nature – Terri LaBonte- Reinventing Myself in Retirement

Colts

They say that, in the spring, a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love. Well, this slightly not young woman’s fancy may also turn to love, but it also turns to something else. Baby Sandhill cranes.

I live in central Florida where Sandhill cranes are practically the official mascot of our region. Ball teams have cheerleaders that dress in feathers and make deep yodeling trumpet noises to encourage their players. Actual real-live Sandhill cranes are quite content to hang out anywhere reasonably close to water. They seem to have no hesitation about people or other interlopers. Since I live in Lake County, it comes as no surprise that we have quite the Sandhill crane population. In my community, we have lots of feathered Sandhill neighbors. In fact, you have probably seen bumper stickers that admonish “Share the Road With Motorcycles” or “Share the Road With Bicycles.” Instead, we share the road with Sandhill cranes. They are remarkably assertive creatures. They are perfectly peaceful and non-combative, but do not surrender their space easily. If they are standing in the road, they will likely keep standing there, even when approached by a two-ton vehicle. Once you have lived in central Florida for even a short time, you learn to just wait your turn. Those cranes will eventually move out of the way, but it will be in their own sweet time.

The Sandhill crane traffic issues may sound like a hassle, but, in reality, those of us who live with them don’t mind too much. These birds truly are beautiful, peaceful, and graceful. They glide across the sky with wings that span in excess of six feet. Their calls, something between a yodel and a dirge, are distinctively heart-warming. Sandhill cranes, like many birds, mate for life. I get worried when I see one on its own. There is something anthropomorphic about them. I have never been a huge bird person, but I find Sandhill cranes so relatable. Maybe I am more of a birdbrain that I ever thought.

Sandhill crane couples usually have 1-3 babies each year in the spring. Both parents care for the children. Kids stay with their parents for about nine or ten months. In fact, it is a bit traumatic for me to watch the crane families in December. This is about the time that the juveniles are being “encouraged” to leave the nest so that there is space in the family for a new set of hatchlings. The “encouragement” can look a little harsh. Still, there is that circle of life thing and I am hoping that all that “encouragement” will motivate our juvenile cranes to find happiness on their own.

Starting towards the end of February every year, I start scanning the roads, greenbelts, and ponds in my community for signs of the newest Sandhill crane generation. It is a day for celebrating when I see my first Sandhill crane babies of the season. I am not the only person anticipating this annual event. There is a regular traffic sign a couple of miles away from my house that says “Caution: Baby Sandhill crane crossing.” So weird, but so nice.

The other day, the annual miraculous moment happened. I saw the Sandhill crane babies for the first time of the season. We were driving out of our development to visit some friends when we passed a small feathery family of four loping cautiously across the green space along our community exit. I squealed involuntarily and barely refrained from slamming on the brakes. Max would have been alarmed by my reaction, except that he also saw the babies… and knew what to expect of me. I cried out in reverence, “Oh look, BABIES!” My heart jumped around inside my chest for the rest of the day, celebrating this momentous occasion.

I recently learned that Sandhill crane babies are not called “chicks” or “cranelings” or any other birdlike monikers. They are called “colts.” Now, I have always thought of “colts” as baby horses. It would seem to me that there is nothing further from a horse than a Sandhill crane. Despite being called a “crane,” I’m not thinking that the Sandhills can do any heavy construction work. Cinderella never had Sandhill cranes pull her pumpkin carriage, even with a generous helping of enchantment. You can’t ride them. I don’t think there is a Sandhill crane racing off-track betting location anywhere nearby. Then, I realized the nexus. Baby Sandhill cranes basically look like ducklings stapled to the top of two spindly pencils, where the erasers would normally be. Their legs must be about five times the length of their bodies. When novelists write about leggy young girls who seem to not completely know what to do with their limbs, they often use the term “coltish.” I always thought those novelists were making the comparison to baby horses. Maybe, all this time, those novelists really meant baby Sandhill cranes!

What animals herald the onset of Spring where you live? Please share your perspective by leaving a comment. In the alternative, you can email me at terriretirement@gmail.com.

Have a flighty day!

Terri/Dorry 😊

Locked In

I have seen news stories about all the wildlife boldly going where no undomesticated animal has gone before since the coronavirus quarantine drove people into their dens. While we have been locked down, nature sees us as “locked in.” Wild animals are using the opportunity to run amok. I think it is the natural world equivalent to calling all your friends and having a party when your parents are away for the weekend… or for many extended weeks in the case of coronavirus quarantine.

