Change Is Hard

…but change is certain.


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Penny provides her honest review

Hey there! It’s me, Penny!

What’s that guy doing, mom?

Mom posted that Wordless Wednesday picture of me in her big yellow tent and now I hear that all of you guys want to know if I went camping! Like in a real campground, not just hanging out in the tent in my own back yard.

Tell me again why we’re here?

Mom already knows I’m not real happy being in the tent in the back yard. I’ve only made it through the night once out there. Did you know back yards have lots of noises at night? And believe it or not, when you’re in a tent you’re expected to sleep on the ground!

Did I hear something over there?

Anyway, for some crazy reason only mom knows, she decided at the last minute to book three nights at the local campground, in site 16 which apparently is her favorite site. She says that my sister Katie loved to camp there and mom has lots of great memories of them spending time together.

If I close my eyes I can pretend I’m back at home.

I get that, but I remind mom that Katie was seven when she first went camping. I won’t even be four until December. I don’t know why mom thinks I’m mature enough to sleep through all the crazy night noises that come from all directions.

I don’t really see the point of this, mother.

Plus did I tell you I can’t see outside when I’m in there, all I can do is smell stuff and hear stuff and I can’t see stuff, so I’m very much not a happy camper.

Did you hear something out there?

Mom took me over to the campground, which luckily is very close to our house, on two afternoons. The campground was nearly empty, which mom thought would play to her advantage.

Mom is delusional.

Look! Some kids drew me street art!

It was still noisy and smelly even with hardly anybody there. Why the people in a neighboring site were burning stuff in some sort of pit and I could smell it! Geeze. I barked at their fire. And at just about every other thing I smelled or heard or saw.

Let’s go see what’s over here.

I did love going on walks there. I don’t mind smells when I’m on walks, I actually like to sniff stuff while we’re walking. And there was lots of stuff to explore.

I like this site, mom. Do you know why I like it?

We went on lots of walks each day I was there. Mom thought she could make me tired enough to sleep through the night. In a tent. Right.

This is a pretty site, too.

We walked around lots of loops of mostly empty sites. I picked out a couple that I liked a lot. Mostly because they didn’t have a big yellow tent anywhere in sight on them. I didn’t like hanging out at our site. I didn’t see the point.

Can we go home now please?

I kept asking my mom if we could go home. She even fed me my dinner there hoping that would make me feel happier about being at the campground. I ate all my food and than I asked if we could please go home now.

I’m still worried, but I never pass up a meal.

The first day I was there mom thought maybe if we were in the tent I’d go to sleep. So we went to ‘bed’ at 7 p.m.!

I think I heard something.

I did sort of curl up in a few spots, but I didn’t go to sleep. Nope, no way.

I’m not closing my eyes.

And I constantly crawled back up on top of mom to ask if we could please go home now.

Seriously, mom. This just doesn’t feel right!

Eventually that first night she gave up and took me home to daddy at 8:30. Then she went back to camp without me. She said she felt very sad.

Please, mom?

The third day she was there we tried again. I went on lots of walks and connected with trails in the woods too, which I just love.

This is lots better, mom!

Mom was hoping if we did more walks I’d be happier. I was, as long as I was on a walk and not at our camp site. Certainly not in the big yellow tent!

I’m not even afraid of the noisy bathroom place!

She could tell I wasn’t happy so she took me back to daddy at 5:00 and went back to camp all by herself. She was sad again.

We’re going to have to have a discussion about this, mom.

So….yes I was at a campground. And no, I can’t say I actually camped.

I don’t know what mom sees in that big yellow tent.

Maybe next year when I’ll be four and lots more mature. Maybe then I’ll agree to spend the whole night in the tent just because I love my mom, even if I don’t really love that big yellow tent.

We’ll see. For now I’m just glad that experiment is over! I give camping a 1 out of 10. And I only gave it a 1 because mom was with me.

Let’s just stick with walks in the woods, OK mom?


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Ms. Hummingbird – a study

Last week I was sitting on the deck in early evening. I heard a hummingbird chirping in the beech tree.

There she was, sitting on a branch in between beautifully lit pinkish leaves. She was backlit too.

It seemed as if she had just finished dinner and was sitting, fat and content, in the evening sun.

She spent a lot of time itching her head…

…and staring around, up and down and over there.

She fluffed her feathers and left them wide open in the warming sun.

Her tongue came and went. I wasn’t sure if she was catching insects…

…or just practicing tongue aerobics.

She peed four times while she was there. I guess that sugar water goes right through a girl.

And after perhaps 20 minutes of sitting and enjoying the evening light she took off.

I enjoyed watching her, and took over 300 images. She’s still flitting around the feeder but I expect she’ll be gone soon. I hope I get to visit with her once more before she goes.


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Remembering 9/11

Sunday, the middle day of our beautiful 3 day holiday weekend, I took Penny to a park.

Earlier in the day I had watched my favorite television show, Sunday Morning, which was filled with stories about September 11, 2001 and the fact that this year will be the twenty-fifth anniversary of that day.

