Yesterday’s blog, “Dead Butterfly,” may have been a bit dreary for some. Tonight I give you a very live butterfly, enjoying the bounty of summer.☙
Image #113 – Live Butterfly on Thistle
Image #112 – Dead Butterfly
Some time ago I posted a blog called “Dead Hummingbirds.” Over time it has been among the biggest draws to my blog. I can’t imagine who is Googling for “Dead Hummingbirds” but stats don’t lie…right?
Today I present a dead butterfly, most likely a swallowtail variety. Friends and frequent readers will know that I worked in hospice for six years and I can already hear a few of them — “Leave it to Alice to find a dead butterfly.” Maybe it is a cosmic, spiritual link that leads me to these things. I mean, how many people have found a dead hummingbird on their front yard? Dead butterflies are easier to find. I have numerous pictures of various wing parts, shattered on some roadway or forest floor. This particular butterfly was on a dirt road, somewhere near Franklin. I was sitting, almost laying on the road trying to get a shot of the “Broken Hearted Tree“. As I went to get up there was the remains of this butterfly. Such a small bit of a beautiful thing. How could I not take a moment to acknowledge and photograph it?
“All things must pass,” sang the great George Harrison. It is an important thing to remember.☙
Image #111 – Violet-branched coral mushroom
The blades of grass and mossy ground cover give you a sense of scale for this beautiful mushroom. It has been a wonderful season for mushrooms. New ones continue to emerge even as the days grow shorter and the nights cooler. What other treasures does North Carolina hold as the seasons change? ☙
Image #110 – Grass on the Mind …again
About a year ago I posted a blog entitled “Grass on the Mind“. I revisited it today and a portion of it really jumped out at me.
My passion these days is photography and I LOVE photographing grass. There are thousands of varieties of grass in the world and a lot of them live here in Florida. At this time of the year many are “going to seed” — a phrase we have come to regard as pejorative. But if you get close enough to these grasses you’ll see a world of color and wonder. They may be “going to seed” but they do it in style. Just look at the colors and textures of these two samples.
There are many beautiful grasses here in North Carolina, of course. I have only just begun to photograph the N.C. variety. You’ll see their pictures in future blogs. Life has been very full in recent months what with moving to N.C. and working on this old place. It seems there has been little time for photography but once again I have been blessed. Nature has presented a bounty of mushrooms to photograph this year — right in my own backyard — and I have posted many of those pictures. But the grasses are calling me — their rich colors and awesome translucence wave at me in the deepening autumn sunlight. ☙
Image #109 – Yellow Patches Mushroom
Thie picture is actually from last winter. I was visiting my friends in Carabelle, Fl in March and found this handsome mushroom on their property.
Image #106 – Mary Lynn and Tango
That’s my friend Mary Lynn Mathre with my buddy Tango. We visited MaryLynn, or ML, and her husband Al in North Florida last March. This picture was taken on their property near Carrabelle, Florida. I’ve posted her picture today because tomorrow, September 13, ML and I will be co-presenters at a seminar in Lansing, Michigan. The seminar is entitled, “Cannabis & The Endocannabinoid System: What Nurses & Medical Marijuana Professionals Need to Know.”
Collectively ML and I have more than a half century of experience in the medical marijuana issue. We hope that this might be the first of many presentations we give together. Nurses are the frontline personnel in healthcare environment and marijuana’s medical use is a hot topic these days, with 20 states authorizing the legal use of the drug. Michigan is one of those states and has more than 100,000 certified patients who can use marijuana legally! Yet nurses and other healthcare professionals have no training programs or classes.
ML and Al began an organization in the 1990s called Patients Out of Time, a non-profit group dedicated to education. Every two years they have organized an international conference on cannabis research and have brought together the world’s finest researchers who present fascinating papers on the emergining science of the endocannabinoid system. Mainstream America is finally awakening to science that is being conducted in places other than the U.S.A. Dr. Sanjay Gupta recently reversed his position on medical marijuana. In throwing his support behind this issue he issued an apology, explaining that he ” didn’t look far enough. I didn’t review papers from smaller labs in other countries doing some remarkable research, and I was too dismissive of the loud chorus of legitimate patients whose symptoms improved on cannabis.”
Just a few weeks ago marked the 38th anniversary of an arrest in Washington, D.C. that started the medical marijuana movement in America. It was 1975 and not very many people knew about marijuana’s beneficial properties. But a young college professor with glaucoma had realized that marijuana was saving his sight and he began growing marijuana to help keep his supplies steady. When he and his mate were arrested they realized they had two options: 1) pay the fine and be more careful in the future, hoping not to get caught again, or 2) fight the charges and at least create a record that marijuana was helping. They chose the latter and went on to make history.
That glaucoma patient was my late husband, Robert Randall, the acknowledged founder of the medical marijuana movement in America.☙
Image #105 – Tall trees and yellow flowers
A peaceful image for a day carries so much sorrow – 9/11/2013.
Image #104 – Tulip Poplar?
This beautiful blossom was one of many on a very tall tree. A friend told me it was a tulip poplar but the flower does not match any in my reference sources. Perhaps a reader can help me out?
Alice's WanderLand 