A Mental Health Day

We decided to call yesterday a mental health day for both of us to run away from home and all the thoughts and concerns that have been plaguing us recently.

Throwing a few essentials in the car, we headed off into the boreal forest. Hubby usually does 90% of the driving when we're together mostly because he can't read without battling car sickness. But yesterday I commandeered the steering wheel and told him he was to sit back, relax and enjoy the views. (I think this worked because he commented on how much more of the scenery a person can see when he's not driving. Or trying to read. Or trying to not get car sick.)

The day was mostly gray and threatening rain, but we only experienced a couple of drops at a couple of different times.

We wanted to check out the inland lakes to see what the current ice conditions were. Opening fishing weekend is but one week away. We sure couldn't be classified as ardent fishermen (fisherpeople?) and have made it out on opening day only once that I can remember. Since that was the time we got caught out in the middle of a lake in our canoe in a terrific snow squall (couldn't even see the shore) and had serious concerns if we were going to make it to shore without dumping out, we've not been overly eager or felt it necessary to go fishing again on the earliest day of the season.

Here's another lake we checked out. Still ice out there but with luck, it could be gone in another week.

I had my camera at the ready because nearly every back road we went on, we saw moose tracks. The one above has a match box laid by it to give you perspective.

In one area, Papa Pea needed to make a pit stop, so I took a short hike off another path to see if it led to an overlook of a lake we were near. After encountering the third pile of moose droppings (each "nugget" is about the size of a walnut and they were looking none too old, I might add), I decided I'd seen enough and scurried back out of the woods and waited in the car.

We returned home around four and then headed back into town last night to hear a speaker talk on sustainable farming/gardening and eating locally. D and his wife live about 60 miles from here and operate a very successful CSA providing food to sixty families. They live off-grid with their two kids who are now teenagers and have built their farm up from literally bare land. Talk about being an inspiration! A few years back, we took an all-day stone building class at their farm and I still remember the wonderful buffet-style meal his wife prepared for about twelve of us at noon. They are now doing a lot of consulting work. How they manage all they do is amazing . . . and it also makes me tired. The ground swell of people interested in getting back into raising their own food (yes, even in our less than hospitable climate) is wonderful to see.

After D spoke, we saw the movie, "The Queen of the Sun - What Are the Bees Telling Us," which explains the plight of honey bees world-wide. Rudolph Steiner, the founder of biodynamics, predicted this collapse we are experiencing now way back in the early 1900's. The movie is very well done, but I suspect it was a bit of "preaching to the choir" as the building was packed with folks well aware of this dire situation that could possibly bring about a massive world-wide food shortage if we don't find a way of changing practices and philosophies before it's too late. The movie has just been recently released but I've heard it will be available on Netflix in the future. Well worth viewing if you have the opportunity.

As usual, I've rambled on longer than I intended. And lordy-be, the sun has come out now so I'm going to get out there and soak up some of it while getting some clean-up work done this afternoon. See ya!