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Archive for the ‘Journeys’ Category

With Apologies to Edgar Allan Poe

Posted in Birds, Journeys, Writing, tagged , , , on August 19, 2013| 10 Comments »

“Poetry is just the evidence of life.  If your life is burning well, poetry is just the ash.” – Leonard  Cohen

The Worst Poetry Ever, I Do Admit

I’m sorry. I couldn’t help myself.

My morning visitor. -- Photo by Pat Bean

My morning visitor. — Photo by Pat Bean

The Raven

While I welcomed the morning cheerily

While I drank my coffee dearly

While I sat upon my balcony pondering

Over my daily list, wondering

There came a cawing, cawing

Tis’ a bird, I muttered smiling

Only this and nothing more

And it is August, I said and more

And it’s sunny on the desert floor

Now who is cawing outside my window

I know for certain it’s not Lenore

Because it is black and feathery

This it is and nothing more

I went for my camera

To capture an image for ever more

But alas I failed, as I was told

This device cannot record.

Would this bird too soon fly away?

Before I could retrieve the disk

From my computer inside the door

Only this and nothing more

Quickly I ran inside

And retrieved the tiny disk

That would make the camera work.

Black feathers still perched upon the roof

Waiting and cawing, cawing

Tis a raven, I said.

And nothing more.

Bean’s Pat:  Travels and Trifles  http://tinyurl.com/lsm93un  Love the quote, and the trees

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Family Matters

Posted in Journeys, Nature, Travels With Maggie, tagged , on August 8, 2013| 12 Comments »

“The thing about family disasters is that you never have to wait long before the next one puts the previous one into perspective.” — Robert Brault

It’s All about Love

Family is like this waterfall, turbulent at times but always with a rainbow in sight. -- Photo by Pat Bean

Family is like this waterfall, turbulent at times but always with a rainbow in sight. — Photo by Pat Bean

I was listening to a woman tell a group of us what a wonderful family gathering she had just come from, and was beginning to inwardly moan at yet another “perfect family” story  when she added an addendum to her first words.

“Of course the fun was in spite of the fact that everyone in our family has big personalities. It only took an hour or two before the tensions erupted.”

In a nut shell, she had just described my family, which has been fractured and thrown to the four winds time and time again. But we’re family. And that means something — even if I’m not always sure what it means.

I’m the matriarch of five children and five spouse-in-laws; 15 grandchildren plus two more by marriage, plus seven or so grand-spouse-in-laws or partners, plus several non-related young people I claim as grandchildren; and  two great-grandchildren plus two more by marriage.

I’m not even going to count the numbers, because what counts is that each and every one is family, and family matters. Not a single one of them – I dare say not even the great-grandchildren — is perfect. And they all have big personalities — and in those two things I can truthfully say they all take after me.

I feel like the luckiest, if at times the most frustrated, person in the world.

The Wondering Wanderer's blog pick of the day.

The Wondering Wanderer’s blog pick of the day.

Bean’s Pat:  So you just write the book http://tinyurl.com/ltyqwl6 As one who is struggling with the third rewrite of “Travels with Maggie,” this tickled my funny bone. Writing is darn hard work  — even if you love doing it and consider it as necessary as breathing.

 

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Time for Nonsense

Posted in Birds, Journeys, Nature, tagged , , , on August 6, 2013| 3 Comments »

The Llama Song – Listen to it: http://tinyurl.com/2jy2tc

            Here’s a llama. There’s a llama. And another little llama. Fuzzy llama. Funny llama. Llama llama duck. Llama Llama. Cheesecake llama. Tablet. Brick. Potato llama. Llama llama, duck.

            I was once a tree house. Lived in a cake. But I never saw the way the orange slayed the rake. I was only three years dead. But it told a tale. And now listen little child. To the safety rail.

            Did you ever see a llama? Kiss a llama. On the llama. Llamas llamas. Taste of llamas. Llama llama duck.

            Is that how it’s told now? Is it all so old?  Doorknob. Ankle. Cold. Now my song is getting thin. I’ve run out of luck! Time for me to retire now. And become a duck.

IMG_3743

Here’s the llama… — Photo by Pat Bean

Laughter is Good for the Soul

And here's the duck. They were both photographed at Riverside Park in Bayfield, Colorado -- Photo by Pat Bean

And here’s the duck. They were both photographed at Riverside Park in Bayfield, Colorado — Photo by Pat Bean

 

And this crazy song makes me laugh and laugh, Supposedly it was written by someone called Burton Earny in 2004, who has since gone into hibernation.

What makes you laugh?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Wondering Wanderer's blog pick of the day.

The Wondering Wanderer’s blog pick of the day.

Bean’s Pat: Pete Scully http://tinyurl.com/mwtwo5o One of the artists whose blogs I’ve begun following. I love Pete’s sketches.

