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Just Passing By

30 Jul

My Take

 

DiVoran Lites

 “Oh, hi,” I say to the dinner plate sized gopher tortoise off to one side of the trail. Our woods are a kind of sanctuary for them and we see them often. Is this one a boy tortoise or a girl tortoise? Our son, an expert on gopher tortoises, could tell us, but he’s not here, right now.

I walk toward the pass-through into the neighborhood where I live, but before I get there, I spot a smaller gopher tortoise, this one about the size of a Corning salad plate that looks as if he’s about to go into the subdivision.  I’ve never seen two tortoises at the same time so my imagination begins to take over as it usually does when I’m about to meddle in somebody else’s business.

Maybe the big one, is the small one’s, mother. Maybe she’s worried that he’ll go into the subdivision and be run over or attacked by a dog. Anyhow, subdivisions are dangerous for wildlife so I pick him up by the shell and take him over to the big one. If she is his mother, she can look after him and I can go on home.

The minute I set him down, the big one starts bobbing its head so hard I’m afraid it will get a crick in its neck. Right away, I remind myself that gopher tortoises are vegetarians and they don’t have any equipment with which to hurt each other. I hope. Otherwise, it might have been a mistake to bring them together.

Everything seems okay except for the emphatic bobbing. The small one doesn’t bob back, but then he doesn’t pull into his shell either. Now what?The big one starts walking away. The small one follows. Phew. Surely, they are mother and son going home just as I imagined. Wait, though, suddenly the small one dashes around the big one and slips into a hole exactly the size of his shell, leaving the big one on the outside looking stunned. It waits a moment then begins to graze.

We’ll have to talk to our son and see what its all about. Stay tuned. Maybe it’s just one more lesson in minding my own business.

Proverbs 26:17

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The Robin Diaries- Part 6

28 Jul

Speak Up Saturday

Patricia Franklin

Our yard is becoming popular real estate for birds now. Besides the two nests in the yard, some little red finches were inspecting our satellite dish. They did not come back though. I noticed a hummingbird sailing around in that heavy wind yesterday. I don’t know how they do it. I put out our hummingbird feeders now. They like zeriscape. After noticing that the robins really like the millers, which are migrating to the cool mountains now, I released a bunch of millers from under the BBQ cover and watched the robins catch them.

I was worried a couple of days ago about the robins. One got in a big fight with robins and neither of them would quit. They ended up chasing each other all around the neighborhood. Then I only saw one robin for the rest of the day. I kept watching and finally, just before I went into the house that night, I saw both of them at the nest again. That meant I could sleep without worrying about them. The same evening we took a walk around the block and ran into a neighbor we had never met before. He was coming out of the house with his son-in-law. We said hello and he told us he was going to show his son-in-law the robins. So of course, we inquired about it. He showed us a nest, and, surprise, they had all flown away. So the man ran into his house to get his camera and show us the close-ups he had taken of the three babies. I was excited to hear he was so interested in them. He said he had been off work, and so he watched them all week.

Frank sneaked a peek into our nest and said there was nothing there, but I know there is. They must have scrunched down. I said, “No more peeking in the nest.” I want to stay out of their way. I don’t want them getting anxious and leaving prematurely. They are still small. I have not heard them chirping yet, but the adult robins sit on the fence and sing to them so they will recognize their voices and learn how to chirp back.

Robin nest

Robin nest (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

 

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Summer Exploring

26 Jul

On the Porch

Onisha Ellis

This summer it has been an absolute joy to spend time with our grandchildren, taking them to many of the places we explored with our own kids.  Yesterday, though we went on a new adventure, and took the grandchildren to Black Rock Mountain State Park in Georgia. We have passed the entrance hundreds of times on our way to Florida and on our way to Wal-Mart. Years ago we tried to visit the park but the road was too steep for our van and we didn’t make it to the top. The park is less than twenty miles from our mountain home and we have missed out on it for years. After that failed first attempt we overlooked it because it is practically in town and the signs were so familiar we just tuned it out.

Our first stop in the park was the visitor information center to get a park pass. Outside the building is an overlook and like all mountain overlooks, the scene was beautiful, but what made it really cool for the kids was they could see Wal-Mart.

