“I want a word that means okay and not okay. More than that: a word that means devastated and stunned with joy. I want the word that says I feel it all, all at once.” - Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer, “For When People Ask”

Hello friends! I can’t believe we’re already at the end of September! I’m starting to see a few more migrants each morning, like ospreys and gulls. I notice the birds I’m not hearing anymore, like orioles and even the big group of eastern kingbirds that seemed like they would stay forever.

Here are my photo choices for today:

May the truly important things bubble up in our awareness this week - like kindness, beauty, and wonder.

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“The ideals which have lighted my way, and time after time have given me new courage to face life cheerfully, have been Kindness, Beauty, and Truth.” - Albert Einstein

Hello friends! As I mentioned on Friday, I am taking a class this weekend, so today’s post is photo-centric. If the forecast is to be believed, it looks like it will be a rainy week. I’m glad I found a rain cover that fits the new camera!

Here are my photo choices for today:

May the week ahead bring greater ease wherever you most need it.

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“Darling, you feel heavy because you are too full of truth. Open your mouth more. Let the truth exist somewhere other than inside your body.” - Della Hicks-Wilson

Hello friends! Feeling a little scrambled making my way towards this weekend. I’m taking a class this weekend, so I'm expecting Sunday’s post to be “just photos”, lol, as if you all will mind. :) I love you guys so much and I’m so grateful you are here!

Here are my photo choices for today:

May pleasure seep its way into everything you do this weekend.

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“Listen deeply enough to be changed by what you hear.” - Hal Saunders.

Hello friends! The cold front finally arrived, and it feels like such a blessing after one of the hottest Septembers on record. North winds are expected to continue, and I think I might have to break out a light jacket later this week. Fall feels good!

Here are my photo choices for today:

Wishing you many moments of beauty in your week.

September. Night and day in nearly equal length. Sunrise time is perfect, in my opinion, but it doesn’t stay in this sweet spot long. Fall is trying to displace summer, but so far summer isn’t having it. Maybe this week?

Hummingbirds are still chasing each other around the feeder and enjoying the last blooms of the cuphea and salvia I planted for them. Females seem to get more turns at the feeder as the males disappear.

Over the lake, a handful of ring-billed gulls seem to have become regulars. I've seen an osprey or two diving. I heard a Caspian tern, but it never came close enough to say hello.

Turkey vultures have gathered in large numbers, forming a giant preschool I suspect will last another month. For reasons known only to them, they always choose the power lines as their hangout. Something poetic about that, isn’t there, vultures gravitating towards power?

The young vultures seem to get bored easily, so I find them exploring the edges of the water and anything else that captures their attention - sometimes including me. I can relate to this curiosity!

Speaking of schools, the flicker middle school numbers anywhere from five to fifteen each morning. They are busy pounding the earth for ants, or whatever else it is they find there. They are equally interested in exploring the metal shelter house roofs, as best I can tell, to see what sounds they can make.

The bluebirds have been delightfully prolific this year, and flocks of bluebirds and flickers seem to follow each other around. Bluebirds cock their heads to the side, listening or watching for bugs. They flutter back and forth between a perch and the ground, chasing bugs or alternatively chasing each other.

Butterflies seem to be everywhere. I find them in the grasses, on tree trunks, and floating in the air. Like birds - and dragonflies! - some species migrate long distances, and some do not migrate at all.

I knew monarchs migrated, but just learned that painted ladies and red admirals also migrate. This week I was lucky enough to find a few question mark butterflies. Apparently some of them will migrate, and some will stay put - I wonder how they decide?

I’ve only seen one or two egrets, and they’ve stayed a fair distance away. This is usually a September species for me, so I hope they aren’t taking a different route this year. Maybe the rain, which is bringing the water level back up, will help.

With a legitimate cold front finally expected this week, I’m hoping to see a shift in the migrants over the lake. I'm hoping for terns, shorebirds, Bonaparte’s gulls, and any other friend who wants to visit!

Meanwhile, I watch the young crows, juvenile hawks, phoebes, killdeer, herons, vultures, butterflies, and the remaining dragonflies. I appreciate this great circle that brings new surprises even as others leave for a while.

I always think of September as the start of the year. Maybe from school schedules growing up, maybe because we come out of the worst of the heat and things start to get more interesting again. Whatever the reason, fall feels like new possibilities to me.

I find letting go in nature to be so much easier than in the rest of my life. Nature tends to depart in a flash of brilliance - the colors of fall leaves, the explosion of wildflowers and butterflies, the curiosity of young birds. She leaves you wanting more, but with at least the whisper of possibility that this will come around again, even if it looks different from year to year.

