Outside...letting the last rays of summer light dance on my brown skin. My brown skin a marker of the love affair summer and I have had. How grateful I am for this summer... As I sit i think- If I had been a goddess what a challenge it would have been to chosen my domain. Love, wisdom, wine...but I think I would have wrestled that chariot away from Apollo and been the goddess of light.  In my chariot I'd travel the world bringing light with me wherever I went. Yes. I think that's what I'd have chosen.

There is a thunderstorm upon my nook of the world today. Lightening casually flashes across the sky and thunder comes angrily behind it. As the patchworked gray and white sky moves across, I sit sheltered on my little porch. My bare feet and pink polished toes are kissed by flecks of rain. I wish I was in the woods dancing in that rain. The limbs of the trees would be heavy with water and yet I am light and so are they. We would revel in the refreshing water that gives us sustenance and give thanks for the cleansing that the rainfall brings. We are refreshed. We are still ourselves yet renewed.

At a beautiful event celebrating Martin Luther King Jr. My heart....it is so full.

I wrote a post a few days ago; however my blogger app won't upload it. It was I think a pretty piece of writing and I was quite sad to see it disappear to the abyss of the internet. Going forward any longer blogs will have to be done by a good old fashioned computer...short one with pictures can be done on the app so please still expect those though slightly less frequent longer posts.

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This weekend I traveled to Vermont for my third wedding of the season. Each one has so wonderfully suited each couple's unique personalities and so accurately represented what makes each couple so special. While the logistics of wedding can be tedious, the actual events are joyous and for two of the weddings have required travel to places I wouldn't normally get to experience. 

So Vermont was my wedding destination this weekend. My gps happily took me on the most roundabout way to get there. My gps usually makes me want to throw it and it's garbled and annoying voice out my window, but this time it made a good solid choice. I was taken on the most scenic route possible and passed Miller's River, which of course I am now dying to boat. I passed numerous other charms and gems along the way as well and when I hit Vermont there were cows, wildflowers, and streams to spare. 

The actual site of the wedding was at a pond. The ceremony was drenched in sunlight and I had to fight every delicious impulse and desire to jump into the water. My charming sunshiny yellow and white dress with the jaunty white bow belt be damned...agh, but my grownup instincts prevailed so no badly timed jump into the inviting waters. I did determine though that coming to Vermont meant a hike was in order.

So today I woke up, wished the happy couple the best, and hiked a wonderful two hours. The trail was onsite of the hotel I stayed at- The Equinox. They had donated land for a preserve many many moons ago and now it is the home to many trails including one to the top of the mount of the picture posted above. The hike to the top is a five hour excursion so I chose a smaller trail on another lookout. Despite the fact that at the top I found obnoxious teenagers in addition to the stunning view, I was happy and content. This whole weekend was set in nature with the backdrop of celebration and love.

I find nature so nourishing...I know I say this a lot. Today as I drove into Boston I felt the low levels of anxiety that I have come to just accept as a Bostonian return. Part of why I do this blog and try to be in nature as much as possible is because I know I need to focus on the beautiful for my own sanity. There is enough ugliness in the world and I don't care to focus on it. Not focusing on it doesn't make it go away or make me immune to it though. I love Boston and I have created a happy life here, but I do think it may be time for a change soon. I like the North though and experiencing Rhode Island, Vermont, and other parts of MA have shown me that I can stay up North, but find the right pocket for me. So, the Story Girl may have some new adventures to report soon. Maybe not. But it is nice to imagine the possibilities. 

 “I learned this, at least, by my experiment: that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.” 
-Thoreau  

A beautiful Saturday with watercolors, butterflies, Thoreau, and Bonnie Raitt.

I had a nice little interlude this morning at an intersection in Jamaica Plain. As I pulled up I saw a youngish man collecting trash. His bike leaned casually against a tree as he purposefully gathered the rather gross remnants of other people's lives. I watched him for a moment and then rolled my window down to call to him. He came to my window and I thanked him. He looked surprised and then smiled broadly and thanked me back. He stated he lived up the street and that as he had rode by the intersection he had felt an urge to do a little extra something for his community.  I agreed that this was a good gesture and as the light changed we parted ways. The moment that we shared was brief, but it was a gentle reminder that even when other's in our communities don't do their role we don't have a free pass. Sometimes when we do that little extra we can inspire others to do their part too and may even a little bit more too. And those little extra bits help our communities to be a whole bit better.

These are weeds along the side of the road. I saw them on my walk from the bus stop. Many consider weeds nuisances, yet I think so often how wild and unintentionally beautiful they can be. Dandelions are weeds, yet those merry orbs inspire us to be silly and make floating wishes. I loved the flashes of pink that the bright green leaves of this 'weed' flaunted proudly. I could stretch and make a metaphor of all this, but I think I'll just enjoy what I found. Beautiful mistakes of nature, yet does nature have mistakes? A purpose to everything perhaps.