March 29, 2024
Stellar Events
It was the beginning of an epic day. We woke up early, happy to have a Friday off from work. The pups seemed excited too, playing, barking, running around the house like mad dogs. While I fed them, my wife made coffee and threw cinnamon rolls into the oven for breakfast. After breakfast, my wife asked if I wanted to go into the woods. Yes, please.
I enjoyed walking through the woods with my wife. When I was alone, the woods seemed like a solo exercise in refocusing or letting go, a type of recovery or preparation for time outside of the forest. But, when I was with my wife, time in the woods always felt like an adventure. The air in the pine grove was frigid, and the rain gave the pine needled floor a sweet smell and deep orange hue. The eastern sky was lighting, throwing elongated shadows across the forest. It was a beautiful morning, and we were ready for the day.
We made our way to Beaver Tooth Rock and stood there overlooking the ravine, admiring the overfilled creek that swelled from the rain. Suddenly, something broke the water’s surface on the eastern side of the creek. It was a river otter. A second little head popped up. There were two. The otters climbed over the bank into the high brush, spooking a large blue heron that was hidden from view. The prehistoric-looking bird beat its large wings, seemingly in slow motion, flying from behind the brush, landing right in front of us. As soon as it landed, the heron spotted us standing on the boulder and took flight again, this time over the trees and out of sight.
We stared intently, hoping the otters would return, and nature did not disappoint. The otters reentered the water and began moving westward at a leisurely pace. My wife and I turned and looked at each other wide-eyed. There were four otters! The animals were large but slender, their wet grayish fur sleek from the water. They seemed playful and energetic, swimming back and forth, diving and resurfacing, stopping occasionally to feed on tasty morsels along the bank. As the otters swam past, we quickly left Beaver Tooth Rock and strode through the forest so we could cut the otters off to the west.
We arrived at a location just fifteen yards from the stream, hoping the four otters would approach. The water was flowing, but no otters appeared. Then the smooth water roiled, like a pot of water coming to a hard boil. The four otters, swimming underwater, surfaced, continuing along the creek. We watched in astonishment as they passed right in front of us before swimming underneath a fallen log and disappearing into an adjacent stream. It was the neatest thing we had seen at the creek, and we walked back to the house excited and enamored with this magical place we called home.
When we arrived home, my wife used my office to study while I wrote at the dining room table. After a few hours, we got hungry, so we changed clothes and drove into Wilson for lunch at La Rancherita, where my wife had a combination platter and I munched on birria tacos. I was so stuffed after lunch that we shopped a little, just so we could walk before heading home. We stopped at Target to pick up a few items and then Marshals for dog toys and treats. After, we stopped at Harris Teeter, where we found three new IPAs. There was Carolina Pine IPA by Gizmo BrewWorks in Raleigh, Lower Falls IPA by Highland Brewing in Asheville, and, my favorite find, Fake News IPA, also by Gizmo BrewWorks. The hilarious writing on the label of the Fake News IPA was worth the price of the beer.
After putting away the groceries, my wife worked on securing furniture and other amenities for her uncle who lived in New York. I felt sleepy after our large lunch, so I grabbed my camera and headed out into the woods. I took my time exploring, making my way back to Beaver Tooth Rock, where I sat taking in the scenery. The wind pushed the clouds through quickly, making the ambient lighting flicker. First the light was soft, then overly bright, and then went dark as dusk for a minute or two. I made my way to the creek and snapped a few photographs, but the wind picked up, which made time in the forest a little unnerving. There was no need to get crushed by a falling pine top.
As I exited the grove, I noticed my sleepiness had subsided, and I felt more energetic. The forest, it seemed, was not just a place of relaxation, but one that promoted alertness. I joined my wife on the back porch where we shared one of the Fake News IPAs. I was glad to discover that it wasn’t just a novelty. The beer was truly delicious, and that wasn’t an alternative fact. After a quick break, my wife picked up on her studies while I went to my office to read. After she was done, we went to a clearing in the forest where we had stacked several dead trees. With us we brought a large, knobby wheeled cart, gloves, and two handsaws. My wife also sported some nerdy safety glasses, which made her look super cute and, well, nerdy. Got to protect those green eyes, though. We worked for about forty minutes, cutting the trees into log sized pieces to be used as firewood. After we had filled the cart to the brim, we gathered our things and made our way up the hill; me pulling and my wife pushing the cart back to the house. It was hard, satisfying work.
After we cleaned up, I started a fire, and we ate bourbon ham sandwiches out on the deck. The sun was going down, and the air was cooling, which made the fire even more gratifying. We sat outside talking about all manner of things, covering past, present, and future, some words more serious while others made us break out in laughter. It was a beautiful night, and we were thankful to have two more days off. The bats fluttered over the backyard, but, to my satisfaction, I saw no mosquitos. A flock of geese passed over, something I found very relaxing, a vivid reminder that I was out in the wild.
In the evening, after the sun had gone down, we heard a few gunshots and fireworks. Neighbors were also playing music outdoors, so we turned down our speaker to listen. Their music was far off in the distance, which made the tunes echo through the forest. It sounded haunting against the crackling wood burning in the fire pit. The stars looked faded, but were brightening slowly as the darkness took over the sky.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a bright flash, but I wasn’t sure what it was. It flashed again, this time about twenty feet closer. It was the first firefly of the season. Fireflies were one of my wife’s favorite things, so I was excited to point it out to her. She gasped as the little lightning bug flew closer toward us, its tail periodically lighting in brilliant neon green. And as if the little bug sensed our welcome, it flew right over us, flashing one last time, and then disappeared into the night. It was so early to see one and we felt lucky that we were there to witness it. The bug’s dim light was so special to us it might as well have been the upcoming solar eclipse. Go find your once in a lifetime wonder. As for us, we had found the marvel of our own tiny light eclipsing the night.
My wife went inside to bathe while I threw a few more pieces of wood on the fire. The stars were bright by now and I studied them. I observed the Big Dipper tucked into the tree line in the northeastern sky while Orion guarded the southwest. There was a dim dot moving fast across the sky, and I wondered if it was a plane flying at high altitude or satellites in orbit. I looked up at Betelgeuse, wondering if it would explode soon, as expected. Just then, a small meteor shot through the sky, moving east to west. It lasted less than a second, but flashed through the black sky, burning white hot and then fading into a greenish hue. I wondered how the day could get any better, but then I realized that after a shower, I’d be crawling into a warm bed right beside my best friend, my own daily, epic, stellar event.