September 2025 – Thoughts From The Passenger Seat

2025, biking

My New Ride

Posted on September 27, 2025 by nancyb422

I have to go back to my last bike ride to explain my “new ride”.

We headed out on with friends for a ride on a beautiful Friday morning, September 12th. We met at the covered bridge in Colchester and headed out for a ride I’ve done before. It’s a good ride and I enjoy it the most out of the 3 different routes I’ve done.

It has packed dirt, country roads, paths through woods, and ferocious up and down hill, rocky forest roads.

There was a section the first time I rode that had huge puddles and I had to make a sharp turn between two trees that I didn’t make and fell into a tree! I didn’t get hurt just very muddy! Coming out of that section there is a steep, rocky (very rocky!) hill that I walked my bike up.

It was still muddy with huge puddles but I was able to ride up the hill! It wasn’t until I got to the top that I realized it was THAT hill. I did a little happy dance when I got off the bike. This is my favorite ride of all I’ve done and one along the shoreline is another favorite.

My bike, a Salsa Confluence, is a good bike but it’s designed more for roads and bike paths. There are no shocks in the handlebars and unfortunately the death grip I have on them along with bumping along over the rocks is wrecking my hands!

So….we decided to upgrade me to a Specialized bike because it comes in my size and it has shocks in the handlebar stem which will make it less painful going downhill over rocks. I hope!

Now I just need to sell my Salsa!

2025, life

My Lucky Day!

Posted on September 20, 2025 by nancyb422

Today I drove up to my college, Annhurst College in Woodstock, Connecticut for my 45th class reunion. I wrote about it here for a prompt on “what colleges have you attended?”.

It was a lovely hour and a half drive, part highway, part back roads. Once I got there, I checked in and then took some time to walk around the grounds which is now the South Campus for Woodstock Academy.

*I love that the building is called Annhurst Hall!*

I will tell you more about the day with pictures later but you want to know what made it my Lucky Day?!

My ticket was the first of ALL the raffle tickets pulled! I picked the BIGGEST basket there. All the items were from Maine – maple syrup, coffee, crackers, pancake mix, popcorn, potato chips, jam, soap – it was so heavy!

Then, just before lunch, I was getting ready to put the basket in my car so I could pull my chair closer to the table and then said they were drawing the 50/50 raffle. I set the basket by the door and sat down.

MY TICKET WAS CALLED! It was the first year they did this raffle. I won $175.00! Everyone was saying, “What?! She won again?”

It must have been that Holy Spirit shining down on me today. Or maybe because I was sitting next to a “Daughter of the Holy Spirit”? 😁 That was the order of nuns at our school, and I was sitting next to my former boss in the Admissions office, Sister Gertrude 😁

Whatever caused it, I felt truly blessed by my prizes and to be with the incredible women (and a few men) in the room today.

2025, life

Fri-yay!

Posted on September 19, 2025September 19, 2025 by nancyb422

I was so happy when I heard our weather forecaster mention the moon and Venus so close together this morning. I made sure to look up when I went outside.

I’ve been so good about NOT documenting my every trip outside but this morning brought me such joy

I love to capture the brilliance of the sunrise but the sun through the trees as it comes up is so special too. Many trees in our neighborhood are HUGE because they’ve been there in the 64 years I’ve been here.

I’m grateful for the trees and my neighborhood. It’s such a special place!

2025, life

Never Say Can’t

Posted on September 18, 2025 by nancyb422

The ant and the rubber tree plant, the flower (or weed?) growing out from the crack in the sidewalk, and this single lavender bud growing on a plant winding down.

All not taking can’t be done for an answer.

2025, Dreams, life

Interpreting Last Night’s Dream

Posted on September 15, 2025September 14, 2025 by nancyb422

Actually, it was a dream from early morning after I woke up at normal weekday time but fell back to sleep. That is when I usually have the strangest dreams!

Here’s what happened:

I’m somewhere with a group of people and there is another group of people (women) in another room. A young girl, Beth, is going to be performing(?) and I’m not sure how I feel about her. I don’t know how old I am in the dream.

I leave the table and when I come back, there is something, like a small poster, rolled up and secured with tape with Beth’s name on it. But not the shiny scotch tape, the matte kind that I think is for presents? Anyway, of course I have to open it! Inside there is a motor vehicle violations ticket and I think, “haha what did she get herself into?”, only to realize it’s a joke ticket designed to surprise her from the people she is with in the other room. They couldn’t have it delivered to the table she’s at, so put it on my table.

I roll the ticket back into the poster but now have no way to secure it because the tape won’t re-stick! Oh no! I leave with the poster in hand to find some tape, none….can I find an elastic band? I find one – it breaks. What about ribbon? I think I have ribbon somewhere. I find it but I can’t tie it without someone to hold it and no one is there. What do I do?!

