Category Archives: nature

Walking in 2012

nature, winter


I don’t take walks by myself anymore. At least, I didn’t for a long time, but maybe that is changing. Yesterday I asked Mr. Glad if he would like to go for a walk, and he quickly answered, “No, you should go for a walk; I am going for a bike ride; and it’s going to be dark soon.”

“But I don’t want to take a walk by myself,” I whined.

“Just do it,” he said simply and authoritatively. “You need to get outside.” I had been away from the house a lot over the last few days — in church, in our church’s new hall setting up our new bookstore, in church again…but out of doors very little.

Oh, why not? I thought, why not just follow my husband’s advice, go for a walk by myself, and start two new trends in 2012? Some time in the last few years I got impatient with walking alone. I don’t like exercise for its own sake; I’m lazy in that department. Walking is time-consuming, and if I walk on the treadmill at the gym I can get a better workout while distracting myself with interesting articles in magazines at the same time.

My memory was not serving me well, I discovered as I set off down the street and on to the bike-and-walking path two blocks away. Walking all by one’s lonesome in the outdoors can serve many purposes, if Getting Things Done is the aim.

I didn’t have my camera last evening, which caused me to remember right away why I don’t burn so many calories when no one is along to keep me moving: I want to stop all too often to examine a flower or new redwood needles, and often to delve more deeply and longer by looking through a lens in order to get another slant.

On this, my first solitary walk of a new year, I particularly noticed the thickly blooming berries on the shrubs that the city must have planted long ago. Every Christmas for 20 years various ones of our family have come here to snip a few branches for decorating the house. Even last week — oops, the week before that — Pearl had taken her children on a walk and returned with a bag full of cedar and redwood branches, and many sprays of berries.

Because I didn’t have my camera, I walked very fast and came home in about 15 minutes, grabbed my pruners and a bag and walked right back to the path. I carried home several branches, and re-supplied some of my tabletop displays with fresh berries to get us through Theophany.

Today my husband and I took a walk together, into the center of town to Starbucks and back — one of our new jaunts together since he retired recently. Later I went by myself once more, down to the path along the creek to snap some photos of those berries that are so striking in the winter.

As I set off I realized that what had seemed like a good use of my time, avoiding these more leisurely walks, has been a missed opportunity. When walking “alone” one is never alone, because God is everywhere present. There are the trees and bushes, the sky and the birds and sometimes friendly strangers walking often beautiful dogs.

The “distractions” of nature and real people are not nearly as diverting from prayer as what I do at the gym, and my strenuous indoor workout turns out to be no substitute for the much more soul-profiting outing that I can otherwise get — and I don’t even have to drive the car.

Whether I’m happy or sad, it’s almost impossible to go walking without remembering my Divine Companion at least part of the time, talking to and listening to Him. I’m thanking God for giving me the idea for one more way to avoid the winter blues.

Kinfolk in November

family, grandchildren, nature, travel


The only theme that I can find in the photos I took this week is family togetherness, but the California weather was mild enough that I could add some shots of the various natural settings in which we happily congregated.

Many of us gathered at Pippin’s place in the woods — the resident deer clan showed up, too, and were gifted with potato peelings and runty pears for their Thanksgiving dinner. They also ate a quantity of willow leaves, sometimes from the patio table.

 

 

Snow had fallen Wednesday night and creatures were storing up for the winter, whether in fat or food or bedding. Pippin called me to the window once to see a squirrel chewing off grass and stuffing it into his mouth. Clumps of grass stuck way out on either side of his fat cheeks even after he rearranged it so as to fit more in.

He looked over our way and when he saw us staring he stopped work and stared right back for a minute, then figured he had enough for that trip and disappeared around a tree.


Arriving a day early meant that I had time to help bake pumpkin pies and read Sunset magazine to Scout.

Mr. Glad had put out a call for people to bring table games, and Soldier brought Jenga. While the pies were smelling up the house real nice I showed the little boy how to play and he immediately learned how to at least look like a serious contender.

When Pathfinder’s group arrived Annie played the piano, and after dinner they revealed the darling candy-and-cookie turkey craft that they wanted to show the littlest cousin.

 

It really was a lovely and relaxed afternoon and evening, with plenty of time for various groups of cousins and uncles to play several games, listen to 49ers football, and scatter the deer when they went out back to throw the football themselves.

We ate pies baked by four different people for supper, and sang “O God Our Help in Ages Past” before we had to say good-bye by passing around kisses and hugs. Four of the Glad Children had been able to come and take this rare opportunity, along with a couple of spouses and five grandchildren.

The next morning we brought Kate and her friend home with us for a couple more days, driving through the patchwork of orange and brown in the Napa Valley vineyards on our way. Kate and Mr. G. listened to each other’s iPod collections and I took the wheel for the windiest stretch of road so that I wouldn’t get carsick.

