Nurturing the Heart

Dandelions

Feeding Mason Bees

Making Wishes

Makes Me Grumpy, Sometimes

Small Acts

Celebrations

Not a Road for the Car

Dandelions in the Valley, Snow in the Mountains

Eyes on the Pack River

Rushing Snow Melt

Cavorting Dogs

Watching the River...Moose...What Moose?

Danger Lurks in Mossy Trees

The Man Cares for His Dogs & Wife

Watching Dandelions & Mason Bees

Commit Acts that Nurture the Heart

#1000Speak

Mason bees flit from dandelion to dandelion. Their golden wings and small bodies are easy to overlook. Sitting in the grass affords me a closer inspection

I can't understand why anyone would consider dandelions weeds. The blossoms scatter across meadows and lawns like tiny returning summer suns. Often, these blossoms provide the first food for pollinators, like these silent mason bees. Pluck the flowers and you can make dandelion wine. Pluck the feathery globe of dandelion blossoms gone to seed and you hold the power of making wishes in your hand.

The leaves are slightly bitter and edible. Salad season is nearing and already I have greens to add to the mix. Those who do not understand the gift that is a dandelion curse the tap root. Home improvement stores even sell a special tool to dig the roots, not to mention dangerous chemicals to kill the plant. Yet the root and leaves are most beneficial; they detox the liver, prevent diabetes, boost iron and strengthen the heart.

I'm sitting in grass surrounded by mason bees and heart-toners. If not by dandelions, then how do we nurture our hearts?

I've been grumpy with my husband lately. As we approach 28 years of marriage, I recognize a dip. The path to longevity in relationships includes highs and lows. Couples who want to forever be in love are shocked the first time they hit a dip. The heart might recognize love, but we have to do the nurturing. We have to keep our relationships heart-healthy.

Dandelions don't bloom every day of the year and neither does our heartfelt love for one another.

The grumpiness will pass if I practice patience and loving acts. My loving acts are simple and constant, mostly. I cook his breakfast before he goes to work, and most days I cook his dinner, including fabulous BBQs now that the weather is sunny for such outdoor cooking. If I withhold these simple acts, I can almost feel my heart shrink. Yet, I want to experience something other than grumpiness with my spouse.

Some couples renew their wedding vows. I've known people to take elaborate renewal vacations to Hawaii or on cruise lines. Other couples have thrown big shindigs with gaudy party favors and elaborate invites. And some have paired up for high-risk adventure such as zip-lining through the Amazon jungle to re-spark the heart.

For us, the moment simply happened, unplanned without invites or plane tickets. We renewed our vows of commitment through a shared near-death, heart-stopping experience.

With the return of dandelions and mason bees, the roads to the upper Pack River are free of snow. Well, almost. It started out with me feeling grumpy toward him because he was driving our car up what was more or less a muddy two-track winding higher and muddier into the mountains. We reached a spot rutted by 4-wheel drive trucks and I said, "We can't go through that."

He grinned and shifted the car -- a car, not a truck -- and said, "Yes we can."

Gripping my seat, grumpiness flared into full marital fury. Why had I married a three-year-old? When would he grow up?

We made it through only to get high enough up the road where the snow was yet drifting and melting. Beneath a tall span of pines was a clear patch where we could get turned around. I could see the roaring Pack River coursing with spring snow melt and I wanted photos. Once turned around, we stopped and I headed to the river.

The silts in the Selkirk mountains are blue-gray. When the snow melts and silts churn, the water doesn't look muddy, it appears glacial blue. With huge frothing rapid over boulders that range in size from pumpkins to smart-cars, the river echoed down the forested canyon. With eyes only for the river, I didn't heed my surroundings.

Our dogs -- his dogs -- cavorted like children and stepped into the churning waters. They galloped upstream and I snapped my camera doing a full circle and when I saw my spouse coming at me he looked grim and determined. Had he grown heart-weary of our relationship, too? He seemed on course to push me into the river.

In a low and calm voice he said two words, "Charli...moose.."

How I missed walking right past a moose, which is as large as a horse, is beyond me. Even the dogs zipped past her. Her. The worst gender to meet on the trail when dandelions are in full bloom in the valleys below. A female moose is deadly.

