New Jersey Baby Boomer

Years ago my husband and I spent time in a Sunday School class taught by a man named Earle Davis, who always loved to talk about his years working with Les Paul, another famous New Jersey Celebrity.

It was at his home in Mahwah, NJ, about 1/2 hour from where we live now, that Les did some of his pioneering work on the solid-body electric guitar…which means he had a significant role in the rock ‘n roll industry, can you imagine rock ‘n roll without an electric guitar or two or three? I believe Les Paul guitars were later made by Gibson. It was always fun to hear Earle’s stories, and until I did my homework on Les Paul, I didn’t fully appreciate the significance.

Our friend, Earle, traveled with Les and his wife, Mary Ford, as their sound technician. If you click this link, you’ll be taken to a “Stars and Stripes” photo of the day that has a picture of our old friend, Earle, with Les Paul, his wife Mary and his son…I’d like to bring the picture over here, but want to respect copyright guidelines…it’s a great shot.

I believe Les is close to 90 and still making beautiful music, correct me if I’m wrong?

(I found the guitar pictured on eBay, on sale here in New Jersey. I don’t know the seller and have nothing to gain sharing the link to the post, but here it is just in case you’re looking for a vintage Les Paul guitar.)

Tomorrow is a special day all over the United States. The first Thursday of every May is set aside as “The National Day of Prayer“.They are predicting rain for tomorrow, but I’m sure there will be some of us that will meet at the Town Hall around noon, and other places throughout the day.

Actually, every day is a good day to be praying for our Nation, our present and future leaders, military, fire department, first aid squad members (here it is mostly volunteer), store owners, school teachers, the list is just endless.

• Theme this year is: Prayer, America’s Strength & Shield
• Verse: “The Lord is my strength and shield; my heart trusts in Him, and I am helped. Psalm 28:7
• 2008 Prayer for our Nation by Dr. Ravi Zacharias:
• Holy Father, in a world where so many are hungry, you have given us food in abundance; In a world where so many are hurting, You offer to bind up our wounds; In a world where so many are lonely, You offer friendship to every heart; In a world longing for peace, You offer hope; Yet, we are to stubborn and resistant, Have mercy upon us, Lord. Our nation is at a crossroads this year, we look to you to be our strength and shield. Please give us the guidance to elect one who will honor you and to respond to the wisdom from above so that our hope may be renewed and our blessings be treasured. In God’s holy name, Amen

Yesterday was a nice day, not as sunny as it has been here in New Jersey for the past couple weeks, and not quite as warm, but with everything turning green, it is still beautiful. It was a busy day, but we took a little time between stops to unwind at the Ecology Center in Wyckoff which is now called the James A. McFaul Environmental Center. We have visited there during many occasions in our life, when we were dating we had pictures taken there; when our children were young we took them to see the animals and walk the trails; now that they are grown, we just go to walk, remember and enjoy the peaceful environment. Here are a few pictures for you:

These turkeys were so much fun to watch, they couldn’t get enough of strutting their stuff, and the closer we got to the cage, the more they strutted, what a pair!

The Peacocks never did display their tail feathers for us, there were two of them, but looking closely at the tail feathers, you could imagine what it would have looked like. It was amazing to see them run around with their long, beautiful “train” behind them.

Yes, that’s me, and I’ll do my usual female thing of saying it was at the end of a long day, I didn’t have time to fix myself up, I forgot to take of my glasses, yadayadayada, but that’s the real me, no escaping it! Isn’t the tree beautiful?

When it was time to leave, two handsome geese lead the way, a fine end to a beautiful day!

(I just had to come back and take a closer look at this picture, my husband just told me that if you look closely to the left of the goose furthest away, there are two little goslings, I think that’s how you spell it? Can you see them? They are SO tiny right now. We saw another mother goose on her nest quickly pull her little ones under her…you couldn’t see them, but could hear their little “peeps” from under her.)

I wasn’t able to attend the first annual Boomer Diva Nation Spring Break event in Daytona, and have been sitting on the edge of my…uh…couch, with my laptop, waiting to hear from woman who have truly become friends over the internet get home and share with us their experience.

Beverly Mahone, the one who started it all, has posted all that you need to know at the Boomer Diva Nation site, so click here, read all about it, see some of the pictures from the trip…and OH how I wish I’d been there! Great job, Beverly, enjoy reflecting on a job well done!

It’s quieter than usual on the Baby Boomer Diva Yahoo discussion group because many of my Diva friends are down in Florida meeting each other for the first time, and enjoying all kinds of events and fun. This is a wonderful, diverse group of woman that I’m proud to call my friends, and I just can’t wait to hear all about the weekend.

Even though we’re having spectacular weather here in NJ, and I’ve loved my time digging in the dirt planting Petunias, I keep wondering “how are my Diva friends doing” or “I wonder what they are doing now”? It won’t be long before we’ll hear word.

There are several of us that had to stay behind, and not be part of the first annual weekend event, and we’ve been keeping each other good company while our friends are away.

If you’re stopping by for a blog visit, know you are missed…but somehow I bet you’re having way to much fun to be on the internet!

One great thing about being a Baby Boomer, at least one my age, born in 1951, is that you have new choices. You can dye your hair, or you can let it go Grey. You can get a face-lift or keep those wrinkles.

I’ve opted to “go natural”, enjoy the new crow’s feet that are multiplying around my eyes and wrinkles that surround my smile. I’m letting the Grey hair that glistens in the sunlight when I look at myself in the rear view mirror of my little red Volkswagen Cabrio convertible keep on going grey.

I’ve told this story before, but when I was in my early 20’s, that’s about 30something years ago, I was at one of those hippie Jesus festivals standing in a circle holding hands and singing, and looked at the woman next to me with her denim jacket, long greying hair pulled back in a clip, and her weather-wrinkled face and thought she was beautiful, and said “when I get older, I want to look like that”, I’m on my way!

Oh, you want to see a picture? I’ll get on that right away and have one for you within the week, the one I’ve been using is a couple years old, time for an update!

I just had a telephone call from my husband telling me that he finally saw a Mountain Lion crossing the road on the way to work. I say “finally” because we have been hearing rumors of sightings for a while, even right here in our neighborhood. This is how it started with bears when we first moved here about 24 years ago…we heard people mention seeing tracks now and then, but never did we see bears, they were just talk and rumor. Now we see them every summer, we are on our 3rd bird feeder of the season because the bears LOVE bird seed and I have to get used to bringing in my feeders every night. We don’t have a lot of trouble with our garbage cans, but, well, not to get gross, but if you have baby, and use disposable diapers, you’ll get a LOT more visits to your garbage cans.

The picture in this post is taken off the side of our deck of a younger bear enjoying some of our trash, we took this one about 5 years ago, they don’t seem to bother with our garbage as much, but on occasion they still visit the cans. Maybe looking for the bird feeders on the other side of the house is more interesting. Some get the new bear-proof cans, which are helpful for many (garbage collectors don’t like the screw-off lids but if you get a persistent bear, he/she will just carry it off and try to figure out how to open it, and you have to find the cans.

I love wildlife, and to me, seeing a big black bear lumber across the road, healthy fur shining in the sunlight, there’s nothing quite like it…if it’s a “she” and there are a couple of cubs in tow, all the better!

As for Mountain Lions, they are predators, I’m going to have to do my homework and keep a close eye on my little Yorkshire Terrier, Aspen.

If you love God’s creation and chose to live in an area where there are lots of woodlands and lakes, you have to learn to co-habitate with whatever creatures decide to move in.

Oh, by the way, no Tigers yet