To me, being up on that mountain was paradise. It was heavenly to be without the noises and smells of civilization. The richness of the oxygen in the air was impossible to miss. Being in the lush jungle made me feel healthier than ever! The scent of flowers was everywhere! Every basic necessity of life felt like a luxury. Breathing became a difference experience. The native fruit and coffee was unlike anything I could have imagined tasting! That pure of an environment combined with my intense sensitivity must have been what it was like for Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden.

(Click images for full view.)

Before having gone to Panama, I was told there exists a place where I would be accepted. Now decades later I know why it’s the most remote areas, non-conformed to modern society. Aspies think differently. So do those who are not civilized. Civilized societies are supposedly advanced and more polished. Advanced and polished are subjective terms. I’d rather say societies change.

After learning about Aspergers five years ago, it makes sense to me how I’d fit in a lot better among a highly foreign culture than one I’m native to. The inhabitants of the area where I stayed on Volcán Barú relished my company. Even though we spoke different languages, acceptance was clearly communicated. My favorite memory of the people there is the sound of their laughter. It was contagious and deeper than any I’ve ever heard before.

Normally when others are laughing and you’re not, it’s insulting. It’s a sign you’re being laughed at. But, it’s not always insulting when you’re being laughed at. An example of this was when I was learning to speak Spanish from a translation book I brought with me on this journey. A young school girl sat beside me as I read out loud what was in Spanish from my book. It was my first attempt at speaking Spanish. There were native adults within hearing distance observing what I was doing. Rarely were they not observing me.

As I was verbalizing Spanish for the first time in my life, laughter began to roar around me. I had no idea what was so funny. I got told it was because I was shocking everyone (including the guy who told me this). They didn’t expect me to sound exactly like someone indigenous to their culture. If I was not seen and only heard speaking their language, they’d never know I was a foreigner. I thought I had said something incorrectly which provoked laughter. It was the opposite. After I began laughing, they’d laugh even harder.

Being there provided a lot of opportunities for joking around. When down in Boquete, a phone was given to me to take back up the mountain. The guy said, “Give me a call when you get up there.” Lines for electricity or rapid means of communication didn’t exist where I stayed. Nor did roads past a certain point. It was primitive, as in dirt floor, grass covered huts. The only building not like that was the rustic cabin constructed after my arrival. I didn’t ask for special treatment. It’s what others wanted to do for me.

The women wanted to wash my clothes. People wanted to give in every way they could. They didn’t want me doing anything for them other than to stay there and not leave. They knew I loved horses, so one was brought there for me to have. Someone had even carried a toilet up the mountain to bring to the cabin I was staying in. That too was off-beat humor sending everyone (including myself) into stitches of laughter.

When I left though, it was with painful tears. It still saddens my heart to be gone from there. At least I have my memories of what once was. A special time is something that can never come back to the way it was once it’s gone.

Wikipedia’s info on Volcán Barú –

The Volcán Barú (also Volcán de Chiriqui) is the tallest mountain in Panama and is 3,474 metres (11,398 ft) high. It lies about 35 km off the border of Costa Rica.

Due to its height and Panama’s relatively short width, it is possible to see both the Pacific Ocean and Caribbean Sea from Volcán Barú’s peak on a clear day.

Volcán Barú is a dormant, but potentially active volcano just south of the Continental Divide in the western Chiriquí Province. It is surrounded by a fertile area of cool highlands drained by the Chiriquí and Caldera rivers. The towns of Volcan and Cerro Punta can be found on its western side, while Boquete is on the eastern flank.

The occasional fall of hail or ice pellets has been reported on the summit, where the minimal temperature can be below 0°C (32°F) and the formation of frost is frequent during the dry season.

The last major eruption of the volcano was about 500 AD. There are reports and some evidence of a minor eruption around 1550 AD. However, in 2006, an earthquake swarm occurred underneath the mountain, raising fears that it could erupt sometime in the future with explosive force.

