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| Living in the Woods |
I love August in the northern woods. This time of year, one can literally smell
the change of seasons in the night air.
Already gone are the too-hot nights of July when I throw my windows open
and beg for a breeze off the lake to cool my bare skin as I sleep, fan humming
overhead.
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| White Pine |
The air tonight is heavy and damp with the scent of white
pine. It’s as if I can’t breathe in deeply enough. I want to soak in that scent. The tiny wisp
of cool breeze carries on it the sweet/spiciness from the huge pot of Thai
basil next to me.
I pulled a wicker chair to the railing and have propped my
feet up, reclining my head to the sky.
Though I am deep in the woods, a little clearing allows an awesome
(meant in the truest sense of the word) view of the universe above me.
Three miles distance from the dim lights of the nearest
small town allows the Milky Way to appear; a great white swath of stars laid
across the center of the sky. Utterly stunning.
I have a few times been further north and in more open areas where it is
visible, literally, from horizon to horizon. The big dipper appears huge tonight
and lies squarely in front of me, tipped slightly forward as if pouring its
contents into the lake below.
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| Minnesota's State Bird, the Common Loon |
Each year at this time, the Perseid meteor shower brings about
a week of nights when you can reliably see shooting star after shooting star. Tonight,
if I look up for just a few minutes, another star races across the horizon. Loons, calling across the lake to seemingly reassure
each other of their presence, are giving the night an even more ethereal
feel. Each night, I sit and drink
it in.
The chill in the air would be the perfect excuse to build a fire and sit
up with friends and a good bottle of wine but that will wait for another night. Tonight I will lay an extra
blanket on the bed, open the window and fall asleep to the call of loons.
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| Fire & Water |