We had a great time exploring the park, grilling hot dogs and we even saw a baby bear, the first bear sighting for our grandchildren.  After leaving the park we went to Wal-Mart. Our grandson was fascinated to be able to locate the park while standing in the parking lot. You see, for years he had seen that rough brown spot on the side of the mountain but thought it was just construction. How many opportunities and relationships do we overlook because the first time we tried was too hard or we just weren’t seeing what was there all the time?

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Keep Your Eyes On The Road

25 Jul

A Slice of Life

     Bill Lites

 

In the fall of 1954, I was going to school, working part-time as a checker in a super market, and riding a lightweight Harley Davidson 165cc motorcycle all over town.  I was tall and lightweight myself at the time, so the motorcycle suited me real fine.

One day, after school, I was on my way down town to the Harley Davidson shop, when I saw my sister up ahead, walking home from her school with some friends.  Hoping to show off my shiny red motorcycle and get a little attention from the girls, I honked my horn and waved as I passed them.

With my attention on the girls, I hadn’t noticed the dump truck and workmen stopped in the middle of the street making pothole repairs.  There were no caution signs of any kind or flagmen warning traffic of the roadwork being done.  So, the first time I was aware of a problem was, when I looked from the girls and back to the road.  There was the bed of the dump truck right ahead of me.  I didn’t have time to think.  I just reacted.  I threw my weight and the motorcycle to the left, my left foot hit the pavement with a slap, and then I pushed myself and the motorcycle back up with my left leg.  This all happened in a split second as the motion carried me and the motorcycle down, under the corner to the bed of the dump truck, and back up on two wheels.

I pulled over to the curb, slowed to a stop and just sat there trying to stop shaking and catch my breath.  I couldn’t believe what had just happened.  If I had held my attention on the girls for one second longer, I would have run right into the bed of that dump truck and that would not have been a pretty sight, and I wouldn’t be here today telling this story.

I believe that Someone bigger than you and me has my life and breath in His hands and has been guiding me and watching over me from the day I was born.  I don’t know why He has been so good to me but, I thank Him,  God of the Angel Armies.

 

 

John 10:28

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A Place to Hide

22 Jul

My Take

DiVoran Lites

Heavy rain comes down in sheets, clatters on the aluminum roof of the porch and rattles the screens on the windows. The T. V. says the wind is blowing at 60 mph. Seventy-five mph means hurricane. We are grateful to be hidden in our snug house away from the storm.

This morning our two cats had an altercation. Maybe it was because Jasmine was playing around the cat size basket on the porch they both like to sun in and Lily wanted it. When Lily gets mad, she scares Jasmine to death so Jasmine was backing up through plants and trying not to get nailed. She ran to the French doors, but they were closed so she climbed one and clung by her claws in a place where she knew Lily wouldn’t follow. Lily will climb sometimes, but it’s not second nature to her as it is to Jasmine. Jasmine has an even better place to go, a place where Lily gets a bit of vertigo and hunkers down. She has never gone there voluntarily. I put her there once to see if she liked it, but she definitely did not, so I lifted her down. Jasmine gets there by jumping onto the kitchen counter and running across the stove. It’s definitely a no no, but she goes so fast I can’t stop her. Where some of us might get vertigo, she feels perfectly safe.

I guess we all need a place to get away from others who scare us and from things that go bump in the night. There is one sure place: we sing a song that starts, “You are my hiding place.” When we were younger, we sang, “Rock of Ages, cleft for me, let me hide myself in thee.” We are speaking here, of course, of our Father in Heaven. It’s good to know that no matter what is happening He promises to be our hiding place. He will not only hide us, but he will settle us down and give us direction and insight. He loves us, his children; nothing delights him more than seeing to all our needs, especially our spiritual needs. We have only to ask and a hiding place appears.

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The Robin Diaries-Part Five

21 Jul

I am always thrilled with God’s timing. Patricia originally wrote the following paragraph  to close today’s post but in light of the tragedy in Colorado, I made an editorial decision to move it up and use it as an intro-Onisha

“With all the turmoil going on in the world, it is very refreshing for me to block it all out and concentrate on the simple, normal life of mother nature and her little critters. I am glad to know that I am not the only one. I know you enjoy it too, and my friend that was here this weekend actually set up a movie camera one year and took a movie of robins nesting in her yard. She let it run until the birds were gone.”

