The First Photos

I didn't update my computer from a backup because the backup had the virus on it somewhere. So, I erased the hard-drive completely and started with a blank clean slate. All my photos exist on that backup disk.  I may risk it someday just to take a look, but certainly not anytime soon while I'm still in recovery mode from such a mind-numbing hack. 

I now have 17 photos on my rebuilt computer. So, here are a few new views of life these days

We thought this tree was looking at us with the setting sun lighting its eyes. Of course we shouted hello.

First sunrise of the new photos. A short while later the sky looked like this.

Things change quickly around here. 

I could see a bit of lovely sun rays in the moment. I'm not sure they're quite as discernible in the photo as they were to our eyes.

True, this is not a sky photo. I couldn't resist photographing this very beautiful rooster. My grand-nephew wanted to see a rooster photo, so this beauty happened to pose for me. 

That's life these days. I'm still extremely wary of doing much stuff on the internet. Blogs are still my favorite place to go. 

Computer Issues

While trying to find more Wordle games to play Tuesday morning I went to a website that infected my computer and changed my ability to reply to comments here. I reinstalled a backup from an earlier date prior to the virus infection, but my computer is still compromised. I still can't comment. So, thank you all for your comments. I'll update when I have more information and a virus-protected computer. Wish me luck.

At least the sky was beautiful late Monday afternoon when we could see the beautiful end of the rainbow. And the sky was lovely Tuesday morning and filled with the sounds of geese honking. You can see them if you click on the photo. Then I went looking for more Wordle games to play. Lesson learned.

Spring Time

You'd think with all the blue-sky photos I've been posting that the weather has been just lovely. Nope. It's been cold, gray, damp, and uninviting. But in those rare moments when the sun shines in a blue sky, we run (not really, we don't run, we don't even walk fast anymore!) outside for a walk. 

This flowering beauty definitely shouts spring in every way. The blossoms lift our hearts as high as the sky. We shout yes to spring beauty, knowing that the rains and winds will return and these white petals will fall gently to the ground. 

And then this white-winged black-tipped beauty flies over us, circling the cow pastures looking for lunch. I don't know what kind of hawk this is, but I have an email out to my brother and sister-in-law (the true family birders) and hope to have an answer soon. I googled around and couldn't find a match.

When we got home from our walk, I looked out the window and saw this sweet little thrush (not sure which kind yet) on our fence. I was hoping to hear its song. These birds sing the most beautiful songs in spring. 

Everywhere we looked it said spring. It's here. The season of renewal has begun. Yes! 

Signs In The Neighborhood

We're still going out walking everyday, trying to get in at least two miles a day. Sometimes the weather has been very windy and sometimes nice and sunny and warm. Out on one of most recent walks we noticed these two signs. 

We thought they captured the ambiance of our neighborhood so well. 

We went shopping at the local food co-op on Thursday, the day after the new California mask mandate went into effect. The mandate states among other things that only un-vaccinated people need to wear masks while in public indoor spaces. We went in wearing our masks even though we are fully vaccinated and boosted. Nearly every shopper and employee in the store was masked as well. It made us feel so good and safe. We loved that sign of our neighborhood as well. We really are all in this together. 

That's our quiet life here on the north coast. 

A Walk At The Beach

 The weather has been so crazy sunny warm and beautiful we just had to go for a walk at the beach. So we drove up to Trinidad Harbor and breathed in the sea air, enjoyed the blue blue sky, and got mesmerized a bit by the colors of the rocks there.

Those colors are so beautiful and vivid I'm not sure I captured what it really looks like out there. 

We've been listening to a song lately that my twin brother sent us a link to. It's one of the reasons we went to the beach. The song is called Wash Away.

Talking To The Alpacas

Roger and I always talk to the animals. It's what we do. We pet every dog we see, if they're friendly and want our attention. We meow to the kitty cats who always look at us askance. We even say hello to the Alpacas.

