A Friendly and Grateful Firefly Forest Welcome to The Gnomist Online!

Check out the film! And keep the magic alive, everyone, wherever you are!

  

Respect Nature, Don’t Scrapbook it. On continuing “landscaping” of Tomahawk Creek Trail

www.instagram.com/p/CAbjfUmp0yO/

I get it, I really do. But there is a fine line between good taste and literally tossing glitter that can kill wildlife, and is a general eyesore, onto a public trail. Please see recent posts, I’m usually on Instagram but am opening this to the old blog as it’s becoming an issue.

Aside from these attempts to decorate, there is a large number of sequined ribbons tied to branches in recent weeks. Due to the shutdown and late sunset, I’m able to get to my old trail, and the attempts to “decorate” it went into full swing yesterday, including an attempt to decorate the door I made for my father, which I promptly removed (yes, I do carry a bag with a screwdriver with me! Why do you ask?).

The Gnomist project was lovely, but these have returned to being our neighborhood woods and good taste and decorum as well as respect for nature and the creatures who live in this ecosystem is required.

Thank you.

A Final Word on Tomahawk Creek Trail & Decorating Nature:

www.instagram.com/p/CAb0cgWpNTW/

Thank you

There’s Fall Magic All Around!

Apologies, I’ve been basking in the beauty and magic of the woods (it takes walking aids, but I manage; what it really takes is the will to be in the woods!). I often do just bask in the great beauty around me, it is a deeply spiritual thing for me, a home as true as one made by hands; a glory of things forgotten, but remembered upon the touching of the bark, the smell of the fallen leaves; the rustle of wind in the trees, a wild branch crashing to the ground; a memory of tales and times forgotten, lost in memories and story books, and in our imaginations–but just around the corner in every wood, if only you dare to look. 

I’ve been posting as @alexalexides at Instagram, but haven’t the skill to share accounts here, so I’ll leave that and share some of the recent pictures for this week of Thanksgiving, snapshots of a fall in forest! Do enjoy, some are obvious homages to Arthur Rackham, most are just my usual tree entuhusiam, and a warm and happy holiday week to everyone! 

(Do please check out the posts as mentioned above, some of these aren’t quite the right ones, and I do try to keep it up daily there!) 

Fall Forest Art; Beowulf in the Woods:

The Crown of Autumn, all materials collected in the forest by my daughter and woven by my daughter into this crown of sorts (for a birthday). I was good for: reading Beowulf. 

(Fall leaves, with a few added grasses, woven bottom of vinca/periwinkle, woven with the stems of the leaves.)

Oh, & My New Favorite Fairy House

I’m not saying I don’t love solid, worthy carpentry in worthier hands than my own, just that these are a different woods, a very different park. I do like that (this is behind a nature center) someone, probably with kids, was playing in a grove, creating some visions of magic afoot.

Enjoy, breathe the air and just enjoy what you can of nature.

And do what you can for those affected by this horrible season of natural disasters, and know if you’re in any of the effected areas, that we here are thinking of you more than anything else right now. Whether fires or hurricanes, our thoughts and prayers are with all in peril right now.

Different Woods, Hope Returns.

Well, you can’t keep a determined forest lover out of the woods. Truth be told, I’d drag myself with arms alone if I had to. But luckily, I am not at that point anymore. Hope lives in the woods. These are my alternate woods, the woods away from my home woods. I finally got to return to them this week, and things are much as they were here over a decade ago. Wilder, darker, but soon to be vibrant with the reds and oranges of this region.

This Watcher is still watching! And sharing. I hope to share some beautiful woods (if not the most beautiful iPhone shots) throughout the coming Autumn. Please forgive the repetitions, I am often in the same spots.

Out of Hope

I was back to walking, even found some old woods in a city I’ve lived in before. I was able to make it a mile or more plus plenty of weight training per day. Life has been tumultuous, but good. 

Sadly, my right leg was injured last week, and I’m yet again looking at pictures longingly, wishing I had abilities I had even two weeks ago. 

I’m far from home. Injured. Out of hope. Devastated. If anyone can send some my way, please think of it. Apologies for the pathetic post. 