I roll it super small. It’s all grubby and the edges mangled. I bring it to the table, only to realize everyone has left and her party is going to wonder what happened to it!

I run out to give it to her telling her I found it and yes, this is what it looked like when I found it!

Then I woke up….

My initial thoughts are feelings of jealousy and my “curiosity killed the cat” curiosity. Feelings of being left out, and lying to avoid confrontation.

Could it have anything to do with the fact I succumbed to yes, curiosity and read some Facebook posts and comments that irritated me!

Any thoughts?

2025, Gardening, life

Sunday Morning Walkabout

Posted on September 14, 2025 by nancyb422

Oh this weather!

The angle of the sun coming up over the trees and the subtle changes in the leaves just screams, “Fall is coming!” I don’t hate it. As a lover of sweater weather and “the chill behind the heat”, I’m here for it.

This morning I did a little walk around the yard and I noticed how one side of the steps is getting a little more Sun Love than the other side and it’s popping. One rose bush is budding all over the place and this little purple plant is blooming still while its other side of the steps counterpart is brown and sad.

This plant is part of the honeysuckle family (caprifoliaceae) of flowering plants. There are four “clades” (group of organisms that is composed of a common ancestor – hey! Like genealogy) above the family name. The Genus is Scabiosa but the common name for members in the genus is Pincushion Flowers. (Wikipedia).

Thinking about honeysuckles, we had a tree in our yard and would pluck the flowers, pull the center out (like the little pincushion piece), and taste the (supposed) honey at the end. Was it really? I have no idea, I’m sure our dad told us it was!

Take a close look at the blooming and post bloom and you see the little “needles” sticking out.

“Scabiosa” makes you think of scabs right? How about Scabies? That’s because the herb’s traditional usage as a folk medicine was to treat scabies, an illness that causes a severe itching sensation. (Wikipedia)

In my need to limit my social media footprint (facebook and instagram), I’ve stopped taking daily morning pictures of my short walk from the house to our garage workout room but weekends give me time to really enjoy my yard.

In the vegetable garden, the okra Just Keeps Producing! My husband slices it length wise, mixes it with olive oil, salt and pepper and roasts it to a golden crunch.

I’m looking for at least 2 more months of backyard wandering.

2025, life

As Summer Comes To An End…

Posted on September 10, 2025 by nancyb422

I walk out my back door almost every morning at about 6:15 to work out. I have taken so many pictures of these mornings. Why? I don’t know! I feel like I have to capture what I see to make it real. To remind me of what I’ve seen.

As I stood and looked around this morning, I wondered “did I enjoy this summer? Did I dig in? Or did I just go through the motions?”

I felt very confident that yes, I did embrace this summer. It was hotter than Heck, but I sat outside under the cover you see in the picture or on the covered side porch where there is always a nice breeze.

I would head out there after dinner and my husband would soon follow. We’d sit outside there for 2 hours, me reading and him watching you-tube videos.

I rode my bike a few times, less than I hoped, with my husband and friends but that is something there is still time for before the winter sets in.

We didn’t spend much time on our boat and that will be a conversation during the winter. Give it one more year? Give it up? The few times I was on it, I enjoyed it! Sometimes it’s the getting there…

And of course, there was our cruise to Alaska! That took up 10 days of the summer. The travel to and from felt like it took 10 days itself, but it was worth it.

For me, it’s not about being busy, or going to a lot of events. In the summer, it’s about being outside!

I’d been feeling down for the last couple of weeks, but the other day something shifted (full moon?), and now I just feel GRATEFUL and THANKFUL.

2025, Healthy Living, life

Digging In

Posted on September 4, 2025 by nancyb422

If you are a reader here, you’ll see I can be “in my head” a lot.

I am reading a book entitled, “High Functioning” overcome your hidden depression and reclaim your joy by Dr. Judith Joseph.

I have told myself that I don’t fall into the perfectionist category and a lot of what she says about overworking was something I did in the past, but not now. However, by beating myself up mentally, I think I should be perfect, or strive to be perfect. Both in my work and my “being”.

She says it relates back to “trauma” most times childhood based, but not always. There can be trauma with a capital T or it can be lower case t.

What I’m more concerned about is that feeling of “blah”. Anhedonia – the reduced ability to experience joy in life which makes you feel meh or blah all the time. For me, I t’s a feeling of doing to get through the day and then the night. When did that start?

I have begun to explore how all this figures in my life. I can see why I am never (never ever) happy with my weight or shape.

I’m beginning to understand some thoughts and reactions in my marriage.

As my business coach says, “what gets measured, gets improved”.

I’m looking forward to digging in deeper.