Just then, my husband did an incredible thing; he stepped between me and her. That one act was greater than 28 years of cooking breakfasts. That one act renewed our vows of love, commitment. That one act nurtured both our hearts. He took on til death do us part. And we were looking at it.

Incredibly, our dogs returned from up river and saw the moose and gave her chase. His dogs -- our dogs -- stepped between us and her. What happened next is unheard of; the moose turned and ran. Moose do not turn and run. Moose kick, charge and stomp. They hold their ground. This one did not, and Todd told me to run to the car. He went after the dogs.

Once at the car, which is not necessarily safe as moose are capable of destroying a car, I called for those dogs like a desperate mother calling for a lost child. Todd trailed them for almost a mile before they turned back miraculously unscathed. It was a miracle that none of us were injured.

My husband knows he has hero status now. I don't doubt his love. Nurturing is vital, big or small acts. We have to nurture our own hearts to be able to love another. We have to practice that love when it is difficult.

Those dogs mean the world to my husband. I know that without a doubt. But I know that I mean the world to him, too and he to me. So when I feel stuck with a special needs dog, I remember what we all mean to one another.

So here I sit among the dandelions and mason bees holding my dog -- our dog -- in the throes of a full seizure. It's a little act, one he knows I'll do because I love him and these two dogs. The other dog waits patiently by the door understanding that his sister is helpless but being helped. He'll lick her face when we return inside.

Nurturing the heart is never easy, but we can't mistake dandelions for weeds. Sometimes the very things that annoy us, feed us. Embrace a life full of dandelions and live the big and small moments fully.


This post is part of a #1000Speak movement happening every month. Learn more at 1000Speak for Compassion.

Stranger in the Shadows

Hoarfrost Where It Belongs

The Ignored Crow Tree

Horses in Fuzzy Sweaters

Driveway Glaciers Melting

Almost a Sunny Day

Stranger Slinking in the Dry Grass

Which One of Us is More Scared?

A Coyote Dog?

We Keep a Watchful Gaze on One Another

And Then It Was Gone

Hoarfrost crystallizes the top trees of the ridge like a confectioner; the monster is sweet when he stays away from my barn. I admire his work from the valley floor below where crows continue to commit murder elsewhere.

They fly over head -- caw! caw! -- each passing by the pond, the barn and the tree I decorated for them. Baubles remain like unopened gifts. I'd take them down and spare my gilded ribbon exposure to the elements, but I'm not risking the drifts of snow that remain.

This is not snow for trekking. Snowshoes or cross-country skis would make it passable, but walking is treacherous. One moment you step across glistening crust, the next you break through and become entangled. I will stay on the icy worn trails and emerging bare patches.

Beyond Elmira Pond, the neighbor's horses trample the drifts and seek clumps of dry grass. Their winter coats are fuzzy as angora as if they put on full-body horse sweaters. Come spring, they will need a good currying.

Spring can't be too far away, after all the driveway glaciers are melting from underneath. Small pools and glacial streams form during the day. It's not sunny but the clouds are high enough to make the day feel expansive. The dogs bark and I think they have cabin fever.

But then I notice Bootsy, the barn cat. She's still and pressed against the outside wall of the garage not far from her kitty door. She's staring in the same direction as the dogs are barking. Wouldn't you know it? They are all focused on the barn where I thought I heard a monster last week.

With camera in hand -- if I can click Big Foot or a grizzly it might be worth my moment of terror -- I go outside. Bootsy dashes through her kitty door and I feel as though I've at least saved the cat. I stand at the fence and stare. Nothing. Dogs continue to bark.

Then I see it. A shape so cleverly still, so perfectly camouflaged that I thought it part of the wood pile. Inside the wood barn is...something.

As soon as it realizes that it has been seen, it zips out the structure in odd little leaps the way coyotes do when they hunt mice. How did it know I finally saw it? Did it smell my fear, a chemical reaction in my body, a subtle change in my stance? I didn't move or make a sound. I merely saw. How did it know?

In the light of day, it has a coyote muzzle and ears but a hound-like body with a cream chest and brindle coat. What the dickens is it? Dog is the obvious answer. Coyote dog is a possibility. Is it wild or domestic? Is it lost? This is not a critter I've seen before and I'm not comfortable standing in my snowy pasture looking at it looking at me.

