Sally Gerard

Thunder sounds quiet in the distance as this storm we weren’t supposed to have moves our way. It’s one of the busiest times of year with harvest, pump delivery runs, the new batches of chokecherry jelly going in various stages, summer school and all the professional development required for fall launch, keeping up with my college students, the regular day-to-day chores around the farm and with the cattle, my garden, and making the time for a  lot of hiking to prepare for the 23.7 miles we’ll be hiking for the Make-a-Wish Colorado Trailblaze challenge in August.

I cherish my early morning run time just to breathe, to find a cool space hidden from the heat of the day, to pray, to remember how blessed I am and my dreams and goals, and to begin my day fresh and grounded. Sometimes it may not last long, that peace among the stars, but without it, my day can be lost from the start. If the gentle rains do arrive, I’ll welcome them as the gift they are.

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In late May and early June, it isn’t uncommon to see antelope fawns. They are all legs and spring into a run as fast as their mammas do when startled. Cute as they can be, they learn early and often to pay attention to their surroundings.

For the last several days, on my early morning run, I noticed a doe antelope with two fawns, which isn’t all that uncommon. They were in the last two miles of my run, so there was a faint glow on the eastern horizon and that is what caused me to notice them. They seemed frozen there, heads up, with a fawn on either side of the doe. It appeared to me that they were bedded down in that stubble. I expected them to take off when I got close, but I ran past them, parallel on the dirt road, and craned my neck around to watch them.

This morning I tried to notice them at the beginning of my run, but it was still too dark to see. No version of the moon is up right now. Like the previous days though, on my way back, there they were. Only today, they seemed to be standing there. More cautious now I guessed, but they didn’t run.

It wasn’t until I drove the load of wheat to the elevator in the full light of morning, that I realized what my little antelope family really was. Volunteer corn, deep green in the morning light, growing in the stubble field. There were two stalks close together and taller, and then on each side of those stalks, two more but smaller. No wonder they went from bedded down to standing!

It is amazing to me all the variety of people we meet on the trails in the mountains of Colorado, and I guess it probably is the same in every state. Elaine and I hit the trail just at first light. One because we can be hiking in the crisp cool and be headed back to the trail head before it gets too hot, and two because we have the trail to ourselves for much of the early morning. It’s quiet and there is just this sense of peace and awe and for me, all the little stresses in my life get put into perspective. Something in me wakes up and reminds me that this earth was created with an artist’s hands, and those hands clearly loved the placement of each tiny flower, rock, and tree and painted them all together to feed my soul and spirit.

As the day moves closer to noon, more and more hikers hit the trail. Trail runners speed by and I wonder if they see anything around them. Small groups come along chatting about their lives. Some groups have music blaring because even in the wild places, they cannot leave behind the normal distractions in their lives. It annoys me because I don’t want that intrusion on my time in the wild. We often pass hikers with dogs, which is a good thing. Unless they decide the rules do not apply to them, so their dog is not on a leash. I wish I could ticket them. I’ve taken to saying, “Thank you for having your dog on a leash” to those who are following the rules. And we always see more hikers on our way back.

As we came around the lake by the willows at the very end of our hike, we shared the trail with a swarm of these incredible iridescent blue dragonflies. There were hundreds of them hovering all along the lake trail. Stunning.

Sometimes, as I listen to music when I’m driving, a song will come on and I’ll find myself overcome with emotion. Does that ever happen to you?

A few days ago, it was Dan Fogelberg’s Leader of the Band. He wrote the song as a tribute to his father, and whether or not you take the title literally, many of us can relate to the idea of living a life that honors our father or carrying on that legacy.

My dad was a music man and we have him to thank for our love of music. Whenever I hear certain hymns, I’m right back in church next to him, hearing his beautiful voice. He was kind and caring, gentle and loving, firm in right vs. wrong, adept at handling chaos in the back seats as he drove and had the most generous spirit.

As the songwriter sings, “My life has been a poor attempt to imitate the man…” But it was this line that stole my breath and brought my tears: “And Papa, I don’t think I said I love you, near enough.”