After a summer of learning turtle ways and practicing deliberately slowing down, my fall appears to be a practice of letting things change. I can be very set in my routines and rhythms, so I am starting to play with changing them up in small ways. Not so much that I overwhelm myself (which I am very capable of doing), but just enough to reinforce the message that I am adaptable and resilient.

I interviewed two young women this week for open positions on our team at work. I watched them light up at the idea of ever-changing projects and schedules with a bring-it-on attitude. It reminded me that I used to approach life in the same way - and I can do it again. It reminded me that it can be FUN.

I see this same attitude from young birds every year. Everything is new to them, everything is interesting, everything is fun. When my grandfather was dying 35 years ago, he said to me, “You don’t have to be so perfect.”

I feel his message even more strongly now. I don’t have to be so set in my ways in an attempt not to make mistakes. I don’t have to take on responsibility for everyone and everything. I’m also - still - allowed to explore, experiment, and be playful.

How do you cultivate curiosity and playfulness in your life?

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“The good news is that nothing has gone wrong with you. Your nervous system is doing exactly what it evolved to do. It has just been dropped into an environment that looks like Times Square had a baby with a casino and raised it on espresso and Xanax.” - Dr. David Rabin

Hello friends! This week has been all about the hummingbirds and butterflies, so it’s been a good week, despite the craziness of the world! It’s so easy to take tons of photos with this camera, and I’m having to be faster and more ruthless with my culling process. It’s a good thing fall migration runs at a slower pace so I can keep learning this skill!

Here are my photo choices for today:

May your weekend be full of wonderfully astonishing moments (only the good kind)!

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“You got to find your people, the ones that make you feel whole, that won’t leave your side when you lose control. The ones that don’t let you lose your soul.” - Drew Holcomb, “Find Your People”

Hello friends! It has mostly cooled down, though today is quite steamy. I can see the 60s and 70s coming in the forecast and it makes me do a happy dance!

Here are my photo choices for today:

May you find lots of gold and rainbows in your week.

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Walking in the heat and thinking about the water that waited for me in the car. The birds were wisely sticking to the shade, and I didn’t think I’d take many photos. But then…

…I saw a flutter. I looked at the sawtooth oak that stands across from the 1.8 mile marker on the trail, and I realized there were lots of flutters all around its trunk. Butterflies!

Two wood nymphs that were…mating? Playing? Chasing each other? I have no idea! What I do know is they were fluttering together around the tree. Have I seen that before? I don’t think so.

As I looked closer, I realized they were not alone. There were at least a half dozen wood nymphs on that tree trunk.

I noticed differences in their color and size I had never noticed before. Some were larger and lighter. Some were a rich, dark brown. Some had bigger “eyes” on their wings than others. Some had two “eyes” and some had four. I hadn’t realized there were differences in male and female wood nymphs before!

As I wondered what would attract wood nymphs to this particular tree, I noticed more butterflies. These were not wood nymphs - they were hackberry emperor butterflies!

Here, too, I noticed distinct differences. Some were more reddish and others quite pale. Some were triangular while others were roundish. Some were clearly larger while others were smaller.

Then, as I watched, two red admirals flew in to join the butterfly dance. Butterflies paused to rest. Butterflies fluttered around. Butterflies gently chased each other around the tree and through the grasses.

I heard myself giggle. There is something about butterflies that touches that playful place in me. The place that never takes an encounter with magic for granted.

I stood and watched. I drank it in. I took photos. I laughed. I couldn’t believe I was standing in the middle of a bike trail, undisturbed, in the middle of a butterfly party.

Every once in a while, I heard a voice inside saying, “Hey, it’s hot! You need to get back to the car!” She wasn’t wrong, but I waited as long as possible because sweetness is important too. When I finally began walking towards the car, I felt a warmth swelling in my chest, a mixture of gratitude, wonder, and delight. It was such a pleasant feeling, and I thought, all these years I’ve been avoiding feeling my feelings, but I didn’t know it could feel this good!

I got back to the car and drank most of my bottle of water. I was driving home on the familiar road when suddenly I saw a huge swath of yellow tickseed in the roadside ditch. I heard a little voice say, “Ooooh, stop!”

Another voice said, “Hey, it’s still hot, and we still need to get home!” I admit I ignored her. I thought I would just take a few photos of the yellow flowers and hop back in the car.