It's not comfortable either. I'm not sure if my stranger is male or female. I'm not even sure if my stranger is scared or scary. It bounds away in those funny leaps and hops through the wires of the fence as if they were mere illusions, simply shadows of lines.

The stranger stops and stares. First at me then toward the highway. Maybe it isn't sure which one of us presents more danger. I opt to consider the stranger a lost dog and whistle. It trots down the road, then turns around and trots toward the place behind ours.

And then, the stranger disappears into the dry grass and trees, slinking away into nature as if it had never been here in solid form.

Linking up with Abracabadra for Wordless Wednesday. Photos by Charli Mills.

Turkeys in the 'Hood

Peek-a-boo

Turkeys in the Grass

Bobbing up the Dirt Road

Bobbing Down the Dirt Road

Turkeys Being Turkeys

Turkey Formation

Following the Flock

Turkeys Head to School

Where Children Once Recessed

Tom, Yes, We See You

Late morning sun filters through the pines on the north-side of the house and my bedroom window is open wide to catch the glorious autumn air. Despite the gathering insects--flies and beetles--this is my favorite time of year.

Like spring, fall has movement and feels vibrant.

The movement of the morning is right outside my bedroom window and both dogs bark at it. It's too late in the day for the moose and most likely it's a feral cat. Turns out there's an entire flock of turkeys in my yard.

Grabbing my camera I head downstairs and out the door. This will be a great close-up, I think. Evidently turkeys are speedy birds on foot. Not one is left in my yard. When I catch their movement, the flock is all the way across the north pasture, ducking under the fence.

Through dry grass I snap shots. The turkeys spread out up and down the dirt road that leads to my neighbors behind our property. Their feathered fannies scuttle like tortoise shells and their blueish heads bob like big chickens. They must be feasting on the insects that cover the ground.

I'm too short for clear shots. My best vantage point would have been the bedroom window. They shuffle up the knoll behind the schoolhouse, the flock fanning in and out of formation. One tom struts his wings in case I didn't catch that he was the male. Show off turkey.

The dogs join me outside, Grenny leashed. The two GSPs strut their stuff, sticking noses to the ground and following the bird scent. According to the dogs the turkeys had been all around our house. Bobo is so intent on following I have to shout her name several times to break her concentration.

It's my neighbor who jumps at the sound of my voice. I'm not normally at the north-side of the pasture with the dogs and she regularly walks the road for exercise. This morning I've caught her with her pants down--literally. She was peeing by my pasture gate. No big deal, really. We all do it around here. Pee outside, that is. I turn away with the dogs, pretending I didn't see.

But it reminds me of other turkeys in the 'hood. The women who come to northern Idaho to camp, trout-fish or hike and who don't know the etiquette of peeing outdoors. I know who you are, Ladies, because you leave a trail of toilet paper wads in your wake.

Todd and I go up the Pack River regularly and nothing annoys me more than people who leave a paper trail. The rule of the forest is "pack out what you pack in." Don't leave me your white flags that show every spot where you dropped your drawers, as if claiming a forest service campsite the way wildlife would. For the turkeys who need some educating, here's some tips:

1. It's okay to use toilet paper; it's not okay to leave it behind.
2. If you're squeamish about picking up your own used tp, think about the next visitor!
3. Bring a few sandwich baggies. Use one like a glove if you're extra prissy, pick it up and wrap it away. But take it with you!
4. Learn the hanky method or use a squirt bottle to freshen up (no tp to worry about).

The only time men flag with tp is the worst thing to encounter on the trail. Okay. I know bears leave scat on trails, moose too, but listen to me all of humanity who visits the forests--don't poop on the trail! Off-trail, do your business, off-trail. And bury it. Bury the tp if you must, but bury it, man! My dogs will roll in it and that upsets me beyond belief. You may think your man-scat doesn't stink but on the neck of a GSP, it's not cologne.

I like to pee freely outdoors just like my neighbors. I don't mind visitors who discover the freedom (or necessity), but don't be turkeys about it. Spare my dogs, me and the next set of campers.

Wordless Wednesday, September 10, 2014

Off-pond for this shot: working cattle dog on a cattle ranch in southeastern Minnesota.

