Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Signs of the Season













A beautiful morning today in the village of Raquette Lake. The colors are changing a lot in certain places. It seems early, but a careful assessment proves otherwise. The maples are still in their summer coats. The changes seem mostly related to the wetland trees. There is a really nice little pond right on Rt. 28 near the village. I've done a few simple things there over the years, but today I was determined to dig into it a little. Today I was captured by the subtle variations in the earth-tone colors of the trees bordering the pond. The image I made looks like chaos at first, but there is a definite simple structure and the more I look at it the more I see. I'll look at it again six months from now and decide whether I really like it or not!

Monday, September 12, 2011

Driving Through The Woods

Beautiful weather today once the morning blah burned off. I couldn't resist taking my new car into Moose River Recreation Area. It's been so long since I've had a car that can go in there without my being on edge the whole time. So long in fact that the D.E.C. has since closed my favorite road in the area, toward Muskrat Pond and Squaw Lake, one of the most beautiful remote trails in the Adirondacks. It still makes me sad.

Today was all about checking out what's changed, stopping along the way to walk down to the various streams, clear my head. It didn't take long for me to be reminded why I love northern forest so much. Nothing smells like the north woods.

This being a weekday, the Otter Brook campsite was unoccupied. A great place for me to plop down my camp chair and finish a book. Sure wish I would have brought my tent...

Finally

Misty, rainy, Seventh Lake Mountain
Got up to meet the sunrise today. At least that was the plan. It wasn't obvious to me when the sun actually came up. So my first morning here is a gray one. But that's OK. Anything here is better than a nice day anywhere else!

Goal #1: Take a photo of something. Anything. Just get started.

Mission accomplished. It's not much, but I saw, I heard, I smelled the Adirondacks again.

I find myself wishing I could share it with someone...

Saturday, September 10, 2011

Looking Forward

I was supposed to be on the road today. Figured I'd get up at 5:00 AM, pack the car, and head to Inlet for my fall season. That plan went to hell when the torrential downpour (that lasted an hour!) and lightning storm began at 4:45. As I lay in bed it occurred to me that I could stay here one more day and get a head start on my materials for the next two workshops. So here I am...

I came across this poem by Mary Oliver last night. It reminded me immediately of Nancy Rotenberg. It also makes me ponder my own uncertain future. It is a wake-up call to us in our muddling through life...


The Summer Day
By Mary Oliver

Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean –
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down –
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?