Wikipedia’s info on Boquete —

Boquete is a small town on the Caldera River, tucked into the green mountain highlands of Panama, in western-most Chiriquí Province, about 60 km. from the border with Costa Rica. Because of its altitude, some 1,200 metres above sea level, its climate is cooler than that of the lowlands. Its scenic location, temperature, and natural environment make it extremely popular with Panamanians, and attracts tourists from all over the world.

Some of its landmarks include nearby Volcán Barú, a dormant volcano and, at 3,475 meters, the tallest point of land in Panama. Hikers enjoy a relatively easy hike up and over the volcano, along the Sendero de los Quetzales, which runs from Boquete up to Cerro Punta and Volcan, on the other side of the volcano. Boquete is well known for its coffee, judged to be among the finest in the world. The Caldera River runs through the town, a river that has shaped much of its form.

A week ago I washed my windows. This afternoon, before it got dark, I went out to dump a bucket of compost. When looking up towards my house, my windows grabbed my attention. I haven’t had time to notice, after they were cleaned, how their appearance changed from the outside looking in.

Is it just my imagination or do my swirly windows have an oddly artistic look to them?

Is this how everyone’s windows look after they’ve been cleaned and I simply missed out on the patterns they create? Does this make you wonder what your windows can do?

By the way, the only two edits I did to these photos were cropping and resizing. The wide photo is of my house’s west side with the camera aimed east at 4:40 p.m.

At 4:44 p.m., I took a shot facing north from the south side of my house and captured a western window coming through. That one lacks swirls, so obviously designs reveal themselves from the angle at which windows are observed.

This house is one story and has 20 windows on the main floor, when including the 3 skylight windows. I haven’t counted how many the basement has. You’d think with so many windows on a house, it would be bright inside. The only truly bright rooms are the ones with the skylights… the kitchen and bathroom.

I began my drive around 12:40 p.m., Monday, October 10, 2011. I got home at approximately 6:50 that evening. That 6 hrs. and 10 mins. of driving was part 2 of my vacation for this year. Part 1 was when I Wandered West on a day trip to the Cannonsville Reservoir. It’s doubtful there will be a part 3 to vacationing in 2011 thanks to the lousy economy.

Monday’s excursion took me past the Ashokan Reservoir and through Boiceville. One mile and 720 feet past the Onteora Mountain House (96 Piney Point Road) is where I turned around to head back home. That day, I didn’t know this Bed & Breakfast resort is the summer home of Richard Hellmann, the mayonnaise mogul. It’s located on a promontory overlooking the Esopus Valley; surrounded by 250 acres of forest preserve.

During my years growing up, I spent time exploring the Boiceville area with my cousin while she lived on the north-east corner of Center Lane and Piney Point Road. We’d trek through the woods (along the train tracks) to the Ashokan Reservoir (starting at 3 a.m.), swim day and night (and ride the rapids) in the Esopus Creek, go Trick or Treating on Halloween around her neighborhood, ice skate (at night) on a nearby pond, and ride bicycles to Woodstock. I’d like to return there again to reminisce our mid-60′s bike route on Piney Point Road, Cold Brook Road, Wittenberg Road (Rt. 45), and Rt. 212 (Tinker Street) into Woodstock.

Upon returning to the reservoir, I relished my first slice of mushroom pizza I got from Winchell’s Corner Restaurant. I made sure my little Rascal got bits of that delicious crust. It was a simple day; just me and my dog. If I had not gone, I would have had to endure listening to my dog bark every time someone walked past my house. It would have been often, considering that Monday was a Columbus Day holiday.

She is half Chihuahua and half miniature Poodle. This hybrid dog may be referred to as a Wapoo, Chipoo, Poochi, or a Choodle. My 10 pound Rascal Chi-Poo was born on March 13th, 2007. She’s around 4 ½ years old in this photo. Rascal was bred in Sloansville, NY. She joyfully became mine on May 9th, 2007.

