Day 53 / 312

Saylorville Lake – Sunny  66 Degrees

“The environment is where we all meet; where all have a mutual interest; it is the one thing all of us share.”     —Lady Bird Johnson

Today is Earth Day and what a day it has been! Instead of looking out the window into overcast skies, we were greeted with abundant sunshine. Instead of listening to the sound of wind thundering on the slide-out awnings and sleet clicking against the windows, we were treated to a symphony of song birds busy feeding and building nests and a steady rumble of motorcycles cruising down Highway 415 in the distance.

I love Earth Day and the awareness it raises to take note of the great outdoors and the importance of preserving things not built of concrete.  Living on federal lands most of the time really resonates with my love of natural areas and watching people get excited about being in this environment, even if only for a few hours.

I celebrated today by gathering the rest of my gardening stuff that will eventually become my RV pad container garden. I researched how to do it last year and had good success. This year our site has two raised beds and I just received permission to build a third. One of my biggest anxieties about going full-time was I would have to give up my yard and gardening passion. Nothing could be further from the reality of my life now. I seek out volunteer jobs that include landscaping and gardening tasks. I create my own yard and garden here at Saylorville, thanks to the dynamics of Volunteer Village and the blessing of the rangers to let us grow things at our site. Add to that, my daughter is developing my green thumb and passion for creating micro habitats in her yard, and a friend who is a yard geek like me and is more than happy to let me come to her house and get my fingernails dirty. I dig in the dirt now more than ever!

In Iowa we must wait till Mid May to safely plant things we expect to survive outside. In the meantime, I have a motorhome windshield that makes a great greenhouse, and I can walk through the greenhouses with my friend Joyce and inhale the smell of loamy soil and fertilizer and dream of the summer growing season just around the corner.

Until tomorrow…