Today we took them wine-tasting in another valley, where the scenery was rich and the weather was warm enough for us to sit outside for lunch. Strange, though, how the vines in my best photo from today have barely started to turn color.

This picture might make you think it’s all tropical here. But the sun was slanted and we didn’t feel exactly toasty. I was glad to come home and build a good hot fire against the cold. Its warmth is a better metaphor right now for the kind of love that binds our very God-blessed family.

Big Sur

nature, travel, , , , , ,

 

Mouth of Big Sur R. – Andrew Molera Park

Many years ago at the spot in this first photo, Mr. Glad and I watched a group of waterbirds playing. We were having a weekend at Big Sur to celebrate a wedding anniversary.

Here the Big Sur River flows into the Pacific Ocean on California’s central coast. On that day in March way back then, the birds would float down the riffles of the river, then fly back up to the jumping-in place and wait in line behind their fellows until their turn came; jump in, float down, fly back up, over and over. We watched them a long time, and they were still at it when we left.

This week we had made the trip to see family and friends. It was a very short visit, but we managed to take in aspects of both Andrew Molera State Park and Soberanes Canyon.

The Big Sur area features such a profusion of plant forms, not to mention the animal life that I mostly ignore, that it is easy to understand why so many people want to live there where the ocean and trees and flowers make a dramatic but not agitating backdrop for solitude.

Everywhere we went for three days, the air was thick with the aromas of a casserole of natural ingredients, seaweed and sagebrush, redwoods and damp soil, a thousand essential oils in microscopic droplets bombarding my senses and reminding me that I should get out into the woods and the fields more often just to inhale this kind of nourishment.

If I did live near Big Sur, I’d want to go regularly to Soberanes Canyon, where the plant forms overlap in an unlikely and seemingly chaotic way.

Old cactus with baby on Soberanes Canyon Trail

I’ve never before seen redwood sorrel and poison oak growing together, or ferns next to cactus. Those are the most surprising things that jumped out at me, but if I went every month or so along the same canyon trail, other wildflowers or shrubs might eventually get my attention with the changing seasons and blooms. Whether I saw a scene or a tiny part of it in mist or sunshine would also make a difference.

Redwood sorrel with poison oak and nettles

This is a coastal steppe zone, my guide and son told me. The cactus were old and weather-beaten, some of their trunks resembling thick board platforms, but still producing new and fresh green sprouts.

one of the smaller lupines

Venerable lupine “trees” five feet across stood alongside the trail, with trunks four inches in diameter, still blooming mid-October.

Only a couple of minutes up from Highway 1, the trail takes you through dry hills with spreads of cactus all around. We got hot and sweaty pretty quickly, as it was mid-afternoon on what was probably the hottest fall day, but we didn’t grumble, being quite glad that the usual fog wasn’t dampening our spirits.

Soberanes Creek

Before we knew it, we were descending to the creek, stands of tall, thick redwoods and carpets of sorrel, and after twenty paces the temperature had dropped ten degrees.

At the base of one of those huge specimens of Sequoia sempervirens, Mr. G pointed out to us the sponginess of the ground. It was not dirt, but many inches – or feet? – of redwood needles, making a duff that we all took turns bouncing on before we went on down the grade and back to our car.

I just love the way the Father creates these playgrounds for the delight of His children.

 

Looking and Sniffing Around

my garden, nature, , , ,

runner ducks

The rain brought out the good smells of the earth and plants, like the junipers lining the broad sidewalk along which Pippin and I walked for a long time yesterday. We were on our way to the park so that Scout could feed the ducks. Dozens of ducks, geese and even some coots came to sample our bread — but I focused eventually on the backs of the geese, and dreamed of a skirt in those colors and patterns.

More species of birds live by the lake and sleep on the lawns than last time I was here. Even runner ducks, and several types of geese in addition to the Canada geese, who were not interested in us at all.

I loved these khaki-colored guys with their topknots.

pimiento pepper

After we got home, Pippin looked out the window and said, “Oh, you have a phoebe!” I was so excited to hear that, but it took me a while to see the little bird on the fence after it was pointed out to me, and not just because I wasn’t wearing my glasses. If a large goose gets in my face the way they did at the park, I notice them, but otherwise the details of my environment have to be fairly stationary if they are going to get my attention.

This morning I went out to take photos of the wet and more stationary garden. Quite a few pimientos are ripe red now, and I’ll be snapping them off soon to roast over the gas flame of the stove.

In the front yard the verbena is still blooming away, and contrasts nicely with the variegated leaves of the shrub whose name I can’t remember right now.

Cécile Brunner

The mister and I are Glad that our nest will be ready against the winter cold: At this very moment a man is installing a brand new furnace in the garage, and yesterday we laid in a supply of oak firewood. Those logs make for another yummy scent of Fall. Stay warm, Everyone!