- Chicken Little worried about the sky falling, I think I know why. She must have been in the woods, in the fall. First thing on the list…the sky was falling. Okay, so not the blue pouring like paint or the fluff of clouds splatting down on us like roasted marshmallow, but orange mushy fruit. My husband almost got clunked in the head with one. He brought it to me and said, “What’s this?” Of course, I should know, biologist, resident of these great United States all my life, but alas, I did not. However it smelled sweet. It looked like fruit. I took a taste. Lucky for me it was a perfectly, ripe persimmon and tasted like honey dipped orange. Google told us the name and thus we became persimmon hunters which is a lot like Easter egg hunting. Look once and see nothing, look again, and there’s a plump fruit right there as plain as day. What a wonderful surprise! Now to figure out what to make with them. Recipes anyone? Thanks.
- Once we got over the sweet persimmons falling from heaven, we were gifted with another display of glory. We sat down to a hearty camp breakfast of half burnt hash browns, bacon crisped in a way that can only happen on a hot griddle, scrambled eggs with brown bits of stuff, and toasted ‘everything’ bagels. Yeah we do it right! A light breeze came whispering through the lemon yellow, lime green and apricot orange leaves on the trees all around us and then, the trees let loose and rained down leaves like confetti over our breakfast. We happily ate around them. What else? When in the woods, be one with the woods.
- Speaking of trees, lying in bed, I gazed out at view through the ‘Fantastic fan’ screen on the roof of our camper (2015 My Pod micro-teardrop) and saw something that kind of freaked me out. Though there was no visible wind around, there at the very top of the very tall trees, the branches were swaying and twisting like a storm was thrashing them. What was going on in the upper atmosphere? Worse yet, it was not only the branches up high but the mighty trunks swaying. It occurred to me that they looked like giant flowers in a field. Then I thought of how it is all about perspective. From my point of view, the trees were tall, strong, unyielding pillars of the forest but, that is in relation to my size. If I was giant, the trees could be as inconsequential as blades of grass. It reminded me of the Dr. Seuss story, “Horton Hears a Who” about the world of the “Who’s” that lived on a dandelion plant. It’s all about perspective isn’t it? If you look at a situation, a person, a season from one way it can seem huge, insurmountable but then look at it differently, through the eyes of someone else, or through faith or just plain accepting your own smallness, and it can change your world completely.
- Second looks at first glances can reveal a lot, can’t they? Take for instance what I saw while walking on a hiking trail and not even in the depths of the woods. Bigfoot! No, seriously, first glance my brain registered a giant person thing, potentially a threat but on second glance, it was just Bigfoot. A clever person’s rendition at least. Keep your eyes open and don’t panic with what you see, it could turn out to be a good laugh and appreciation of someone’s sense of humor.
- But then sometimes what you see might be mysterious and unexplainable, a freak chance of nature or if your imagination runs too wild, the entrance to the Twilight Zone. It happened that way when we took a serene walk around a secluded pond. It was just us enjoying the peace, the old growth trees and the new baby pine forest hugging the edge of the pond. Lilly pads festooned the surface of the water, rippling in the breeze. Then I saw it. “I know,” my husband said before I even spoke about what was in view. On the pond, the lily pads were thick but here and there were random patches where they didn’t grow. But across the water, on the other side, there was a place devoid of the lilies but it was not a squiggle shape or even a round area. It was a watery ‘crop’ circle, perfect in its arching curve. Maybe this is not unusual. Maybe. But I could not think of a reason that the plants did not grow in such a shape. My curiosity however did not push me to get down in the water and figure it out so it remains a mystery.
- Bonus! Sure, I could have changed the title to “Six” things I saw but where’s the fun in that? Everyone likes a bonus! So here’s mine, walking on the trail I sighted a rare and often overlooked purple tarantula. Seriously! Well of course you can see what I mean as it is the ‘featured image’ for this post.
And to tie it all together for my writing friends, what do all these great views mean? Keep the unexpected both fearful and humorous in your writing. Discovery is fun, expanding someone’s perspective is worthy of the time to be creative, and worth reading. Sure writing the expected script is easier to sell but don’t be afraid to be the pioneer, to write the story no one has told. Just be sure to do it well!
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CG Express 
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