FIRST: I thank you and my family thanks you for your love, thoughts, prayers, stories and advice. Geez, your words mean a lot. We read it all. Thank you.
Yesterday I went for a hike with Ruby and Alice, after we dropped Margot at school. It started out as a little walk but I kept going up. Up. Up more. Breathe. Tread.
I called for Olive as we ascended. I liked thinking of her roaming the hillside, I loved imagining her trotting out from behind the tall, blond grass and dried arrowleaf balsamroot. It was nice to wonder about.
Ruby was on my back, her cheek pressed between my shoulder blades.
Ruby: Mama, I wish I was a mountain.
Me: Oh yeah? Tell me about that.
Ruby: I be a big, giant mountain. I sleep. Margot be a little, tiny, baby mountain. Next to me.
Me: What do you think that would feel like?
Ruby: Fun. Because I always next to Margot. Us love each other.
We walked on the dry trail through the dry grass, the surrounding valleys thick with dry fire smoke. Alice trotted in front. Two hawks cruised on circular wind thermals above our heads. It was exceptionally quiet, the sky exceptionally blue, the sun a welcome warmth to the chilly morning. My feet crunched the crispy earth beneath us. Deer, bugs, birds everywhere.
A grasshopper flew straight into my forehead. Hit me so hard he died.
We saw two brazen coyotes on our decent. They ran up to Alice. I’ve never been so close to a coyote. I broke trail to where they were initially lounging, just to see if I could see anything. I don’t know what I was looking for. But I looked.
I went for a run with a friend last weekend. We ran from my house, up the valley and back. We turned around and two minutes back on the same trail there was a giant pile of fresh bear poop. Chances are, we ran by, just a few feet from the bear on our way up. Chances are, she was still a few feet from us.
About 50 finches have been hanging out in the trees around the chicken coop. I’ve never seen them gather there, certainly not in a large pack like that. They have been there for two days, entertaining Sam. I read a bit about finches, the bird of happiness. I like this (from here):
Finches are a sparkly omen of high energy and bright days on the horizon. Consider their flight pattern. In the same way you can pick up on a person’s character by his/her gait, we can do the same with a bird’s flight. And, in the realm of symbolic interpretation, flight can give us a lot to work with in bird meaning. Finches are never satisfied to just go from point A to point B. They seem to boogie from place to place. Bouncing and bobbing through air currents is big fun for these birds. Observing them just gives you a feeling of freedom and happiness.
Interestingly, the day Olive went missing but before we knew it, I wrote a piece about seasons, growth, rebirth. Click to read mama digs: gather, preserve.
The walk that turned into a hike did me some good. We are all wild. From a great distance, I could hear the wind tumbling toward me. My hair was down and blew straight up, the curly, frizzy tips level with the peaks across the valley. My legs felt strong. Ruby hung on my back like a little primate. Alice ran like she wasn’t 10 years old. Or maybe she ran like she was 10 and loved life.
23 Comments
I love this, I feel like I’m there with you. Beautiful writing. I can feel the mountain air on my cheeks all the way from my English living room 🙂 xxx
Beautiful, as usual. Thinking of you all and of Olive.
love these writings of yours.
you are just so present in life. i strive to be that way.
My darling blonde headed/blue eyed granddaughter, Alice the Wonder Dog and you all beneath the glorious blue sky of Montana…..wish I was there with you!
Love you!
ps….maybe those finches are trying to tell you where Olive is….hope so.
I love this. Too bad I’m stuck behind a desk and nowhere near a mountain.
This is your most beautiful post yet. You took me there, and I loved it. Thank you.
Nici, we are worlds apart on many different levels. But I keep coming back to your blog. Every day. I love hearing your take on life. It is so refreshing. So grounding. Thank you for your honesty about everything. Thank you for sharing your heart and life. I never think about hiking because we don’t have the mountains/hills as beautiful as yours, but we do have trails in our little “city” and you have moved me to walk one of them. To be closer to nature and God. To get away from the “noise” that corrupts my every day life (even though a majority of it spent alone, working in my house). Thank you.
