life – In the Woods

to live with loss

The reality is you will grieve forever. You will not “get over” the loss of a loved one; you will learn to live with it. You will heal, and you will rebuild yourself around the loss you have suffered. You will be whole again, but you will never the same. Nor should you be same, nor would you want to.
~ Elisabeth Kubler-Ross & David Kessler
(On Grief and Grieving: Finding the Meaning of Grief Through the Five Stages of Loss)

I have found these words to be true. It’s thirty-four years now since my mother died and I have healed and have learned how to live with that never-ending feeling of painful loss. After my father died twelve years ago, grief was much more familiar to me and I more quickly got used to feeling like an orphan. But now, to be a widow.

I miss my husband so much. How is this much pain even possible? The loss feels like it’s cutting even deeper than the loss of my parents because I intimately shared my life with this man for more than fifty years. My days are full of memory flashes, as if my brain wants to watch the video of our whole life together in bits and pieces. (I think in pictures.) So I pause whatever I am doing, recall the scene, cry a little, talk to him a little, and then try to remember what I was doing and carry on.

Sunday evening I took another very long two-hour walk with my friends. It was cold and the atmosphere felt like it was going to snow. It was magical. (It did snow the next day in some places nearby, but not at my place.) Very healing and I am so grateful for their love and support. We were still out there when the sun set. A good memory.

vase de chrysanthèmes

“Vase of Chrysanthemums” by Pierre-Auguste Renoir

We have ceased trying
to tie up all loose ends.
We have discovered
that life does not need to be neat.
We have more questions than answers,
and this is a great delight to us.
We trust the Mystery of life
without having to possess It.
We cherish the feeling of awe
that has grown within our soul.
~ William Martin
(The Sage’s Tao Te Ching: Ancient Advice for the Second Half of Life)

Tim

After a long and very ordinary day of chores and errands and making plans I suddenly lost my best friend. We were watching TV together, late in the evening, a program about building modular housing. Tim was making an observation about the process when he had a heart attack and died. This was how he had hoped his life would end, without having to suffer through a prolonged illness, and for that I am thankful. Farewell, my love. I am numb, and so lost without you.

11.11.25 Edit: It wasn’t a heart attack. The cause of death was ‘ventricular fibrillation resulting in sudden cardiac death.’ Cardiac arrest is different from a heart attack.

around the botanical garden

10.7.25 ~ North Carolina Botanical Garden
37th Annual Sculpture in the Garden

So, we haven’t visited the botanical garden since the end of May, over four months ago. I wasn’t about to risk any more seed tick attacks. On this new try, I had Tim spray my shoes and pant legs with picaridin, giving up on previously tried deet and permethrin. So far, so good, but I’ve not been attacked in the month of October before so maybe I didn’t need it. Not taking any chances, though.

I didn’t get too many pictures of the sculptures this year. I guess I was starved for the beauty of flowers and berries!

“Sonoran Sentinel” by Gary Taber
*A contemporary reimagining of a desert giant, drawing inspiration from the formidable presence of arid landscapes.* ~ Gary Taber

wildflowers in the sassafras sapling grove
(this spot always enchants me)

When we got to the boardwalk going through the Coastal Plain Habitat we were amazed to find ourselves surrounded by a sea of black-eyed Susans, some of them quite tall, enjoying the sunshine.

Even though there were a lot of old favorites to delight my eyes, some new-to-me flowers presented themselves, sending me peeking into the greenery looking for id signs. If none could be located there was research to do at home. It felt good to get back out there and into the swing of things again.

“Marshland Morning” by Forrest Greenslade
*My egret reaches for the sky to greet the day*. ~ Forrest Greenslade

“Guardian of the Night” by Nana Abreu
*Taíno Moon Goddess symbolizes renewal, mystery, and unseen life forces,*
*representing the feminine rhythm of existence while illuminating the shadowed side of nature.*
~ Nana Abreu

Chinese aconite aka Carmichael’s monkshood

“Opossum in the Cherry Orchard” by Bronwyn Watson
*Local opossum in early summer after an enjoyable night dining in a cherry tree.*
~ Bronwyn Watson

branches growing in flat tiers

You might also notice that leaves growing closer to the ground, where the forest is shady, tend to be larger and softer. This is because trees are trying to absorb as much light as possible with these shaded leaves. Understory trees such as dogwoods live their lives in low light. They not only have larger leaves to absorb all the light they can get but also grow their branches in flat tiers so their leaves are spread out in single layers to make the most efficient use of the light that filters down to them.
~ Peter Wohlleben
(Forest Walking: Discovering the Trees & Woodlands of North America)

passing summer

Summer ends, and Autumn comes, and he who would have it otherwise would have high tide always and a full moon every night; and thus he would never know the rhythms that are at the heart of life. There is a time of sprouting, a time of growth, and a time of harvest, and all are part of the greater whole. There comes the time now to savor the harvest, to pause and know another year not yet brought to full finality.
~ Hal Borland
(Sundial of the Seasons)

asters dans un vase

“Asters in a Vase” by Henri Fantin-Latour

The times are disgusting enough,
surely, for those who long for peace
and truth. But self-disgust
also is an injury: the coming
of bodily uncertainty with age
and wear, forgetfulness of things
that ought to be remembered,
remembrance of things best forgot.
Forgive this fragmentary life.
~ Wendell Berry
(This Day: Collected & New Sabbath Poems)

molting and preening

Sometimes when one is feeling cooped up with summer cabin fever, the universe will send a little gift from the great outdoors right to one’s window. This little molting Carolina wren was sitting on a dead rhododendron branch, singing very loudly and with marked enthusiasm. A bright streak of sunshine bathed him in a magical aura. After I got my camera he started to preen, and preen, and preen.

Just now the wren from Carolina buzzed
through the neighbor’s hedge
a line of grace notes I couldn’t even write down
much less sing.

Now he lifts his chestnut colored throat
and delivers such a cantering praise —
for what?
For the early morning, the taste of the spider,

for his small cup of life
that he drinks from every day, knowing it will refill.
All things are inventions of holiness.
Some more rascally than others.

I’m on that list too,
though I don’t know exactly where.
But, every morning, there is my own cup of gladness,
and there’s that wren in the hedge, above me, with his

blazing song.

~ Mary Oliver
(The Wren from Carolina)

‘Twas my lucky morning! You never know who might stop by. These pictures were taken through a dirty window with my neighbor’s wall and window in the background. I’m glad her shades were closed — there were already enough reflections cluttering up the shots. I’m surprised the photos came out as well as they did.

a fledgling cardinal

It’s been so sweet listening to our cardinals sing this summer, and now they have some youngsters exploring the world around them.

This one seemed particularly interested in our birdbath so I was able to get some fuzzy pictures through the sliding glass doors. He kept picking up and putting down catkins, splinters, and twigs, as if he was learning what might or might not be edible. He never did go into the water, though.

So, art thou feathered, art thou flown,
Thou naked thing? — and canst alone
Upon the unsolid summer air
Sustain thyself, and prosper there?
Shall no more with anxious note
Advise thee through the happy day,
Thrusting the worm into thy throat,
Bearing thine excrement away?
Alas, I think I see thee yet,
Perched on the windy parapet,
Defer thy flight a moment still
To clean thy wing with careful bill.
And thou are feathered, thou art flown;
And hast a project of thine own.
~ Edna St. Vincent Millay
(The Fledgling)