Speak Up Saturday

Patricia Franklin

After all the commotion yesterday, things have settled down today. We had a nice rain last night and I was out pulling weeds from my little garden today – about 10 feet away from the nest. The robins do not care. Neither are they bothered by any of the doves or other birds. In fact, they will get down on the grass and eat with the doves. The blackbirds are a different matter. They chase them away. The robin was loudly tweeting a warning last night, so I went out to see what was happening. Both robins were trying to chase a blackbird away. He finally landed on the fence, but would not leave, so I decided to offer my services and went out and chased him out of the yard.

Somewhere I heard that robins hear the movement of earthworms and that is how they find them. I don’t know if that is true, but I know they have good eyesight. Frank replaced a sprinkler yesterday and we had to dig up a lot of the grass. Any earthworms that I found, I tossed in the grass near the lilac bush. But, I found a huge cutworm and did not want it to get back in the grass, so I just put it on the edge of the patio where I was digging. I stopped working, went in and got a drink of water. Out the window, I saw a flutter of wings, and ran back out to discover the cutworm was gone, just like that.

Earthworms are a good example of soil-dwelling...

Earthworms are a good example of soil-dwelling detritivores (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Now as I am awaiting the robin family to appear in public, I have a ring necked dove who tried twice to put a nest on a bare limb, above the picnic table. Twice it blew away. Today when I went out, she had completed her nest and is now sitting on it. It is not much of a nest, but I will be watching her as well now. I don’t see how she can have room for an egg, let alone a baby bird, but we will see.

Robin nest

Robin nest (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

All that passing laws against sin did was produce more lawbreakers. But sin didn’t and doesn’t, have a chance in competition with the aggressive forgiveness we call grace. When it’s sin versus grace, grace wins hands down. All sin can do is threaten us with death, and that’s the end of it. Grace because God is putting everything together again through the Messiah, invites us into life–a life that goes on and on and on, world without end.

Romans 5:20 The Message Bible

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Mis-adventures Are Fun Too

19 Jul

On the Porch

Onisha Ellis

We have been enjoying the summer exploring with the grandchildren. Two weeks ago we visited the Great Smoky Mountain National Park. We had planned some short walks and a picnic at Collins Creek picnic area. The weather decided to change our plans but we were able to grill our hotdogs under a wonderful pavilion at Collins Creek.

This week we were on a waterfall hunt in Clayton, Georgia. Due to bad directions and an over-full ford, we didn’t find the waterfalls but we did discover a great picnic area, Warwoman Dell.  Warwoman has two amazing picnic pavilions, one with a large fireplace the other with a central fireplace with four grilling stations.  We ended our day with the grandchildren wading in the Chattooga River located on the South Carolina-Georgia border.

Uh-oh should have driven the truck.

Love the fireplace. Looks like a great place for a Fall picnic

Wading on the Chatooga

Neither of our days went as we planned but we had a great time. Sometimes those rainy day picnics and mis-adventures create memories that are remembered far longer than perfect days.

How about you, do you let the weather or bad directions keep you from having a good time?

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Just Another Day At The Flying Field

18 Jul

 A Slice of Life

Bill Lites

A friend called the other day asking me to meet him at our model airplane flying field to help him with one of his planes.  He was in remission from cancer and had not flown for some time. The last time he tried to fly he passed out on the field and woke up in the hospital. Now, he wanted someone there in case anything happened again.  It was a beautiful day with just a hint of a breeze right down the runway.  He unloaded his plane and all the gear needed to setup his large electric powered model.

The first thing he noticed was that the three batteries he had charged for the occasion did not have the right connector on them to mate up with the airplane electronics.  He looked in his support bag for the adapters that would solve that problem, but couldn’t find them.  “I must have left them at home” he said.  Then he discovered the battery with the correct connector was still in the plane, but he had not thought to look for it in there, so he could charge it for this trip to the field.  This prompted another search in the support bag for the battery analyzer to see if that battery had enough juice left in it to fly the plane.  Finally he said with disgust, “I must have left that thing at home too.”  But, when he plugged the battery into the on-board flight system, the system “beeped” with a response that indicated “I’m ready to go.”

So, he decided to fire up his new computer radio system to see if the on-board battery had enough charge left for a flight, and broke out his radio control transmitter.  When he couldn’t get the transmitter to show him the correct model information on the display screen, he had to refer to his radio control system manual to look up the proper procedure to set up the radio for the model he had brought to the field.  Every time he thought, he had the right sequence, it would be for the wrong airplane and he would have to start over.

