Melancholy seeps in. Sometimes I try to reason it away or wrestle it to the ground. This time I decide to take it for a walk at a local forest preserve. A place that lends perspective as crushed gravel crunches rhythmically under my boots. I note nests high in the...
Sometimes hiking is like a dream. Yesterday was one of those days. Few people were on the trail; that alone was surreal, especially on a warm spring day. Beauty and surprise were abundant. I was walking along the River Trail near LaSalle Canyon. The mighty Illinois...
It was cold but sunny, the perfect morning to wander around Matthiessen. Tonight is the Equinox, the beginning of Spring. A time of balance, night and day are the same length; Yin equals Yang. This hike is a quest to find Spring, I thought. I laughed and shivered....
Recent hikes in the Shawnee National Forest inspired me to research critters I was unfamiliar with; bobcats, rattlesnakes and copperheads. The process led me to consider fear in general. We are afraid of things we don’t understand, right? In theory, education will...
Every February, I long to get away. This year, I took time off work, so I would go, no matter what. I wanted to visit somewhere warm, which didn’t happen, mainly because I couldn’t coordinate it. Last week, I impulsively chose Shawnee National Forest over Hocking...
It was cold, but the snow had stopped, and there wasn’t more forecast. I love the snow. It will only get colder, I reasoned. It was decided. I bundled up and went to a small local forest preserve early Sunday morning. It sure WAS cold. I’ve gained a little weight...
I saw my daughter’s sweet face in a dream and smiled. Other images of her followed, dancing and twirling until my heart felt like it would explode with joy. The vision suddenly shattered and settled, spreading out, arranging itself like a Gustav Klimt painting, tiny...
I always had a studio to paint or build things in, but I let that part of my life slip away as I busied myself with graduate school and building an acupuncture practice. When the pressure from those things eased, I sewed costumes for the Ren Faire, took pictures and...
The soft wail of a train, the familiar rumble, the rhythm as metal met metal, this sorrowful, distant music pulled me from sleep. It was still dark, but I remembered the sunny creek from yesterday. Swiftly moving icy water spilled loudly over the rocky bottom. It sang...
I went to Nature seeking answers; she is always generous. I was looking for my 2023 word, the word by which I’d measure all things, a sort of rudder, my version of a New Year’s Resolution. I thought the verb “muse” might be perfect. I liked the pondering meaning of...
