myretroperspective

I was up and at ‘em pretty early this morning so I could get on my way to Callaway Gardens in Pine Mountain, GA. While only about 35 miles from where I’m camped, I budgeted an hour to get there.  With back roads and having to go through LaGrange, it was the right amount of time.  Skies were still overcast from last night’s rain, but that meant the temperatures stayed in the very pleasant range for this visit. Once again I was able to have two very personable people give me a tour of one of their home town’s attractions.  Gerri and Mike Jones have often posted about these gardens on their blog, and have included fantastic pictures of what they’ve seen.  So, when I figured out I was in their neck of the woods, I sent them an email and they readily agreed to meet at the Gardens this morning. Little did I know that Mike used to work here, so he knew how to get around to the best spots for an abbreviated visit.  This place is huge, and it would take days t...

Never did get out on the water yesterday.  It was a warm sunny day, and the checkout time for the campgrounds on the lake is 3:00 in the afternoon.  That means all kinds of boats with big motors were buzzing around.  I decided I’d wait for today after the weekend warriors had gone home.  I think it was a good decision.  I needed to do laundry anyway, and I always enjoy the quiet that descends on a late Sunday afternoon.  It also meant that last night and today no people were trooping through my site (a pet peeve of mine), and I wasn’t required to listen to other people’s choices of loud music selections.  I did, however, pump up the kayak last night so it would be all set to go this morning. With such a nice little beach in back of my site, I put on my water shoes and walked the kayak out into the water around 10:00, and hopped in.  That splash of yellow is my life jacket and you can be sure I always wear it.  The water was nice and calm, and...

After reading all the helpful suggestions people made about my kayak mishap, I went outside this morning to pull the kayak all the way out of the bag to take some pictures of the mouse hole.                                     This is it.  It’s about three inches long and two inches wide.  As I pulled it entirely out, I discovered more destruction.  Perhaps one hole could have somehow been repairable. On the opposite side I found an even larger hole and a mouse nest.  It seems a female mouse had taken up residence, and brought in plenty of bird seed and shredded paper and such.  Yuck!  My hopes of finding repair solutions slowly sank. In the meantime, I had been emailing Jeanne and Eldon (Where’s Eldo bloggers).  They are also in the area...

I had a very nice adventure today that I’ll talk about in a little bit, but first I want to get the bad news out of the way.  My plan for tomorrow morning was to take a nice paddle on the lake in my inflatable kayak.  So late this afternoon I dragged the Sea Eagle out of the basement storage area along with the paddles and the air foot pump.  I had decided to pump it up tonight so tomorrow all I had to do was get it down to the water, and hop in.  As I went to take it out of the storage bag, I discovered that a mouse had eaten a hole the size of two golf balls in the side of the kayak.  Of course that mouse, which probably did that while I was at Anahuac, didn’t touch the three seat backs that were in the bag.  Nope, it chewed the side of the kayak!  Grrr!!  I don’t think there is any way to patch a hole that big, so I guess I’m literally sunk.  Phooey!  What a bitter disappointment that was. On the bright side, I drove to Warm Springs...

{this is one of my favorite kindi students...chocolate. whenever i asked him what was on his shirt he would get really excited and yell "it's SUNNY!" oh and timmy is behind him trying in any way possible to get in the photo} dear boss, thank you for surprising me by switching my schedule. a four hour workday on friday kind of rocks. dear doctor, i know that you were trying to talk about tissue survival rate or something (i kind of zoned out) but i couldn't help but laugh when you mistakenly said "your survival rate is 30-50%". dear middle school students, i know you don't think i'm funny but thank you for laughing at my cheesy jokes anyway. takes the stress of being a teacher away. dear mogis, i know i taste good to you but can you please leave me alone and possibly bug the hubs for awhile? i'm starting to get stares in class from scratching so much. dear kindi student parents, please stop changing your kid's names. a)it's already hard en...

I arrived at the Holiday COE campground on West Point Lake yesterday with the help of ‘Jack-in-the-Box’ (my GPS) and the directions from the lady at the Georgia Welcome Center.  So today I decided to visit one of the other COE campgrounds on the lake and the Visitor’s Center.  I decided I didn’t need Jack since I’d already driven these roads…big mistake! I eventually found the campground I was looking for.  Fellow bloggers will be staying there a night or two, so I wanted to see how their accommodations compared to mine.  The R. Shaefer Heard campground is closer to things I want to visit in the area by about 20 miles.  Despite the extra mileage, I’m happy with where I am at.  Many of the sites there were closer together and the back in to the sites had very steep downward grades. After taking a drive around, I headed for the visitor’s center where I enjoyed all of the displays and watched a five minute movie.  Then I had to take the obligatory...

When a connection seems broken, the universe finds a way to reconnect... guiding us back to the source with light and love. No matter where I travel in the world, I always know that there is nothing like a connection with a stranger that proves to be life changing. I've had this experience happen to me in some of the most unlikely places, but each time teaching me something about myself that makes me a better person. The connections with people who are brought into your life for a much bigger reason... to help you find your purpose are powerful. It reminds me of the Chinese proverb, The Red Thread of Destiny... some connections can never be broken. The next time you run into that person who seems to be connected to you, in ways that you can't explain, consider the possibility that he or she may have been sent by the universe to help you walk into your destiny. Just remember even "angels learn how to fly." Has this ever happened to you?