I am seeing it in my own neighborhood. Our friendly neighborhood rabbit, Honey Bunny, has made several appearances in my backyard in the last couple of weeks. We often see squirrels scattering around in the trees back there. Seeing Honey Bunny is a rarer phenomenon. Up until a few weeks ago, we had not seen hide nor hare for over a year. Then there was Ghastly Gussie the Gator. I’ve lived in Florida for over five years and, before the quarantine, saw no alligators sunning themselves in the proximity of my sun porch. After seeing a very live Ghastly Gussie in the backyard, I have seen two halves of alligators on opposite sides of the main highway outside my subdivision. They might not have been so ghastly as Gussie, but certainly grislier and more gruesome.

A week or so ago, a friend and I both saw some sort of mystery critter within a few days of each other. It was skedaddling into the brush around our community “meditation glen” wooded area. We both saw it in about the same location, so I think it is probably the same animal. Neither one of us have a clue as to the identity of this animal, even after extensive googling. To me, it looked like a brown, furry, ambulatory ottoman roughly the size of an overfed lhasa apso. Someone suggested it might be a wild hog, but it seemed too fluffy to be a hog. It moved like an extremely large skunk, but it seemed to be devoid of any skunk striping or coloring. I wondered if it might be a mink or otter, but it seemed too large and stocky to be a mink or otter. It also would have had to have been a mink or otter having a really bad hair day because this creature certainly lacked the sleek elegance of minks and otters. It might have been a raccoon, but there was no banding on the dark brown bushy tale. I really thought it looked most like a fisher cat or wolverine, but fisher cats and wolverines do not live in Florida. Whatever it was, I am sure I have never seen anything like it before the quarantine.

The other day, as I sat at the table eating breakfast, I noticed some action outside my screened-in lanai. I caught some movement out of the corner of my eye. I looked outside and saw Robert(a) the Bobcat sidling past my lanai. If I had been out on the lanai and the bobcat had stayed where he/she was, I could have touched him/her through the screen. That is how close the cat was. Robert(a) was not in any particular hurry. He/she walked purposefully but was clearly not in any “fight or flight” mode. Max and I watched while Robert(a) made his/her way past all the houses on my street until he/she disappeared around a curve in the conservation belt behind the houses.

Not to be outdone by the bobcat, Rocky (short for Rockette; I am guessing she was a female braving the daylight to forage food for a nest of babies) the Raccoon tramped by the lanai yesterday. When I posted a photo on Facebook, my neighbors responded with dire warnings that Rocky was probably the Rabid Raccoon because she was out during the day. Further research indicated that, although raccoons are primarily nocturnal, they are often seen during the day, especially in the spring when mommy raccoons leave the babies in the nest while they wander in search of calories. Either for the babies or for themselves. Apparently, nursing baby raccoons is hard work. Google indicated that, if rabid, a raccoon will likely be disoriented, clumsy, and lethargic. Rocky was none of those things. In fact, she traversed the backyards along my street with a certain pep in her step and lightness of foot. She seemed to travel most gracefully with a rhythm of movement. That is why I named her Rockette. I half expected to see her doing eye high kicks.

I think I am beginning to understand how animals in the zoo feel. I’m locked in and the regular inhabitants of my world are coming out to look at me!

Rockette the Raccoon high-stepping outside my lanai

FRIENDLY REMINDER: Today, my second book, Random (A)Musings, launched on Amazon. You can order paperback and kindle editions. You can thank me later!

Me, showing off my new book before yesterday’s virtual launch party

Wild And Un-Woolly

Well, it has finally happened. There was an alligator in my backyard.

Yes, after more than five years of living in Florida, we saw an alligator meandering around the green belt behind the houses on our street. He was a reptile on a mission, although a slow-moving one. Luckily, his mission seemed to be taking him in a direction away from us.

Let me back up and remind you of the little bit of heaven we call home. When I bought my house in this quiet little age-restricted community, the realtor went into raptures about the beautiful location and natural view. Truthfully, that location and view were big selling points for this particular house. I look out my sliding glass door and huge windows into a beautiful, peaceful greenbelt area. It is a conservation zone. Developers will not be constructing any new houses in that area. It is quiet. It is serene.

What I didn’t realize until several years after I purchased the property is that the “greenbelt” is actually a wetland. It was at least a year after I moved in that I realized there was WATER down the grassy, forested slope from us. The epiphany that there was a body of water about 20 feet from my house dismayed me for a little while. People say that, if there is a glass of water anywhere in the state of Florida, there will be an alligator trying to get into it.

