Sick Day and mental escape

Last night, my husband noticed my moodiness.

He decided we had to go out to dinner.

I got a greek salad, but I didn't realize it was the style with no greens - just cuke, peppers, onions tomatoes, feta and olives.

Oh, I got them to bring me some lettuce, but it was still too much onion for me. (and I didn't even use the salad dressing).

My body is having its revenge from the stress, anger and irritation of the last two weekends, no doubt.

I need a day to unwind, to do all those lady rituals like touch up my hair color, give myself a facial, and exfolliate my feet, and such stuff, put on my favorite celtic or classical music and relax. I need my son not to let the dog escape again.

We were supposed to do fun things yesterday, and it didn't happen. Yesterday was the pits. Today I am too sick to do anything. Tomorrow I'm expected to feel like chauffering son to his therapist.

There's a place not more than 50 miles from here that has a lovely stream that looks like this...not very deep, except for holes where the trout tend to hang out, but the water is very cold, like many mountain streams.

We ford a place that looks like this, usually in hip waders because it is cold. Beyond the stream is a trailhead that parallels two intermittent streams up to the top of the mountain, which is more a plateau on top, with ridges that peek out above the plateau. There's a spring up there. It's about three miles in from the road and a thousand feet up. As the autumn grows deeper, the spring sometimes is visted by huge flocks of robins, coming in for a drink. I was amazed how many robins hang out there. Once at the spring, I saw a mule deer doe with two younger does, no doubt her daughters following behind as they came to get a drink. It's rare for the deer to get seen in the early fall. They don't normally come down until the snows start. There are a lot of elk in the area too, but I haven't seen more than their signs so far.

There's a place on the trail up filled with aspen, and when the leaves start to fall, it looks magical for a week or two.

We also see blue and ruffed forest grouse up there, which is often our excuse to go up the trail.

I am looking forward to hiking it again. Right now, before the hunting season starts, it's filled with cattle and sheep, because it's got some good pasture in the mountains. But in a couple of weeks, they will be herding the animals off, and it will be left to people like me, to escape from the everyday in a long hard walk up the mountain.

But I like it. There's a point when you're walking up, that you realize that you can see more of the next mountain across the valley than you realized was there, if you were only on the valley floor. It's a breathtaking view, but you have to work for it.

Something to look forward to.