Friday, June 18, 2004
Pond Geek
Here she comes:
And my partner-in-wading, Melissa:
We were sent to Richardson's Wilderness Preserve up in Lee County, IL (next to DeKalb County) to collect frog eggs. We had been there the previous week with no luck, hearing a billion and a half green frogs and bullfrogs singing around us, taunting us, and watching them plop into the water, but never finding any eggs.
This time, we found a mass of eggs the first afternoon we were there, shortening our trip from the expected three-day stay to a one-and-a-half day overnighter.
We were relieved that we found what we came for, but also bummed that our stay in that farm house was being cut short.
The farmhouse and the luxurious university mininvan we rented
The farmhouse dining nook
The house had a back door but no porch
I've re-discovered that there are several benefits of living in the middle of trees, ponds and farmland, away from what most humans call "civilization".
- First of all, crappy television reception forces one to rediscover pastimes like reading, conversing, looking out the window, listening to birds, or just being.
the television in the house had one volume: LOUD
- The pitch blackness of a starless, moonless night with only the sound of crickets and frogs interrupting the silence is good for clearing one's mind and curing insomnia
- You can leave your keys in the car and all the doors and widows in the house open to let in the smells and sounds and feel of the outdoors
- Being 20 minutes way from the nearest one-stop-sign town and any semblance of suburbanization makes idle consumption inconvenient, so one can enjoy taking walks, jogs or meeting the neighbors down the road for a barbeque
- Its nice to be reminded that being busier doesn't make a better person
- The sound of 40 different species of birds singing in the morning beats the hell out of any crappy radio or TV talk show
Well, there's more that I can't quite put into words at the moment, but you get the idea.
Anyway, our trip was cut short, but it was enough to refresh my interest in getting outside (I mean
really outside--outside the concrete monotony of the city, burbs and the like) while the weather's nice and the gettin's good.
Revelation of the day
. . .pondered while I was in the pond. . .
A revision of an old proverb:
- Boring people talk about themselves.
- Insecure people talk about others.
- Conspicuous consumers talk about things.
- Educated people talk about books.
- Intelligent people talk about ideas.
- Enlightened people don't talk much. They listen.
We're all at least a little of each.