Well, truth be told, we don't say hello. We shout out "Llamaste" (rhymes with Namaste). They look at us like we're crazy. 

We tell them that we know they're not Llamas, but they're in the same family. So, Llamaste to you, Alpaca! 

I haven't told them yet that they're related to camels and that they're lucky we don't sing "Camelot" to them every time we walk by. 

A 47 Year Old Basket

 I have had this little basket on my dresser for 47 years. It comes with so much history. I thought I should share some of its story.

This basket was handmade for me in 1975. It was made from pine needles that were gathered on the ten acres of land I had bought in southern Oregon with my love at the time in 1974. He made the basket and brought it to me after we had split up. It wasn't a peace offering. It was a gift of heartfelt love and sorrow. 

I met Michael D eight miles up the mountain trails in Big Sur in 1972.  (My family always called him Michael D because we already had a Michael in the family, my twin brother). We talked and laughed and hiked together and got to know each other on that winding trail. We were with two groups of people all hiking to the same campsite. So, we got to spend nice time together out there in the wilderness. I had never camped before and so was completely unprepared, but he was quite the skilled camper, so he helped me find my way for those few days of roughing it. 

We exchanged landline telephone numbers and mail addresses. We began writing each other as soon as we got home. He lived in San Jose, and I was living with my parents in the San Fernando Valley. We started a long-distance romance, and then he came south to be with me and start our crazy plan. We both got jobs and started saving money for our dream piece of land. He had a pickup truck, and we built a beautiful wooden homemade camper for it. It had the loveliest madrone door handle. We didn't know where we wanted to settle, so after we had saved enough money to start our journey. We headed east to Virginia to see my cousin who had 108 acres of land in the mountains there. Michael D had never been east before, and it really was not what he was looking for. So, we packed up, drove north and decided to drive across Canada heading west. Oh we did fall in love with Canada. We camped all across the country. The prairies of Saskatchewan were so breathtakingly beautiful. We thought we could see far enough to see the curve the earth. Then we fell in love with the Canadian Rockies and onward to the stunning coast of British Columbia. Oh we loved Canada so much. We crossed the border into Washington and headed south. We drove around looking for land, acres to buy. We finally arrived in southern Oregon, looked at 10 acres with a small boundary on the Illinois River. It was beautiful. 

My dad helping us build the cabin

We bought it, and started building our cabin there. My parents drove up from Southern California to help us build. We worked without power tools because we had no electricity. We were still living in our little homemade camper. It was rough and beautiful. 

But then Michael D got restless. He was a musician. He wanted to go into town to make music, meet people, start a real life there. I was quiet, reading books, and contemplating Ram Dass's Be Here Now. After all of the cross-country crazy travels and finally settling down, we were drifting apart. We suddenly realized we had different dreams and goals. We were headed in different directions. 

So, I left. I got on a Greyhound Bus in Cave Junction, Oregon and started my own little 750 mile journey south to my parent's house in Southern California. I mended my broken heart there for a couple of months and headed north to the beautiful little town of Capitola. I got a job as a waitress there in a lovely little restaurant. It was my first waitressing job. It went well. I met lots of people and integrated into the community. I lived in an apartment that had a stunning view of Monterey Bay. I grew confident that I could actually be somebody, go to college, start a new life. 

That's when I got a letter from Michael D asking if he could come and visit me. He missed me. He reached out with four hand-written pages of sorrow (I still have that letter). I replied that he could come and visit, but that I had moved on. My heart had healed. I was whole again. So, he did stop by for a very brief visit and brought me this hand-made basket that he had woven himself with pine-needles from our ten acres of land. 

I've held on to that basket ever since. It's traveled with me all these years. A gentle reminder of old love. I googled Michael D's name last year. There was only one entry that came up. It was his obituary. He died 25 years ago. It was definitely him because it had his correct birth date. I googled it again just the other day, and even that entry is gone. He's gone. There is not a single entry, not a word that he once lived.  Except for that basket, that basket lives on.