At this point I suggested it might be better if we tried another day when he had time to get everything working properly.  But, he wasn’t ready to give up an opportunity to fly, and this went on for about 10 or 15 minutes.  Finally, he came up with the proper sequence, and when activated, the motor sounded as if it had plenty of battery power, and we were ready to put the wing on and give it a try.  He decided the rubber bands that had been on the wing were old and questionable, so, rather than take a chance, it was back to the support bag for fresh rubber bands.  These he did have, and now all was in readiness for the flight we had come to the field for.

He taxied the plane out onto the south end of the runway to get the feel of the controls.  When he said he was ready to take off, I said, “The wind is out of the south, you need to start from the other end of the runway.”  Would you believe he took that plane off, did a nice slow circuit of the flying field, and brought it back in for a perfect landing?  He said, “I think I’ll call it a day.  Thanks for your help.  Any day I can take my plane home in one piece is a good day.”

 

He obviously felt good about his success and so did I. I hoped that if I ever experienced that kind of devastating illness I would possess the positive attitude, the faith, and the stamina to persevere as he had done.

 

 

I Thessalonians 5:18

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Conquerors

16 Jul

My Take

DiVoran Lites

When my brother and I were kids, in Colorado, Dad bought us a part-Shetland pony to ride. We called him, Yankee. He wasn’t as small as a regular Shetland, or as big as a quarter horse, but he was stubborn as all get out. My brother took to horses right away, he inherited it from, Dad, I guess, who was once an amateur race jockey.

We took Yankee up to the house from the feedlot to bridle and saddle him, but every time I got on, whoosh, Yankee trotted back to the feed-lot with me holding on to the saddle horn and trying to keep my feet in the stirrups. I only weighed about fifty pounds, and I was about to give up. Then one day Dad was there when we brought Yankee, and he saw what was happening to me. He didn’t blame the horse, though. He said it was my job to show Yankee what to do.  We started over.

Back at the house, Dad held the reins in a firm grip down close to Yankee’s mane as I got on. He then showed me how to grab a fistful of rein and a fistful of mane and hold tight. In other words, he showed me how to take control over the situation. Much to my surprise the horse stood until I gave him a nudge with my heels and eased up on the reins a little. I was no longer a victim.

What a great life lesson. In the book of Genesis, God says we have responsibility and dominion over the animals. In Romans 8:37 he says we are more than conquerors. Sometimes problems come and things seem out of our control. Nevertheless, I’ve learned an additional lesson from my Heavenly Father. With prayer and faith, we can tap into the power to conquer anything. What a relief to know that we are no longer victims, but conquerors.

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The Robin Diaries- Part 4 Twittering and Tweeting

14 Jul

Speah Up Saturday

Patricia Franklin

 

This is the 20th day since the robins built their nest. The female has been sitting now for 10 days. She will leave for about 10 minutes or so, not much longer. Both of them watch the nest though. One day some blackbirds came along looking for seeds, etc. on the ground. The female was gone and the male came flying in and sat on the nest. The female came back a little while later and seemed surprised by his presence there. She immediately took off again for some more time by herself and he just stayed where he was. We have about 6 or 8″ of grass growing under the bush now, not to be mowed for another couple of weeks, or until the babies are gone. I’m pretty sure there are no babies yet. If there were, we would see a lot more feeding activity. We have been out working in our yard and garden just about two yards from the nest. They do not seem to worry about us. They will sit on the nest, fly in and out while we are there, or just sit on the fence, or look for bugs/worms in the grass.

Yesterday was the 14th day of sitting on the nest. We had company over the weekend, so did not have time for robins. However, I noticed yesterday both robins were eating a lot and taking turns flying back and forth to the nest. I believe we have some babies now! I have not heard any little peeps yet, but we are having some construction on our street and all I can hear are jack hammers, revving engines and beeping machines going in reverse. In addition, Frank is working outside sanding our windowsills with a power sander so he can repaint them. The poor little tykes are going to be deaf before they get a chance to hear the twittering and tweeting they should hear in a normal day. I sat out with a cup of coffee this morning and did see both adults on the edge of the nest taking turns feeding the unseen little mouths inside. Guess I will get a glass of ice tea and go see what is happening this afternoon. Maybe there will be a lull in the construction noise during their coffee break.

Mother Robin

Mother Robin (Photo credit: striderp64)

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