I will be eternally grateful for your great gift of taking in to the fullest extent what it is that I
have to offer, living it, and then reflecting it back in terms of the potential experience of others.
You have given words to a process that defies words. And you’re constantly in a position to help
me continue to hone that, deeper and deeper and more and more resonantly, who I am and what I offer,
which is truly invaluable. — Jon Hansen, 
Working together was absolutely key, and I think that’s what made it such a great
experience. I felt like you were my partner in this. I felt like my success was your
success. To me, someone who has that attitude and the skills to go with it —
that’s an unbeatable combination! — Daniel Stone, 
I have a website I’m proud of — but for me, the hugest benefit has been
increased self-confidence. Because of the process we went through, and the validity that
came with the process, I trust what I think and I trust myself to speak about it. I have
greater confidence and clarity in my message about who I am and what I do. — Bev
Dwane AICI CIP, 
What you’ve sent me is so darn perfect it hurts! It’s a sheer pleasure to work with someone
who writes as beautifully as you do — and in “my” voice. — Ariane Goodwin, Ed.D,
You have a real gift for words. You’re really, really good at it. — Sherry Essig,
Wildlife
One of the many things I find delightful about living in Southern California, as opposed to the New York/New Jersey area from which I migrated eleven years ago, is the wildlife.
Jewels-on-wings called hummingbirds, year-round visitors to the feeders outside my windows. Black-and-white, jauntily crested black-capped phoebes, arial acrobats in search of their buggy breakfast. Tufted titmice, happy flocks of tiny taupe birds that chatter and insect-munch their way counter-clockwise through my yard.
Gracefully sinuous foot-long tree-climbing lizards in the acacia outside my office window. Bright yellow Lone Ranger-masked warblers poking curiously at the undersides of leaves. Orioles grappling with the slippery glass of the hummingbird feeder, trying to get their share of the nectar. Red-winged blackbirds, always in groups, voracious and skittery at the birdseed feeder. Brilliant yellow goldfinches, hanging upside-down and squeezing the oil out of thistle seeds.
In the desert, I’ve seen kangaroo rats, tiny little big-eared, fluffy-tailed creatures with oversized hindquarters. Scorpions, which, thank you, I’ll view from a distance, but fascinating nonetheless. Kit fox, smaller than your average cat, with ENORMOUS ears, lurking just out of firelight-range, ever the canid opportunists, snapping up scraps of campfire-grilled steak. Coyote, heard not seen in the desert, wildly yipping songs, and seen not heard at home, dawn-walking as bold as you please down the sidewalks of my development.
Road runners, alert long-legged birds quick to pounce on a lizardy lunch. Hawks, red-tailed and red-shouldered, crying wild seagull-like cries overhead and perched on the lamp-posts waiting for a meal to wander by underneath. Cooper’s hawks, a young one blundering clumsily through my yard, frustrated with the too-flexible acacia-tree branches, thinking the patio shade structure looked nice and solid – till it saw me sitting there. (I swear I heard it think – “Oh, shit” – before it turned, aerobatically graceful, and flew away.)
Kite, strange birds of prey, brilliant white, hovering in one place waiting for something to move and become dinner. Inland and up in the high desert, stellar’s jays, big birds, vivid blue, brightly crested, and with the proper jaylike attitude. Gray fox crossing the road late at night, glimpsed in my headlights.
Toads and their hundreds of toadpoles – um, tadpoles – in my lily-pond from late December well into summer – tiny little fellows with seriously outsized voices, serenading their lady-loves all night long. Huge crab spiders, autumn web-spinners, nocturnal and beautiful.
Dolphins at dawn, especially on New Year’s morning. Pelicans flying in stately formation, riding the air currents just above the crest of a wave. Plovers and sandpipers, diggers in the sand; the longer-legged plovers wade, the sandpipers run hysterically up and down the beach. Gulls of all sizes and colours, brassy and bold as gulls will ever be.
Yard-long snakes (no exaggeration) basking in spring sunlight on the sandy trails along the San Luis Rey River drainage embankments. Lizards of all sizes and colours squirting through tiny cracks in the rock. Gophers and ground-squirrels – please, not in my yard! – but fun to watch elsewhere. Bats pouring out of the trees above the river drainage paths. Crows flying east in the early morning, enough to blacken the sky overhead, and returning westwards to bed in the evening, raucous and bold in either direction.
Two weeks ago, a bobcat, nonchalant, abbreviated tail-tip twitching, seen at midday on an easy mountain trail with a visiting New York friend. Not so shabby. (Said New Yorker was lamenting the lack of cell phone reception at the top of Palomar Mountain. He subsequently got beaned on the head by an acorn from a California live-oak tree. I think the mountain was trying to make a point.)
This afternoon, a discovery. Mice had been visiting, chewing their way through the bags holding my soap-making supplies. And then, going through the kitchen, I looked sideways – and there was a four-inch greenish-gray and gold lizard sitting in the middle of the room. I’ve seen thousands of them outside; this was the first in eleven years that had actually entered the house. Getting him out again was interesting, and a pleasant diversion from cleaning up mouse-mess.
Posted under Living in San Diego.