When I looked through my lens, I realized there were butterflies everywhere in the flowers. Painted ladies, buckeyes, duskywings, hackberry emperors, skippers, sulfurs - and monarchs! An even bigger butterfly dance!

I stayed as long as I could and took it in. I watched the monarchs flutter, sail, flutter, sail with such lightness and grace and yet surprising speed. I took in the delight of it all, the joy of beingness they exude.

I looked down, and there were three butterflies on my legs. I was not just an observer; I was part of the dance.

I noted that butterfly chases have a playful energy, in opposition to the hummingbird chases I’ve been enjoying for weeks. Butterflies seem to sprinkle glitter everywhere they go. It’s more like a playful game of tag than a game of king of the mountain.

I stayed too long; I didn’t stay long enough. I know the presence of these butterflies is ephemeral. They might disappear when the heat leaves, or the mowers come, or it’s just time for them to move on. They might not be here the next day.

They drank in the nectar, and I drank in the magic. When I finally drove home, I noticed the tension and pain in my neck and hip were completely gone. The tension came back, but it was gone long enough that I know now it can go away.

Some moments, it’s so easy to stay present to life. Other moments seem much harder. I want to carry the lightness of the butterfly dance into those more challenging moments and see if maybe, just maybe, there might be magic where I don’t expect it.

Where do you find unexpected magic in your day?

May you discover unexpected magic all week long.

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“All the months are crude experiments, out of which the perfect September is made.” - Virginia Wolf

Hello friends! The cold front came through, and my AC made it! It’s so nice to walk in cooler morning temperatures again! The heat did have an amazing gift, and I will write about it this weekend. Here’s your hint - butterflies! Stay tuned!

Here are my photo choices for today:

Hoping your weekend is full of cool breezes and warm hugs.

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“I go among the trees and sit still, All my stirring becomes quiet around me like circles on the water.” - Wendell Berry, “I Go Among The Trees”

Hello friends! One more day of this extreme heat wave, and I am really ready for a cool front. Say a few prayers for my AC; it’s been challenged, and there’s not a tech available in the city for days. Luckily, this too will pass!

Here are my photo choices for today:

Wishing everyone a week full of ease and delight.

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Hello friends! I’m taking a writing holiday this weekend before what I think is going to be a very challenging work week. However, I finished the bird song download I promised you all when we hit 100 paid subscribers! There are also some bonuses at the end of this post.

Compiled bird song recording - 13 different birds (and a few others in the background). I thought it might be fun for you to listen and see what birds you can identify before seeing the list, so I’ve included the list at the bottom of this post. If anyone guesses the last one, I will be seriously impressed! (And yes that last one is birds!)

Instructions: To download, you need to be on the web version of this post. In the web version, you will see a download arrow next to each of the audio files included. Clicking on the title from the email will often take you to the web version. However, if you use the app, it may take you to the app.

If it takes you to the app, you can still get to the web version by clicking on the share button (see screenshot below), then copying the link. Open your browser, paste the link, and you should be in the web version of the post.

The rest is at the bottom of the post, but you didn’t think I’d send out a post without photos, did you? It’s been a butterfly and bird bonanza the last few days, I have so many photos I am excited to share with you - and so many more I still have to get through!

Ok, enjoy the additional information and downloads below, and I hope you all have a great weekend, plus a holiday for those in the US and Canada! Please add your gratitude to mine for everyone who contributed paid subscriptions to make these downloads happen!

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Compiled bird song - list of birds and bonus recordings. I had to keep each clip short in the compilation, but some of you might like individual, longer clips of a few birds, so I’ve included them below each bird's name. The meadowlark was in the last drops of beauty post, here, if you missed it.

1. Wood Thrush

2. Brown Thrasher

3. Mockingbird

4. Indigo Bunting

5. Hooded warbler + pileated woodpecker

6. Meadowlark

7. Baltimore oriole

8. Prothonotary Warbler + Oriole

9. House Wren

10. Willet

11. Loons (my personal favorite, and I’ve only gotten to record it once)

12. Prairie Chickens (possibly the weirdest bird sound I have ever had the privilege to hear!)

“When I rise up, let me rise up joyful like a bird. When I fall, let me fall without regret like a leaf.” - Wendell Berry

Hello friends. It seems many friends of the earth are joining the angel realms this week. Wendell Berry’s “The Peace of Wild Things” is one of my all-time favorite poems. I’ve included it below in honor of his passing.

