For those of you who don't know, my mother is getting on in years and I have moved to Marquette to take care of her. One of the things I have taken up to keep us both involved is a daily drive out to Presque Isle. We look for deer, ore ships, and whatever else we can see.
There is a man who goes out there nearly every weekday and sets up a hammock between two trees and reads a book out next to the lake. We have seen him many times. When he is NOT there we speculate on why. "Maybe he's found a job," Mom said one day. The next day she quipped that maybe his wife found out where he was going and put a stop to it. Silly Mom!
The Michipicoten has often been seen lately anchored in the Marquette harbor right at the end of Wright Street. (See my Blog on the Ore ships: link at right.) I've developed a major interest in the topic of Ore Ships since I've come here.
Oh, and I've made some friends, one of whom, Carolyn Scott, has given me some yarn she no longer wanted. So I made this afghan. When I took the colors out of the garbage bag I saw that they all went together. They reminded me of citrusy sherbert colors so I call this the sherbert afghan. Just as I was getting to know Carolyn she had a change in plans and is now moving out of town about 30 miles. I probably won't get to see her as often now. With her living right upstairs all I had to do is shout out and she would come down and spend time with me. But after she moves we will have to schedule appointments to get together. That's OK, we will, we have become very good friends. We respect each other's privacy but we still enjoying doing things together. I've never had a problem making friends. I haven't even tried the local quilt guild yet. Those are friends waiting to be made!
All in all, this move has been good for me. Taking care of my mother is difficult because she needs to have noise in the house at all times. If she isn't watching TV in the kitchen, she has the radio on and listening to music. I can't concentrate hard enough to READ a book, let alone WRITE one. So I have been walking in the mornings, usually with Carolyn, but also by myself, and then going to the local library where I can find a quiet cubical in the mornings to write for a while. When I need time to think I have been going for long morning drives out to the Island and sitting there to watch the ships. I come back with the pictures to prove it, but I always take a little time for myself.
I also have been known to go "shopping" mostly at thrift stores. And yes again I come home with certain little things that I have purchased at these stores but mostly I go there and walk around or sit in my car and listen to an audio book, or walk in the park with my camera. Anything at all to get away and let my own thoughts filter through the nonsense!
Carolyn is good at doing this for me as well. She sometimes suggests we go somewhere and get out and walk around, be at one with nature. I discovered one place on the Island that I had never seen simply because I've never gotten out of the car on this particular stretch. The entire back of the Island is cliffs overlooking Lake Superior and at certain vantage points you can see them from the land.
The day I took these photos was a clear day in late May, notice that there are still icebergs on the lake! It's such a beautiful place, Presque Isle.
School kids must have made this into a tradition, to put their locks on this overlook fence.
Flamingos I suppose aren't the only birds who save one leg. Mom and I saw this gull Picnic Rocks. A day or two later we saw what we thought was the same bird at the Island. I can only presume that it's a trait they all share.
I don't really blame them for saving their feet, this is how they use them. How many of us would survive barefooted on the icebergs!