When my mother moved to Florida, she insisted that I find her a home that was not on the water because she did not want to share her property with the alligators. I thought she was being a little unreasonable because we live in a place called LAKE County. There are over 1000 lakes in Lake County, which cover over 200 square miles of water. Finding a place to live far away from the water is sort of geographically impossible. I did find her a place that didn’t back up directly on water, so that was a win in my book. I didn’t take the alligator thing very seriously, though. All in all, my #1 strategy for living in Florida is to try not to think about alligators.

We had a guy do some work on the soffits in our house. This was after the great snake chase ( http://www.terrilabonte.com/2016/07/the-great-snake-chase/) and I was kind of paranoid about wild things entering my home. I was thinking about small wild things like snakes and squirrels. Obviously, an alligator could not get into my house through the soffits. Or could it? The soffit guy mentioned that he heard a big bull alligator bellowing while he was on the ladder screening up our gaps. I, for no reason other than abject denial, decided it must be bullfrogs he was hearing. I validated this opinion based on Google, which told me that mating season for alligators was over, and on some random wildlife page that said an alligator sounds like a motorcycle starting. The noise in the backyard did not sound like a motorcycle. More like the foghorn on the Titanic. Return to strategy #1 for living in Florida…. Try not to think about alligators.

As I lived in Florida longer, I started to get a little more comfortable. The only place I ever saw an alligator in the wild was on the grounds of the Kennedy Space Center, of all places. It was becoming easier to employ strategy #1 for living in Florida. Still, I had friends who kept insisting that alligators are commonplace in Florida communities. They recounted their alligator sightings on golf courses and local ponds. One friend seems to spend a lot of her time in the passenger side of a car keeping her eyes peeled firmly on the surface of any body of water, fascinated by the prospect that she might see an alligator. Sometimes, she does. Me? Strategy #1 for living in Florida… Try not to think about alligators.

Once I got on Facebook, I saw photos of alligators wandering in my subdivision. At first, I thought some of the folks who posted these pictures might be trying to pull my alligator-ignoring leg. Then, there was a video of a whole batch of my neighbors herding a small alligator from one pond to another. Apparently, he was too young to challenge the male alpha-alligator for breeding rights and too old to be tolerated as a juvenile by said alpha-alligator. Papa Gator apparently ran him out of the breeding pond. Junior was looking for new digs, aiding by my neighbors.

Despite my strategy #1 for living in Florida.. Try not to think about alligators…. I think I always knew, deep down, that there were alligators out there. Because I live on the wetlands (which looks suspiciously like an everglade environment to me), I really did believe that someday I would see an alligator in my backyard. The only thing that really surprised me was that it took as long as it did. Well, one more thing really surprised me. This guy was huge! I figured the day would come when I’d see an alligator, but I thought it would be one of those 3-5-foot models. Oh no, this guy was super-sized. He had to be at least eight feet long.

Max was standing out in the Florida room, looking out our windows. He called to me and asked if I could identify a large dense-looking dark patch of matter about 25 yards from our back door. We thought it might be a fallen tree or large turtle (strategy #1 for living in Florida… try not to think about alligators.) I almost had him convinced it was a log. Then, the log lifted its head, opened its mouth, and meandered a few feet up the slope towards the house next to us. Ghastly Gussie the Gator was on the move. We watched, pretty aghast ourselves, as he ambulated a few feet north, stopped to rest for a few moments, then progressed a few more feet before pausing again. He continued in this manner for some time.

I called the phone number Google told me to call for “nuisance” alligators. I wasn’t sure Ghastly Gussie was really a nuisance, to be fair. Sure, I saw him as being in my backyard. I’m certain the alligator thought I was in his backyard. He wasn’t really threatening anyone, although I was certainly relieved that he was “non-threatening” further away from me as time passed. My Google research advised me that the alligator wranglers would likely not “relocate” Ghastly Gussie. At least, they wouldn’t relocate him alive. Apparently, alligators are very territorial and will keep returning to “their” place repeatedly, despite human attempts to change their venues. Still, Gussie was a pretty big guy and I thought, given that he seemed to be getting closer to peoples’ back doors as he headed north along the water line, there might be some danger to people and pets. Anyway, when I finally called the alligator wranglers to get their advice, I only reached voice mail. The voice mail gave me another phone number to call if there was an immediate threat. The message listed the criteria for declaring an alligator an immediate threat. Some of the criteria were finding an alligator in your garage, finding an alligator under your car, and finding an alligator attached to your leg. None of the criteria for immediate threat applied, so I left a message. I also posted a picture and a warning on our neighborhood Facebook page so people could exercise a little extraordinary care.

Eventually, Gussie disappeared from my view. I started trying to re-engage with my strategy #1 for living in Florida… Try not to think about alligators. It was a little harder to force my brain into that frame than usual. However, the experience wasn’t all bad. At least Ghastly Gussie practiced proper social distancing!

