The Thunder Moon doesn’t technically occur until July, but if ever such a name was appropriate for a full moon, it was this one. It seemed to rest and roll along the tops of this magnificent soaring June thunderhead at sunset, like some whimsical bright ball up there bouncing down cloud stairways. As I watched from the porch steps, the billowing cloud rumbled faintly and the liquid gulping of a bittern echoed along the lake shore as dusk slowly fell—and I thought about David’s words:
“I will give thanks to you, O Lord, among the peoples; I will sing praises to you among the nations. For you steadfast love is great to the heavens, your faithfulness to the clouds. Be exalted, O God, above the heavens! Let your glory be over all the earth!” (Psalm 57:9-11)
And, while we’re on the topic of the moon, just for the fun of it, I thought I’d share a few interesting lunar-themed links I’ve happened across recently. Hope you enjoy them as much as I did!
Here’s an interesting article on how each month’s full moon got it’s name.
Read this book by Astronaut James Irwin for a first-hand, uniquely Christian perspective on the first landing on the moon—it’s full of pictures and fascinating!
Actual video clips and audio from that first landing, with some unexpected lightheartedness. “Hippity hop and over a hill…”
Sometimes I feel like this, too when waiting for the moon to rise.
Moon phases explained, with Oreos.
Once in a blue moon, you should eat a blue moon torte. But ever wondered where that phrase “once in a blue moon” came from? Click on the torte photo or here to find out.
If you could read French, this would be a spectacular lunar treat to create.
If you’re as fond of Beethoven’s ‘Moonlight Sonata’, and Horatio Spoffard’s ‘It Is Well With My Soul’ as I am, you should listen to this.
And just in case you missed it, a previous post of mine about the Harvest Moon, and another about the Wolf Moon.
A little farmhouse on a lake is a very nice place to live, but there are a couple times every year when something happens to make it feel pretty much like a palace. Like when the big old lilac bush out front blooms. We’re rich in lilacs over here, folks.
I wonder if he feels as rich as I do when his home is in bloom?
This is the story of a search for morel mushrooms.
Twice I went looking…
Twice I returned empty-handed.
But, in process of closely examining large stretches of forest floor in vain, I did make a lot of other wonderful discoveries.
Once, I sat quietly staring into a stand of fiddleheads so long, a grouse thought I’d left and started drumming his log within ten feet of me. For just a minute, I thought my heart was palpitating—until I realized that he was really just that close. Then he exploded suddenly off into the woods when I tried to shift to a spot with a better view, which is, incidentally, when my heart rate did increase.
I nearly stepped on the elaborate den of some creature (I’d like to imagine it a fox den, but it more likely belongs to far less charming skunks), and happened upon a wolf track, perfectly dried and preserved in last week’s mud.
I chanced upon a place where jack-in-the-pulpits preached in a woodland meadow to spears of blue flag leaves…
…and another where the wild plums were wreathed in clouds of frilly white.
I didn’t find what I was looking for—but I did find so much more.
It was almost as good as Yellowstone National Park when a bear is sighted along the road.
Mama hovered nervously in the woods nearby, snorting, stamping worriedly. They bleated back like tiny lambs as if to say, “Whatchya so worried about, Mom? See? These people like us.”
It wasn’t a strong or stormy wind. It was a soft, pleasant spring breeze, just stiff enough to ruffle the tops of the big pines we were walking through and cause them to whisper mysteriously together. It rose and fell with drama up above us, compelling enough to get our attention, but not enough to so much as sway the massive trunks rising around us. Sometimes, in the moments between the squeals of little girls discovering spring blossoms along the forest floor and the chattering of squirrels indignant at our intrusion on their private retreat, we’d stop to just listen to it.
There was a kind of music to it, the kind that made me want to lay right down on that thick, soft carpet of pine needles and soak it in while I stared up the towering pillars of tree trunks to the bits of blue sky like a mosaic of stained glass above. Then, as we neared a swamp hollow, the fluted tones of spring peepers harmonized as only nature can, and I had flashbacks to a beautiful wind concert I attended once, performed by talented musicians under the soaring ceilings of a grand lobby. But, I thought to myself, could a wind concert be performed in any grander a place than this remote and silent cathedral of a forest, by the actual wind itself?
At that moment, it was hard to believe not. And if you listened closely enough, you could almost hear the words…
It’s the best part of spring, that brief period of time when life begins to reemerge from the bare branches and brown earth. The world is exploding almost visibly with life, and I hardly dare blink lest I miss something. Everywhere I look there are buds bursting open, leaves unfolding, new scenes unfolding and an unending number of discoveries to make.
Then, there are the woodsy pilgrimages to make, traditions dating to my childhood, like going in search of the dainty lavender and white hepaticas that are so absolutely quintessential of a Minnesota spring.
And, if I’m paying attention and watching my step as I go, there is almost always something new to discover. Something unexpected, like the strange forms of emerging horsetail at the edge of a gravel country road. Or a pair of sandhill cranes, flapping their half-graceful, half-ungainly way out of the maze of last year’s cornstalks. Or a fisher bounding across a lonely, narrow, backwoods road, stopping just long enough to glance back at us curiously.
Beauty in the expected and familiar; beauty in the unexpected and unfamiliar. Truly,
It really wouldn’t have been a proper Minnesota April (or May?) without a good snowstorm, now would it have been? Besides, I needed proof that crocuses really do bloom under such circumstances. They seem no worse for the wear for it—and I don’t suppose any of the rest of us are either. But just in case you were struggling with the idea of snow and cold after so long a stretch of warm weather—or even struggling with some other frustration or trial that has nothing to do with snow—consider this admonition of how to live that these brave little flowers model well:
“Look, Mommy, it’s an ostrich!” cried my oldest daughter excitedly from the window.
Every spring, there’s this short window of time, just before the ice goes out, in which there are little open areas of water around the edges of our lake. All the waterfowl congregates in these puddles and pools to forage for food and paddle around in one great companionable waiting game for the lake to open.
The ducks and geese seem to have a mutual agreement that it’s a nice little community event, too, and mingle quite nicely.
Such a fuss we had from them, of fiercely territorial wing-flapping, neck-bobbing and trumpet-blasting, particularly when another pair of swans would come in for a landing (on a multi-daily basis). It was all very exciting, and we’re going to rather miss it now that the lake is open and the spring festival is over.
The night was bright with a million stars, each one pulsating distinct and three-dimensional against deep black velvet of the sky. The aurora was dancing low but visible on the horizon. Across the lake, a monkey owl laughed, and in the distant forest echoed the drum roll of a grouse. Just above the treetops, a slender waxing crescent of reflected sunlight rimmed the lower curve of dark round moon. It dangled, then dropped out of sight. One meteorite fell, and then another. It was a good night to go walking without a flashlight, and so we did.
The otters had been playing not on but in the ice while the northern lights rippled softly green, enjoying the effects of the steadily aging and honeycombing lake ice. I didn’t realize how rotten the ice was until I stood on the shore and watched their game for a good hour. They were literally running all over the lake breaking holes in all the thin places and diving in and out of them, which explained the mysterious tinkling and shattering sounds of the previous night.
Rejoicing Hills 