Change Is Hard

…but change is certain.

Category Archives: fun stuff


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Life lessons learned from water-skiing

When I was a kid we lived on a largish inland lake and we’d go water-skiing most summer evenings after Dad got home from work.  We had a little blue boat with a 35 horse power outboard engine and all four of us plus Dad and sometimes Mom would pile in the boat along with our skis and life vests, towels and other debris.  We’d ski till it got dark, then we’d head home exhausted, sopping wet and very happy.

Lots of time has passed, I haven’t lived on a lake in thirty years and now if I’m lucky I might ski once a year.  Sometimes not even that.  It has become more intimidating, less familiar and much scarier to try.  When I was a teenager I could stand on one foot ankle deep in the water, ski on the other foot resting on the surface, yell “hit it!” and pop up behind the boat with no problem.  I’d land back at the same beach barely damp.

Now we ski in deep water and I struggle to get the unfamiliar ski on my foot as the life jacket floats up around my ears and the ski rope slides by behind me and the boat idles as everyone waits on me to get ready.  I panic a bit as the line pulls taut and I’m not at all sure I’m going to be able to heft my larger self out of the water.  Different boat.  Different ski.  Different me.

This week I went skiing with one of my brothers.  I was kind of afraid to try, sure that I wouldn’t be able to get up, but it was just him and me, and the water was a sheet of glass, what we used to call “water-ski water” when we were young.  So I decided it would never again be a better time to try.  Into the water I went, but two attempts later I couldn’t get myself up.

Lucky my brother is ingenious and he gave me a different, flatter, less competitive ski.  Part of me rebelled because I had always been able to use the fancy competitive ski, but part of me was resigned to accept the changes in me that meant I was less athletic.  And of course part of me thought that if I couldn’t get up on this “beginner” ski, well… I won’t go there.   But even though I was tired from being dragged twice along behind the boat, I tried a third time.  And guess what?  YES!  I popped right up! *

It was magical.  Nothing but flat water, mountains and clouds reflected as if in a  mirror, nobody else out there but us.  It’s as close as I’ll ever get to flying like a bird.  You float effortlessly through the images of trees and clouds, soaring across the water toward freedom.  It’s a feeling that is almost indescribable. 

So here’s the lesson to be learned from water-skiing:

Sometimes if you just hang on you can fly.  And sometimes you have to let go in order to regain your freedom.   The feeling can’t be bought;  if you find yourself in a position to experience it – do it.

Even if you’re really really afraid.

*disclaimer:  these aren’t pictures of ME skiing, these are my two brothers who went skiing on a previous day this week.  It’s so much fun to watch them!  And I had my camera on a stupid low resolution and didn’t realize it…so they’re grainy…but you get the idea…right?  🙂


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DUCK! Literally…

Just a funny…

My brother and I were what we call “bobbing” last evening off the end of our dock.  Bobbing is sitting on a flotation device, up to our shoulders in water, chatting about stuff.   We’ve noticed a female mallard duck that seems to be quite the popular lady with the male ducks; they chase her all around our little section of the lake.  Last night as P and I were bobbing the female started flying, low and fast across the water, a mallard in hot pursuit.  I saw her coming out of the corner of my eye and yelled “DUCK!  Literally!” at my brother just as they flew past inches above our head.

So cool and so funny all at the same time!


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Into the "jungle"

This week my brother and I took the canoe up to the end of our slough.  A creek feeds into the lake there,  winding it’s way  through cyprus trees and grasses, then on back into the hills.

Want to come along?  Here we go!

I loved the shapes of the cyprus tree trunks…and the reflections.

It was fascinating how the dappled light played along the water and the trunks.

When we were inside a circle of cyprus trees I imagined what a great camp site this would be. – till I remembered that I was floating on 3 feet of water.

Then we paddled further upstream.

The creek began to narrow…

…and there were more branches overhead and below the surface.  We were taking lots of pictures…

…and we realized it was dark enough in there that our flash would go off.  Hmmm….wonder what that would look like?

The photo above is of grape vine roots.  The vine is above and the roots have grown down to the creek.  They didn’t show up well till I used the flash.  Very cool!  And even more spooky looking!

Now Diana, I know what you’re thinking…”there could be snakes in there!”  And you’d be right, but we didn’t see any, and trust me I was looking!

Eventually we couldn’t go any further upstream, so we edged ourselves around.  The trip downstream went much faster, as I had already broken through all the spider webs! LOL

Back through the cyprus trees,

with a look at their seedpods…

…and back out into the open water…complete with sunshine!

It was a really fun adventure, and reminded me of a time several years ago when the same brother and I paddled up another creek on this lake, but we did it after dark.  With no lights shining.  The sounds of the bugs (and tigers and grizzly bears and monsters) were SO LOUD I was totally freaked out and finally, even after my brother told me not to, turned on my flashlight to realize there was nothing there.  No giant snake ready to drop from the trees, no scary bug weighing at least 10 pounds ready to fly in my face!  I still laugh (sort of) when I think of that adventure.  This one was much more sedate.

But then – we’re much older now.