What is the strangest thing you’ve ever seen in your backyard? Please share your perspective by leaving a comment. In the alternative, you can email me at terriretirement@gmail.com.

Have a wild and un-woolly day! But stay safe!

Terri/Dorry 😊

Leaving The Nest

I have been living in Florida for over five years now. I wouldn’t say that I live in the country, but I do live in a “country-ish” location. There is abundant undeveloped land in my community and the surrounding area. It is certainly more rural than anywhere else I have lived. I’ve seen more types of wild animals than I can easily count. I have had numerous opportunities to watch the cycles of nature play out over time. You’d think I would be used to the aftermath of the circle of life by now. Not so. I saw something a few weeks ago that brought me to tears.

I’d say the wild mascots of our community are the sandhill cranes. I’ve written about them before on this blog (http://www.terrilabonte.com/tag/coping/ and http://www.terrilabonte.com/2018/05/cranes-in-my-cranium/.) If you don’t know what a sandhill crane looks like, you should google it. You should also read my prior blog to get a sense of how I tend to anthropomorphize them. They are so much a part of our community; it is hard not to.

Sandhill cranes mate for life. They have babies once a year and those babies stay with their parents for about 10 months. The time of the year when we start spotting the baby cranes is noteworthy. Facebook comes alive with notifications of baby crane sightings. People pull over on the side of the road to take pictures. There is one street not too far from here that posts official-looking, professionally printed signs proclaiming “Caution! Baby Sandhill Crane Crossing.” We watch those babies grow from little fuzzballs on stilts to mature cranes that are indistinguishable from their parents.

What we don’t think about is what happens at the end of that ten-month raising period. I never thought about it until recently. Sure, I’d noticed that our little trio and quartet families of cranes were back to being couples around Christmas each year. It happened gradually, so it wasn’t something that signified anything to me. I lived in a little fantasy world where the juveniles had a graduation party and went off to crane college or something. They literally left the nest.

A few weeks ago, I saw the darker side of the Sandhill crane life benchmarks. As I drove down the street towards the exit of our community, I saw one of the crane families on the side of the road. One of the adult cranes was charging the juvenile. There were furiously flapping wings, hissing noises, and gnashing beaks involved. Clearly, the adult was running the juvenile crane off his territory. It made me so sad. How could these creatures who carefully hatched and raised their babies turn their backs so callously on their progeny? How could the creatures, who mourned and cried when a baby got tangled in a telephone wire and died, now snarl and spit to drive away their remaining offspring? It just broke my heart to think how confused and sad those maturing cranes must feel to see how emphatically mom and dad want them gone. Where will they go? Won’t they be lonely and scared? The entire episode really bummed me out.

I know that there is a circle of life and that last year’s nestlings must make way for this year’s babies. I know that the newly emancipated juveniles will likely find their own mates and begin exciting new lives of their own. I know that the Sandhill cranes likely do not take stock of their emotions as humans do, so probably don’t feel as betrayed as I would feel had my parents decided to cut off all ties with me when I turned eighteen. The logical, rational side of me understands that there is no tragedy involved in the launching of the juvenile Sandhill cranes. My heart, however, can’t wrap itself around the idea.

I know it is important for children to become independent and live their own lives. It is extremely difficult for each generation to accomplish their own goals and achieve societal evolution if that generation is still occupying the last generation’s nest. Just as the very act of struggling to emerge from a cocoon strengthens a butterfly’s wings and prepares it for life in the great unknown, I’m sure the struggle of leaving the nest strengthens children of all species and prepares them for life in their own great unknown. Still, that Sandhill crane approach to launching their children seems unaccountably harsh.

Those chicks did not just leave the nest; they were pushed!

What experiences do you have of “leaving the nest?” When you or your children left the nest, was it as harsh as the Sandhill crane emancipation? What was the result? Please share your perspective by leaving a comment. In the alternative, you can email me at terriretirement@gmail.com.

Have an exciting day!

Terri/Dorry 🙂

Snakes. Why Did It Have To Be Snakes?

Some of you may remember my serpent-related panic the first year we moved to Florida. You can read all about it at http://www.terrilabonte.com/2016/07/the-great-snake-chase/

Time passes. I have seen a snake here and there over the past several years and we have firmly dispatched all of them- one way or another- to a place (either physical or metaphysical) far away from our house. Since that first snake, none have made it inside any location within my residence. They have all been tiny and, I believe, non-venomous. In fact, they have been basically harmless except for severely increasing the amount of cortisol in my bloodstream.

