In the far corner of the back lawn a sagging cedar arch begins the short trail to our marsh. Everything changes when I step through the archway. The sky disappears behind a confusion of overhead branches. Shadows linger on trunks and stumps, while slices of sunlight punctuate a path of fir needles and moss.
Sometimes my husband clears the path of winter’s branches, dead twigs and the squirrels’ collection of tiny cones, but otherwise the land here is left untouched. I love this walk. It’s less than three hundred yards long, but it meanders, and without losing my way, I can get lost in peace-filled moments miles from the waiting world.
This is called a pond on the site map – it use to be a beaverpond – but at summer’s end wild grasses have all but obliterated any view of the water. I sit on a rustic bench, my back pressed against the rough bark of a massive cedar, and I listen to hidden mallards, and hopping sparrows. If I am quiet I may see a heron, but usually the dog’s enthusiasm causes it to go flapping across to sit high in a tree at the far end, out of range of my binoculars.
Some days this is the perfect place to contemplate snarls in my manuscripts, scene dead ends and similar frustrations. Other days it provides quietude.
On rare occasions I am eerily reminded of the bears I’ve seen moseying around the edges of the marsh, and I decide it’s time to make a beeline back up the trail into the relative safety of my back yard.
With the return to fall routines I’m mulling over the direction I should take with the current manuscript. I seem to have lost my way. How are you doing with yours? Are you beginning anything new, or close to finishing something?
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MUSINGS 
What a beautiful place to find inspiration, Carol!
Nice !
If this is your backyard, I want a bedroom. Beautiful!
I’m at the beginning of a new manuscript, haven’t even penned the first words yet, so hopefully I won’t be lost yet!
Hugs~
I’m currently seeking an agent for my manuscript. Karen and I are working on a book, which is still in its infancy. It’s been slow going since we’re bogged down in post-conference tasks.
Praying that you’ll work out the kinks in your manuscript.
Thanks for taking me with you on your walk this morning. I think it was just what I needed to clear my mind (and path).
I’m feeling a bit bogged down myself….but I can see the sun coming up!
Hugs
I love your photographs – what a beautiful place to live. Thank you for sharing these things. In the midst of a major move to a new location I’m being frustrated with lack of time to write – – but know I’ll have time back soon. I’m just trying to remember to take notes!
I’ve walked with you and know the “other worldness” of the whispering trees, chatting birds and softness underfoot to where we have sat by the marsh and enjoyed it together.
I hope you will (seriously) do up a “book” of your pics and blogs, I want one!
(Catt…that bedroom is MINE! 🙂
mE
A book? Only if you’ll do your cookbook, too, because I want a copy of it. 😉
I’m too engrossed in your blog and your photographs to concentrate on my WIP. Wow, what a beautiful path. I’d be out there walking it every day too. Stunning.
Beautiful photos. I’m getting back into a routine, too. It’s the “getting back” that’s most difficult.
Carol, you have taken us on a magical journey into your private world and OH, how beautiful it is to see! More often, I lived in the polar opposite … street noises and traffic, children playing below my bedroom window and the constant hum of my precious City. Now I live in a quiet residential community and have a host of other sites. Behind our property there is a pond edged by the draping banyon trees, and complete with turtles, iguanas in their array of colors, frogs and the birds. Ibis and blue jays, the great white heron who love to walk along the edge to fish and sit at days end in the branches of flowering trees I cannot name. Where I work is at the far end of the condo in a room banked by a retaining wall, the silence broken only by the click of my computer keys. I am in the process of sending out my completed novella to indie lit-pubs and selected agents and have the almost last draft of my novel and its query on the brink of flying into cyber-space to agents. Thanks for another great post 🙂
I’ve been out of town for a couple days and am just now getting caught up here. Thanks for all your comments. I know I’m very blessed to live in this place, and I love it. It should be conducive to inspired writing. Unfortunately, my brain still has to do its share of the work. 😉
Beautiful photos, Mom. I’ll have to wander the trail when I visit in a couple weeks. 🙂
As you know, I’m nearing the end of this WIP, at least until an agent or editor wants more revisions! I should be done this time next month, and then I’ll be at the beginning of a wandering trail again when I start the next novel — already excited about where it may take me!
Hoping you find some clarity soon….