nature – The Traveling Kites

Sometimes it is good to be reminded of how great it is to be happily married. Sharon and I celebrated forty-five years a few months ago and our life together has been a joy. Sure, we have ups and downs. Every married couple does. But we stick together through each one and our life together has been a true blessing from God.

He who finds a wife finds a good thing and obtains favor from the Lord. -Proverbs 18:22

All our married life, we have enjoyed camping together; first the two of us, then with our two kids (and an occasional pet cat or dog), then with a church youth group (mission trips, music festivals, etc.), then back to the two of us again.

As I look back, there has never been a time that I’ve taken a solo camping trip. There have been a few occasions when I have gone without Sharon, but those times have been with a group. All of that changed this fall.

Sharon went with a group of ladies from our church to a women’s conference about four hours away. They were gone Friday morning through Saturday evening. So, I made a reservation at a lakeside state campground an hour from home. After driving to a town near the lake, I stopped at a supermarket to buy some cheese-filled sausages to cook over the campfire, and some buns. It was still an hour before check-in at the campground, so I stopped to walk four miles on a bicycle trail, alongside the lake. It was a beautiful day with an amazing view of God’s creation.

Upon arrival at the campground, it didn’t take more than a few minutes before I missed my travel companion. We have wandered together enough that we have a good routine upon arrival. Sharon sets up the inside while I get things ready outside the van. So, it seemed to take twice as long to set up this time.

That feeling of missing her continued throughout the trip with one exception… Saturday morning.

Sharon and I are very different people when it comes to morning time. My perception of her is that as soon as her feet hit the ground, she goes immediately to work on something. It may be cooking, or sewing, or something else, but she hits the ground running.

I, on the other hand, am more of the quiet contemplative type in the morning. I get up, spend some time with the Lord in my Bible and prayer, then make a fresh cup of Aeropressed coffee. The coffee is a continuation of my morning solitude as I sit and slowly sip while watching a travel video on YouTube (I am currently on a Tokyo kick). My genre of choice is the travel video with no talking. Subtitles are OK, but just the sounds of the surroundings or quiet music is all the background I need. This contributes to my morning calm.

This is not to say that Sharon doesn’t have a personal devotion time. She does. She just has a different time of day when she connects with God. We often go to the Lord together, in prayer, when we take walks. So that is another part of missing her on my solo trip.

On the Saturday morning of my solo trip, my camping routine came into play. I got up slowly and quietly, gathered my gear and went outside to grind and brew some pourover coffee. Then, with Yeti cup in hand, I came back to sit in the rotated passenger seat in the van beside the opened, side sliding door, where I spent some time in the Word and in prayer. Being alone, my quiet time continued as I walked the short distance from my campsite to the boat docks to view the coming sunrise. The temperature was cool, but pleasant. There are actually two docks that go out into the calm morning water. I was on the one further from the sun because there was a lady with her small dog on the other one. This presented the opportunity to compose a nice photograph of the sunrise with she and her dog silhouetted in the foreground.

As I stood there, admiring the beauty of God’s creation, another gentleman joined me on my dock. He said he had to come down to watch the sunrise because he works early and usually misses it. I was very pleased to share the dock to allow him this opportunity.

I took a morning walk around the campground to get started on my step-count, then a bit later walked about three miles to an ice cream shop next to a causeway. I would end the day with over ten miles on my fitness app.

Back at camp, I spent the rest of the day making a campfire and cooking another of those sausage dogs. They were delicious!

As evening came and it started getting cooler outside, I turned to an episode of Miami Vice (Season One) that I had downloaded prior to my trip. Ah yes… pastel-colored t-shirts and suit jackets with a background of great music of the 80’s. I must admit that I adopted a bit of the Sonny Crockett fashion for a short while back in the day.

I slept well on Saturday night and got up early Sunday morning for my coffee and devotions before breaking camp, stopping by the dump station, and traveling an hour toward home in time to arrive at our church for Sunday school and reuniting with my bride at 9:00.

I am thankful to have had this experience. It gave me a great appreciation for my wonderful travel partner and also showed me just how much I enjoy my morning solitude. I am often reminded of the quote by Chief Hopper on the television show, Stranger Things: “Mornings are for coffee and contemplation.” And to that, I close with a hearty AMEN!

-Randy

Blog & photos: ©️TheTravelingKites 2024

I am looking out the large window into the back yard at my mother’s home. She sits nearby, working on her latest puzzle that is spread out atop the dining room table. As I gaze out the window, I see a familiar pair of avian friends, strutting and picking around the yard. We affectionately know them as Harold and Everett; a couple of black birds that visit the yard daily.

You might be thinking, Ah, how cute. They named the birds. While you are correct on that, there is a deeper story behind the naming. My father’s name was Harold. He grew up on a small farm a half-hour away. By the time he graduated high school, he had decided that he did not want to spend the rest of his life farming. So, he took a job at a steel mill a half-hour’s drive from the house he built down the road from the farm.

After some years of driving the one-hour round trip to the mill, frequently working ten hours a day, six days a week, he became weary of the daily trek and decided to build a house within a few miles of his workplace. I sit today in the house he built.

My father had a good life and was a great dad to my sister and me. Sadly, he passed on Fathers Day in 2009, following a month-long hospital stay. My mother continued to live in the house he built and was very happy to be able to stay there well into her nineties, with the assistance of my wife and I.

One day at mom’s house, we observed two black birds that landed in the back yard. We would soon learn that they visit every day. Interestingly, there are black birds all around the neighborhood, but these two are the only two that seem to have made mom’s yard their daily hangout. We know that it is the same two that visit every day because one is slightly larger than the other and they have become recognizable by the three of us.

Mom said, “That’s Harold, come home to visit.” My wife asked who the other one was, and we all decided it was Everett the neighbor who had also passed several years before.

After getting to know them by name, we have come to look for them each day. Over the past month, I have made it a habit to take a scoop of seeds and peanuts out to the bird feeders each morning, then walk a little further and whistle while throwing the rest of the scoop out into the grass. Harold and Everett would eventually find their way, landing quite a distance from the tossed treat, then walking cautiously, side to side, while slowly approaching the feed. Eventually, they would gather up enough courage to peck at the food, oftentimes flying back to the safety of the tree line to eat the mouthful they collected.

Over the past few days, it seems that they have become used to my routine and maybe even expect it. Yesterday, I was in the kitchen, and I heard some cawing. I told my wife that they were hungry and promptly went out to whistle and toss. They no longer delay in flying in. They now land in the yard before I get back inside the house. They still make their first approach to the food with caution, but after that first mouthful, they just walk right up to it. I look forward to the day when they trust me enough to no longer use caution on that first approach.

Harold and Everett have become a cherished addition to our days at the house. I wonder if my dad is in heaven, looking down at us with a smile on his face and a bit of laughter in his breath.

“Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom o barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds!” – Luke 12:24

-Randy

Feathers photo by Vignesh Kumar R B on Unsplash

In-flight photo by Steve Harvey on Unsplash

Tag: nature

Lakeside Solitude

Harold and Everett