For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: white.
This is a male common merganser, swimming on the C & O Canal. I took this earlier this week.
We did not have binoculars, but I thought it was a merganser because of the feather mohawk on the female.

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: white.
This is a male common merganser, swimming on the C & O Canal. I took this earlier this week.
We did not have binoculars, but I thought it was a merganser because of the feather mohawk on the female.

Today’s Mundane Monday Challenge #175 is “line up”. (It’s already Monday in parts of the world!)
The parent merganser led the rested group down the rock and into the water. They swam by us in a line, bunching up when the parent realized we weren’t rocks.
Submissions to last week’s challenge water color:
KLAllendorfer: waters of many colors.
For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: tenacious.
Here is the parent merganser with the young, all groomed in the morning sun and resting in the early morning sun. I counted ten of the young in the other photographs. A lot of parenting work.
For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: bird.
This is the second time that I have been blessed by mergansers! I am sitting on the front rocks, which face east, with P in the early morning. Tea, journal and camera. Camera just in case. The family of mergansers swam around the point and we froze. They came up on the rocks, about 15 feet from us. I took pictures and otherwise we held very still. The family groomed themselves. One settled facing the woods and the others slowly settled, the parent bird still on the alert. After they rested enjoying the early sun, the parent led them back in the water and they swam along the rocks in front of us.
I read an article about productivity yesterday. It talked about taking breaks and more importantly breaks outdoors. A study of work after breaks showed that people thought an outdoor break was better than an indoor one for relaxation, but the measured effect was even greater than expected.
I can only be blessed by mergansers if I go outside and wait and am quiet. I feel so blessed.
I took this distant family shot zoomed out and saved the identification for today: a family of hooded mergansers. The feathered hoods are tucked back and this is in the early morning.
I can’t duck my feelings: I miss the lake. I haven’t been there in three years.
For the Daily Prompt: forlorn.
For the Daily Prompt: fluff.
I took this at Lake Matinenda, in Ontario, Canada, summer 2015.
These are some of the creatures that I saw last summer at Lake Matinenda. A whole family of mergansers swam around the point in the early morning. I was drinking tea and writing in the very early morning. Suddenly they startled at something in the water and all rushed up on the rock ten feet from me. I froze and when they didn’t notice me, I slowly picked up my camera.
What were they scared of? There are pike and lake trout and otters…
Oh Beloved
Oh thank you from my deepest being from all of me from every cell for this touch this kiss this day this cat this daughter this son this family this work this rose this farm box these vegetables tomatoes in my yard and deer outside the fence in town crossing at the crosswalk
the motor working the sailboat flying across the water my aunt laughing my uncle hanging the hammock up in the house the farmer’s market the panda trailer friends new bunnies who barely have fur and sniff at my alien scent in my hand teen bunnies who delight in celery patients and patience and enough
books a box from Wisconsin with a vintage suit fake fur collar and cuffs that unbutton and a woman in a wheelchair laughing when I show her the collar and cuffs and getting through another week and catching up on some of the paperwork a massage to look forward to music and song and a photograph of my father at 6 and my aunt at 3 and my great grandfather and great grandmother in about 1900, he was born in 1881 showing the photos to my daughter and my niece
physical delight that morning comes the wind in the sails of the boat hugs hands touching me and me touching the taste of the tomatoes blueberries a cream puff with whipped cream and strawberries soft cashmere yarn on sail in downtown and my daughter wants just the right hat knit of this yarn just so and it must not come down to her eyebrows we all laugh
loons mink crows raccoons deer a flock of cedar waxwings by the church who stop curious when I try to do their call cat fish frog nuthatches snapping turtle small bunnies
I am afraid to feel happy happy doesn’t stay I hold it away how can I be happy what disaster will strike next but little by little Oh Beloved I let the feeling rise and feel happy
Oh Beloved thank you for this and all
My photograph of common mergansers on Lake Matinenda, Ontario, Canada, 8/2015
BLIND WILDERNESS
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