Just before dusk, the country comes alive with a musical Morse code. First, you'll hear the chorus of cicadas and the deafening, antiphonal throngs of tree frogs and bull frogs singing through the night. If you listen carefully, you can hear the sound of the howling coyote and great horned owls calling to each other. The air is thick with every type of insect imaginable. As the sky fades from light blue to navy, the night is aglow with the twinkle of thousands of fireflies. Bright constellations poke through the darkening sky. It is the magic hour. Country nights are all about sunsets, fragrances and feasts. It is a whole new world. Snakes, lizards, coyotes, bobcats, rabbits, racoons, muskrats, opossums, skunks, deer, mice, moths, and frogs abound.
In the silvery morning light the striking silhouette of the surrounding hills emerges.The gentle cooing of mourning doves and the percussive tapping of woodpeckers builds. This cacophony of bird conversations builds as the opalescent moon disappears Soon, the gregarious cardinals and crows join in the chorus. Above the pastures, a hawk zeroes in on its prey with razor-sharp vision.
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The countryside is remarkably beautiful with rapidly moving clouds causing sriking variations in sunlight and multiple rainbows. The land, fields and hills are extraordinarily vivid in color. Summer in Tennessee is a time of wonder and abundance. I have never seen so many fruits and vegetables in my entire life. Tender June peas, snap beans, Irish and sweet potatoes, okra, collards, lettuce, sweet onions, turnips, squash, beets, cabbage, limas, speckled buttter beans, bell peppers, sweet corn, tomatoes, peaches, watermelon, cantelope, strawberries, and blueberries abound. Walking through country gardens and farmers markets in Tennessee is like walking through the Louve with an art connoisseur, except you can touch, smell and taste the still lifes.
To dwell close to nature is to comprehend the presence of a creator. The slow turning of seasons, the rhythmic cycles of planting, growth, harvest and decay, the extraordinary order of every detail is amazing. In order to see this one must commit to a slower contemplative pace. Maybe it is that we are wired for greater simplicity as we mature.
Tennessee country is beautiful and bountiful. God continually and with infinite variety reveals his laws of balance, rengeneration and continuance in the midst of change.
