I had one of those ah ha moments and these days I seem to rush to my blog rather than call up a bewildered friend who won't understand what the fuss is about. I think I'm at least marginally better at explaining these ah ha moments in writing. I wonder if other adults continue to have obvious facts conceptually come into focus, long after they should have known what these facts mean. Today my ah ha moment has to do with time zones. I know different places have different times zones. I have family members living in different time zones in the US. I have been to Europe twice, and my daughter has been to Europe five times. I've generally known what the time is where loved ones are as well as where I am.
However, for the first time it dawned on me that these different times zones mean that while it's Friday afternoon here, for example, it's Saturday morning in certain parts of the world. It took me awhile to arrive at that conclusion when I noticed that some PhotoHunt participants had already posted their Saturday theme photos for this week. I'll explain more about PhotoHunt tomorrow, when I post my photos. In short, it's an activity a group of bloggers do where they all post photographs on Saturday to illustrate the pre-selected theme. Sounded like fun to me so I decided to join them this week. While getting the tags in place so I'll have a link to the originator of PhotoHunt's page as well as to the technorati PhotoHunt page, I was surprised to see some PhotoHunters already had their posts up on technorati. Not that it matters, why not post on Friday if you like? However, the realization hit me, BAM, that it was already Saturday where they lived.
I don't know why realizations like that hit me full force. I had a similar ah ha moment early in my marriage when I was looking at an atlas and something clicked. I announced to my husband that the earth was round. He was vastly amused, knowing I was reasonably well educated but also knowing me, he sort of got why I was making such a big deal about it. I had been pondering how Alaska and Siberia could be so close and yet on opposite ends of the flat map when I announced, I get it, that's what it means for the earth to be round. He had conquered such concepts in grade school and had worked in navigation while in the Navy for 4 years so this wasn't exactly earth shattering news to him. It's not like I didn't know the earth was round but the ramifications of what that means had never sunk in with me. Much as the full ramifications of time zones not sinking in until my ah ha moment today.
The visuals I am including are photographs of some of the aids that I grew up with. That's what makes it so crazy that it took so long for these rudimentary facts to sink in with me. The globe and atlas in this entry were hanging out in the den while I was growing up. I have much newer ones because I bought a ton of geography aids to have when my daughter was growing up but I held on to the ones my parents had too. It's interesting to see how much the geo-political boundaries have changed since I was a child. I find it very odd that I would continue to have moments where the light bulb turns on in my head. It's not so much a matter of learning something new as having something click. Too weird for this old dog. Muchado about nothing I suppose, or rather something pretty basic. It was, after all, a long time ago that Galileo Galilei was shocking people.
In the middle of the worse heat wave, perhaps in the history of where I live, the early signs of fall have started. What, in August? We get the majority of our fall color in late October through mid November. Sometimes the seasons do mix up. I live in one of those places known for the adage: if you don't like the weather, stick around for a day. Summer doesn't have quite the variation of other seasons but even in the hot months we can have an unseasonably cool spell. Even so, I'm baffled by why some of the leaves would be confused in the middle of August. I tried to find out but I don't understand. The amount of sun light is a signal and that signal isn't there yet.
If it was an isolated leaf like the one in the first photo, I'd chalk it up to a singular confused young bush but that's not it. The dogwood leaves in the second picture have started to change. After I noticed the bush, I checked out the dogwoods. The dogwoods are among the first trees to change colors where I live. The photograph above is an exaggerated view of the early changes in the dogwood because I had to close in on a cluster of leaves in one spot to see that they were beginning their change. That little dab of color is surrounded by thousands of green leaves (maybe hundreds but it seems like thousands).
Perhaps if the question keeps bugging me, I'll try to do some more reading and look for clues. I know the amount of rainfall can be a factor in the fall color as well as other variables. None of the variables I've read about can account for a preview to fall during a heat wave in the middle of August, long before the leaves are scheduled to change. I have a theory but I doubt it will be widely accepted.
My theory is connected to the flower fairies and wood nymphs who have set up housekeeping in my garden. I suspect this may be the work of the wood nymphs in particular. They are the ones who moved in after so much of their habitat was demolished by housing projects. They noticed that my wild yard has far more hiding places than your average yard which is manicured on a regular basis. They think as far as humans go I'm at least marginally better than the noisy ones with their leaf blowers and gas lawnmowers. The Queen of the Wood Nymphs noticed how droopy I've been lately. She issued paint brushes to her army and instructed them to start painting a few leaves with bright colors to cheer me up and remind me that fall is on the way. Therefore, for the next few weeks while I'm looking for seeds on my favorite flowers which will signal the promise of future flowers, I'll also keep my eyes open for the handiwork of the wood nymphs and be grateful for the fall preview.
I have been tagged by Miss Melanoma to list 8 random facts about myself. Lori requested that the people she tagged post random pictures in addition to the other rules of the game. I like random pictures so I'm following that rule. You are supposed to put all of the rules of the game at the beginning of your post. Which brings me to number 1 of my random facts about myself.
1 - I don't do well with rules.
2 - I was kicked out of brownies for setting up the benches in the cafeteria where we met to be horse jumps. I led the little brownie-horses over the jumps. Although this was before the leader arrived to start the session, I was kicked out of brownies.