Rascal rings her bell when she needs to go outdoors to relieve herself. She likes to play with her food. She throws each kibble up into the air a few times before she eats it. When it lands somewhere she can’t get to it, she asks for my help in getting it out… not by barking, but by speaking in a certain tone I’ve come to know well.

Rascal invents her own games. Instead of her fetching a toy to bring to me, she has trained me to go fetch the toy from her. Sometimes she adds a challenge by hiding, with her toy, to make me look for her. She’s smart, but very much a rascal too.

Her favorite place to sleep is under the covers with me. I can’t think of a better way to begin each day than to be hugged by a lovably warm perpetual pup cutie pie!

Mamie Mouru - Oct. 1973

Back then, 100+ million less people lived in the U.S. The U.S. seat belt law was more than 11 years into the future. The ban to burn leaves anywhere in New York State was 38 years ahead.

My favorite natural fragrance is the aroma of dried maple leaves. Second to that, is the smokey scent of burning maple leaves.

science.howstuffworks.com says,

A smell can bring on a flood of memories, influence people’s moods and even affect their work performance. Because the olfactory bulb is part of the brain’s limbic system, an area so closely associated with memory and feeling it’s sometimes called the “emotional brain,” smell can call up memories and powerful responses almost instantaneously.

The olfactory bulb has intimate access to the amygdala, which processes emotion, and the hippocampus, which is responsible for associative learning. Despite the tight wiring, however, smells would not trigger memories if it weren’t for conditioned responses. When you first smell a new scent, you link it to an event, a person, a thing or even a moment. Your brain forges a link between the smell and a memory. When you encounter the smell again, the link is already there, ready to elicit a memory or a mood.

Because we encounter most new odors in our youth, smells often call up childhood memories. But we actually begin making associations between smell and emotion before we’re even born.

Backyard Quarry - Oct. 1973

Being that I was born in October, it could very well be that I have a conditioned response to the smell of fall leaves and their being burned. I know my Mom would have raked leaves and burned them right up until the day I was born. Maybe she was happy knowing that her time of carrying me around in her womb was soon coming to an end? I’ll never know since she’s been deceased since March of 1993.

These photos here are scanned from prints off the first roll of film I shot in my first real camera; a Minolta SR-T 101. The picture of my mother was taken of her when she was the age I now am.

Predator Truck

1987 Arnold Schwarzeneggar Predator → the truck!

Puz of Oz

Puz isn’t interested in the Wizard of Oz, but rather the Wizard of Zzzz.

Birthday Girls

Aspie Mom at age 6 in 1960 with her neurotypical daughter at 6 age in 1988.

Teddy Buddy

I was told that my buddy bear up there looks demon possessed.

Dressed in Dots

I’m thinking I don’t have much to think about yet.

What did get on my nerves was the sound of tractor trailer trucks off in the distance on the highway along the reservoir’s north shoreline. It was as if the trucks timed themselves to come one at a time so that there wouldn’t be more than a few minutes of occasional quiet. If the highway wasn’t there and the water level was high enough to hide the rocks all along the shore surrounding the entire reservoir, then maybe I could actually enjoy padding around.

(Click on images for expanded view.)

Of course my little Chi-Poo Rascal came along for the ride. She stayed tucked inside the bow of the boat. Going against the wind was a little splashy when hitting the waves, but she stayed nice and dry.

If New York State allows other Hudson Valley Reservoirs to begin permitting steam-cleaned kayaks (it’s being considered for next year), I may consider paddling the Alcove Reservoir.

It’s basic, and most influential, ingredient is the hot Italian sausage made from venison and pork. The venison and pork used in the recipe for the sausage included in this casserole happens to be what my husband acquired (not from a store) and ground up.

(Click on the foods for enlarged views.)

