We have been home (from the Jersey Shore) less than 24 hours and what I most appreciate is the quiet here.  All I hear here is the ?crickets or is it the ?cicadas.  And the occasional “whoosh” of a car passing nearby.

The bed and breakfast we stayed at for three nights was on a busy road.  It was very difficult to make a left hand turn.  It was only a block away from the ocean.  New Jersey just had too many people.

For some reason I become very unsettled in crowded areas.  It is not my fault.  I just do.  I will appreciate my house better.  It is not on a main fare.  I watch the birds come to and fro my feeders all day.  Especially the hummingbirds who never fail to delight me.

There is a reason mental hospitals always were situated in the country.  They used to be called rest homes.  Many years ago the array of medications to treat mental illness did not exist.

People who had nervous breakdowns were sent to hospitals in the countryside to recuperate and recover.  There is nothing like the calm found in nature to do so.

I will appreciate my home better.  It is just a relief to be here.  My trip to the Jersey shore reminded me how fortunate I am to be on the edge of country.

The beach In Bay Head, NJ was much nicer than I thought it would be.  It stretched for miles and there were not many people on it.  I had this idea there would be some kind of barrier at the border of each town on the beach but that was not the case.

We even saw dolphins in the ocean.  I was thrilled.  They were huge and I never expected to see them.  They “made” this trip really memorable.  I have not thought about my dogs who I boarded until now and now I miss them.  Absence makes the heart fonder.

The Atlantic Ocean is really far from us so I will appreciate it now.  The Inn we are staying at is really nice although the beds were really hard.  I am off to the Ocean again.

The Nurse From Bricktown

Author: siggy

She came out of nowhere.  I asked my young nurse (during my brief hospital stay) where she was from:  she said, “Bricktown, New Jersey.”  I immediately asked her if that was near Lakewood.  And then asked her a flurry of questions.

She knew about Winwood Beach.  It was a vacation spot on the Manasquan River we often rented a bungalow for the weekend.  It could have been forty years the last time I was there.  I assumed the owner sold it a long time ago and the land was built on.  I was thrilled to find out it now was a park.

I used to love getting up in the morning to flush the cottontails.  There were the barn swallows who inhabited a garage there who would dive bomb every time I would go there near there.  I also picked wild blue berries in South Jersey every year.

Winwood Beach was the place where I used to throw rocks at the blackbirds perched at the barbed wire and once I hit one breaking his wing.  That was the last time I ever threw a rock at a bird.  The Beach was also not too far from The Atlantic Ocean.

She was familiar with Ocean County Park.  My Dad loved that park.  We lived two hours away but we often went there for the day.  My father upon entering that park would make sure the car windows were down so the smell of the virgin pines tree needles could drift in.

I also asked her about the park on the lake on route nine in Lakewood where we often went.  One memory I had of that place was my sister on a bamboo pole catching the largest yellow perch I had ever seen at the mouth of a stream there.

More of my childhood memories buried came back when I talked to this young nurse.  The conversation, unfortunately, was too brief.  I wanted to continue it but I did not have another opportunity. I owed my father a big debt for introducing me to nature by all our trips to South Jersey.