News? A Thank You To Nottingham, Overland Park Anonymous HopeBringers

I have moved, yet these woods and this trail remain my home. I’ve known them since I was 17 years old. I’ve walked them for years. My father died nearly within sight of this trail, where I built a door once, on the spot he used to go into the trail from our first home in the neighborhood. It was the last place he lived before leaving this life. Where a simple door had to suffice until a more permanent monument can be arranged with the city of Overland Park, our longtime home. I know every inch of these woods, which trees have now, sadly, died. I mark their passing, as if they were friends. Please excuse this post, of a perspective that I don’t think many notice when viewing The Gnomist online, or seeing any related news stories about our lovely home. Certainly not in regards to news coverage, as local residents are rarely included. Here is my thank you to them all.

(From one of the most beautiful days of my life, when I walked for hours, miles through deep snow from my house to the woods. Early 2013.)

I know many people from both our neighborhood and the trail, people who’ve enjoyed this stretch of earth for years–some for decades, like myself. We remember when it was paved. We all have stories. We’ve all loved, lost, and lived here. We’re proud of our home and our lovely trail. I also know many who, after people made the original Firefly Forest project and associated film, The Gnomist, worked like mad to recreate some of the previous charm (though you don’t want to litter up a forest too terribly much, one thing the original project excelled at). We wanted to give others hope again, but we were fairly subtle. We didn’t have the time, the good health, or any help from outside sources. We sought no fame, no fortune for our deeds. Many of us merely cleaned up trash thrown by irresponsible trail goers, of which there is always a bit too much.

We remain, mostly, nameless. There was no coalition, no neighborhood meetings to do any of this, it was merely done by those of us who love these woods. It was done out of love, for our community, for our neighbors and trail goers, for those seeking hope and magic. We were called “good copycats” with a smirk or two, and we didn’t blink. We carried on, because neighborhood kids were asking, “Where will the fairies live NOW?” We did our best to answer that, for them. For us. That is all.

I’ve shared more than most, but I’ve never shared one thing here, and will continue not to, for the most part. This blog is about hope, and being inclusive to all who come to our local trail to seek solace, natural beauty, and the friends we have all become. This will always be my home, and this is where I have designated my ashes be scattered when I die. I’ll share that much, if that is what it needed to express how much this means to me. Not because of something done for a film, that was in place prior to 2013 when these doors appeared. I will simply express that it is an odd thing when people show interest in your favorite stretch of home for one reason, when there are so many more stories to be told. When they leave, and very much like the doors themselves, only stop by to peek in every so often and for only one reason. It is simply an odd sensation, because we are a good community, and a strong one.

We exist regardless of who is peeping in at the moment. I say this not to sound rude to anyone, or to belittle the Gnomist or the project it followed as it unfolded. I merely say it because it appears people often forget, at least the local media, that so many others with so many stories have added to this one (and only one) that they continue to cover. They continue to by just living their daily lives and doing their parts. Today, I am praising them, the anonymous people who answered the questions for the children (and a few adults), of “Where will the fairies live now?” We’re not museum worthy, or particularly newsworthy, but we didn’t give up. I don’t say this to malign anyone others, that is not my sentiment, but to express a deep love and gratitude to everyone in the place I’ve called home since 1991. Thank you, you all know who you are.

Please, if you have a chance, take the time to get out on the trail. Visit the many beautiful spots there, visit the Deanna Rose Farmstead. Meet the people, pick up the stray can of soda or beer and take it to the trash. See the beauty in all of it. I will certainly be returning, hopefully before the events I have delineated in my will. To see my friends, my woods, my home. Because this is a home for many of us. Thousands of us, actually.

Thank you for reading.

In other news, something about the trail I’m far too homesick to view at the moment. Someone’s peeping in the doors to home again.

Back For The Holidays

Tough walk, but good. (I can’t have the only surgeries to fix my hip joints I can potentially have, but I’m good with it). But there’s some activity still! I was particularly happy to see flags for Gondor and Rohan represented. Forth, Eorlingas! (Tolkien reference…more Tolkien reference). My shabby box fell too far to ruin, so I merely left the piece with the Tolkien quote as a plaque of sorts. Home! 

Sorry I Couldn’t Be At Your Door Today, Dad

I know it’s your birthday today, you’d have been 71. We all miss you more that we can even express. I was going to come back to be there, wish you a happy birthday and work on making the world a better place. This is the note I’d leave there, if I could’ve been there. That we all love and miss you, you were the greatest Dad anyone ever could’ve had. You brightened the lives of everyone you ever met, made parts of Kansas City better for your presence, and will always be loved and missed.

I fell and have not gotten quite ill, possible fracture not picked up on scans, no one is sure. Still can’t walk. Hope at all time low.