This all changed the other day when I was out spraying Round-up on the weeds around the house. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted a colorful strip of evil incarnate poised at the doorway to our lanai. It was about 16 inches long and made up of bands of red, black, and yellow. When it realized I was close by, it slithered away towards the wetland behind our house. I was relieved to see the back end of him without having to actually confront him. The thing is that this snake was either a coral snake or a king snake. Both are similarly colored. Both are found in Florida. The difference is… wait for it… the king snake is harmless and the coral snake is deadly.

Since moving to Florida, I have heard all kinds of adorable rhymes composed to help hapless souls like myself know the difference between king snakes and coral snakes. One popular one is “Red on black, okay for Jack. Red on yellow, kill a fellow.” I remembered that one when I spotted the alarming serpent, but I have to admit that I didn’t really understand to what it referred. I have since learned that the colors mentioned in the rhyme refer to how the colored bands on the snake are arranged. If the red bands touch only black bands, it is a king snake and harmless. On the other hand, if the red bands touch yellow bands, it is a coral snake and is extremely poisonous.

It didn’t really matter that I didn’t understand the context of the snake mnemonic rhyme. I wasn’t getting close enough to analyze the bands of color. I also didn’t have the presence of mind to process exactly what I was seeing. Also, I don’t think I would have trusted the rhyme anyway. Who relies on something that sounds suspiciously like a nursery rhyme for their personal snake safety? All I knew was that I had a visceral, loathsome reaction to the beast. I made a very odd, guttural sound the second my brain registered the fact that I was standing less than 2 feet from a snake. It was something between a gurgle, scream, and hiccup.

Later in the day, after I stopped shaking, I consulted Google to try to identify the snake. Unfortunately, I had not thought to take my phone out of my pocket and take a picture when I saw the snake. I think I was too intent on not taking my eyes off it for even the instant it would have taken me to fumble around with the phone. Still, I thought if I saw pictures of king snakes and coral snakes, I might recognize the band pattern on the sinister reptile by my lanai. Unfortunately, my mind must have been so frozen by fear that it turned off automatically. I had no powers of recall. I did learn that coral snakes have extremely poisonous venom, but they also have an extremely inefficient venom delivery system. Apparently, a coral snake doesn’t inject venom with its bite in the same way most snakes do. One source indicated that a coral snake would basically have to gnaw on me like a dog with a bone to kill me. That was a little bit comforting, but it also left me with a disturbing image burned into my brain.

In my research about coral snakes, I learned that they are very solitary and reclusive creatures. I learned that, far from wanting to gnaw me to death, they want nothing so much as to get away from me. It is the old “they are more afraid of you than you are of them” axiom. I seriously doubt that, but I get the idea. The venom can kill a person, but nobody has died from a coral snake bite in the United States since the development of the anti-venom many decades ago. Many hospitals don’t actually have the anti-venom on hand, but it apparently takes about two hours for the poison to get into a person’s bloodstream. I guess that is why God invented helicopter medivacs.

All in all, it isn’t a great idea to get bitten by a coral snake. Still, I learned that it is unlikely that I will get bitten by a coral snake if I keep my eyes open and don’t go around stepping on them. Should I suffer a coral snake bite, it is even less likely that I will die of it unless I ignore the whole incident. I’m pretty certain I would not be ignoring a coral snake bite. Or any snakebite, for that matter. I tend to be a bit dramatic about such things.

I don’t know why I have the reaction I do to snakes. This is an argument I have had with myself frequently. I love animals. I love interacting with domestic animals. I even love observing and interacting with wild animals, in a respectful and safe way. There just seem to be certain animals that I can’t help but loathe. Snakes, rats, and mice are at the top of that list. So, basically, snakes and snake food. I know it makes no sense whatsoever to discriminate between animal species in my level of attachment.

I know I can’t be the only one who animal loves with such irrationality. I used to listen to a radio talk show in California that featured two hosts who frequently discussed various absurdities of life, politics, and human nature. This question of why we react much more sympathetically to some species of animals than others came up now and again on the show. The hosts agreed that there is definitely a hierarchy of animals, though no one can really give any logical basis for it. I tend to agree. The snakes, rats, and mice have to be pretty low on that particular totem pole.

Maybe it all boils down from that fall from grace in Eden. Genesis 3:15 tells us God said to the serpent, “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.”

I’m a pretty passive, nonconfrontational person for the most part. I’m not usually known for having enemies or crushing heads. However, when I see a snake, I’m afraid I definitely feel the enmity.

How about you? Are there any animals that you make your skin crawl? Why do you think it is that we can coo over a bunny, yet shrink from a rat? Please share your perspective by leaving a comment. In the alternative, you can email me at terriretirement@gmail.com.

Have a cuddly day!