The sweet smell of wild roses always takes me back to summer camp. The wildflowers on mountain trails are such a vibrant blaze of color. It can’t help but be a blessing, even when you are huffing and puffing yourself up a hill. Meadows full of purple, red, white, pink, and yellow cover the hills and valleys.

Raspberries and strawberries are not blooming yet, but we try to remember where we see a lot of them so we can go back to that trail in July for a sweet feast.

Sage and wild onion provide the savory opposite that wonderful honeyed breath of the rose bushes all covered with delicate pink petals. It’s a choice: focus on the sore feet or focus on the rough beauty. No contest.

Do you have different kinds of tired? I’ve been on the brink of exhausted, but exhilarated at the same time. I’ve been tired after a day of what felt like beating my head against a wall and simply ready to close my  eyes and try to forget about the battle. And I’ve been every kind of tired inbetween.

I prefer the exhausted but exhilarating kind of tired, like after a long hike, or a high mountain hunting trip, or six hours working on a new story, or sharing a summer read with a struggling reader who finally overcomes his resistance and tells me he can’t stop reading. I thought I heard angels singing.

Elaine and I are close to our fundraising goal for Make-a-Wish Colorado and I am grateful to all of you who have donated. There is still time and I will continue to share the link to our donation page. The kind of tired we were after 14.75 miles was exhaustion, but it gave us a clue about what hike day will be like and how we’ll need to rest and regroup to head back onto the trail between the first and second legs. We may not eat granola bars for weeks after the hike.

Make a Wish Trailblaze Donation

I presented, for the second time, a professional development seminar for teachers on self-care. Like a lot of careers, teachers can be overwhelmed by all the demands and find themselves stressed, anxious, and reacting instead of stopping to take a breath, observing, and responding.

The admin wants this done and they want it done in the five minutes left before you were going to leave for the day, and that is long after the actual time that you should have left for the day. It’s so much easier to fill up on rage and want to tell the admin what they can do with their demand on your time. But when we can learn to step back, outside of ourselves, we have a better shot at seeing the big picture and being able to respond reasonably and in a way that honors the time we have. Just because someone tells me I need to jump and jump right now as high and as fast as I can, doesn’t mean I have to jump.

Whatever it is can wait until there is a chance to think it through and still manage the time constraint so both admin (whatever that looks like in your life/job/calling) and I are happy to complete the task.

We can give ourselves permission to step outside and breathe some fresh air, eat that lunch that should have been eaten three hours ago, voice the prayer that needs to be heard, or find the positive in the situation so we can get behind it. We can also give ourselves permission to go home for the day and come at it again in the morning when we’re fresh.

Sometimes things don’t go exactly the way we plan. It’s easy to be anxious or go to the blame game in the moment. But is it really life and death? One of the many things I love about hiking season is finding the space to take a deep breath, and yah, it doesn’t hurt that it is crisp mountain air I’m taking in.

The wild flowers, right now kinnikinnick, iris, larkspur, parsley, shooting stars, clematis and so many more I don’t know the names of, purple, yellow, white, and pink against the green of the leaves and grasses lovingly planted and tended by the master gardener fill my vision if I choose to see them. I do.

While I’m hiking with a different purpose this summer, to fund those wishes for as many kids as we can, I refuse to lose sight of my love of the trail and for what is right in front of me and also around the bend, both steep rocky climb and pine needle lined path along the creek.

Spring moving into summer is always a kind of crap-shoot. The fruit trees bloom before we’re done with snow and cold on a regular basis, but the little fruits still form. The, what I like to call, smart trees are only now leafing out-the mulberries. I wait until Memorial Day to plant my garden, so those tender shoots are only now poking through to the sunny days that will help them grow, and I can already taste the fresh grilled zucchini and the butternut squash lasagna.

And then we get horrendous winds and hail and that takes a toll on the little fruits, and on the crops in the field. I start counting the jars of jelly I still have from last season in case they have to last another year, but I always hope for the fruits that weren’t pounded into the ground to have a running chance of making it to harvest. I love a good spring snow. I love a summer snow. I love snow. But I can do without hail and 40 mile ‘an hour winds.