canoes and eagles

Today is the first full day of Autumn. How I hate to see Summer go!
Don't you love the outdoors? I don't consider myself to be an "outdoorsy person" but I do love this time of year. Well, actually I enjoy - in fact, favour - any season during which I will not freeze. The sunshine and flowers and singing birds rejuvenate me. I am always amazed at the beauty God created.

Do you canoe? On the weekend my husband and I made the long trip to Amherst - a three hour drive for us - which gave us many pleasant hours together - a rare event since he works in the city and I at home. Usually we only have parts of evenings and weekends together. It was a wonderful day. Our purpose was to purchase a canoe at Cumberland Canoes and Kayaks, which we did - a bright orange one. It was a longer drive home with that strapped on the top of our car, but we certainly could not get lost in the crowd. :) This canoe is very similarly made to the yellow one we lost in the cottage fire (caused by a neighbour's carelessness) two and a half years ago. Now we need to find time on a good weather day to enjoy a "test drive."

On another note -- have you ever watched the eagle as it floats on air currents? It is an amazing bird. I enjoy watching one or more nearly every day from my house or yard. There are many bald eagles around here, and one particularly large one that glides majestically on high.

One day a few weeks ago I was on one of my walks when I was dismayed to find an eagle corpse in the ditch. When I told my husband, he said that when he was driving out that way several days before he had seen one trying to lift off the road with a dead raccoon in its talons. When an eagle gets a grip like that it has a hard time letting go, so we don't know if another vehicle carelessly hit it, or if the eagle accidentally rose up under the power lines and got electrocuted. Either way, it was a sad find.

I got thinking about how people would probably like to have eagle feathers for crafting or something, but then there was something about it that didn't feel right. It seemed I had heard some legal aspect to that, so I did some research. It is illegal (with huge fines levied) to own any part of that honoured bird since it is very special to the First Nations people, so I contacted the Department of Natural Resources about it. I was told that there is a long waiting list of Mi'kmaq wanting even just a feather, and even that item has to be approved by their Band leader. Well, that got me excited! If I could bless some of these people through my find that would be fabulous, so later that day I went out and carefully gathered the remains. Not long after I placed another phone call a man from the department came out and collected the eagle from me. It would be handled appropriately and given to the right persons. That makes my heart feel glad. :)

Of course, this means you will not find eagle feathers on my website, but you will find authentic wild turkey feathers once I get them posted on there.

Thanks for reading, and Blessings on your day!