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Celebrating

I celebrated the 4th down here in Alabama with family and friends.  And a whole lot of boating, swimming and eating.

When we were kids we lived on a small inland lake and always took our boat out to watch the fireworks the city was shooting off from the boat launch.  We’d pull into that bay and watch all the action directly overhead.  Sometimes bits of burned out fireworks would fall sizzling into the water nearby.  It was a wonderful way to spend a late evening, and I was always sad in later years that I  couldn’t watch fireworks with my family bobbing in a little boat, covered in bug spray, sweating slightly in the warm, humid Michigan night.

Well last year and again this year I got to watch fireworks from a boat filled with family and friends!

It’s just the best way to enjoy them.  Saturday night we were in my brother’s big boat on a big lake and along side of us are at least 1,000 other boats, bobbing peacefully in the evening sunset filled light.  As darkness sets in the crowd settled back and we all enjoyed the amazing colors and loud bangs of a first class firework show.  We munched on homemade salsa from my sister and smoked chicken tenders that my brother made.  What a life!

The next morning we took the boat out again, this time to watch the annual jet ski parade on the lake.  This year close to 50 jet skis, most decked out with flags and red, white and blue tinsel, gathered near an island, then took off in single file to run the entire circumference of the lake.

It was sort of heart stopping when they all took off, and in an odd sort of way it made you tear up when the long line of people proudly flying their flags roared past.

My sister was standing in the back of our boat playing patriotic songs on her bagpipe as they flew by and the jet ski drivers waved and grinned back at us.   I was grinning too, at the absurdity and beauty of it all.

After the last buzzing jet ski was long gone up the shoreline, we moseyed over to the “church island.”  It was, after all, Sunday the 4th, and there was going to be a preacher doing a church service there.  Every Sunday boats anchor off shore while a minister or preacher provide a service from the island.  This Sunday I listed while floating with my family in the cool lake water, boats bobbing all around, the sound of music and prayer filling the air.

Sunshine, flags, blue skies, music, good food, family.  Can’t think of anything else I need right now.

Well…maybe my husband and my Katie girl.


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An afternoon on another lake

Yesterday I popped over to my other brother’s lake house.  It was a cloudy day, but when one is visiting a lake, one must take a boat ride!

We stopped at a friend of his who also lives on the lake (visiting by boat…how fun!) and got to meet her dog.  Such a cutie!

The clouds were dark and ominous, but it only sprinkled a little bit.

All in all, a refreshing afternoon out on the water!  Maybe the next time I visit I’ll take out his rowing scull.  But the lake would have to be a bit smoother for that!
Just another relaxing day in the south…


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Not in Michigan anymore

My trip south went well.   We loaded up the truck and off I went.

I took two days, stopped often and enjoyed the scenery.  First there were the flat farmlands of Ohio…

…then the hill country of Ohio’s southeastern edge. ..

…which is where I set up camp for the first night, on the banks of Lake Lowell in the Hocking Hills.

It was a peaceful and small private campground, and I was the only one there on the edge of the lake.  I enjoyed the sunset and watching a blue heron fishing in the lake.

I messed around with the camera some, for something to do…because it was way too early to go to bed in my little tent.

In the morning I enjoyed the quiet mist on the lake…

Then I packed up my tent, which looked  sad  before I folded it up.  I was sad too, this had been a lovely little campsite, and I hated to leave.

Then it was on into the mountains with lots of winding freeway in West Virginia and Virginia…

…until I finally arrived, load still in the back of the truck…at my brother’s house in North Carolina.

I knew I was in the South when I saw the crepe myrtle in bloom.

Today we walked into town to the farmer’s market and around Davidson College…if I get time I’ll share those pictures with you later!  Hope you’re all having a wonderful weekend!  It’s HOT here, but we’re sitting down to lunch of sweet corn and fresh tomatoes, purchased locally.  Can’t wait…gotta go!


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Just gotta get on the road again

I’ll be heading south later this week, hauling some stuff down for my siblings.  I’ll probably head for North Carolina first, drop off a dresser to a brother, then on to Georgia where I’ll drop off more things to my sister, then skip over to Alabama, visit another brother and finally get all the way over to the big lake and my parents’ cabin.

I have to find windows of good weather, and Thursday looks like my opportunity.

That will mean Katie misses her agility class..but I promise to take her again when the next class starts up.  She’s still a lucky girl, because her Dad is going to stay home with her so she doesn’t have to go to a kennel.  She’ll miss her mama, but not that much.  Silly girl.


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Another park

The advantage of not having a job (No I haven’t heard anything good or bad yet on the last set of interviews) is that I get to go to the park more often.  Today I told Katie that I was bored with our little local park, so we went out to my favorite park, the one I used to run in each week –  Kensington –  which is about 30 minutes away.  It has an 8 mile bike/walk trail around a big beautiful lake.  Katie and I didn’t walk all 8 miles, but we did do a total of 2.5!

The black raspberries are getting ripe, and in fact I got to taste one or two.  Yummy!

