
the illusion of three-dimensional space,
wisteria separate
from the bridge it covers.
What can I say to convince you
the Houses of Parliament dissolve
night after night to become
the fluid dream of the Thames?
I will not return to a universe
of objects that don’t know each other,
as if islands were not the lost children
of one great continent. The world
is flux, and light becomes what it touches,
becomes water, lilies on water,
above and below water,
becomes lilac and mauve and yellow
and white and cerulean lamps,
small fists passing sunlight
so quickly to one another
that it would take long, streaming hair
inside my brush to catch it.
To paint the speed of light!
Our weighted shapes, these verticals,
burn to mix with air
and change our bones, skin, clothes
to gases. Doctor,
if only you could see
how heaven pulls earth into its arms
and how infinitely the heart expands
to claim this world, blue vapor without end.
Quoted on ifemmanuel-ifeOluwa’s Rambles
at https://ifenihinlola.wordpress.com
Laughter: Carbonated Grace 