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Why I Write My Thoughts Down

Posted in Birds, Journeys, Quote for the Day, tagged , , , on August 1, 2013| 7 Comments »

“I still find each day too short for all the thoughts I want to think, all the walks I want to take, all the books I want to read, and all the friends I want to see.” — John Burroughs

Because of What Happens when I Don’t

            I had this great idea about what today’s blog would be about just as I was dozing off to sleep last night.

I love it when I wake up to the twitter of birds, even if I've forgotten the great idea I had the night before. -- Pat Bean sketch. .

I love it when I wake up to the twitter of birds, even if I’ve forgotten the great idea I had the night before. — Pat Bean sketch. .

I slept easier knowing the subject of today’s blog had been found. I even awoke remembering that I had this great blog idea – then realized Mr. Sandman had stolen it during the night.

Maybe I’ll find it again, I thought, as I looked at the unused note pad and pen that is always on my night table – just in case a great thought runs through my mind while I’m in bed.

Of course there are mornings, when I have remembered to record my great idea on that same note pad — and I find what I’ve written laughable. In the light of the morning sun, I discover it isn’t a great idea at all.

Isn’t life fun? I just bet you have such moments, too. Come on. Admit it.

Bean’s Pat: Happy Birthday Miss Mitchell http://tinyurl.com/mvehh4v I’ve told my granddaughters they owe me a debt for fighting for equal pay, for equal work, for women – which today my granddaughters may, or may not, receive. Maria Mitchell deserves much credit, too.

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Posted in Books, Journeys, Lakes, Nature, tagged , , , on July 18, 2013| 1 Comment »

Bookish Wednesday

            “A well-composed book is a magic carpet on which we are wafted to a world that we cannot enter in any other way.” Caroline Gordon

The dark mirror in the book of the same name is a dark lake. -- Photo by Pat Bean

The dark mirror in the book of the same name is a dark lake. — Photo by Pat Bean

The Dark Mirror by Juliet Marillier

Yup! I may be an old broad, but I still haven’t lost my ability to stay awake when I’m in the middle of a good book.

And the woods and rocks of the landscape are integral to the story. -- Photo by Pat Bean

And the woods and rocks of the landscape are integral to the story. — Photo by Pat Bean

But I must admit that it’s been a long time since I stayed awake reading – actually I was listening to an audible book – until 4:53 a.m. That was the time on the clock in my kitchen – I don’t have one in the bedroom – when I finally looked.

I had known it was late, but not that late.

The book was “The Dark Mirror: Bridei Trilogy, Book One,” by Juliet Marillier.

I  knew it was getting late last night, and I kept saying I was going to put the book down as soon as I found out what was happening next, but by the time I did that, there was something else going on that kept me reading. And so it went all through the night.

“The Dark Mirror” was the first Juliet Marillier book I’ve read. I was delighted to know she’s published many more.  This first, published in 2004, is an epic fantasy with tangled plots, characters with depth and good writing.

I just downloaded the second audible book in the trilogy onto my Kindle. It is 23 hours long. Let’s hope it keeps me as intrigued about what’s going to happen next as book one.

I predict many more sleepless nights ahead of me.

“O frabjous  day! Callooh! Callay!” – and who knows what this is from?

The Wondering Wanderer's blog pick of the day.

The Wondering Wanderer’s blog pick of the day.

Bean’s Pat: The Blood-Red Pencil http://tinyurl.com/lbxm4nv The woman, who is proofing and editing by book, “Travels with Maggie,” and I differ over the use of commas, which is probably why I enjoyed this blog so much.   Perhaps my writer-readers will enjoy it, too

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Monday Morning Wondering

Posted in Books, Journeys, Writing, tagged , , , on July 15, 2013| 6 Comments »

“I would hurl words into this darkness and wait for an echo, and if an echo sounded, no matter how faintly, I would send other words to tell, to march, to fight, to create a sense of hunger for life that gnaws in us all.” – Richard Wright

            “It is necessary to write, if the days are not to slip emptily by.  How else, indeed, to clap the net over the butterfly of the moment?  For the moment passes, it is forgotten; the mood is gone; life itself is gone.  That is where the writer scores over his fellows:  he catches the changes of his mind on the hop.” — Vita Sackville-West

This is the view of the Catalina Mountains from my third-floor bedroom balcony. The sliver of rock between the two larger humps is called finger rock. I've adopted it as a finger pointing at me, asking: "So have you met your writing goal today." -- Photo by Pat Bean

This is the view of the Catalina Mountains from my third-floor bedroom balcony. The sliver of rock between the two larger humps is called finger rock. I’ve adopted it as a finger pointing at me, asking: “So have you met your writing goal today?” — Photo by Pat Bean

Is it Good Enough?