The sausage’s ingredients:

25 lbs ground venison
15 lbs ground pork
7 tablespoons rubbed sage
7 tablespoons garlic powder
7 tablespoons coarse salt
5 tablespoons black pepper
4 tablespoons crushed red chili peppers
2 tablespoons allspice
2 tablespoons cayenne pepper
2 tablespoons dried crushed habenaro pepper

Directions for the sausage:

Course grind the venison and pork together.
Re-grind the meats with the spices included.
Wrap in plastic & paper for freezer.

The casserole’s ingredients:

2 lbs of hot Italian sausage
cooked corn cut off one cob
16 oz of creamed corn
3 large raw tomatoes, diced
1/2 cup of lightly sautéed onions, diced
4 cups of steamed broccoli, diced
1/4 cup of fresh dried basil leaves, crushed
25.5 oz of pasta sauce (I use Muir Glen’s organic garlic roasted garlic)
1 lb mozzarella cheese, shredded
12 oz whole wheat whole grain elbow macaroni (I use Hodgson Mill’s)

Directions for the casserole:

Preheat oven to 350º F
Fry the sausage; the remove it from pan.
In that same pan, lightly sauté onions.
Steam the broccoli, then chop it up.
Boil the macaroni for 7 minutes, then drain.
Mix all the ingredients together in a large bowl.
Fill the mixture into a 4 quart baking dish (15x10x2).
Bake uncovered for 45 minutes, then let cool for 5-10 minutes.

While it’s cooling, fix yourself a drink.
Wouldn’t a refreshing tequila sunrise look pretty next to a plate of a spicy sausage casserole? →
If you’re interested, Agavales Gold is an inexpensive, but yet tasty premium tequila.

Oh, yes . . .
I almost forgot about dessert!
What else but a homemade peach pie made from peaches off peach trees that grew in the garden by accident?
Someone must have thrown peach pits into the garden one year — causing two peach trees to grow along the inside of the garden fence.
How sweet the taste when you don’t waste!

I’m now thinking about Thanksgiving . . .
Who shall I invite for dinner?
Those who eat daily in my yard maybe?
Here’s a few from that rafter I think will be delicious to go after.

“Hey! You don’t mean us, do ya?”

Towards the end of summer, almost two years after that theft, I purchased a Minolta X-700 to use for my college photography classes. Peter Correia was not only my instructor, but he was also my daughter’s instructor too when she took the same classes. I gave her my camera to use.

We both had numerous photos we shot, developed, and printed that were put on display in the college’s art gallery. I recently scanned one from my old collection to put into this post. It’s a photo I took of my daughter, a couple of months before she turned three years old, for class back in the fall of 1985. I forgot about it until she retrieved it back for me, after seeing it still hanging on Mr. Correia’s office wall, when she was his student. The print wasn’t protected, so it got damaged somewhat.

As you can see, the photo on the right is much less faded. It’s a scanned print of a photo my daughter also took for Mr. Correia’s class. It wasn’t until the beginning of March in 2006 when I bought the third camera in my life. It’s also my first digital camera, which I still have and use. Panasonic is its manufacturer. The model is a Lumix DMC-FZ30.

It’s a bridge digital camera and has a 12x optical zoom Leica lens and OIS (optical image stabilization, that I probably forget to employ most of the time). I’ve never used any other digital camera before, so I can’t say how I’d rate it against others.¹ This rugged camera is all I need to be content for taking photos. For over four years, it’s been dependable and does its job to my satisfaction.

All of my photos taken before March 2006 are prints from film. The others after those are digital images that rarely get printed. I like things simple and basic, so even though I tinkered around years ago with Adobe Photoshop Elements 2 for Windows to see what it’s like, about the only thing I might do with a photo anymore is either resize or crop one once in a while. I have no interest in starting to make any videos either.

[Edit added the next day] — Probably the main reason for my diminished interest in photography is because of the internet. When you’re financially unable to explore the world offline, it only leaves the option of doing it second-hand through the experiences of others who share theirs online. Take this morning for example; I was mesmerizingly lost in time from being stunned by the magnificent beauty coming through the images found on page after page of the blog Summit Stones & Adventure Musings.

