Marion Normandy 1933 – 2014

Marion Normandy

Marion (Louise) Kisner Normandy died at the age of 80 at Parkmoor Village Health Care Center, Colorado Springs, Colorado on August 15, 2014, following a brief illness.

Marion Louise Kisner was born on November 27, 1933 in Martinsburg, West Virginia, to Ruth (Thompson) Kisner and Paul Kisner. She was an only child but had many relatives living close by. She developed close friendships with several girls from elementary school and stayed in close contact with them throughout her life.

In 1951 she graduated from Martinsburg Senior High School, and began attending Shepherdstown College in Shepherdstown, West Virginia, where she studied biology. In 1955, she left college to marry Willard Davis Normandy, Jr.

One year later, on their first wedding anniversary, their daughter, Catherine Elaine, was born. Four years later their second daughter was born, Caroline Elizabeth. Elaine and Caroline were raised in the Maryland suburbs of Washington, DC.

In 1978, Marion began her career in the Federal Government in Washington, DC. She worked in various divisions including FEMA and FAA and retired in 1999 from the Federal Aviation Administration. She moved to California and lived there for five years. In 2004 she moved to Colorado Springs.

She is survived by her two daughters, Elaine Normandy and Caroline Normandy Levenberg, her two sons-in-law, John Heneghan and Edwin Levenberg, and her two grandchildren, Jessica Manning and Anthony Manning.

Black Forest Regional Park

Black Forest Regional ParkMonday, a friend and I took our dogs to the Black Forest Regional Park. The park is adjacent to the subdivision where the Black Forest Fire of 2013 started and 74% of the park timber burned in that fire. It was closed until fairly recently until walking trails could be made safe for the public.  Pikes Peak is hidden by the burnt, twisted pine.

 

 

Hail Storm

Hail Storm

This is the biggest sized hail that I’ve seen in a couple of years. Fortunately, when I looked out toward the barn, the other two horses had let Lily (the least pushy of the three) into the barn.

After a hail storm, I am always surprised by the sharp smell of shredded vegetation.

Mountain Lion

I was in the mudroom when Jack rushed by me to get to the garage. We have a neighborhood mailing list, and Jack had just received email that there was an elk kill across the road from our house, and that it was being guarded by a mountain lion in the shrub trees behind it. For a while, the only signs of action were birds:  mainly magpies, though after a while I started seeing ravens as well. At one point, a very alert coyote wandered up for a snack. Here is a detail from a photo that I took several hours later, after watching the lion run up to the kill to chase off birds.  The lion is behind its kill:

Mountain Lion Detail

I don’t know if it was disturbed by me taking photos but it ran back to the shrub trees to the west back toward the National Forest. (I stayed close to the house, I promise!) Here is the larger photo from which I took the above detail:

Mountain Lion

 

I didn’t realize that mountain lions could down elk:  I thought they stuck to mule deer and whitetail deer.  Another neighbor reported that there was another elk kill a little to the east of us.

When we first moved here, we never saw elk unless we went up into the mountains.  When they started coming into our valley, people would park along the road to watch.