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.
Grace Comes in our Helplessness and in the Present Moment
For me who naturally lives in the ideal land of possibilities, it takes both faith and perseverance to find grace when facing the harsh limits of human reality. I can only stand up to my inner Greek Chorus, that keeps me frighteningly aware of my frailties, by focusing on God who simply says over and over, “I love you.”
Some twenty-five years ago by the end of my mother’s fourteen years of dying by inches from Alzheimer’s, I really wasn’t strong enough to devote myself to holding her hand and sitting helplessly with her at the foot of her cross. It was partly because of my own emotional weakness, some because of selfishness, but ultimately because her suffering shook my faith in God.
Now, I’m being challenged once again to seek grace to live that out as my husband’s Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis progresses. Some personalities are naturally reasonably good at accepting reality, however harsh it may be. But I’ve always been a change agent, a problem solver, a person that is good at finding alternative solutions.
Now, I know that there comes a time when that is not what we are able or even called to do, no matter how naturally good we are at it.
We are called to find grace in our weakness. But that is terrifying and only done by staying aware that though we are not good at this, God is and God is with us.
And grace comes only in the present moment. That is where God meets us. And learning to live in the present moment is a whole new way of being in the world for many of us. Some of us live in the past, while others focus on the future. I’ve always focused on the future with its infinite possibilities. So my first challenge is to only ask where is God in this moment and reach for His hand. My second challenge is to accept that God isn’t asking me to solve anything, but to trust and stay with Him in the circumstances, like Mary at the foot of the cross of those we love most.
The Song in My Head
The song in my head won’t stop
no matter how I try to drown it out.
I have a Greek Chorus always
providing back ground music.
They sing Bass while I sing Treble,
overwhelming my feeble voice
defending my reason for being.
Over and over the chorus sings,
“You’re no good! You’re no good!”
I hear it echoed in small slights,
whether imaginary or real,
in jokes that sound like put downs,
in my endless longing for affirmation.
And my envy of my friends’ success
Just confirms that awful chorus,
“You’re no good.”
Yes, Eileen, America Has Changed for the Better
Lately, seeing people support politicians who are appealing to the worst in Americans, I get extremely discouraged about the future of my country.
But, today I was watching Notre Dame play football against Texas. The Texas coach is African American. I lived in Texas and went to Rice University in Houston. But for Thanksgiving of my Junior Year, I flew to Notre Dame for their football game and to become engaged to my high school sweetheart, who was a Senior there. Carolyn, a friend of mine who grew up like I did in Louisiana and Texas, flew up with me. Back then, Notre Dame was a guys’ only school and we couldn’t even sit with our dates, who had to sit as a group with their fellow students.
So these two little Southern gals were in the nose bleed section at the top of the stadium, freezing from snow on the benches and under our feet. We couldn’t even pick our dates out of the pack from that distance. After a few plays, Carolyn, squinting at the tiny players below asked in her southern drawl, “How can that California player catch passes with those long black gloves on?” There were some snickers from a few people close to us and I realized that it was the player that was black, not gloves.
We had never seen a black football player in the South.
I ended up moving to a small rural town in Tennessee the first year the schools were integrated. But for quite a while, that’s all that were integrated. Now, one of my doctors is African American and his wife and I attend the same bible study. She and her husband are planning on adding on to their home and are considering hiring my architect husband. And the owner of the local radio station where my son is News Director is also African American.
Everywhere I go in town there are mixed marriages and multi-racial families. Like everything else, neighborhoods are integrated. And this has happened in one life time.
And yes, there is still prejudice and racial tension in America, but thanks to Martin Luther King, we have come a very very long way.
FREE on Amazon! DO NOT WASH HANDS IN PLATES. Maybe it’s a sign? #travel #humor #memoir
Wonderful!
I admit it. I don’t get Amazon. Why is this free?
In their infinitely mysterious wisdom, Amazon has lowered the price of DO NOT WASH HANDS IN PLATES down to well…nothing. Nada. Zilch. No moola.