Terri/Dorry 😊

Flying Creatures Of The World, Unite!

And that seems to be exactly what they are doing. Uniting. In mid-air.

It seems like something has gotten into the birds, butterflies, moths, and dragonflies in central Florida. Something frisky, to be precise. For the past couple of weeks, I look out my window to see birds in brilliant shades of red and blue and yellow engaged in elaborate mating rituals. I see parades of butterflies, soaring around trying to impress each other. I see moths displaying their most spectacular colors and patterns. The other day, I was driving and could see two copulating dragonfly couples spinning through the air. At least, I think they were copulating. Maybe they were just cuddling.

I suppose it is just a natural phenomenon that I am experiencing. I would have thought this frenzy of animal attraction would have happened earlier in the spring, so I did some googling and found out that butterflies and moths tend to emerge from their cocoons in the late spring or early summer. As soon as they emerge from the cocoons, there is apparently a free-for-all designed to keep their genetic material going. Dragonflies supposedly mate during the hottest and wettest time of the year. It is feakin’ Florida. I wonder how they know when it isn’t time to mate? As for the beautiful bird ballets, I had a harder time accounting for those. Googling confirmed that mating usually takes place in the spring. Maybe my fine featherer friends were just feeling left out.

Whatever the timing of this explosion of color and life, it is amazing to behold. Whatever it is, it is perfect. I don’t know why I’ve never noticed it in past years. The grace and peace and inaudible music of the whole panorama is too lovely to describe. It is heart-breaking and heart-healing all at the same time. When one of these vignettes catches my eye outside my dining room window, my brain seems to suspend all activity. I don’t think about what I am seeing… or about anything else, for that matter. My mind and my heart and my soul just live in the beauty of what I am experiencing. My senses overlap- I seem to be able to see sounds, hear sights, taste scents, and touch God.

Maybe that is why I’ve never noticed this phenomenon before now. I’ve not been able to let my senses override my brain enough to fully live in the moment and appreciate this exquisite miracle around me.

I hope it isn’t too weird that I am noticing this. Being so fascinated by free flying creature procreation makes me feel just a little voyeuristic and obscene. On the other hand, the United States Supreme Court decided that one criteria for obscenity was that it didn’t have any “artistic value.” I think my flying friends might be the very essence of “artistic value.”

What miracles have you encountered when you observe nature? Please share your perspective by leaving a comment. In the alternative, you can email me at terriretirement@gmail.com.

Have a miraculous day!

Terri/Dorry 🙂

REMEMBER: You can order your copy of Changing My Mind: Reinventing Myself In Retirement by visiting: https://secure.mybookorders.com/orderpage/2076

Cranes In My Cranium

Recently, I wrote about my feeling that the “circle of life” might be more of a curved line in my case because I don’t have any children. Mona, one of our faithful readers and commenters, shared her perspective on the “circle of life” from her experience working in a hospital. She said that there were always new babies in the nursery when someone died elsewhere in the hospital. Her comment really resonated with me. It was a timely reminder that everything isn’t always about me all the time. Imagine my surprise and dismay! Still, even when reality is a bitter pill, it can have the power to heal.

A few days after I posted that piece, the Universe brought Mona’s point into even sharper focus for me. As I was driving through my community, I nearly drove off the road because of cuteness distraction. I saw my first baby Sandhill cranes of the season. Those of you who have been reading the blog for some time will understand my reaction. By the way, if you haven’t been following every blink of my rapid eye movement for the past couple of years, where have you been? If you would like to jump on the Sandhill crane express now, you can read http://www.terrilabonte.com/tag/cranes/ .

Sandhill cranes are a bit of nature’s serendipity to me. I never expected to fall in love with them when I moved to Florida, but they never fail to lighten my mood. Over the past several weeks, I’ve had my eyes open because Momma and Daddy Sandhill cranes usually start prancing their new offspring around the development right about this time each year. Even with my keen anticipation, the sight of these new fluffballs on stilts flipped my equilibrium when I saw them. It was only by the grace of God that I did not flip my car as well.

The sight of those newborn cranes filled my heart with effervescent delight. I felt as bubbly and fizzy as champagne all morning. I was operating under the influence of baby cranes, a condition which surely must alter the state of the mind. In fact, by the afternoon, I didn’t think my day could get any more whimsical and entrancing.

But wait, there’s more. Later in the day, I was driving down a highway to a doctor’s appointment. I turned off the main road onto a smaller street to get to the medical building parking lot. Almost immediately, I noticed a very official-looking sign on the side of the road proclaiming, “CAUTION! BABY CRANE CROSSING.”

I know, right?