It hardly seems possible that twenty-five years have gone by. I remember the details of where I was and what I was doing when that attack happened like it was just last week.

I remember hearing it first from one of the women in my department whose teen daughter was home watching TV.

She said her daughter called and while they were talking a second plane had hit. She was watching the news. We figured it was just footage of the same plane, being shown over and over, like the news does.

We figured it was a small, private plane and a terrible accident.

As the story grew my staff became more agitated and scared. My job was to keep everybody calm.

I was calling my husband who worked nights and was home asleep. He wasn’t picking up the phone. I knew he would want to know so I kept trying. Our answering machine kept asking if I wanted to leave a message. I finally did.

I told him to turn on the TV.

One woman in my department was becoming hysterical because she couldn’t get in touch with her husband who, it turns out, worked for the federal government. By then we knew the Pentagon had been hit. I thought he was working in DC. We called someone to come and get her.

Other employees who felt they needed to be at home were allowed to go.

Back then there was no TV at work, no social media, no internet at all for us to keep up with the news but family and friends called and emailed with updates. No further work was accomplished that day.

But that was OK.

We drove home that afternoon listening to our car radios, still unable to grasp the entirety of what had happened.

And though it seems like it was yesterday, there are adults in our world today that were toddlers, babies, or not even born yet who don’t have these memories, have only the stories told to them by older folk.

I imagine it feels to them something like Pearl Harbor feels to me. I know Sunday, December 7, 1941 was important. I know it changed the world, but I don’t feel it inside of me the same way I feel September 11th.

Last Sunday as Penny and I walked around a lake, enjoying the brilliant blue sky I remembered the events of that September blue sky Tuesday morning and how it changed the world.

And I hope we never see such a thing like it again. But in my heart I know that some future generation will have it’s own moment that changes everything and they will, someday, walk and contemplate history just like we do now.


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Name this bird

As you know I have a lot of birds in my backyard. Mostly because I feed them. They are not unlike Penny in their affection for me based on their feeder fullness quotient analysis.

This week this rather cheeky yet uncertain little guy showed up.

He hopped along the deck railing, back and forth, seeming unfazed by the bird traffic all around him.

He picked at the husks of seeds left behind by previous diners.

He stared at me.

And then, eventually, he flew off.

I’m thinking he’s a juvenile red breasted grosbeak. Maybe male, given the yellowish breast? I’m using the logic that red headed woodpeckers have brown heads when they’re juveniles.

But it could be a female too, they have a yellowish cast to their chest feathers.

What do you think?


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Hey!

Penny here.

Me hanging with my dad.

Mom’s super busy and she’s not paying attention to me (par for the course lately) so I figured I’d check in with you guys.

In front of one of my gardens. Mom makes me do this every. single. morning.

Life is going along like normal around here which is to say boring. Mom says boring can be a good thing. She says I should be glad both she and daddy are home with me all the time now.

Sometimes mom and I hang out on the porch.

I suppose.

Mom tried to get me to like the pool. I did not.

She says I’m going back to school in a week or so and I better remember all the things I know and not goof off this year. She’s says we’re both gonna learn some obedience.

I’d rather spend time at Katie’s park. Or any park.

Huh. It’s about time mom learned some obedience. And I stand my ground and repeat — there better be lots of treats. And the good kind too, not just kibble from my supper. She doesn’t think I know she does that. I’m a sheltie. I know everything.

Mom and me practicing stuff at Katie’s park one evening.

Anyway, mom’s been taking me to parks and stuff. I’m not totally ignored.

At one of my parks!

But geeze…I feel like I need a real adventure!

After my Friday evening group walk at another of my parks!

Your suggestions are truly appreciated.

I’ll just catch a snooze while I wait for your ideas.

Your bored tour guide, Penny.


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Magic of watercolor

I’m working on watercolor cards for the Truck Safety Coalition’s annual Gala silent auction. They’ll be getting 3 sets of 5 cards. I’m almost finished with them, but I wanted the last card to be a watercolor of a fall oak leaf. I didn’t find anything online that I liked particularly, though I did find a great tutorial about how to paint an oak leaf.

I watched the tutorial but I wasn’t sure about freehand drawing something similar. Three oak leaves plus acorns. Maybe I could do it but it sure would be easier if I could trace around a real oak leaf. I looked out at the oak tree in my back yard. The limbs were way too high for me to grab a leaf.

I decided to think on it a bit and went to collect the garbage can from the curb since the truck had emptied it and moved on down the road. And there, beside the empty can was a bit of oak tree branch….complete with the top part of an acorn.

Like it was waiting for me. I smiled and gathered it up, rolled the garbage can behind me as I pondered how things work out.

After I took the picture of my prize I went back out to the front yard to see what other treasures might have blown off my neighbor’s oak. I found several leaves to show me colors…

…and another bunch of leaves attached to their twig, to show me how the stick part might look.

Oh…and this ginkgo leaf apparently traveled inside on the bottom of my shoe.

So I got to work. I copied a few of the leaves…

…and traced that onto a page of my practice book.

Then I got to painting.

So fun….

Now, if I can just do it again on the actual card.