In the original 1964 Adams Family television show, daughter Wednesday Adams uttered one of my all-time favorite lines. It’s so nice and gloomy.
I thought about that statement a lot yesterday as rain settled in across southern Ohio. As the sky darkened, folks scurried down the street, pulling their jackets tighter from beneath their umbrellas.
It was a perfect rainy November day and I was all for it. My only complaint was that it wasn’t a weekend when I could be home to enjoy the whole thing.
So I went skipping home after work, lit the Christmas tree and put on warm pajamas before doing a few chores. A hot dinner plus cuddle time with Scout while I watched the Ken Burns documentary made for a delightful ending to a delightful rainy day.
It’s sometimes a little surprising to me how different I am from other people. Dark, gloomy days are invigorating to me. I breathe better. I work harder. I’m happier. The small comforts last night – warm pjs, a good baked potato, some twinkle lights, time with my cat – were like a big ole dollop of whipped cream atop my proverbial mug of hot chocolate.
I’m fortunate to be a weirdo who welcomes the rainy days. I’m also lucky to understand the value of making the best of things and of having a place of one’s own to feather a nest and to rest and recharge.
Enjoy your day, friends. I hope it brings something that will make you happy.
CBS yesterday morning ran a profile on the Goodyear Blimp. What’s a ride like? How do you get a ride? The pilot they interviewed starting out cutting the grass many years ago and now has logged thousands of hours in this airship. The Blimp celebrated its 100th birthday this week so it’s getting a lot of attention right now.
This story got me to thinking about one surprising summer day when I saw the blimp float past our home here in southern Ohio. It was the nineties. I was a teenager and was so shocked I could hardly breathe as it floated by. Unfortunately, it was the nineties so I didn’t have an iPhone in my hand to quickly grab a picture. There was no time to run and grab a camera.
There was hardly time to register what I was seeing before it slipped from view.
I was sitting on the side porch of our home. Probably reading if I know me. It was a quiet day and movement out of the corner of my eye caused me to look up as the nose of that amazing airship soundlessly moved into view. I have always wondered where they were headed and what the heck they were doing flying west to east across my rural neck of the woods. I was also surprised at how low it was flying.
For a country kid who grew up in a poor part of Appalachian Ohio, it was pretty special seeing the Goodyear Blimp so close it felt like I could reach out and touch it. Until then I had only ever seen one on television.
The news story jarred loose this memory along with a nearly surrendered desire to take a ride in the blimp. I looked it up again to be sure but you can’t typically buy a ride. Their website says they give away rides for charity fundraisers (which is an amazing thing for a company to do) and that they keep a full schedule where the eight passenger gondola is occupied by media members, charity auction winners and corporate partners.
Sigh. My odds of being any of those things are pretty slim but a girl can hope!
I have only a memory of those few seconds and no proof that it even happened so you’ll have to take my word for it. What I wouldn’t give for an image to remember it by and to share with others who think that nothing exciting ever happens here.
If you ever travel Route 35 through Jackson County, Ohio you’ll notice an unassuming sign for Leo Petroglyph and Nature Preserve. If you follow that sign, you’ll turn off the four lane onto a two lane country road and then another country road to a parking area with a small shelterhouse.
Why should you do such a thing? Because this series of turns will take you to one of the most important remnants of ancient culture in Ohio.
In case you don’t recall from school, a petroglyph is an image made by removing part of a rock surface. Basically, chiseling or even scratching off the surface of the rock creates a lighter area that forms the image.
Leo Petroglyph consists of 37 such images on a single slab of sandstone that is protected by a wooden shelterhouse. There are footprints, a human stick figure, birds, a snake and some things that are difficult to interpret. One of the birds looks like a bird with wings while I think another resembles a penguin. My fella was fascinated with another image. It resembles a smiley face with horns and bird feet (pictured above) and looks comically out of place amongst the other images. A nearby sign says that it may represent a shaman. I read someone else’s suggestion that it is a great horned owl.
It’s impossible to know today but it is fun to venture a guess. The Ohio Historical Society says these petroglyphs are likely the product of the Fort Ancient Culture.
There’s also a half mile nature trail through a gorge and along beautiful cliffs. Wildflowers, mosses, birds and Eastern Hemlock are abundant here. It’s a sight to behold when there’s snow on the ground too. This is a short trail but it is a nice one if you just want a little stretch of the legs.
I read other bloggers’ accounts of Leo Petroglyph and they were not too kind because the place IS small, there are NO restrooms and it does feel like you are in the middle of nowhere. One blogger griped about all of this and asserted there are no decent restaurants nearby and ordered his readers to not bother going. He calls himself a photographer and suggested that his readers could get the gist from the truly terrible pictures he shared. Let me tell you. This dude was not my people. He is also an example of why I don’t trust strangers on the internet. But I digress.
Here’s what this stranger on the internet wants you to know. Temper your expectations.
