Autumn is in the Adirondack Air

Feels like football weather! Where long-johns are appropriate and where winter hats warm cold ears, but what about the nose???

Tesla didn't work out, my lodging plans became dislodged and without a place to leave the bike I couldn't make it to the concert. Well, I could've, and then I could've returned to where I left the bike and found empty panniers or perhaps a few gang signals spray-painted on from the resident rowdy state-fair-goers who had been consuming Bud, Miller or Coors Light - take your pick! - since 10am.

Anyway, the past few days have been absolutely gorgeous. You could not wish for better weather. Not too hot, not too cold. Just right. The middle bear's porridge, if only goldilocks would leave it alone and not eat it all! If I had a bed I would tell her to stay out of there too, since beds are a precious commodity.

I slept behind the bathroom at Pixley Falls. Earlier in the evening I showered under Pixley Falls. Me and Dr. Bronners and the shivery-chilly-willies! Shoooeeee was that cold.

As I set up my tent, I couldn't help but sense a feeling of uneasiness. Nothing was wrong or out of place, it just didn't feel right. Was the bathroom haunted? The ghost of Camping Past telling me not to camp there? I laid there, eventually falling asleep, but was awakened throughout the night by various noises and shadows that eventually led me to move.
I got out of my tent and looked around. I heard the howl of a coyote in the distance. I saw the unmistakable glint of two animal eyes in the darkness at the edge of the open field near the woods.
It could've been a bear, it could've been a bunny, it could've been a coyote, it could've been a deer, it could've been anything. At that point I didn't care and moved down to across from the ranger's station, closer to the road. From there I slept better.
Although at various points I awoke to sounds of scurrying. Furtive burrowing movements beneath my tent. As I was moving my tent previously I had noticed a field mouse diving for cover into a crack in the bathroom wall. That explained some of the strange noises I was hearing.

And now that field mouse's cousins were having a field day beneath my tent!

Was it some kind of fort for them? The kind of forts that us children would create out of the living room furniture, much to the chagrin of our parents? The mice seemed to be having a ball and completely unaware of the fact that it was 2am and I was trying to sleep. Why, the nerve of these rascals! And where was Little Bunny Fu-Fu during all of this, wasn't he supposed to be picking these guys up and bopping them on the head? He must get Labor Day off too.

I thought back to when my brothers and I would make tents out of the living room furniture... what a great time that was. It made me wonder - why do we always want to be reminded of childhood memories? Whether it's hot cocoa after snow or forts in the living room or hot soup during fall football weather or even riding bikes - what is it about those memories that makes us wistfully reminisce? Why can't that playful innocence continue into adulthood? I suppose at some point we start taking things too seriously. We take on responsibilities and feel the burden of bills, we feel the fear, the insecurity, wondering if we're enough, if we're adequate, if we're a success, if we're loved.
It becomes a game of what-ifs and wonders, when previously my main concern at age 9 was whether or not both of my feet touched the pavement as I caught the football before falling into the neighbors grass.
How did we go from feet and football to fears and unclears?
There was a subtle change there, it most definitely happened and seems to have grown into a veritable chasm. I just wonder if it's something that gets lost. And if it is - is it something we can find? Perhaps it was always there and we just muddled it with things that don't mean anything to us.

My friend is thinking of getting a tattoo. The word means hopes and dreams in Italian. She doesn't want to forget them. Or, she wants to be reminded of them.
The band Keane has an album titled Hopes and Fears. We all hope and fear. And dream.
We dream of a better day, a tomorrow where dreams come true. Somewhere over the rainbow. Where skies are blue. We worry about tomorrow, we have weather forecasters providing the 10 day outlook, but what about today?

There is a saying - Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift. That is why they call it the Present.

What will I do in 16 days when I reach Bar Harbor? What do I want to be when I grow up?

There is a book called A Course In Miracles. In it, it talks about 'the holy instant'.
Woooops, you just missed it! Oh boy, there it went again. Annnd again. The instant is quick. Blink and you'll miss it. What if we could create our tomorrows by connecting a neverending string of holy instants? A collection of moments and todays. Today is yesterday's tomorrow...... how do you feel? Different?

Change takes action, so Do. Being is good too, but change requires doing. To quote Ben Stiller and the Dodgeball dudes - DO IT. Come on, do it.

I took a yoga class in Ashland, Oregon on my way up to Anacortes. The instructor was amazing, she was constantly encouraging us. On more than one occasion she came by and pointed out that my right foot was 'closed' - meaning it was pointing left of where it should be. She indicted that this was precluding the natural flow of energy and keeping me from fully moving into the stretch. Well, how do you do! I had no idea.
I've thought about that moment a lot. My right foot being closed off. We need to approach life and yoga with open right feet! Reminds me of the golf swing, how the slightest change can have the most profound impact. A little dab'll do you. It doesn't take much.
So make some changes. Figure out what you want, what you'd like, what your dreams are. Start fiddling with stuff. Open your right foot. Allow the energy to flow. See what happens. Make today your tomorrow.