            I’ve been a writer for half a century, although I didn’t call myself one for many years. It seems to be a failing with writers. Many of us think that unless we’ve written a best-selling book, we’re just a piddler of words.

I recently met such a person, a retired history professor who read a chapter of his book in progress. He started it by saying “I’m not a writer.” But he was. His words were richer and more readable than those of many a published author. I later told him he was a writer, and should call himself just that

The place where I spend many hours a week. Sometimes I simply open the shutters and gaze out the windows, wondering. -- Photo by Pat Bean

The place where I spend many hours a week. Sometimes I simply open the shutters and gaze out the windows, wondering. — Photo by Pat Bean

Yet, even as I accept that my book, “Travels with Maggie”  — which  is undergoing a final editing — contains some of my best work,  this Monday morning I found  myself asking: “Is it good enough” – good enough to throw out to the public and risk it not being good enough?

Perhaps I’m still thinking about the words contained in a blog I read this past week: “The fine line between creativity and crap.”

Why do writers have such a hard time admitting they are writers when asked their occupations?  What’s the proper usage of passed and past? Do I write my book in first or third person? Will what I write offend a loved one? What will someone think if they read my journals and learn my true feelings? Why can’t I find an agent for my book, is it not good enough?

The questions are endless, and writers seem to have too many of them rattling around in their heads, like a poisonous snake coiled and ready to kill their ability to write. Some call it writer’s block.

I’m learning to call it simply wondering.

The Wondering Wanderer's blog pick of the day.

The Wondering Wanderer’s blog pick of the day.

Bean’s Pat: Lime Bird Writers http://tinyurl.com/nv7mrs6  One of the writing blogs I follow regularly. This day’s  blog offers some market opportunities.

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Just a Reminder

Posted in Books, Journeys, tagged , , , on July 13, 2013| 6 Comments »

             “You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.” – C. S. Lewis

Some say the Mourne Mountains in Ireland were Lewis' inspiration for the land of Narnia. -- Wikipedia photo

Some say the Mourne Mountains in Ireland were Lewis’ inspiration for the land of Narnia. — Wikipedia photo

The Chronicles of Narnia

            One of the nice things about growing older is the opportunity to go back and reread the books that you loved reading as a child. I recently did that with the “Chronicles of Narnia.”

What fun!

And this is how film makers pictures it in one of the Narnia movies.

And this is how film makers pictured it in one of the Narnia movies.

As a child, I read for the love of the adventure, not being able to turn the pages fast enough to satisfy my need to know what happens next. I still do that. But I also sometimes take time to look for deeper meanings.

It was easy to find them in Lewis’ Narnia, which he wrote about in seven fantasy novels for young people. The books sold over 100 million copies, and are now being made into movies that  have hit it big at the box office.

I guess I’m not the only one enchanted by Lewis’ imaginative mind and words.

More C.S. Lewis

“It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird: it would be a jolly sight harder for it to earn to fly while remaining an egg. We are like eggs at present. And you cannot go on indefinitely being just an ordinary, decent egg. We must be hatched or go bad.”

            “You can’t get a cup of tea big enough or a book long enough to suit me.”

            “Failures are finger posts on the road to achievement.”

            “We are what we believe we are.”

            “Reason is the natura order of truth; but imagination is the organ of meaning.”

The Wondering Wanderer's blog pick of the day.

The Wondering Wanderer’s blog pick of the day.

Bean’s Pat: Being Present http://tinyurl.com/pxzl5nk Something worth remembering.

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Cooper’s Hawks

Posted in Adventures With Pepper, Birds, Journeys, tagged , , , on July 8, 2013| 11 Comments »

“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.” Anais Nin

One of the pair of Cooper's hawks flying around the apartment complex earlier this year. -- Photo by Pat Bean

One of the pair of Cooper’s hawks flying around the apartment complex earlier this year. — Photo by Pat Bean

First the Lovers, Then the Juveniles

            Earlier this year, I blogged about seeing a pair of Cooper’s hawks that appeared to be courting. For the past week, the results of that courtship have been entrancing residents. The hawks built a nest in a tall tree visible from my bedroom balcony and raised two young in it

And a quick sketch of one of the less-colorful juveniles now flying around my apartment complex. -- Pat Bean sketch

And a quick sketch of one of the less-colorful juveniles now flying around my apartment complex. — Pat Bean sketch

Those two juveniles have now fledged, and are so much less wary of we humans than their parents that I’ve been seeing them daily for over a week.  A few days ago, I actually saw one of the birds dehead a songbird in the air.

The luckless songbird’s body fell near where Pepper and I were walking. The hawk watched as we passed by.  I hoped that it retrieve its meal, as it would have been a shame for the songbird’s death not to have served a purpose.

As one who is an avid nature watcher, I’ve learned to accept the circle of life, which puts hawks at the top of the bird food chain. While many small birds can produce up to three large broods of chicks annually, hawks rarely raise more than one or two each year.

