Spending time outdoors is the real idea when you live in Maine, right? Well, that's where I really excel — my idea of a good time is being in the yard, fields, and woods around my home here in Windsor!

What's so exciting about that? Well, it isn't necessarily always exciting but it sure can be relaxing, and healthy too.

The sunshine vitamin, Vitamin D is really supposed to have healthful effects. Now, I certainly wasn't an expert about that when I was younger, but I did get my share. Seems as though I was outdoors in the summertime from about 7 in the morning till well after dark at night! Of course, I was inside for breakfast, lunch, and dinner — (couldn't miss a meal). In fact, when a bunch of us would get together we used to take a "lunch tour" and hit everybody's house and all have about five lunches, one at each house!

Modern times now, I know better than to eat five lunches! I just don't burn 'em off the way I used to. But still, as much time as I can squeeze into my life to be outdoors is usually what I get. Take a break from work? Outdoors. Any excuse will do and I'll sometimes just make no excuse and say, "I'm going out!"

That doesn't mean I'm off to anywhere but the places I love right here, at home. I could be just down the hill under a tree, or I might be out back — way out back in the woods.

"So," you ask, "What do you do out there?"

Well, I walk, or do some yard or field work. And, most often, I find a place to stand, sit, or lean and I relax and wait. Soon, the birds loose their fear and fly very close. And sometimes, I'm really rewarded with a close encounter of some wild kind.

Yesterday, while the power was out, I walked into the woods. I sat, listened to the birds, and waited. After a while, I heard a slight cough and the soft thump of hooves on the stone wall close by. It was, most likely, a buck! And soon, I could smell him. And that, to me, is exciting!

My times outdoors morph into my writing and have done so for years. I journal a bit about the weather, and I've found a web site where, for the last 6 years or so I've contributed observations occasionally. Today, there are more than ten years of entries on the site from all over Maine. Winter, spring, summer and autumn, many different people contribute sightings and some pictures and it makes a great tool for identification of various natural things plus good reading.

You can visit
http://www.mainenature.org
and you can be sure it's a safe site, held on the University of Maine servers and carefully tended by Frank Wibbey who works at the Folger Library at U. Maine in Orono. Its worth checking out, even if you live in the town or city you can contribute your sightings — or just read along!

I send in some things when I've got time, so folks can enjoy what I find on The Other Side of The Door!