Why I Quit RWA

The complete answer to the RWA survey that was sent to me when I did not renew my membership.  Why should we be in such seperate h...

Monday, September 19, 2011

Sometimes It's Not the Writing, But the Living

Arrr! It’s National Talk Like a Pirate Day, actually I think it might be International Talk Like a Pirate Day. In any case, we should be practicing our Pirate speak, if for no other reason than it’s supposed to be fun, but why not celebrate?

I’ve been on a vacation, of sorts. It was not restful, it was not perfect. I wouldn’t even say I completely enjoyed it. It was one of those vacations we’ve all had, where everything just goes south. Like seven days of rain on a vacation to the beach, but it’s the good you find. I guess that’s true of life too, isn’t it?

Vehicle trouble, forgotten needed items, a sick grandchild, bee stings and frustrating fishing. That was the bad, but the good outweighed all that. Marvelous sunsets, big, yellow moons in inky skies. You forget how distant and faded the stars have become until you get into the wilderness and see the unlit night. Then you just feel smaller and bigger than yourself.

There was helping two stranded boys on the archery hunt, one of which looked exactly like a fifteen-year-old Ricky Schroder. His companion looked about seventeen. Well, I couldn’t help thinking about my own sons, hoping they would find someone that would help them jump their battery, too, if they were ever in the need. It was so refreshing to see two super polite boys, so worried about worrying their dads. Sometimes we forget how great the younger generation is, but I have had several incidents that just make me have all kinds of faith in putting things in their hands.

There was the wind in the aspen. How I love that sound and the shiver of the leaves. And of course, the food: the best grilled pork chops I’ve had for ages, Catalina chicken, messy and sticky, just as it should be, fried filleted fish for breakfast, plus bacon and egg breakfast cooked by my son, watching my most miracle granddaughter introduced to camping, cold and all, hot chocolate, grilled steak and of course, s’mores.

Discoveries too, that fall begins at the bottom. The grasses have turned golden, the banded-winged grasshoppers make their short bursts of flight with a loud clicking ahead, the wild strawberries are beginning to turn scarlet and the willows, amber. Touches of golden quakies have just begun and when it rains the smell of dry grass and wet pine gives me all the aroma therapy I could ask for. And everyone looks beautiful by campfire.

Shiver me timbers, it sounds a bit like I'm a land lubber now, don't it, me hearties?

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