Some days I am so deliriously happy in Scotland.  The people, the landscape, the lifestyle...all things that I value deeply and love dearly.  Other days, I find myself only half present here while the rest of me longs for the open landscape and people of the place I grew up.

I made a list of the simple Iowan pleasures that I miss:

1. Red Winged Blackbirds.  They would line up on the telephone wires in their hundreds.  I remember thinking every time that it could be a photo out of a nature magazine.

2. The open, singing, green expanse of Iowa in spring.  After the brown of late autumn, the barren white of long winter and the mucky ochre after the melt...it seems like the whole place just bursts forth in a musical number. 

3. Tiger Lilies in the ditches in summer.  To this day, I find their orange audacity shocking.  How can something so opulent grow in a ditch? 

3. Milkweed in autumn...well all year, really.  My brother and I used to pry open their pods in summer to get at the feathery masses, but we were usually left covered in sticky sap (which tasted awful when it coated my thumb-sucking thumb)

4. Iced Tea...wherever you go.

5. Cinnamon flavoured everything: Scones, Rolls, Chewing Gum

6. That first hug with my mother when I arrive...both of us in tears.  Actually, that pleasures not such a simple one.  Its complex and rich, delectable and bitter-sweet, but mostly heavy.  Heavy with sadness and regret for choosing a life so far away.  

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I know I usually do simple pleasures on a Wednesday, but yesterday was full of unhappy and unwell boy-needs, so crafting and blogging had to rightly take a back seat.  Hopefully today will see a bit more health and wellness, as its simply unfair for small people to be sick on nice days. Though it seems fever and cold phlegm have been added to the pox.