An Awe-filled weekend

Today is my husband's birthday and to celebrate, we spent to extra days at our haven in North Georgia.  We splashed around in the swimming pool - and I experienced a first: I skinny dipped.  I now understand the appeal and plan to be butt naked in my swimming pool as often as possible.  Thankfully where we live is very secluded!

As I sipped my coffee each morning, I watched hummingbird wargames at their feeder.  My goodness those little buggers are fast.  It's hard to believe how this beautiful little bird whose image is often used to invoke tranquility can be so very aggressive!  It must have something to do with getting all the energy necessary to make their annual flight across the Gulf of Mexico.   Until then, I'll enjoy watching their wargames.

And then there was Baby.  Baby is a black bear.  About 250 lbs of black bear and he (we think & hope) has a major penchant for sunflower seeds.  And if you haven't guessed already, D and I feed the birds - black sunflower seeds.  We figured he was a nocturnal to dawn thief and didn't think anything at all about traipsing off our porch to go get a bite to eat.  We had one surprised bear, 2 surprised humans and one very dead bird feeder.  We'll find another bird feeder - one that is hopefully a bit more bear proof.   I don't care if Baby noshes our birdseed as long as he remembers to run away when we surprise him.  The image of this incredibly powerful animal trotting off to the border of our yard, every once and a while looking to see if we were still there, will be forever with me.  I am in in total awe of Baby.

This is not Baby - but you can get the picture...

And at this moment, I'm in awe of myself too.  For the past few days, I have actually listened to my body and paid it attention.  I put my fork down.  More than once.

It is my hope that as D and I spend more and more time with the bears, hummingbirds, deer, and frogs, that I will never lose the awe I have of them.