Tag: Musings

Sometimes, you need a bigger map

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 3 Comments

I’ve loved maps since childhood, so our new interest in Downeast Maine has whetted an appetite to investigate more of the region’s geography, which includes a lot of water. Not just the ragged coastline and bays, but also large lakes and many bogs, marshes, and swamps plus rivers and waterfalls.

One thing that’s rather boggled my mind is discovering of what’s cut off from U.S. maps on that edge of the continent.

For instance, I had no clue of Grand Manan Island, which is 21 miles long with bluffs rising 200 to 400 feet above the Atlantic just nine miles east of Maine. It even has three lighthouses. Getting there’s a whole other matter.

Still, I doubt that many Americans think of anything lying in the ocean east of the United States until you get to the British Isles or European mainland. So is there anything else we’re missing?

Well, there’s tiny Machias Seal Island further south, claimed by both the U.S. and Canada, which has a long lighthouse presence there.

What’s really surprised me is how far the province of Nova Scotia extends south.

From the easternmost point in the U.S., Nova Scotia is more than 82 miles to the southeast.

From Bar Harbor, Maine, it’s 113 miles to the east.

And further south, it runs down past Portland, Maine, where sits more than 200 miles to the east.

Put another way, nearly anyone sailing from Maine has to navigate around this extension of Canada.

If you follow the news, it also puts some of our fishing controversies in perspective.

From Provincetown, at the tip of Cape Cod, for instance, the distance to the tip of Nova Scotia is roughly 230 miles, versus 111 to Portland, Maine, meaning that the southernmost point of Canada juts that much further into what I had considered U.S. fishing grounds.

With the bigger map, one including both the New England, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia shorelines, you can see how a funnel is formed, one where ocean currents push into Fundy Bay to create the world’s highest tides.

For me, this is a reminder of how often our comprehension of a problem is limited by conventional thinking when we look at the situation.

Just how else do you get outside the box, anyway?

What you’ll find in my studio

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment
  1. My laptop and the battery rechargers for my smartphone and digital camera.
  2. Tons of paper. Manuscripts, notes to myself, bills, and correspondence, mostly.
  3. My journals. (200+ volumes.)
  4. My stereo. Yes, I still love vinyl.
  5. My most favorite books plus dictionaries, thesauruses, reference works.
  6. Separately, my collected Quaker and related religious volumes.
  7. Seashells and rocks from across the continent.
  8. Incense, a small Shiva Nataraja statue, and a postcard of Green Tara.
  9. Filing cabinets and mailing supplies.
  10. A cabinet drawer stuffed with maps.

~*~

What’s your favorite workspace? What doodads would we see there?

 

Ten categories I’ve collected

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 3 Comments
  1. Fossils and rocks.
  2. Butterflies and beetles.
  3. Classical LPs.
  4. And then tapes and CDs.
  5. Paper clips. The colorful ones.
  6. Concert programs. Add to that theater, opera, ballet playbills.
  7. Books by the ton.
  8. Correspondence and rejection slips.
  9. Welcome brochures from visits to Quaker meetinghouses.
  10. Tearsheets and clippings … graphics.

~*~

What about you?

Ever been out on the Plains?

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

My novel Nearly Canaan starts off in a railroad crossing called Prairie Depot, and my story The Secret Side of Jaya returns there.

Prairie can be found as far east as Ohio, but it’s more extensive out on the Great Plains.

Here are some tidbits about the landscape.

~*~

  1. It’s bigger than I thought. The region runs from the Rio Grande river bordering Mexico all the way to the Arctic Ocean in Canada, and along the Rocky Mountains to the west. Its width is about 500 miles and it covers about a seventh of the continental U.S.
  2. Rainfall ranges between 13 and 20 inches a year, too little to sustain trees.
  3. Its natural vegetation is a variety of grasslands. And it’s flat or gently rolling.
  4. It had immense herds of bison as well as pronghorn. Prairie dogs, coyotes, prairie chicken, and rattlesnakes remain prominent.
  5. Native American tribes included Blackfoot, Crow, Sioux, Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Comanche. The nomadic tribes followed the bison migration through the year.
  6. The introduction of the horse from Europe dramatically changed the Native culture.
  7. The rural Plains have lost a third of their population since 1920. Ghost towns, which have lost so much population they’re considered extinct, are the most common category of towns.
  8. The climate includes cold, harsh winters and very hot, humid summers.
  9. Without natural trees, hills, or mountains, there’s no protection against wind and erosion.
  10. The region includes Tornado Alley, based on the frequency and intensity of the twisters generated in its open spaces.

~*~

What surprises you here?

What I don’t like about November

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

Here we are!

  1. Election Day. How can so many Americans be so dumb, so often, these days? Once in a while, I’m surprised by a miracle.
  2. The time change. Moving the clocks back from so-called Daylight Savings is the real beginning of winter. Where I live, it means sunset in the middle of the afternoon. How depressing!
  3. The foliage is gone. The trees are naked. The landscape’s turned black-and-white for most days.
  4. It’s cold. The fact is, we have to get used to the falling temperatures. It always comes as a shock. By the time we get to February, the same readings will seem balmy.
  5. Christmas songs and décor everywhere. It’s all a big retailing push. It’s not even Advent until the 29th this year – or the end of the month. It’s SO wrong! And remember, the Twelve Days of Christmas aren’t a shopping countdown – they begin on Christmas Day itself.
  6. Garden cleanup. OK, it’s not all bad. Harvesting the root crops can actually be fun. But turning off the water to the outdoor faucets, emptying the hoses and taking them to the loft of the barn, collecting fallen leaves, bringing the hammock in, along with other outdoor furniture and the ceramic pots, can get tedious.
  7. Putting up outside Christmas lighting. I prefer getting this done before it turns into a knuckle-freezing trial.
  8. No more yard sales. My wife’s pretty good at finding things on my everyday shopping list at way-below-retail on most Saturday mornings. Alas, any new items will have to wait till May.
  9. I have to clean ash from the wood-burning stove. It needs to be done every-other-day, at the least.
  10. Can’t sit in the loft of the barn. Not for long. And even then, I can’t leave the hayloft door open.

~*~

What about you?

Sing along, if you will

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

As Joni Mitchell has sung, “And the painted ponies go up and down, we’re captive on a carousel of time. We can’t return we can only look behind from where we came and go round and round and round in the circle game.”

Makes me think of my Barn blogging, with its emphasis on the seasons, too, as well as the way my categories go round and round.  

Out west, it can be a long drive to anywhere

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 5 Comments

When Joshua and Jaya finally arrive in their Promised Land in my novel Nearly Canaan, they discover how far they are from other destinations.

As I recall, some people would drive hours for a fine dinner, and hours going back.

Here are some drive times from Yakima, Washington, to other Western locales.

~*~

  1. Seattle, 2 hours, 16 minutes. I remember it taking more like three or more.
  2. Spokane, 3 hours, 9 minutes.
  3. Walla Walla, Washington, 2 hours, 6 minutes. Having the Interstate down the valley has certainly cut the time here.
  4. Wenatchee, Washington, 2 hours.
  5. Portland, Oregon, 3 hours, 6 minutes.
  6. San Francisco, 12 hours, 6 minutes.
  7. Boise, Idaho, 5 hours, 33 minutes.
  8. Salt Lake City, 10 hours, 11 minutes.
  9. Denver, 17 hours, 19 minutes.
  10. Missoula, Montana, 6 hours, 9 minutes.

~*~

And that’s not stopping for fuel, food, or comfort.

How long does it take you to get to a favorite daytrip destination?