Don Scallen presenting on Tuesday November 15th!

The always engaging Don Scallen will be our speaker for the upcoming November 15th meeting! He will present an illustrated nature talk. A well known local naturalist, Don is a regular contributor to In the Hills magazine, and author of Nature — Where We Live. An autographed copy of his book will be given away as a door prize on November 15th.

I personally admire Don Scallen for exemplifying the theme of one of my favourite poems, in this case the last stanza of Robert Frost’s Two Tramps in Mud Time. Don is one of those remarkable people who delve so deeply into the richnesses of the natural world, and then reaches out so broadly to infect the rest of us with his sense of understanding and awe and wonder. For me, he admirably combines his former vocation as a teacher with his deep love of nature.

“But yield who will to their separation,
 My object in living is to unite
 My avocation and my vocation
 As my two eyes make one in sight.
 Only where love and need are one,
 And the work is play for mortal stakes,
 Is the deed ever really done
 For Heaven and the future’s sakes.”

Two Tramps in Mud Time, Robert Frost

Swaying in the breeze: Smilax herbacea, Smooth Carrionflower, Orangeville gravel pits

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