¹I know cell phones can now do many things, besides taking photos and videos. However, I don’t have one; never have and probably never will. The desire simply doesn’t exist for me.

While I was on vacation (except for the stressful parts; e.g., motorcycle madness and thunderstorms while far out on a large body of water), I felt enjoyably alive for the first time since childhood! The area I live in, and have spent most of my life growing up in, is nothing like it used to be. Generally and straightforwardly speaking, those who have grown up and live in areas further north than a latitude of 42.66 (longitude 73-74 W) in New York State, are friendlier and nicer people (especially the women). I’ve found that to be true even in the northwest region of Maine. I’m not the only person who thinks so either. My husband’s friend, who has traveled often to these areas, also has this same experience.²

As soon as I’m back in my community, I recognize a lack of a welcoming spirit. When it is seen, it looks phony. In the north, people sit on their porches and wave to everyone passing by. They will freely open up and talk about themselves, along with showing genuine interest in the lives of newcomers. So, naturally, uptight people are a depressing thing to come back to.

Besides leaving behind the more pleasant attitude of those in the north, the clean air, quieter surroundings, and laid-back relaxed pace — all of which had me sleeping properly unlike I can remember having done once upon a time many decades ago — are also left behind. What I did bring back with me was a sunburn, poison ivy, and an infected ankle (from a cut done by hitting a rock underwater). While I was up north, those things didn’t bother me… probably because the daytime temperatures ranged between 60-72 degrees Fahrenheit and it wasn’t humid there. Being hit with the horrid heat and humidity (common for being further south and at a lower elevation level) exasperates whatever is already going to irritate the nervous system.

I knew about the outdoor skin cleanser Tecnu, but was too late in getting a bottle while up north for it to do much good against urushiol. A poison ivy wash that’s way better (and much more expensive!) than Tecnu is Zanfel, but I didn’t even know about it until a week later, which was the first time I ever used it (and it does work!). I think the itch and pain from the poison ivy and sunburn kept me from realizing my ankle was in pain from being infected and was swelling. I began taking doses of Colloidal Silver and also applied it to the cut. The swelling left by the end of the next day and the cut proceeded to heal. Besides those products I’ve just mentioned, a camping first-aid kit should also include: band-aids (maybe some butterflies too), a small bottle of hydrogen peroxide, antiseptic cream, sunblock, a tick removal spoon, tweezers, insect repellent (preferably Deet-free, like White Mountain‘s), and bee sting cure (Baker’s Venom Cleanser – a neutralizer for bee stings). You can do minor surgical procedures without a doctor!

Adding to the unpleasantries of being back, what I described enduring on the 4th of July, every bit of good that vacationing did for my health rapidly became undone! All I have left is my photographs to confirm to myself that I did at one time, not too long ago, feel alive and looked forward to another day. Now I’m back to working seven days a week at trying to keep from becoming exhausted from things like insomnia, sensory overload, and social isolation. The most depressing aspect of all this comes from learning how the horrible economy, along with an excess in human population (especially dangerous foreigners³) increasing and disrespecting nature with trash, is already showing signs of destroying what little beauty is left in the wilderness areas I (including my children and grandchildren) might have another chance to someday visit again.

¹I went on 3 trips in other years past, but they were not vacations. During those trips, I was working just like I do when I’m home. Work is to exert oneself by doing activity directed toward a purpose or out of necessity.

²Someone I once knew, who traveled around to different parts of the world throughout most of his life, told me that no matter what country it was, those who lived in rural areas were much nicer people than those living in urban ones. That was my experience also when I was in Central America in 1980. The “primitive” natives living on Volcán Barú in Panama were the civilized ones. Those who lived in the cities were nasty in comparison.

³My native “rural” community I continue to live in has it’s own fair share of malicious creeps too that have victims either speaking up years later or never reporting what they’ve gone through. I näively spoke up once about a horrible life-threatening incident I endured when I was young, to the detriment of my own life, and learned to never do that again.