Sunset on a Farm
Rose’s Ridge
Spring Awakening
“The seemingly everlasting winter has held its grasp far too long. Cabin fever lingers, and we find ourselves bursting with a craving for green grass, budding blossoms, chirping birds, lingering daylight, and the opportunity to shed the layers of clothes we’ve been trudging around in for months now.
And then, finally, spring arrives. As if it has been sleeping for months, the earth begins to awaken.
To me, there is nothing more exciting than the moment the first bit of green, that long-lost and forgotten hue, emerges from the thawing ground.
The moment you can throw open the windows and inhale the first breezes that soften the bracing winter air.
The moment the stillness comes alive with birdsong and buzzing and a constant trickle from the thaw – when the sweet scents of daffodils and forsythia awaken our senses, fiddleheads make their way through the soil, ramps spread wild over the forte ground, stalks of rhubarb gain height, and spring parsnips (wintered over, now sweet) are finally ready to be pried from the thawing ground.
New life, new hope, and new dreams emerge with this season that I wait for most impatiently, the season of new beginnings.”
–Quote taken from The Lost Kitchen by Erin French
Morning Fog
The December Darkness
“May the blessed light be on you, light without and light within. May the blessed sunlight shine on you and warm your heart until it glows like a great fire, so that a stranger may come and warm himself at it, and also a friend.” –Irish Blessing
It is the seventh day of December and thoughts of the brevity of time swirl in my head like a winter storm. The light of day is brief; it is 4:30 in the afternoon and I light a candle, an instinctual and essential ritual that helps to keep the darkness at bay. For the sun sets early here in New England in the great woods of New Hampshire, where December can be a month heavy with darkness. Read more
Falling into a New Beginning
“Life starts all over again when it gets crisp in the fall.” – F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
Having come across these words in a recent piece in The Atlantic, “Why Back-to-School Season Feels Like the New Year – Even for Adults” (Sept. 17), I was reminded of the strange grasp that both nostalgia and hope often have on us this time of year; of our heart’s aching for past joys and memories, gently soothed by the hopeful anticipation of things to come.
Perhaps it’s because, as the article notes, roughly half of one’s lifespan is tied to an academic calendar – from being in school through young adolescence to becoming the parents of children – or because we long for one last chance to make “all things right” before the year’s end, but Fall does seem to signal the start of a new “life,” a new beginning, a new opportunity to usher in change alongside the changing color of leaves. Read more
A Seeing Eye, a Listening Ear: In Honor of Usher Syndrome Awareness Day
The beloved children’s television host Mister Rogers once said,
“The gifts we treasure most over the years are often small and simple. In easy times and tough times, what seems to matter most is the way we show those nearest us that we’ve been listening to their needs, to their joys, and to their challenges.”
Indeed, the essence of life seems always to come down to the small and simple things, to the things we often don’t think about, the things we take for granted, the things we forget are gifted to us as human beings: our ability to see and hear, taste and smell, walk and breathe.
I am gently reminded of such gifts each time I play hide-and-seek with my three-year-old niece, Emma, who was diagnosed with Usher Syndrome (type 2A) – the most common genetic cause of combined deafness and blindness – two years ago. Hiding together while her older sister counts to ten, she mimics my “shhh”, only to let out a squeal, revealing our location and screaming in delight at the sight of her sister. Equally delighted by the sound of music, Emma is a natural entertainer, grabbing her microphone and eliciting howls of laughter with her wild dance moves. How precious the gifts of sight and sound truly are. Read more
Isle of Skye’s Old Man Storr
It’s been a busy summer, but we’re excited to be back and grateful for all your support and emails as ATG continues to evolve!
It happens naturally in the ascent, to shed the duties and disappointments that weigh one down in daily living. At the summit, one is rewarded with a lightness of being. A step and a glance up, a step and a glance up, the breathing becomes deep and rhythmic, and listening, I no longer know where I am or where I came from. But I know that I have become enfolded in the immense green beauty of this ancient mountain in a surreal landscape, and that I am where I should be. I understand that it is not about power. For here alone, there is no need of power. On top now, I am free to just be…in the warm golden glow of an early summer evening. This is nature’s gift to those in search of truth and beauty. Read more
Pleasure in the Vineyard
“The most beautiful gift of nature is that it gives one pleasure to look around and try to comprehend what we see.” –Albert Einstein
Invited for a weekend getaway, I was recently a guest at a relative’s home in Virginia that sits at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains* and is a stone’s throw from one of Virginia’s 250+ wineries.
Having driven through Virginia more times than I can remember – always heading somewhere else and with little time to comprehend where I was or what was around me – my visit turned out to be a most pleasant gift, reminding me of the restorative power of nature’s beauty. Read more
“Freedom Is Not Free”: Memorable Words for Memorial Day
“Freedom is not free, as the saying goes. Maintaining the republic has been the work of people shedding blood, sweat, and tears for 240 years. That herculean effort was not driven by politics alone; it rested on a culture that kept the citizenry active and engaged in the project of their own self-government at every level of community.”
–Daniel Krauthammer, “What Makes America Great?”, The Weekly Standard, May 8, 2017
A Memory of a Mother’s Love
“A children’s story that can only be enjoyed by children is not a good children’s story in the slightest.” ―C.S. Lewis
Every night growing up, my brothers and I would curl up next to my mother as she read us a bedtime story with a gentleness and nurturing spirit that only a mother can provide.
She introduced us to the kind and imaginative Boxcar Children, took us through the mischief and mishaps of Curious George, The Berenstain Bears, and Corduroy, kept us questioning with Goosebumps, and entertained us with the rhyming cadences of Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do you See?, Jamberry, and all of Dr. Seuss’ classics (Go, Dog. Go! being a particular favorite), in addition to other beloved stories, such as Make Way for Ducklings, Goodnight Moon, and the many enchanting tales of Walt Disney. Read more