I parked the car and walked over to get a better look at the sign. Apparently, the question is not only why does the baby Sandhill crane cross the road, but where. Somebody was taking no chances with baby Sandhill crane safety. There were at least five such cautionary signs spaced out along the road. It was pretty charming.

When I saw the doctor, she asked me how I was. I told her I was wonderful and related my Sandhill crane sighting stories with great delight. She looked at me rather oddly and suggested that perhaps it was time to cut back on the anti-depressant.

Today, I was running errands and happened to notice another Sandhill crane family parading around a schoolyard I was passing. The momma, daddy, and two baby cranes were promenading in perfect unison. They instinctively adjusted their strides to form perfect lockstep ranks and files. I wish I had been a crane when I was in the junior high school marching band.

What a wonderful day! The sight of those cranes put a soft, slippery smile on my face that has been there ever since. It is a smile that suggests I have a precious, heart-filling secret.

I do have such a secret. My Sandhill crane friends have taught me something. My life is not a circle. And that’s okay. My life is a small dot on the circumference of a much huger continuum. And that continuum is the circle- the circle of life.

What about you? Does Nature ever put you in your place and make you realize that there is more to the world than just you? Won’t you tell us about your experience? Please share your perspective by leaving a comment. In the alternative, you can email me at terriretirement@gmail.com.

Have a beautiful day!

Terri/Dorry 😊

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT: I am kind of surprised that I have only heard from a couple of people about a spot at the virtual launch party for Changing My Mind: Reinventing Myself In Retirement. Of course, I know that you all have lives that do not revolve around me and the publication of my book. I understand if you cannot join us or if you just don’t want to participate. A couple of my friends suggested, though, that some of you might not have a good understanding of what you would be getting into if you come to the virtual party. When I was working, I swear it felt like I existed more in virtual life than in real life. I guess I forget that not everyone spent thirty plus years with a phone growing out of his or her ear. I thought I’d give you some more info on what to expect if you come to the party.

Step #1: Email me at terriretirement@gmail.com to let me know you would like to attend. I will reply to you with a telephone number you can call from any phone, toll-free, a little before 4:00pm EDT on Saturday, 5/19/18. I will also give you a participant code.

Step #2: At party time, you will call the phone number I’ll provide you in my response to your email. An automated voice will prompt you to enter the participant code. Once you do that, you will be on a phone call with the other virtual guests, me, and the folks attending in real life. You will be on speaker phone, but I will give you instructions on how to mute your line at the beginning of the call, if you would prefer.

Step #3: Enjoy! We will have a couple of drawings for REAL prizes- no virtual teddy bears! I will do a reading from the book and field questions from the participants. During the event, one of my lovely assistants will be emailing you photos and coupons and information on how to purchase the book. If you don’t wish to get the emails, all you need to do is let me know. You are still welcome to join us.

There is no charge to you for the party and the process for joining is simple. I am limiting the number of spaces for virtual guests because of budgetary reasons- and also just to make sure it doesn’t become a crazy free-for-all. Right now, neither of these issues should be a problem, so please email me today at terriretirement@gmail.com if you would like to join us so that I can give you the call-in info and get you on my list.

The Wild Life

A few weeks ago, I was driving down the main artery of my housing subdivision and noticed a flock of spectators standing at the side of the road. They were staring into one of the many large heritage oak trees that grace our community property. I have to say these oaks are pretty impressive, but I don’t think I’ve ever noticed a crowd gathering just to stare at one before. The people must have come from far and wide to view this spectacle, whatever it was, because the crowd included pedestrians and bicyclists. Many stood motionless, cell phones in hand, breathlessly ready to snap photos.

As I approached the band of sightseers, I slowed my car and peered at the tree as I passed. Then I saw what was captivating the crowd. There were three fuzzy, feathery faces peeking from a messy nest in the fork of the tree. These little puffballs with eyes were baby owls. Obviously, a worthy tourist attraction. I made several trips back and forth over the next couple of days. It was pretty easy to tell when the baby owls were making a personal appearance by the throngs of admirers gathered beneath the oak branches. The owlet view never got old. To be honest, I was gurgling and chortling with the best of them every time I drove by and saw… WHO? The young ‘uns, of course!

Once, I saw the mama and daddy owls. I’m not sure if an owl can actually be self-satisfied, but the avian parents sure seemed to be gloating over their breeding prowess. They stared out of the nest, languidly eyeing the fans below. I guess they deserved to exhibit a smidgeon of smugness. Those babies are quite an accomplishment!

Some days, all I saw was the nest. Before I saw the baby owls, I probably would have been excited just to see the nest. Now a collection of twigs and leaves woven into a bird condominium fails to impress me. I crave the whole baby owl experience.

