August is the month to find shade, preferably by water, and let your eyes drift over the shoreline… You know, do nothing but give yourself a break from the phone, laptop and iPad, from your To-do-List or job demands or your next DIY project… And yes, shelve that self-help book too. This precious month chillax with no plan at all for a day, a week, perhaps if you’re lucky, the whole month!

Following this well-needed advice we took one day off the calendar to visit a favorite state park where at most we swim once between buoys and walk a bit in the sand. Arriving late afternoon when most are packing up we bring a Dinner Picnic. This timing might seem odd, but at day’s end beaches are so quiet you can hear the lapping water and watch the timid ducks…Extend your stay until early evening and you will…

“Away, away, from men and towns,
To the wild wood and the downs, —
To the silent wilderness,
Where the soul need not repress its music.” —Percy Bysshe Shelley

As a Nine Cent Girl reader you are uniquely aware of the lovely places where I roam and know many are right out my front door. Having the very best of air, water, earth, with a fire in our hearth keep us balanced on this one small planet. This week as Spring is slowly emerging from her underworld and winter garb, there is the reminder that Persephone is rising with her mantle of yellow flowers and cape of greens. As all New Englanders, I anxiously await the ease this next season will bring and am always reminded how lucky I am to live here, in absolute beauty: under grey clouds or vast blue, each day is a gift.