…Katie’s first trip to the beach…
Dima & Larisa took Katie on a camping trip to the Outer Banks in North Carolina this weekend. Larisa sent this picture and reports that the new family is enjoying bonding on their first weekend getaway, and Katie doesn’t seem to mind roughing it in her little travel bassinet. She looks like she feels safe in Daddy’s arms. No doubt she will grow to love the sea as much as her extended family does. ♥
Goodnight moon. Sweet dreams. Smile kindly upon this little blue gum ball of us while we sleep.
~ Dave Matthews
(Twitter, October 13, 2008)
Can the child within my heart rise above
Can I sail through the changing ocean tides
Can I handle the seasons of my life
Well, I’ve been afraid of changing
‘Cause I’ve built my life around you
But time makes you get bolder
Even children get older
And I’m getting older too
~ Stevie Nicks
♫ (Landslide) ♫
The sea, once it casts its spell, holds one in its net of wonder forever.
~ Jacques Cousteau
(Science at Sea)
misty sunlit noon
swamp mallows basking in pink
a storm on the way
~ Barbara Rodgers
(By the Sea)
I first met this battered old gull three years ago in August of 2011, when we were expecting Hurricane Irene. Today he sat on this post right next to us, closer than he’s ever come before, and we heard his long and mournful cry again. He looks a lot worse for wear, his life has no doubt been difficult with that badly mangled foot. Now it looks like he has a barnacle or a growth on his beak. I think he was letting us know about the approaching rain storm. No hurricane this time, though.
I wonder if some of these big juvenile gulls could be hybrids. I have given up trying to identify them…
All things come and go:
People, seasons, the wind.
Only the sea remains,
the sea’s breakers repeating themselves.
Never the same.
Always the same.
~ Kolbein Falkeid
(Sea & Sky)
On August first I was delighted to see what I think was a fledgling American oystercatcher chick, who was testing its wings. It was about half the size of the parents, who were relaxing on the other side of the rock. We first saw the parents July 19. Even though I took these photos with the telescopic lens, I find myself wishing for an even more powerful one! The flights were pretty short – taking off and landing smoothly are no doubt the most difficult part.
My love for gulls is no secret. Yesterday evening we went down to the beach and found the gulls pleasantly eager to pose for my camera. Incredibly, I came home with 79 pictures of these common and seemingly unremarkable shorebirds.
It was a very windy day as you can tell by the ruffled feathers in some of these shots.
It’s a good thing I took so many pictures of the other kinds of gulls last summer because we aren’t seeing many of them here this year. (But we did have oystercatchers this year, much to my surprise and delight!) These ”regular” ring-billed gulls seemed very happy to have their beach back to themselves… I envy them at times…
Some bodyminds have more stormy weather systems than other bodyminds, just as some geographical locations have more stormy weather than others, and it is neither helpful nor relevant to compare ourselves to others. It is also very liberating to realize that change always happens on its own timetable, not on the the timetable the thinking mind conjures up. Especially in our speeded-up, fast-food, modern culture, we tend to want instant results, and life just doesn’t work that way. Most changes in nature happen slowly.
~ Joan Tollifson
(Nothing to Grasp)
As I sit here wishing for another bout of figurative “stormy weather system” to pass me by, communing with the gulls reminds me that change always happens on its own timetable…
We were born before the wind
Also younger than the sun
Ere the bonnie boat was won
As we sailed into the mystic
Hark, now hear the sailors cry
Smell the sea and feel the sky
Let your soul and spirit fly
Into the mystic
~ Van Morrison
♫ (Into the Mystic) ♫