Create More Light: Tuesday Adventures

It occurred to me several times over the course of this past year that I probably took more day trips with my camera last year, even though 40-50 hours of my weeks were occupied by my day job. What the heck. At that time, the little trips were kind of like an escape from reality, which is maybe why I did it so much more often back then. Since reality nowadays is pretty cool and there is no need to escape from it.

I have wanted to go to the Holden Arboratum (it's almost a three hour drive from Columbus) for over a year now. Ever since I visited Dawes Arboratum last summer (you can read about it HERE), I have wanted to explore every place similar to it within a reasonable driving distance. I've been meaning to make it a once a week (at least!) ritual for oh, eleven months now? Better late than never right?

So yesterday, Tuesday Adventures was born. Why Tuesday? Because back when I was working, we would joke about how Tuesdays were the worst day of the week. At least Mondays are supposed to be awful, because it's Monday. But what about Tuesday? It was awful in a different kind of way. Not anymore. Now that is Adventure Day. It's important to take time out of your week for yourself. Go outside. Talk a walk. Feel the breeze in your hair. There are always going to be things on your mind that you "should" be doing (especially if you are trying to support your own business), but sometimes you need to turn your mind off, even if it's only for an hour or so, and relax. Do something fun. Go on an adventure.

Holden was no disappointment. I scream sang Tori Amos (found my old From the Chiorgirl Hotel CD in my car) for the last hour of the drive because I was so excited. It was completely cloudy and overcast at first, and thank the lord I brought a sweatshirt because it was actually chilly and felt more like fall than summer.

Within a couple of hours, when I was wandering around deep in the woods, the sun started to come out. Even as an adult, the woods are still magical to me. When I was young, we had woods in our back yard. We weren't allowed to play in them due to several reasons (a creek we weren't allowed to go in, poison sumac, other scary things that can be found in the woods). Plus to get into them you had to go down this huge hill that was covered in plants and trees and skunk cabbage so they weren't even really accessible... unless you entered from the neighbor's yard. I have two younger brothers and sometimes the three of us would "go on a tour," which meant we would wait until our mom was not looking out of the kitchen window (sorry mom if you are reading this) and run into the woods via our neighbor's yard. The thrill of being someplace we weren't allowed to be plus the natural magic of the woods? It was one of my favorite things to do and was honestly like our own private kingdom. Kind of makes me sad to think that a lot of kids nowadays would rather visit magical lands in video games instead of doing what we did back in the 80's, when kids were just kids. There was no Netflix, no iPads, no XBox. Just bikes, roller skates, sidewalk chalk, the woods.

Here are some of the things that I saw on my first Tuesday Adventure:

There were so many different kinds of flowers. The air smelled unreal. I'm smiling just thinking about it.

I hiked a trail down into a little valley and found this stream at the bottom. I sat on a rock right in the middle of it for a while, just listening and being present.