Tuesday, June 7

Happy Birthday, Dad  # 78

Quote of the Day: “I am a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it.”  Thomas Jefferson

Exercise Log:  Today was my favorite day of walking so far!  Kathy E. and did the Rise and Run, or walk or hike.  I picked her up at 5:45 A.M. and we headed up Millcreek Canyon and parked at the Burch Hollow Trail Head.  Kathy knew that the Water Leaf would be at their peak blooming and she was right.  Water leaf is a purple flower on a fern-like green leaf that is currently covering the mountain side.  It is beautiful and a must see.  We walked along meadows of the flowers under arched trees and could see the beginning of sun starting to come up over the mountains and shine on the peaks directly across from us.  We went 3 miles along the pipeline trail and then 2 miles down the road from elbow back to my car.  As we were nearing one of the last picnic spots before we got the gate, a young moose came out on the road.  I hesitated to get too close to the moose for fear that there must be a Mother Moose nearby.  We sat on the stone wall waiting for the moose to pass by but then started to move towards it.  It went back into the woods.  We thought it was about a year old- looked very healthy as you can see from the picture.  It was delightful!  As we were talking to another biker who had seen the moose, a downhill biker came speeding by and almost clipped Kathy.  What a dope- he assumed we were just standing in the road to bother bikers!  He could have hurt Kathy or the moose!  5.07 miles (+.70)  I’ll probably do the .70 on stairmaster today just to bug the people who think I’m obsessive!!!

Yesterday in my blog, I reflected about having an illness and how that makes you ponder your mortality but also makes you measure the things that really matter in life.  I was thinking about the biker today who really wasn’t thinking but assuming that we were irritating walkers on the wrong side of the road.  He yelled back at us for not being out of the way of bikers.  It reminded me of the person getting on the freeway when we were walking yesterday.  There were about 6 of us and we were almost to cross the road at the freeway entrance and there was a car that didn’t want to wait for us to cross so went right in front of us.  I thought that it might have saved her 10 seconds in getting to work.  What a peculiar thing to trade- 10 seconds earlier to some destination for showing courtesy for some pedestrians.  But all of us trade those kinds of things every day and if you asked us which one we would chose in our behavior, all of us would say that we would be kind to others.  But the truth is when we get in the throws of life or behind the wheel of a car or bike- we often forget the courtesy and become impatient if things don’t happen just as we would like them to.  Another example of assuming we know something that the rest of the people have missed happened to my friend, Sue B.  She was waiting in her car, along with a few other cars, for a mother duck with babies to cross the road when another car passed them all and drove over one of the babies.

So, what are we really willing to trade for a kindness?  I think we all need to slow down, not make assumptions, look at the full situation and please give up 10 seconds to show a kindness to another!

Young Moose in Millcreek Canyon

Water Leaf on Pipeline Trail