About a week ago, I drove by and noticed that someone had secured an area around the owl-occupied oak tree with yellow police tape. Apparently, the hordes of admiring fans and cell phone paparazzi freaked out the baby owls. In the interest of wildlife conservation, someone decided to give them a little space. Not privacy exactly, because crowds still gather regularly to gape at the nestful of adorableness. Owl baby pictures are splashed all over the covers of Facebook. Still, now the owl aficionados have to maintain a respectful distance from the owl nursery. The cordoned off perimeter is sort of like an ecological restraining order. The owls are able to get their forty winks (and don’t owls just seem like they wink a lot anyway?) without worrying about a crazed birdwatcher committing some manner of nest invasion crime against them.

I like living in a community where yellow police tape means “please don’t disturb the owls” instead of “please don’t disturb the evidence!”

With the coming of the owlets, I guess spring is officially here! What makes spring official for you? Please share your perspective by adding a comment. In the alternative, you can email me at terriretirement@gmail.com.

Sorry about the early post this week. I have to be out and about early tomorrow morning, so thought I’d post tonight.

Have a hoot of a day! 🙂

Terri/Dorry

In the interest of full disclosure, I didn’t take this picture. A kind soul shared it on Facebook.

The Hoppiest Place on Earth

When I moved to Florida,

There was no one to caution

That I’d find plagues

Of Biblical proportion….

It wasn’t an eclipse of the sun. Water didn’t turn to blood. I don’t have boils. It is frogs.

The other day, I opened the garage door. Max came out to open the garage screening so I could go to my water aerobics class. He took one look at what lurked outside on the driveway and, without moving the screens, he fled to retrieve a broom.

Frogs. Hundreds and hundreds of them.

Yes, there were literally hundreds of baby frogs lethargically hopping around outside our garage door. They were each about the size of a watch battery and the color of raisins. I’ve never seen a raisin-colored watch battery move before, though. These critters were definitely moving, although pretty laconically. I guess baby frogs don’t really have a sense of urgency.

I dealt with the lizards. I dealt with the snakes. I guess I can deal with the frogs. But what’s up with them, anyway?

I hopped (with considerably more energy than the baby frogs, I might add) onto the internet to google “invasion of baby frogs.” As an aside, doesn’t “google” just sound like something relating to frogs? At any rate, I learned that it is actually quite common to encounter zillions of baby frogs hanging out around your property in central Florida. Apparently, mother frogs lay sufficient eggs to result in up to a thousand baby frogs at a time. Then, the moms just hop off to greener pastures. Our driveway was the froggy equivalent of a doorstep on which to leave a baby…. excuse me…. vast quantities of babies. There are no baby froglet Mommy and Me classes. Apparently, there is no nurturing or rearing of any kind. According to the Internet, few of the thousand or so baby frogs survive beyond their first week. Go figure. I’m sorry to say that the baby frogs born in our driveway amphibian maternity ward probably have a shorter life expectancy than most.

I didn’t really have anything against them per se. They didn’t annoy Max as much as the lizards did. They didn’t creep me out the way the snakes did. They were actually kind of cute little buggers. It was just the sheer number of them that was kind of disturbing. There were so dang many of them; it was almost like there was an entire layer of frogginess on top of our driveway. I’d say there were more frogs in my front yard than there are people in my entire community during the summer. We were definitely outnumbered. It was kind of alarming. We sprayed some stuff across the entry to the driveway and swept away as many of them as we could. I’m sure I probably ran a few of them over as I backed my car onto the street.

As we looked around the perimeter of the house, we saw that we were kind of surrounded. Everywhere we looked, more baby frogs. We kept spraying and sweeping so that the baby frogs stayed “around the house” as opposed to “inside the house.” This operation continued every time we wanted to go in or out any door to our house for the next several days. Knowing it was a self-limiting condition made it easier. Sure enough, after about four days, we no longer had layers of visible frogs surrounding the house.

It has been a couple of weeks now since the frog plague. We still see the odd toddler frog around the yard. They aren’t bothering me, so I don’t bother them. After all, if we have to have a plague of Egypt descend upon us in central Florida, frogs aren’t the worst of the bunch.

Of course, I still have a few niggling doubts. How do we know that the frogs are the only plague in the offing? What bothers me most is that both Max and I are first borns…

Of all the situations I’ve encountered since moving, I think the frog invasion is the oddest! What about you? What is the weirdest thing that you’ve experienced in moving to a new place? Please share your perspective by leaving a comment. In the alternative, you can email me at terriretirement@gmail.com. Have a great day and hop to it!

Terri 🙂