What do you do when you've nothing to do? People tell me all the time that I'm always busy but this winter I have felt like a slug slowly crawling along seeming to go nowhere. Sure, I have done a lot of planning. When my mind is allowed to be more active than my body it gets a little ahead of itself in the planning department. Most of my plans will end up forgotten but hopefully a few will make it through to the completion list.
Other things that have occupied my time on these cold, damp and dreary days include bird watching and learning to play the native flute.
My sister has been an avid bird watcher for years but I had not had the time for this in the past. Early this winter I felt like I should put out a feeder for the birds. This quickly led to the addition of 3 more feeders. As they say, "If you build it they will come." After the blackbirds, grackles and starlings moved in I had to cut back to 2 feeders half full or they would eat me out of house and home. I watch mornings and sometimes late afternoon and keep a record of the various bird species I have seen. It's always exciting to see something new or the return of an infrequent visitor. The cardinals are always a pleasant site adding a pop of color to a dreary winter day. At one time I had 11 pairs of cardinals at the feeder and it's not uncommon for there to be 6-8 pairs feeding at once. I even drug my camera out of hibernation to take pictures through the window of new species for identification. Not the best of photography but it has proved to help refresh my skills. Of course my imagination gets beyond my scope of reality as it envisions a wildlife sanctuary in the small side yard out my window. Too much time for dreaming!
Learning the native flute was a novel idea for me. I would never say I had much musical talent. I had taken piano lessons as a young girl and played saxophone in the school band for years. I enjoy music of all kinds and when I first heard the native flute years ago I loved the serenity of it but never thought about playing one. Looking for something to do this winter I first thought I might enjoy playing the tin whistle. These are relatively cheap instruments so I ordered one and began my YouTube exploration for lessons. I learned some songs and was doing fairly well with this but it was not a soothing instrument to listen to. So I took the leap and ordered a native flute which was roughly 10 times the cost. YouTube had me convinced that most people made up their own music anyway. Since then I have ordered a few songbooks to go along with it and learned some songs, made up a few of my own and sometimes improvise. While I would never say I was good at it I find it makes a much more pleasing sound than the tin whistle. So on a particularly nasty day I find myself sitting by the window watching birds and playing my flute.
While this can be very relaxing it is too sedentary for me. I am ready to be up and moving. I have started walking again and this has led me to think on making another pilgrimage or other long distance walk. I have ordered some guide books and keeping my options open for now. So much is changing with fuel prices and war in Ukraine that it doesn't seem like the best time for making any definite plans. So for now I will just make a bucket list of distance walks that I'd like to make at some point in the future.
Now as the winter is nearing it's end I hope to get out more and start doing something instead of watching out my window. Maybe next winter I can develop a better plan. For now I am looking forward to resuming my living history events, expanding my herb garden, taking some trips and best of all preparing to welcome a new grandchild in May!