I think I’ve got the bird song download I promised when we hit 100 subscribers ready, and I’m hoping to send it out this weekend. I’ve been told that I can deliver it by simply adding it here, and you should be able to download it. I think you have to click through to the article on the website to get the download button (you can’t do it from your email, and probably not from the Substack app), but it’s difficult to test myself.

So, this is a test! Can some of you try to download this recording and let me know if it works? Consider this a practice run! This is a meadowlark singing.

Here are my photo choices for today:

May your weekend be full of ease and rest.

The Peace of Wild Things

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests inhis beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peac eof wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of hte world, and am free.

by Wendell Berry

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“Don’t get so busy making a living that you forget to make a life.” - Dolly Parton

Hello friends! I had my annual mammogram today, so this is your PSA to take care of yourself and get your screenings, especially if these things make you nervous (like me) and it’s easy to put them off. I was so happy to get the results after only 2 hours and know that all was ok! Last time I had to wait for a letter in the mail.

Here are my photo choices for today:

May your week be full of comforting and nurturing moments - and good news!

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Late summer. On the surface, it seems like a rather slow time of year when not much is happening. Yet, when I look closer, there is so much life happening before my eyes.

Young birds are EVERYWHERE in large packs. Flickers are playing in mud, in the sand, and in the grass. Exploring what they can and gently harassing their classmates at random.

Young bluebirds chase each other, catch bugs, and sometimes stop to watch the other birds with curiosity.

The eastern kingbird kindergarten is overflowing, and they are learning both bug-catching skills and their signature “how to run off competitors” skills at the same time. They aren’t called kingbirds for nothing.

I’ve seen more adult male orioles join the females and juveniles this week, and I delight in hearing their flute-like songs echo from the trees.

I have to look closely, because surprise birds may pop out at any moment. Catbirds, thrashers, woodpeckers, and maybe a cuckoo if I’m really lucky!

The water levels in the lake are extremely low right now, the lowest I’ve seen in years. I’m assuming they are working on the dam because it isn’t for lack of rain. This has given way to “mud flats” in places I usually can’t quite access, and the frogs seem to be enjoying it.

There are big youngsters around too. Young hawks occasionally zoom through. The turkey vulture numbers grow by the day, and the annual sports of vulture jousting and volleyball net walking are in full swing.

There are surprises to be had out over the lake too. Once in a while, the terns will make an appearance, and an osprey has been flying around every morning. This week, a few egrets have shown up, though they haven’t come close enough for good photos quite yet. September is the month of egrets, with a little luck!

Butterflies seem to peak this time of year, even if they mowed down more of the fields than I would like. The saddlebags dragonflies fly back and forth across the road in front of me, daring me to attempt to take their photo - an endeavor that is fun, despite the very low success rate, and often makes me “late” returning home.

In the fields and along the roadside, the color of late summer is gold as the goldenrod begins to flower in earnest. I have long craved this color this time of year, so much so that I painted my stairwell as close to this color as I could.

At my feeder, the ruby-throated hummingbirds have increased in number. Most days there are two or three vying for control of the magical flower that never goes dry. One young male has been consistent for a few weeks. I know him by the spots on his throat, and I call him my little prince.

Occasionally, an adult male will stop by. They seem less inclined to let me slide open the door and take their photo, and they don’t seem to try to do battle with the youngster. They just take a sip and move on.

One guy this week must have been particularly tired and thirsty. Not only did he let me take his photo, he also stared down the silly young boy. He quietly finished drinking before he departed.

We’ve had some cooler mornings, but summer will give us what I hope is the last hot blast this week. I’m ready for fall, but I’ve learned not to wish any days away. Life goes too fast as it is.

Every season has its challenges; every season has its gifts. I’m enjoying everything late summer has to offer, and the 4000 unprocessed photos on my computer prove it. All too soon, it will give way to fall.

What gifts are showing up in your part of the world right now?

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“I make a point to appreciate all the little things in my life. I go out and smell the air after a good, hard rain. These small actions help remind me that there are so many great, glorious pieces of good in the world.” - Dolly Parton

Hello friends. We lost another wise woman this week. Like Jane Goodall, her light will continue to inspire others for a long time. I can’t think of anyone who was a better example of being utterly and completely true to yourself AND completely and utterly accepting everyone else. She really shows how when we fiercly love ourselves, we are able to be really generous to others.

Here are my photo choices for today:

Did anyone stay up for the lunar eclipse last night? I’m sure I slept right through it because I just love sleep too much to give it up.

May we all find that place in us where we can be as generous of heart as Dolly Parton.

