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| Red-headed Woodpecker - photograph - ©Bruce A. Morrison |
Of course it does! I guess I'm trying to be metaphorical...or maybe melancholy? Even I don't know. Maybe getting older has me thinking about things too much. I was so used to saying to myself things like "I've got to try and see those next July." Or maybe "We really should take that trip to (fill in the blank) next summer. I'm not quite there yet but so many things are now out of my reach - they were great ideas but now no longer in the cards. Especially things like that long hike or trek I always thought would be great to do...even some places I've long had permission to walk with my camera are beginning to be out of the question any more. If you haven't reached that place in your life, it is sobering when they confront you, and you realize fully, I shouldn't have kept putting it off. That is "life".
Lately, when I'm up to it, I have been trying very hard to take each moment and have fun with it. When I was younger, I was busy with things that seemed important. Now I know so much of it wasn't. And now, everything is (important).
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| Female Eastern Bluebird - photograph - ©Bruce A. Morrison |
We have had such a fun year with nature here on our little postage stamp sized acreage. Every day I try and watch and catch things before they pass.
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| Cottontail Rabbit...rabbits make Georgie crazy! - photograph - ©Bruce A. Morrison |
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| Echinacea angustifolia in our pasture - photograph - ©Bruce A. Morrison |
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| Pearly Crescentspot (Phyciodes tharos) - photograph - ©Bruce A. Morrison |
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| Asclepias tuberosa in the pasture here - photograph - ©Bruce A. Morrison | |
Now I haven't caught everything with the camera or easel of course...it's just not possible. But what I miss stays with us in other ways - the Yellow-billed Cuckoo which calls from high in the grove, we know its there as it sings for us each day. Then there's the Eastern Wood Pewee that we also hear each day; we do see it "fly catching" from the lower branches around the yard, but often we only hear it talk to us.
The morning chorus has been amazing. I used to try and record it with audio equipment in past years...maybe succeeded in a small way but could never do it justice! Always first seems to be the Robins, then the Catbirds and Mourning Doves, then the Chipping Sparrows and the Orioles and Meadowlarks and Dickcissels, House Wrens, and so many others...sleeping with the windows open is a blessing!
We have noticed those missing this year...we no longer hear the night time calling of Sedge Wrens, and this year no juvenile Great Horned Owls or summer Redtailed Hawks. Although the Great Blue Herons returned to the Waterman Creek rookery this spring - they abandoned the rookery in mid June and none raised their young here.
Not every year is the same..some things change, and not always as we'd wish. Although we still have our ash trees here in the acreage and in the valley out front - there are farmsteads only a 5 minute trip from us that are losing all of theirs as I speak. We are not far behind.
But I will try and take in and enjoy in any way I can what is given to us each day as it happens...each day is a gift! There is so much to see and do and July only comes once a year.