House wrens, for example, can go from egg to fledging in less than a month. Cooper’s Hawks’ eggs take over twice that time, and larger birds of prey, like the bald eagle, require more than four months to develop from an egg to a fledgling. And the parent will continue to feed it long after that.

I’m thankful that I still view birds, and all the rest of nature, with the wonder of a child, but also with the awe of learning the details of how everything fits into the environment.

Bean’s Pat: Discovering Myself http://tinyurl.com/mfhqdro Yes, yes and yes!

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Posted in Journeys, Nature, tagged , , on July 4, 2013| 3 Comments »

America the Beautiful 

Spacious Skies: Whale Rock, Canyonlands National Park. -- Photo by Pat Bean

Spacious Skies: Whale Rock, Canyonlands National Park. — Photo by Pat Bean

O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America! God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!

O beautiful for pilgrim feet,
Whose stern impassion’d stress
A thoroughfare for freedom beat
Across the wilderness!
America! America! God mend thine ev’ry flaw,
Confirm thy soul in self-control,
Thy liberty in law!

O beautiful for heroes proved In liberating strife,
Who more than self their country loved,
And mercy more than life!
America! America! May God thy gold refine
Till all success be nobleness,
And ev’ry gain divine!

O Beautiful for patriot dream
That sees beyond the years
Thine alabaster cities gleam,
Undimmed by human tears!
America! America! God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea.

— Katharine Lee Bates

Happy Fourth of July

Purple Mountain Majesty: Mount Ranier

Purple Mountain Majesty: Mount Rainer — Photo by Pat Bean

     There are many things in this country that need to be fixed, starting with term limits for politicians so they won’t waste their time in office concerned about getting re-elected, and elected leader benefits – wages, health insurance, pensions – that are more in line with those of the average American.

From Sea to Shining Sea: Acadia National Park, Maine -- Photo by Pat Bean

From Sea to Shining Sea: Acadia National Park, Maine — Photo by Pat Bean

Hopefully, all of us can work together to fix these items, along with many other things.

But there is no place else I want to call home. What’s right with this country outweighs what’s wrong.

I thought this every day, when I woke up on the road as a lone woman traveler who felt safe. I can still get tears in my eyes when the Star Spangled Banner waves beneath a blue sky.

I am thankful to be an American, but I fully believe what Mark Twain wrote: “Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it.”

The Wondering Wanderer's blog pick of the day.

The Wondering Wanderer’s blog pick of the day.

Bean’s Pat: The American Soldier http://tinyurl.com/lwna8ms As a grandmother of a Marine, and mother of three who served in the military, thank you Chris Martin.

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Fate

Posted in Birds, Journeys, Nature, Travels With Maggie, Writing, tagged , on July 3, 2013| 6 Comments »

            “Fate is not an eagle. It creeps like a rat.” – Elizabeth Bowen

I’m a believer  

We never know what we're going to encounter on the path of life. And I wouldn't want it any other way. -- Photo by Pat Bean

We never know what we’re going to encounter on the path of life. And I wouldn’t want it any other way. — Photo by Pat Bean

          “We make our own fortunes then call them fate,” said Benjamin Disraeli. His words were the gist of almost all the quotes I could find on “fate.”

I agree, and yet I also disagree. I’m not a religious person, but there have been many times in my life when it seemed as if fate took a hand.

Most recently, it was after I broke my ankle and met Betty Ann, who was a dog walker, well of sorts. It was something she fell into while searching for a job. She was my next door neighbor, and thus agreed, for a pittance, to walk Maggie until I could take over the task again.

Recently I discovered, she had excellent editing skills. And again, for a pittance, she has agreed to edit and
proofread “Travels with Maggie,” the book which I desperately need to finish and publish so I can move on.

Every writer needs an editor, if for nothing more than to see what the writer really wrote, and not what she thought she wrote. She hadn’t even got past my dedication of the book, which read: This book is dedicated to my canine traveling companion, Maggie, and to John Steinbeck. His book, “Travels with Charley, was one of the inspirations for my vagabond lifestyle and also for this book’s title. I would also like to think the hundreds of other great travel writers who taunted me to discover my own adventures.

Did you catch the mistake? I didn’t. Think should have been thank.

I truly believe it was fate that brought Betty Ann and me together. What do you think? Or is that thank?

The Wondering Wanderer's blog pick of the day.

The Wondering Wanderer’s blog pick of the day.

Bean’s Pat: The Mockingbird and the Cat http://tinyurl.com/l4ebgew I’m both an avid bird watcher and a cat lover, so I’m a fence sitter on the issue of cats being allowed outside. I put a bell on my cat to give the birds warning, just fyi. But I sure do love this mockingbird’s attitude.

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