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“As long as you’re dancing, you can break the rules. Sometimes breaking the rules is just extending the rules. Sometimes there are no rules.” - Mary Oliver, “Three Things to Remember

Hello friends! Rules were made to be broken, right? At least some rules, some of the time. Otherwise nothing changes! The corollary is, learn the rules so you can break them with skill.

Here are my photo choices for today:

May you find a way to dance through your week.

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Quiet. A thin blanket of fog. Not so thick that I’d get wet, but just enough to dampen the sound. It’s cool for August, in the 60s, and even without a breeze it feels pleasant.

Young crows call from all around the lake. One here. One there. It’s as if someone strung twinkle lights all around the lake and they are making a sound one at a time.

I see the young bluebirds and flickers, but it’s as if their sounds somehow don’t disturb the silence at all. It seems all the creatures are respecting this hush, this glorious - and rare - quiet.

I thought about trying to record the silence and quickly realized this is more of an energy, a feeling, and anyway, how does one record quiet? Instead, I let my mind rest in the solitude.

This is the thing I’ve been learning, and forgetting, and learning again this summer. That my mind can rest. That my mind NEEDS to rest. That every part of me is happier when my mind is willing to rest, if even for a few moments.

The wind picks up, gently, easing away the fog. The bird sounds grow louder as they too seem to sense the sunlight is about to find them.

The young birds chatter more than they sing, and this time of year there is less birdsong than there was a couple of months ago. I’m ever so grateful for the singers who keep singing after the spring mating season is done. Indigo buntings, cardinals, Carolina wrens, meadowlarks, and the occasional oriole seem to sing just for the pure pleasure of it.

I’m learning that my mind can rest in these sounds, too. With music and song, my mind seems to say ah, yes, I can float here the way the body floats on water. Even more so if I allow my body to rock, sway, and move gently to the music.

As the sun appears, the birds get busier. The flickers are busy finding whatever it is they find in the dirt. There are a half dozen or more of them, mostly youngsters, which is spectacularly typical for this time of year.

Can I use superlatives with the word typical? Because what’s typical is also quite grand and fills my heart with joy.

Bluebirds are now flitting back and forth from the grass to anywhere they can perch. Catching bugs is to a young bluebird like a video game is to a teenager - great fun, requiring some concentration, but with plenty of moments to chase each other around, too.

Near the shore, I notice two small birds fly in. Sandpipers! The first little peeps I’ve seen this year. I didn’t see many (did I see any?) this spring, so I hope the fall migration pattern makes up for it!

Out on the lake, two Forster’s terns have been vying for control of a buoy. There are a dozen other buoys, but they always want the same one. One youngster tries to land on a float in the water, but it’s clearly too slippery. It is fun to watch the youngsters learn.

I wonder sometimes if birds can rest their mind when they are floating on the air. I think I could, if I only had the wings to try.

Sunrise has moved back 45 minutes now, but my body is still asking for a turtle start to my mornings. I feel better when I give myself some loving attention and move slowly before getting out the door. As the mornings cool, the sunrise colors pull harder, and I really want to be out in the pinks of the early morning.

Whatever time I get out, I am so grateful for the walk. I am so grateful for this park, for the lake, for the access I have to all this beauty. I’m so grateful for a body that can do this.

As I’m writing, there are two juvenile male ruby-throated hummingbirds chasing each other around near my feeder. A chickadee decided to dart in and try to get a drink from the ant moat, and they promptly chased him all around the tree too.

Indeed, the typical is also wonderful. Every day I hope for more typical days like this.

What typical things in your world do you also find wonderful?

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“That’s what sport is. That’s what life is, isn’t it? A series of chances.” - Rebecca in Ted Lasso

Hello friends! I had the photos in this post but completely forgot I needed to write the opening and closing because I was watching Ted Lasso. Sorry not sorry! If you don’t watch Ted Lasso, I highly recommend it.

Meanwhile, I did have the photos done! Here we go:

Let’s end with another Season 4 quote from Ted Lasso: “Sometimes home is just a state of mind.” May we all feel at home, whatever that means to us.

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“Have to be mindful of chicks and tiggers!” - said by me this morning when I was thinking of ticks and chiggers, but from now on I’m saying it this way!

Hello friends! We’ve made it to a new week. We were lucky enough to have a cool front come through, so it’s much nicer than it was last week! You take what you can get in August!

Here are my photo choices for today:

May ease and delight appear on your path this week as much as possible.

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Hello friends! Not feeling my best this weekend, so I’m giving my writing brain a break. I do have new photos to share!