Follow Your Heart!

  Mother Nature does indeed have a big heart!  Or, maybe she has a lot of hearts.  While out and about the hillside, I started finding hearts...everywhere.  Isn't it funny how when you notice one small thing, others seem to just jump out at you?  This all started with an idea.  Perhaps, I could start a game with the Grandlittles where they search for different things in nature.  Back when they had visited the Bayou, we did scavenger hunts where I would draw a simple sketch list and they would find the items.  Things such as pine cones, leaves, shells, etc. were on that list.  Well, since they are now thousands of miles away from the Bayou, those little lists might be difficult to do but what if...what if, I sent them on searches for shapes?  They could scour the island for shapes in nature!  I decided that I better try it out first so I went on the search for the first thing that popped into my head...a heart.  I found hearts...everywhere!  While these may not be the most perfect shaped hearts, if the imagination is used, at least, the resemblance is there.

  First, I found a leaf.  A single mistletoe leaf had been blown down from the tall oak tree.  It was a heart...sort of...maybe?  Then another leaf!  This was the leaf of the smilax vine. While it is not my favorite vine, it did have a great heart!  Perhaps leaves were the only heart-shaped thing I could hope to find?  I went a bit further and found two oyster shell pieces beside each other.  The haphazard position gave the impression that this, too, could be considered a heart shape.  My walk continued until I found one more heart.  Although, this heart was, in a sense, leaf related, it was not a single leaf.  The leaves of some lilies were twisted by the wind into a heart shape position. 

  I just a matter of five minutes, I had found four hearts!  There were more but chores did not allow me to search longer.  Things such as twigs being bent by the recent ice, scars on tree trunks, the small lichens that grow on bark, the whorls caused by the wisping of cane leaves in the sand all have the possibility of being heart shaped.  I shall search!  Or...maybe a new shape for each hike?  Then, maybe I shall suggest this to the Grandlittles or one of the tiny visitors to the Bayou.  Sounds like fun to me.  Yeah, I sure miss those Grandlittles.....