Life with a view

Three Years Later in Rural Colorado…

/ Laura Lee Carter / 9 Comments

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Today we celebrate three years of living in this magnificent part of Colorado. Granted, this was not all a pleasant experience. In fact the first year and a half, from the time we decided to leave suburbia in Fort Collins until our home was completed here, were grueling. Some synonyms for grueling that describe my experience best: backbreaking, challenging, demanding, formidable, and sometimes hellacious. Building in rural areas is not for the meek, and building in mid-winter has its own challenges, but we lived through it and now we are happy as clams!

(Exactly how happy are clams anyway?)

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We moved here for a number of reasons. To live close to nature, to try passive solar living, to build the kind of home we chose to live in for the rest of our lives, and to find a far more peaceful, healthy and less expensive lifestyle than cities can offer us. We received so much more!

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The greatest gift for me is a sense of freedom and natural silence that I have never come close to in my previous life. I now live in the present, choosing each hour how I want to spend my day. I awaken to the birds singing with the sun pouring in, and go out to work in my fledgling garden of mostly native plants, most of which will be sunflowers blooming very soon!

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Then, if I feel like visiting friends, I drive into La Veta on county roads with wildflowers popping up everywhere. Yes, the dining choices are slim here, just one of the “conveniences” you have to give up to live in the country. Luckily I’m a great cook and prefer to eat at home most of the time.

The hardest part for me was taking the original risk. Letting go of our nice home in suburbia was not easy, especially after seeing the one hundred year old miner’s house we would have to move into in Walsenburg for over a year.

decking Comanche home with mountains in backgroun

Then there were the challenges of working with the local contractors and our builder here. Just getting them to come to work was often the biggest challenge! Here’s where we were one year into the build. But somehow it all came together and everything works today, so we have no complaints.

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I know we will face many more difficulties and much stormy weather up here, but at least we finally know where home is. For now, this is certainly where we belong…

Laura and Rasta on insulation 2014 (2)Would you like to read the whole story of how we ended up here enjoying country living? Check it out: A Memoir of Retirement: From Suburbia to Solar in Southern Colorado.

Bicycle injuries rising among older riders

/ Laura Lee Carter / 11 Comments

She was just going out for a short bike ride around her neighborhood. It didn’t seem necessary to carry an ID, or even wear a helmet. Ten minutes later she was found lying in the dirt unconscious near a bike path. The bystander who found her, called 911 and an ambulance arrived soon afterwards. Then a kind Emergency Medical Technician whisked her off to the emergency room with her mind constantly weaving in and out of consciousness. After numerous X-rays and cat scans she ended up in the neuro unit of the hospital for observation.

This is a true story.  It happened to me back in 2008 in Fort Collins. My own tumble over the handle bars and into a nasty bike accident, led to fractured ribs, an injured wrist and thigh, and a traumatic brain injury.

This is my warning to you who think riding a bike is still as easy as climbing back on again. 

Injuries among older riders have jumped dramatically in recent years. Between 1998 and 2013, bike injuries among all adults over the age of 18 increased 28 percent, while hospital admissions jumped 120 percent. Head traumas went from 10 percent to 16 percent of all injuries in the same period.

Older bicyclists fueled much of that increase in injuries, especially ones that required an emergency room visit. Injuries among those 45+ jumped 81 percent and hospital admissions increased 66 percent, from 39 percent to 65 percent of total injuries. While death rates for cyclists younger than 15 fell by 92 percent between 1975 and 2012, death rates for cyclists between the ages of 35 and 74 showed a large increase, according to CDC data.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/bicycle-injuries-rise-especially-for-older-riders/

While I do not want to discourage you from healthy exercise as you age, be careful out there! I feel the effects of my brain injury everyday, especially when I write or speak with others. My memory is definitely not the same and it also completely depends on what area of the brain you injure.  I find I tire quickly in social situations, and the first sign that I am getting overwhelmed is when I cannot think of the proper word for something, a difficult feeling for one who has always been proud of her ability with words.

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On the flip side, my brain injuries (yes I suffered a second concussion after we moved in here!) have taught me to slow down, meditate more, and enjoy each moment as it arrives.

Besides now living in a quiet and contemplative part of Colorado, I have learned some wonderful relaxation techniques that are quite FUN regardless of your brain injury status.

Take care of that old personal computer up there! You only get one.

Early spring wildflowers in Southern Colorado

/ Laura Lee Carter / 3 Comments

Words cannot properly capture the wonder and beauty of spring up here at 7,000 feet. Granted, it does take a long time to get here, but when it does, it is true magic. These yellow flowers appear everywhere in early spring, sometimes as super blooms!

yellow spring Navajo Tea flowersThey are called Plains Greenthread (or Navajo Tea)

Among the Navajo Tea, I also find this purple Penstemon early!

The lupines and Colorado Four O’clocks will come later…  but for now,

Mountain iris are blooming in May at higher altitudes

I am simply grooving on the beauty that surrounds me.

Purpose is highly overrated

/ Laura Lee Carter / 1 Comment

I was raised by a father who was full of purpose. Let’s face it, most previous generations thought the only reason they were here was to find their special purpose (Thanks Steve Martin in The Jerk!) I also used to think that meaning and purpose were important to find. But today, not so much.

Do you realize how many memes you can find if you search under “purpose” and then “images”?  There are thousands! But one that particularly struck me was:

To be here now is your true purpose!

Needless to say, retirement can bring up all sorts of questions about previous and present purpose. In the past my purpose was apparently to go to work and do my job. Regardless of how I felt about it, going to work did give me something to do with myself. I felt useful most of the time.

With retirement I have so much more time to think about purpose, and I have come to the conclusion that most of what we do everyday has little meaning unless it makes us feel good about ourselves.

Now I choose to error on the side of passion over purpose. I know for certain that nothing I will do today will change the world. Few will miss me when I’m gone, so why not choose a few pastimes that provide pure joy for me right now and indulge?

My favorite at present is playing in my small and windy garden…We should have hundreds of native sunflowers blooming soon! We got 4 inches of rain this May!