Chincoteague Calling

I wish I could convey the yearning I feel each time I think of the Eastern Shore of Virginia.  The Teaguers used to say that a person "had Chincoteague sand in their shoes" if they kept returning to the island and ended up moving there.  I wasn't born on the island, but my Mother was, and her family ancestors have lived there since the mid-1600s.  Chincoteague was always my place to escape - and still is.  I'm sitting at my desk, gazing westward out my window and seeing the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains, the foothills and Flatirons of Boulder.  I see beauty in them, and their rugged graciousness, but I don't feel the compelling (almost tidal) pull that I feel when thinking about, or looking at photos of, Chincoteague and Assateague Islands.  Island friends and family say that I have Chincoteague sand in my heart and soul.  I guess I do.
  Boulder, Colorado is a wonderful place.  I love my clients as an extended family, and I love all the critters I care for as if they were/are mine.  While in Boulder, and it's surrounds, I have come into contact with wildlife that I haven't experienced "up close and personal" before - but that also happened when my husband and I lived in Crows, Virginia.  I had my first experiences with groundhogs there.  Each place I have lived has allowed me insights to the natural world - walking into the back yard and finding a mountain lion crouched over a freshly killed deer,  watching groundhogs raid the vegetable garden, seeing bobcats and bears mark the trees in their territories.  I learn from each of these experiences.  I look up information on whatever weird questions pop into my mind regarding an animals' behavior.
   Mom and Dad told me to never stop questioning.  I don't think I have.  One of my biggest questions is, why do I have this compulsion to return to Chincoteague and Assateague?  Yes, my maternal family has lived there for over 350 years.  They were watermen and farmers.  Do I get all this yearning for the islands as an ancestral need or memory?  I love to hear the skree sound of a hunting hawk or eagle, but my heart bubbles with joy when I hear the cacophony of a flock of sea gulls squabbling over fish offal, or emptied clam and oyster shells.  All I know is that I want to smell the odors of the sea, of the salt marsh and hear the cries of sea-faring birds and hear the surf on the shore.  I can be happy in a forest, I can be happy in the mountains, I can be happy in a museum or reading history, I can be happy exploring another country and their culture - but I am only truly joyful on two islands off the coast of Virginia, in the Atlantic Ocean.  There is my home.

Sixty-Nine Cats Left for Free Adoption

Happy Mother's Day!  My kits let me sleep in until after 8 this morning - Lovey did bathe both of my hands and washed my face twice, while she waited - but it was wonderful to be able to just sleep until I felt like getting up.  It's still a grey and cloudy day out, and we're expecting thunderstorms this afternoon, according to the weather folks. It's not quite 50 degrees outside, and the kits are having a blast running in and out.  On my way home from Kathy's yesterday, I came across someone getting ready to cut down and put a huge box into the recycling bin.  I managed to get it home - for Nedi and Lovey to play in.  Lovey just likes to jump in and out of boxes, use them hidey-holes, and use them for hidden attacks.  Nedi likes to chew the boxes down to his preferred size - what ever that may be - he starts chewing (he doesn't eat the cardboard, he just rips it with his teeth, and spits the torn pieces out) at the box flaps and will sometimes gnaw away until there is only a partial panel left.  This box is 3 1/2 by 2 1/2 by 6 feet....  it should take him quite some time to rip it apart...
  There are 69 cats and kittens left for adoption at the Boulder Valley Humane Society, as of 9:30 this morning.  Again, cats 6 months or older are free to a nice home, while kittens are adoptable at half of their usual cost.  This includes a vet check, all vaccinations, spay or neuter and a microchip for identification purposes.  This "special" ends today at the regular closing time.  Please help these needy kits (if you can)!
   And, if you are at all interested in your heritage, family tree, whatever you wish to call it - I highly recommend watching Finding Your Roots, a PBS show hosted by Henry Lewis Gates, Jr. - it shows here in Colorado at 7 p.m. (MDT).  Tonight, the show will look into the backgrounds of three second-generation immigrants: Sanjay Gupta, Margaret Cho, and Martha Stewart.  These shows are always interesting - and Dr. Gates is an excellent host!

Out of the Blue...

After I blogged yesterday, I looked over my e-mail and hestitated about whether to open one letter or consign it to the trash file. It had a woman's name as the sender, and started out, "Hello. You may be wondering why you're receiving an e-mail from Maryland..." Luckily my curiosity got the better of me, and I read the letter. It has sent me digging into newspaper archives and sending off information to a plethora of my husband's relatives - a great way to spend a snowy and rainy day! It all goes back to Ignatius Pigman Ward - he who had so many offspring that spread like crazy all across the States... He was my husband's fourth great-grandfather; his granddaughter married James O. Gingle (upon whose farm the NIH built the National Library of Medicine in Bethesda), and their daughter married Charles M. Devine, becoming my great-grandmother-in-law. Since I had mentioned Ignatius Pigman Ward in a previous blog, I received the letter regarding the fate of Belward Farm.

What is left of the original farm of the Ward family, around what was then known as Hunting Hill, has been steadfastly preserved by the last of the line in the area. Elizabeth Beall Banks refused to sell off any portion of her 138 acre farm, lately used for raising cattle. She wanted to preserve a little bit of country in the area between Gaithersburg and Rockville, Maryland, refusing huge offers from land developers so they could build housing on the idyllic farm property. She reached terms with Johns Hopkins back in 1989, and sold the rights to her property to them for $5 million (much less than the $40 million the developers offered), with the stipulation that, after her death the land would be used for "agricultural, academic, research and development, delivery of health and medical care and services, or related purposes only." It was not long after Banks passed away in 2005 at the age of 93, and when the plans for the Gaithersburg West Master Plan were underway, that the intent of the deed was ignored. Today, Johns Hopkins and the Montgomery County Park and Planning Commission (MCPPC) are proposing 300 housing units and commercial establishments in Belward. They wish to build a "Science City" encompassing 800 acres, and covering the farmland with multiple-storied buildings, rising between 4 and 10 stories high. Of course, according to them this will generate 60,000 jobs just in that area. At the end of today's blog are several URLs regarding this travesty, if you have any interest.

There is currently about 3 inches of snow on the ground, and it is raining, as it has done since yesterday evening. Nederland has received 34 inches of snow so far; most of the interstate highways have been closed since yesterday morning, and the state and the Red Cross have opened multiple emergency stop centers for people trapped on the roads with nowhere to go. It's 36 degrees outside, we're expecting 59 tomorrow, and the 70s for the rest of the week. The kits have run out and ran right back inside. Lovey knows that something's up - she is sitting in my lap and doesn't want to budge - I'll be leaving at 10 to run Kathy and Jim to the airport.
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Satellite map: http://wikimapia.org/4415446/BelwardFarm

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A31546-2005Jan23.html

http://74.125.95.132/searchq=cache:AkxyE29SbOEJ:www.mcc.jhu.edu/data/Newsletters/Hopk%2520Happ%2520Mar%252005.pdf+%22Belward+Farm%22B+Elizabeth+Beall+Banks&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us

http://www.gazette.net/stories/02182009/gaitnew211748_32480.shtml

http://www.gazette.net/stories/032608/montnew63752_32368.shtml

http://74.125.47.132/searchq=cache:eU63IbUhwGcJ:www.reasonabledevelopment.info/letter1_to_Planning_Board_january4.pdf+%22Belward+Farm%22%2BMD&cd=17&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us

http://blog.eventsintime.com/ - scroll to bottom of April 5, 2009 to see photo of lone oak tree on farm

http://blog.eventsintime.com/2008/12/rare-sunset-photo-of-belward-farm-oak.html - same tree at sunset