Mostly we just ambled along until we got to the boardwalk that runs above one piece of lake shore.  Katie wasn’t so sure she liked it, there wasn’t anything interesting to sniff on the edges, like there had been on the path.  And there wasn’t any shade either!  But on our outward trip she trotted right along after she checked the edge just to make sure everything was safe.

Since she was doing so well I planned on going about a mile and a half where I knew there was a bench overlooking the water.  But just before that bench is a bridge across a channel.  It has a wooden deck that moves and makes noise as people ride bikes across it.  And of course just as we got there a whole family of bike riders went by.  The noise spooked Katie a bit, that and being “inside” something.  Then a semi went by on the nearby freeway, running over a joint with multiple wheels, sounding like a nailgun.  She jumped and headed back the way we had come.  That’s OK sweetie, I don’t always like semi’s either!

On the way back to the car we moved slower.  She was getting hot, notice the sideways tongue.

Every time we stopped for a drink (often) I’d pour the remainder that she didn’t finish over her head and back and rub it in.  We sat in the shade at the bottom of our last long uphill and watched people go by, families, individuals, runners, people on bikes, people skating.  She didn’t bark at anyone.  Sometimes a tired doggie is a good doggie!

And she slept most of the way home.  No surprise there!


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Agility review

Another Thursday…another agility class for Katie and me.  Again this week I skipped the Rally class held on Thursday mornings so that I didn’t overtax the Sheltie brain.  Plus I had a ton of garden related stuff to do and it was a beautiful day.   But I’ll blame the Sheltie brain for the missed class just the same.

Again our class was split into two groups, those with more experience (not us!) went over to the other side and worked on contacts.  The rest of us got to start with teeter first.  UGH.  Last time we started with teeter Katie got tired of the game and shut down.  Of course the Sheltie brain had forgotten that, while the human brain tends to dwell on the potential negative outcomes.  So I looked at my dog and decided to assume she’d do whatever I asked.  And when it was our turn she trotted right up that teeter, instructor holding her leash, right out to the end as it gently landed on a couple of stacked up milk crates and got her “Good GIRL!” and treat, then stayed there while I walked a step or two and then jumped off when I released her.  YEA KATIE!!  And it was like that every time, she was pulling on her leash to head up that teeter whenever it was our turn.

But the chute?  What the heck is that Mom?  I’m not going in there!  It’s RED!  MY chute is BLUE!  This is an EVIL CHUTE!  OK.  I’ll go in the tunnel part, but as soon as you’re not looking I’m getting back out of it!  Yes siree!  I am NOT GOING IN THERE AND YOU CAN’T MAKE ME!

In fact when we tried to put together a string of stuff, double jump, send to tunnel, weaves, chute, she bypassed the chute and as I was talking to the instructor about how to get her to do the chute she ran off and did the teeter by herself, with NO MILK CRATES to break the teeter’s fall!!  Behind my back!    I ran over there and rewarded her, she was standing 2o2o looking over her shoulder wondering where the heck I was.  Silly girl, you wear me out!

Then we switched sides and our group did contacts.  We started with them jumping on the table to get to the downside of the dogwalk, then tossed a treat onto a paper plate at the bottoms so the dogs would pause, eat the treat, and then get released.  She did it perfectly every time.  “Don’t need no stinking table mom, I LOVE the dogwalk!”  When we finally got to run the whole dogwalk she was thrilled, charging up and over it, and even stopping at the bottom for her praise and treat!  I was so proud of her.

Her reward, at least in her mind, was that we did A-Frame next and she LOOOOOVES the A-Frame!  Though it wasn’t always this way, now whenever she sees it she tugs to run up and over it, so when we got to actually run it a couple of times she was in heaven.  Contacts?  No problem as long as she got a treat.

So at the end we put the two sides together.  Tire, dogwalk, weaves, curved tunnel, A-Frame, jump, double jump, tunnel, weaves, chute, teeter.  Piece of cake, right?  Well, we haven’t practiced tire in a long time.  It was hot.  We’d been there almost an hour.  Katie was getting squirrely.  We had to wait for all the big dogs to go first.  Enough excuses.  She refused to do tire.  It was already after the class hour, and the next class was waiting to start, so after three attempts I just kept going.  She charged for the dogwalk, ran through the weaves, shot through the tunnel, flung herself up and over the A-frame, stopped at the bottom, I said good girl! and kept running, yelling “JUMP.!”  She did not.   I turned to see where she was and she was SITTING at the bottom of the A-Frame looking at me.  “Treat Mom?  Where’s my TREAT!?!?!  I am NOT MOVING until you give me my TREAT!”  So I did (probably the wrong thing to do) and we moved on to jumps and tunnel and weaves and were running full tilt at the chute!  She ran into it!  She got 3/4 of the way through it, I’m yelling “CHUTE!  GOOD GIRL KATIE!  CHUTE!” and she turns around and runs out of it, runs all the way across the ring and out the ring and into the kitchen.

SIGH.

I went and got her and told her she was a good girl and we tried chute once more, no go, then we did teeter for the treats and that was the end of class.

For the most part she had a really good time and so did I.  In the end that’s all that matters.  The fact that she has a chute at home that she runs through with no problem is something I won’t think about right now.