Art is a gift because, though there may be a correct way to do things, there are no rules that constrain our imagination. When recalling events from the distant past, I often use this freedom to color my memories. That is the case in today's collage.
Shaka's Picture
For the first eleven years of my life I was more in sympathy with nature and its multitudinous creatures than I was with my fellow humans. It was easy for me to see myself in
The Photo Upon Which the Children in the Collage Are Modeled
Picture credit: A family photo from my personal collection (c. 1949)
This photo has been blurred mechanically to protect the privacy of my sisters. They are the fair-haired girls on the left. I'm on the right. Two of my three brothers are standing behind us.
Our playground was the Shawangunk Mountains ('The Gunks').
'The Gunks', New Paltz, New York, USA
Image credit: jrtaylor08 CC 3.0
When I was eleven my family abruptly moved to Brooklyn, New York.
Bensonhurst, One of the Communities We Lived in
Image credit: DommDan515. CC 3.0 license Models of the cars were different back then, as were the names on the stores. But this, basically, is what I found when I moved to Brooklyn.
Let's go back to the Shawangunks.
Shawangunk Ridge, NY
Image credit: Jarek Tuszyński / CC-BY-SA-3.0 & GDFL
The Shawangunks are part of the Appalachian Mountains, which run from Newfoundland in Canada and extend all the way down to the state of Georgia in the USA. It is estimated that the Appalachian range is 480 million years old and once reached elevations that rivaled those of the Rockies and the Alps. Erosion over the years trimmed the loftiest peaks.
Shawangunk Ridge, Bear Hill Preserve
Image credit: Julian Colton. CC 4.0
One of the perils we were warned about as children was the copperhead snake. Only two species of venomous snakes inhabit the Shawangunks: the copperhead and the timber rattlesnake. The timber rattlesnake (which I never heard of all those years ago) is on the endangered species list in New York today.
Copperhead Snake
Image credit:Edward J. Wozniak D.V.M., Ph.D, U. S. Fish and Wildlife. Public domain Thankfully, I never once saw a copperhead--although a copperhead may have seen me. The snake is a master of camouflage.
One snake we saw frequently on our forest adventures, and even in our yard, was the garter snake. We were taught that the garter snake was beneficial to farmers. We lived in farm country so we never molested this snake.
Eastern Ribbon Snake (Close Relative of Garter Snake)
Image credit: Ande9174 at English Wikipedia. Public domain
The garter snake and ribbon snake look so much alike that there are guides that instruct in how to tell them apart.
The Woodrat
Picture credit: Alan Cressler. CC license 2.0
When I was a child, this animal was abundant in Shawangunk Mountains. However, it is nocturnal, so I never saw one. Today the woodrat has largely disappeared from New York. I did see squirrels, rabbits, chipmunks and deer. Happily, I never ran into a hunter.
There is a wide diversity of plant life in the mountains, which varies according to different areas. Besides the soaring pines and oaks, the flowering dogwoods, I recall most vividly a bog. The Shawangunks are home to wetland communities and in these may be found a species of tree that is quite familiar to me: the Atlantic white cedar.
The Atlantic White Cedar
Image credit: Katja Schulz from Washington, D. C., USA. CC 2.0 license.
According to a report issued by the Marine Biological Laboratory of Woods Hole, MA, the Atlantic white cedar is " limited to a ribbon of freshwater wetlands within 200 km of the Atlantic and Gulf coasts of the United States". I recall a boggy area deep in the forest which would grow increasingly muddy as we progressed on our trek. Eventually the mud would become quite precarious and take on a quicksand like dynamic. This was intimidating, because whatever we threw in the mud would disappear.
First I want to thank 
I just took a peak at
The picture at the center took a long time to render. I 'drew' (digitally) the first version a few years ago and then tried to refine the image until it looked something like the way I felt about the photo.
Other elements, besides
The meerkat Matteo Ferrero on Unsplash
Hydrangeas Pixabay
ShrubPixabay
Extra Turtles Janson_G on Pixabay
Alligator, bird, extra shrub, butterfly, deer, fox and rabbits all came from Paint 3D.
Effects--stardust, color, etc.--were achieved with GIMP
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