Your stories about your days with Ruby are helping me look more forward to next year. My first fella starts school and I’ll have just one wee boy to spend my days with. I was thinking we might plan nothing for those days, except a bit of roaming here and there. I can’t wait!
I’m not sure why, but this post of yours made me cry… And then I got to the paragraph about the bear and this here English girl just froze, re read and re read. Oh my goodness! Coyotes and bears. I just can’t imagine…
Thinking of you all
The bear thing – freaking me out!!!!!
Sorry no sighting of Olive 🙁
You live in a truly BEAUTIFUL part of the world. I’ve gotta add it to my list. You know… THE LIST 🙂
Love love love the mountain story. Ruby is an old soul, I feel.
xx
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Gorgeous, honest writing, as usual. So much I can relate to here–I was smacked on the cheek by a grasshopper on our walk this morning. We hear the coyotes on the mountain behind our house nearly every evening. We have a mama bear and cubs up on that same mountain. So much beauty. Keep up hope for Olive. She could be there. Also, she could have moved on. Life. It’s all so beautiful.
Love it. All of your blog writing and beautifully descriptive words about the Montana mountains. My nearly 14 year old daughter dreams of moving to Montana after she completes her DVM and opening a large holistic health clinic for large and small pets, purchasing several acres of land and just living. Living with nature, her horses (yes, there will be a horse rescue on property…she dreams of owning this as well) and her dogs. She’s a free spirit and your posts make me so happy to think that her free spirit may be at home in your beautiful Montana.
is there a chance she may have gone to your old house?
Isn’t it glorious to be able to walk out the back door and walk and just keep on going.
It sounds like you’re in a similar situation as I was last year. One girl at school, the other your constant companion. It was so fun for me and now she’s gone for three hours two days a week at preschool and I miss her so much…I miss both of them so much. I am cherishing the last little bits of our time together, like the last crumbs of a favorite muffin…my little muffin.
Enjoy your time together and still holding out hope for your sweet Olive. P.S., “Us love each other”, wow! Don’t you just swoon over sisterly love?!
J
Rubys words made my heart melt! What great kiddos!
We had to give a few cats away as kids (we had way too many) and strangely enough, we had several of them show up on our doorstep the next day or two. We drove them all the way across town, into farm country, and they still found their way back! I agree with a previous commenter, maybe she went to your old home…? Regardless, I’m sorry she is missing and I have been keeping my fingers crossed that she returns!
I was so hoping I’d read you’d found her…and I don’t even like cats, but I like y’all, and am sorry. Beautiful words from a sweet spirit, both yours and your daughter’s. My youngest is 2 and I wish I had the alone time with her that you have with Ruby, but since I teach school I don’t. Last night, I went and slept beside her to assauge some of the guilt I have about not having that bond with her. Anyway, I know you do, but just wanted to tell you so you can savor that precious time with Ruby.
Such a lovely post…Nothing so good for restoring the spirit as a walk up a big mountain. Love Ruby’s words and intuition.
‘hit me so hard he died’
I laughed. That would hurt, no?
I strive to always run like I am 10 and love life.
beautiful piece, nici. so sorry about olive. sending love!
10 is just a number. Embracing Life is a purpose.
It’s good to be in love with the life that is given to us. Love your awareness.
-Jennifer
This is one of my favorite dig posts. I love your earthy and beautiful writing. It also crossed my mind that Olive may have found her way back to your old home. Of course I have no idea of the distance but could it be possible? Perhaps she is there and the new owners are feeding her? I don’t know why but I feel like you will find her, just a feeling.
As a Brit the thought of bears and coyotes being alongside you is amazing. I love bears but they are also my biggest fear, I have had scary bear dreams my whole life to this day. True story. Tell us more!
Thank you so much for the many suggestions that Olive may have wandered back to our old home! We drove over there this week and shook her treat bag. She isn’t there. The new homeowners are on the look out as well. xo
Yes. We are all wild. <3