Linking up with Abracabadra on Wordless Wednesday. Photo by Charli Mills.

Soggy Socks

Guests at Elmira

Ilya Digging Gophers

Jasper Pond Gazing

Playing Dog Detectives

Stuck on an Island

Stuck

Pawing Eggshell Ice

Soggy Socks

Coaxing Ilya

Braving the Wade

Wet-Dog Shake

Ilya Drying by the Fire

A skiff of spring snow coats the pastures and two cars in our driveway. Elmira Pond has guests. My daughter Allison is visiting from Missoula, seeking the ranch solitude as she revises her graduate work--an hour-long radio script about remediation in the Treasure State (MT).

It's Sunday morning and my daughter knocks on my bedroom door. Peering in she asks, "Mom, do you want to go for a walk?" Her two huskies wrestle like wolf-pups in anticipation of walking the pastures and pond. Not wanting to miss a minute with my grown daughter, I get out of bed and into boots and heavy jacket.

Ilya doesn't waste a minute. As soon as we pass the horse gate into the south pasture he lopes to a gopher mound and digs. Allison sips tea and I snap photos. Jasper gazes longingly at Elmira Pond. We can hear pileated woodpeckers pounding tamarack bark that direction. "Let's walk around the pond," I say.

Allison calls Ilya, and we walk through another pasture to get to the pond. A red-winged blackbird and seed-seeking robins chortle. Two crows pass overhead cawing to the murder that awaits them across the train-tracks. Migrating birds are returning, but still the pond is a slab of ice with some pooling at the edge.

Huskies race ahead, edging around the pond like furry thoroughbreds. We slog behind, stepping from one frozen mound of grass to another with water gushing from beneath the ground like a living sponge.

In essence, Elmira Pond is a spring-fed sponge with a deep pool. How deep, I really don't know, but deep enough to contain fish and interest osprey and mergansers. The spongy, grassy banks attract frogs that in turn attract Blue Heron.

It's a thriving pond.

The huskies spread out, noses to the snow-covered grass, trailing mice and other alluring scents. Jasper seems content to play dog-detective, but Ilya is hunkering in that odd way that animals do before a leap. He's at the lip of a creek that flows out of the pond, south into the abandoned pastures of Bluebird Ranch.

He jumps, landing on the edge of the ice and breaking through. We both hold breath as the 85-pound dog flounders in deep water. How deep is Elmira Pond if its overflow is beyond the lanky legs of a husky? Ilya claws his way up to what we know realize is an island of grass.

It's that moment from "A Christmas Story" when the schoolboy, Flick, is dared to touch his tongue to the playground flag pole--he cries with increasing panic, "Stuck? Stuck...stuck!" That's the expression on Ilya's face. He's stuck on an island, surrounded by deep water and eggshell ice. And he's panicked.

Allison is relieved and tries to coax him back. But Ilya has slunk from confident hound to terrified kid. He paws at the water, trying to obey but afraid to step. Allison now walks around the creek, treading carefully across a narrower spill of ice-covered water and is walking to the other side of the island.

But an island, is an island; surrounded by water. Ilya is good and stuck. I'm left to guard over Jasper lest he tries to get to Ilya, and together we stand in a sinking bog. If my socks are getting wet, it's worse for Allison. She steps off a hummock of grass into water that pours over the tops of her boots. Her yelp let's me know that it's really cold.

Ilya continues to paw at water and whine. I'm thinking if my daughter goes into the water, I'm next. This soggy-socked rescue is not going well. Finally, Ilya musters the courage and plunges into the creek on the other side of the island. It's belly-deep and he treads across.

Once on the other side, he's so happy he runs to Allison. I'm so relieved. When Ilya reaches her, he gives a full-body wet-dog shake. Now Allison has more than wet socks. The huskies reunite and romp back toward the pastures. And again, Allison and I slog behind.

Back at the house, I start us a fire and brew strong coffee while Allison towels off Ilya on the porch. He then stretches out before the fire, smelling of wet dog. The order mingles oddly with woodsmoke and java.

My daughter and I laugh at the sprawled dogs and go change our socks.

This is our soggy, silly story for Sunday. Join host blogger, Everything Susan, for more Silly on Sundays stories.