The nature trail is only a half mile but it’s a nice one. You’ll find a state operated rest area just down Route 35 and a host of businesses in nearby Jackson that do have public restrooms. In fact, Jackson is about 20 minutes away and Chillicothe is about 25 minutes away. Both towns have some great dining options. It does feel like the middle of nowhere but I think it’s really only about three miles off the four-lane.
Some people will show up and wonder why they drove so far to see preschool style artwork carved into a rock floor. Others will marvel at the fact these carvings have existed for hundreds of years. They will be curious about the people who left them and wonder what it all means. They may even leave inspired to go searching for answers or for more petroglyphs that will fuel the fire of their curiosity.
How you view them and how you later talk about these petroglyphs is a window into your own soul.
Personally, I view this as something really special to see and something that can easily be batched into other things you might do in the area. When we visited this weekend, we left Leo to travel over hill and dale for a nice hike at Lake Katherine. If you stay in Jackson County, Buckeye Furnace is a great place to visit to learn about Ohio’s early industrial past and there are a couple of covered bridges worth a look. There are other public lands to hike as well. You might also take a picnic to Leo Petroglyph. It’s a peaceful place and there are picnic tables where you can enjoy lunch as you ponder the mysteries of this place.
Nearby Chillicothe has a ton of historic sites, bike paths, hiking trails, shopping and restaurants that can entertain you for days.
Want to go? Leo Petroglyph is located at 400 Park Road, Ray, Ohio. You can follow signs from Route 35 but I just confirmed that my iPhone’s maps app gives accurate directions.
Friends. We need to talk. Yesterday I wrote about enjoying each day and making the best of whatever may come. Otherwise, we risk wishing our life away while waiting for better days ahead. You can read about that here.
That published around 4 a.m. By 7:30 I had hit a deer. Just a quarter mile from home. On my way to a work meeting in a town 45 minutes away. It came out of nowhere and was in front of my car in the blink of an eye, as deer tend to do. I was even looking for deer because the population is so vast in my rural part of southern Ohio.
Can you say irony?
Bambi’s suicide mission put the day off track in more ways than I count. While I was physically fine I was considerably wounded in spirit. While rattled, I shifted straight into “make it work mode” and tried to figure out how to manage the reality of “the right now” at work alongside the reality of what needed done to fix my personal problems.
Still, I clung to the optimism of the morning message. Try to enjoy the day. Try not to wish away today’s life in favor of tomorrow. Blatantly ignore the successful whole foods eating plan of eight days in favor of stress eating pizza and Diet Coke with coworkers. Live life well.
That last part about the pizza and Coke wasn’t in the original message but sometimes improvisation is the way to go.
Yesterday made it crystal clear that I am one of the lucky ones and I need to remember that.
After all, rural America isn’t equipped with things like public transit and being in the country means that walking or even cycling to work either isn’t feasible or is unsafe. Being without a car in a rural area is a crisis when you need to go anywhere at all.
Yet, in my case, I benefited from the knowledge, kindness and generosity of a few important people in my life and from some strangers too. As of this writing, I feel cautiously optimistic that things will turn out better than I believed possible when I first saw my pretty little car with its hood that now resembles a snarled lip.
I learned later that the deer had a gunshot wound to the leg. It was likely suffering and I’m told that my hitting it was a blessing in disguise. I put it out of its misery. I’m clinging to that hope anyway.
Normally when things don’t go my way I assume that it’s forces greater than myself conspiring to keep me safe. Get behind a slow moving vehicle and avoid an accident down the road. Construction that prevents you from traveling your route of choice could keep you out of trouble later on. That sort of thing.
I’ll admit that watching a deer smash into my hood before sailing through the air like one of Santa’s reindeer made me question just how far my faith in that theory can extend. While I sort through all that in my mind, I’m holding tight to the optimism, gratitude and yes, the humor of it all. This was a laugh or cry kind of day and I don’t like tears.
I was incredulous and frustrated for most of the day but eventually found my sense of humor.
Honestly, I am the only person I know that can smash up their car with a deer just hours after publishing a story about making the best of every day. Am I being taught a lesson? Big proclamations about happiness may be a poor choice moving forward but my internal optimist says that I should at least keep trying. If I am being taught a lesson, I fear I haven’t learned much. I’m evidently a slow learner.
I’m writing this at 7:16 pm on Friday night. That proverbial March lion is roaring tonight as a severe thunderstorm and high winds shake the house and rattle the windows.
The power is out and I’m tired so I gave Scout his medicine and we are curled up in bed. I will read until sleep finds me or till the flashlight battery dies.
… or until the house gets blown off the foundation. All three seem likely at this point.
This front is supposed to move through in the next half hour or so. The weatherman on tv earlier said this and gave people some tips for surviving a thunderstorm. One of his suggestions was keeping both hands on the steering wheel if you’re out driving. Do they teach nothing in driver’s ed these days? That just seems like common sense.
Anyway, I’m pretty happy making lemons into lemonade and enjoying some forced rest. Sometimes that’s the only way to get me to do it.
Here’s hoping we aren’t all flooded in this weekend and here’s wishing safety to all those linemen who have to go out in dangerous conditions to keep us all with electricity.