Click on image for preview, reviews, and FREE book on Amazon!
Ours not to reason why, but instead to haul over there and get that free copy before Amazon figures out their mistake. And I’ll need to get moving on getting the next book in the series out there. Look for it in December! Meanwhile—what are you waiting for? Get your FREE copy here.
And to celebrate, here is another freebie—a preview of our next travel book!
Signs, signs, everywhere the signs…
[If you’re old enough to remember Five Man Electric Band from early ’70s, I apologize for the Signs earworm. The rest of you are safe.]
When I travel, I realize how much I depend on signs. Here are a few…
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Sex and Jelly Doughnuts or the Face and Voice of God? That is the Question.
It’s easy to lose sight of God in our lives and when we do, we become vulnerable to idols. These days an idol isn’t a golden calf, it’s anything we become dependent on, other than God. In the book of Jeremiah, God warns that not only will we suffer if we choose worldly idols, but so will our children and even our grandchildren. That part about grandchildren really gets me where I live. Though I don’t hear this as punishment, but rather as a natural consequence. So, let’s consider some modern worldly idols.
A very popular idol is pleasure, which isn’t bad in itself, only when we turn to it instead of God. Pleasures we turn to when feeling insecure or unhappy can vary from sex to jelly doughnuts, but if they become a dependency they lead to adultery or diabetes or other equally bad consequences.
Another potential idol is financial affluence and while there’s nothing wrong with being successful, it can grow into a need that becomes the focus of our lives to the point of destroying our relationships.
An even sneakier idol is an attachment to social acceptance that leads us to surround ourselves only with people just like ourselves, which not only gives us a warped view of the world, but isolates us from those in greater need.
How can we protect ourselves from idols? It’s a discombobulating world and sometimes I feel like the child of Christian friends, who when told to wash his hands muttered: “Germs and Jesus, germs and Jesus! That’s all I hear about around here and I can’t see either one!”
One thing that helps me, I call putting on “God Glasses.” That means consciously working to see God in everything. Surprisingly, the beginning step can even come through finding God in the hard things.
When heart break or pain has kept me awake all night, the first glimpse of morning light coming through the window often brought relief. Recently, after finally getting over several weeks of insomnia from the pain of a broken shoulder, I would wake up momentarily at sunrise each morning remembering that feeling of relief and thanking God with quiet joy that morning had come again and yesterday’s sorrows were behind.
Ever since an ice storm left us without hot water for eighteen days some twenty years ago, whenever I feel that first marvelous spray of a hot shower, I treasure it for a few moments while thanking God profusely.
Some months ago, our hearts were heavy when a beloved grandchild stopped chatting and smiling because she sensed family conflict. Last weekend, she kept me awake once again cheerfully chatting about her favorite books and beamed with glee at trouncing Granddad at UNO. Now, as I go to sleep each night, I cup those memories in my heart with tears of joy and thank God.
Please, while you can still hear birdsong, stop and listen with your heart and thank God for it. Thank God not only for flowers, but the strength to water them and even to cut the grass. Thank God for the joy of that first taste of morning coffee or tea. Age can take all these away from you. Enjoy them now and let them bring you to God. Thank God for faith to pray. What a wondrous gift that is. And definitely thank God for laughter, which will be your saving grace in old age.
Watch, listen and thank. All these small things are the face and voice of God. And more and more you will experience the deep joy of finding Him in each moment. Joy is the most infallible sign of the presence of God. And joy trumps idols every time.
The day of my Spiritual Awakening was the day I saw, and I knew I saw, all things in God and God in all things. A quote from an unknown Author:
Longest Password
During a recent password audit by a company, it was found that an employee was using the following password: “MickeyMinniePlutoHueyLouieDeweyDonaldGoofySacramento”
When asked why she had such a long password, she rolled her eyes and said: “Hello! It has to be at least 8 characters and include at least one capital.”
You laugh, but her password was very safe!