3- I went to a private elementary school which was owned by the Church where my Dad was the Rector. The 6th grade 
girls got to be angels in the Christmas Pageant. There weren't enough angel costumes for my class so the teacher asked the class to vote on the best behaved students and those with the most votes got to be angels. My best friend and I weren't going to get to be Angels until my Dad got wind of it and borrowed two costumes from another Church. Because we were tall for our age, we were able to wear adult size costumes from that Church which were showier than the others so we ended up 
looking like lead angels. My Dad painted the angel's in waiting which I am including. The painting isn't cut off to the right, that's the photo I took of a print of it.
4 - When I was growing up we had a dog named Shannon who lived outside. One night during a storm, my brother and I went outside to sleep with Shannon in her dog house. We loved Shannon. Our parent thought we were very thoughtful but convinced up to come inside and as I recall Shannon was brought in to sleep on the screened in porch.
5 - I am pretty messy, even as an adult. Make that very messy. I am not entirely comfortable with how messy I am so I do try to straighten up from time to time. It's been a while since I organized my shoes.
6- I married the boy next door and our landlord let us knock a hole in the wall in between the studs between the two sides of our duplex. The first 5 years of my marriage we had two kitchens.
7 - One of the jobs I held when I took some time off from college was as the seamstress in a laundry. I got to let out the pants of the infamous Senator 
from NC, Jesse Helms. No it wasn't me who embroidered, I'm a jerk on his pants in thread which only showed up when he was being obnoxious.
8 - I like to draw, paint, scribble on blank paper in the style of a child. I still do this for fun and it's almost as much fun to laugh at what I've created and toss it in the recycle bin.
That's it folks, 8 random facts about me. If you are interested in finding out what the rules of the game are you can visit Miss Melanoma's site and view her post with her 8 random facts.
When I wrote the title for this post I was thinking about the blossoms fading and also about my lack of energy, but I'm not fading at all. I'm regrouping and I know I'll get a big blast of energy soon as the temperatures moderate. Won't happen this week according to the forecast but it will be soon. I'm also remembering that last summer was even worse. Not the weather. The weather was better last August, as I recall. But I was freaking out over new symptoms and feared the worse. Turned out my new bone pain and balance issues were caused by a vitamin D deficiency. Getting those taken care of was a big help. The fast growing lump on my back was a lipoma, not metastatic melanoma as I feared. The fluid back up in an awkward spot was merely a weird manifestation of lymphedema. All those new symptoms were explained and improved. What I continue to deal with is manageable because I know what it is. The new normal is okay. I'm a good sight better off than I was this time last year.
Nope, I'm not fading, merely kicking back a spell. Focusing on what I have to do (work for one, although blessedly I'm in a slight lull). I'm not worrying so much if walking is a no go because of the weather, or weeding, or ______. I can almost fill in the blank with a pile of non essentials. What has to be done is getting done and the rest, well, there's September right around the corner. I'm not so much wilted as hunkering down for a spell. Not a damn thing wrong with that.
I had one of those ah ha moments and these days I seem to rush to my blog rather than call up a bewildered friend who won't understand what the fuss is about. I think I'm at least marginally better at explaining these ah ha moments in writing. I wonder if other adults continue to have obvious facts conceptually come into focus, long after they should have known what these facts mean. Today my ah ha moment has to do with time zones. I know different places have different times zones. I have family members living in different time zones in the US. I have been to Europe twice, and my daughter has been to Europe five times. I've generally known what the time is where loved ones are as well as where I am.
However, for the first time it dawned on me that these different times zones mean that while it's Friday afternoon here, for example, it's Saturday morning in certain parts of the world. It took me awhile to arrive at that conclusion when I noticed that some PhotoHunt participants had already posted their Saturday theme photos for this week. I'll explain more about PhotoHunt tomorrow, when I post my photos. In short, it's an activity a group of bloggers do where they all post photographs on Saturday to illustrate the pre-selected theme. Sounded like fun to me so I decided to join them this week. While getting the tags in place so I'll have a link to the originator of PhotoHunt's page as well as to the technorati PhotoHunt page, I was surprised to see some PhotoHunters already had their posts up on technorati. Not that it matters, why not post on Friday if you like? However, the realization hit me, BAM, that it was already Saturday where they lived.
I don't know why realizations like that hit me full force. I had a similar ah ha moment early in my marriage when I was looking at an atlas and something clicked. I announced to my husband that the earth was round. He was vastly amused, knowing I was reasonably well educated but also knowing me, he sort of got why I was making such a big deal about it. I had been pondering how Alaska and Siberia could be so close and yet on opposite ends of the flat map when I announced, I get it, that's what it means for the earth to be round. He had conquered such concepts in grade school and had worked in navigation while in the Navy for 4 years so this wasn't exactly earth shattering news to him. It's not like I didn't know the earth was round but the ramifications of what that means had never sunk in with me. Much as the full ramifications of time zones not sinking in until my ah ha moment today.
The visuals I am including are photographs of some of the aids that I grew up with. That's what makes it so crazy that it took so long for these rudimentary facts to sink in with me. The globe and atlas in this entry were hanging out in the den while I was growing up. I have much newer ones because I bought a ton of geography aids to have when my daughter was growing up but I held on to the ones my parents had too. It's interesting to see how much the geo-political boundaries have changed since I was a child. I find it very odd that I would continue to have moments where the light bulb turns on in my head. It's not so much a matter of learning something new as having something click. Too weird for this old dog. Muchado about nothing I suppose, or rather something pretty basic. It was, after all, a long time ago that Galileo Galilei was shocking people.
