SIMPLE THINGS

Hello blog readers. Just a short note reminding everyone to stop and smell the roses out there!! We're gearing up the start of the holiday season (Halloween is next week!!) and all the stress that is involved, never mind the winter season and all the illness that goes with that. Slow down and enjoy your lives.

This weekend, the first half, I spent with a couple of the Elders for an enjoyable urban night out and then Saturday afternoon I journeyed to our country house to spend some time with Papa who is out there every weekend no matter what.

I must admit, I also get re-energized after time in the country. Especially when the weather is beautiful and with the beginning of fall and all the sights and sounds that's involved in the change of season. Sights and SOUNDS. Yep, everyone thinks....country equals peace and quiet but after being out there for the past 8+ years, I can tell you the country is no quiet place.

In the early spring, we have the frogs that start their symphony in the ponds across the road. Then the birds return and there are some mornings I feel like yelling out the window for everyone to just shut up! Most of the summer is the buzzing of insects of one sort or another and then the cicadas come in with their noisemakers toward August and then the geese flying through on their way south this time of year. So if you are looking for peace and QUIET in the country, I suggest you journey there after the snow has fallen....then it's quiet!

Not that I'm complaining about these sounds. There are some mornings that are quite deafening but it does beat the sound of traffic and sirens. But as usual, I've drifted off on another tangent. The simple things.....it seems like they are easier to spot and enjoy more on my country weekends.

Saturday evening Papa and I went on our usual 2 mile walk up the gravel road with Snoopy the dog (LOL---even she has a fictitious name!) A mile down the road, one of the farmers has been working several years building a huge lake. We were alarmed at first, because we thought a development might be the next thing to come in around the lake, but it seems that he just wanted a big lake in the middle of his farm fields.

As we are walking along, enjoying the evening, watching the prerequisite deer that cross the road and Snoopy chases, we start hearing this thunderous noise. Geese....several long V's of geese and then the stragglers in straight lines and more V's. And they are all quacking and carrying on as they flew over our heads; all headed to the new lake. Geese are quite loud when they are in the country, flying low, and there were so many of them. Papa and I both stopped walking and just looked up for several minutes watching them fly over and they were carrying on so, we couldn't help but laugh at them. I could just imagine them as a huge party group of people meeting for the night; they're all laughing and talking and having fun and you can't get a word in edgewise because they are all talking at the same time. Loud, boisterous geese-people! (Yeah, I've watched too many Disney cartoons in my lifetime!)

They all finally landed on the water and we continued our walk home through the sunset but we had big smiles on our faces put there by the geese-party people and were almost envying them their big fun night on the lake.

Grammy says---get out in the country sometime this fall and see and HEAR what's going on.