VARIATIONS ON NO THEME
This is one of those mornings that my wife had to go to work very early. Every Monday she must be at work at 5:30 AM. So that means that I also have to get up very early. About 4:30 to 4:35 AM. So after seeing her off and closing the gate, I came inside, made my first cup of coffee and, it being a warm morning with the moon riding lower from the zenith, I took my cup and went outside to sit in the swing for a while.
Quiet. Oh, lovely quiet. Except for the air conditioner blowing into my ear. But even that seemed rather subdued this fine morning.
I have been reading a series of books written by Effie Wilder, a resident of a nursing home in South Carolina, which tells of all the activities in her life at the nursing home. Yeah, it sounds like it would be rather boring. After all, what possible cheer could there be in a nursing home?
But you couldn't be further from the truth. Ms. Wilder has the unique ability to see the humor in life, even at her advanced age. She is in her mid- to late eighties (85 when she began the series and there have been at least five or six books so far.) Of course there are the tragedies too--the falls, the sprains, the sicknesses and deaths. Plus the romances among the residents.
If you have a hankering to enjoy some light reading , I suggest you check her books out. I found the at the local library.
Later on today, the garden will be the work of the day. I still have a little left of the corn plants to remove, the tomato plants, cucumbers and the beans. Plus the weeds. Then I can till it up and make it ready for the coming winter. I have already removed the fence that kept the deer out for the past three years. We finally got the creek bank protected with a stock fence and there have been no deer incursions since we got it up. So we are removing all the internal fencing around our garden and flower beds.
And, thinking about the deer, we have had three of them killed just at the end of our road within the past month. We live next to the state highway and there is a hollow up past our house and one across the highway also. So the deer use the hollow roads as a pathway from one area to another. It is not unusual to see herds of as many as six or eight deer going back and forth at any time of the day or night. So some are naturally going to fall prey to the high speed traffic.
The creek runs behind our house, about fifteen feet from the back wall. I have never sen the creek come over the bank right here at the house, but it does do so occasionally upstream and downstream. A few years ago, when Ivan came through, we had the highest water I have ever seen in the twenty-eight years we have lived here. It came over the bank upstream into the field below the garden and went back into its banks about thirty feet upstream from the shed on the back of the house. Then it came out really bad just on the other side of the private road that goes up our hollow, and out into my neighbor's field. At that time a slip had blocked the ditch along the highway and forced water from the ditch all over our front yard. So it really looked like we were surrounded by the water. But our driveway and private road were passable all through it.
We had a birthday cookout for my granddaughter yesterday at her father and step-mother's house (my daughter and her husband.) All six grandkids were there as well as their parents, my wife and I plus her aunt and her kids as well as the grandmother from her father's side. All told about twenty or so people, including boyfriends. A good crowd, good people and lots of laughing and fun.
And this Saturday my brothers and their wives and families all get together at my brother's house in town for our reunion. So I guess it will be family time for a couple of weeks. I've not decided whether to fix ribs or a blackberry cobbler. But at least I have narrowed it down to those two.
I guess I must be regressing. I find myself referring to the local university as Marshall College these days. I was in the second graduating class after it was made into a university back in 1962, but I still refer to it as Marshall College, after years of forcing myself to call it University. Old habits come back to haunt us as we grow older.
As a back-up to my reading materials, I keep a copy o0f Frank Herbert's "Dune" and all the various sequels to it available. I began re-reading it back in early August, as time permits and as I feel the urge. I am about one-third the way through the original book so far. In the meantime I have read about six other novels, as well as starting Wilder's series. Some of the others have been McCaffrey and her son's novels about Pern. And some have been small volumes of poetry (no, I've not written any myself.)
And I watched a lot of the celebrations of the two major political parties. I can't bring myself to call the 'conventions' as they were not conventions in the conventional sense. And I'll let that dog stay asleep.
But it is now almost seven o'clock, and time to be out and doing.
Some other time, maybe.
Quiet. Oh, lovely quiet. Except for the air conditioner blowing into my ear. But even that seemed rather subdued this fine morning.
I have been reading a series of books written by Effie Wilder, a resident of a nursing home in South Carolina, which tells of all the activities in her life at the nursing home. Yeah, it sounds like it would be rather boring. After all, what possible cheer could there be in a nursing home?
But you couldn't be further from the truth. Ms. Wilder has the unique ability to see the humor in life, even at her advanced age. She is in her mid- to late eighties (85 when she began the series and there have been at least five or six books so far.) Of course there are the tragedies too--the falls, the sprains, the sicknesses and deaths. Plus the romances among the residents.
If you have a hankering to enjoy some light reading , I suggest you check her books out. I found the at the local library.
Later on today, the garden will be the work of the day. I still have a little left of the corn plants to remove, the tomato plants, cucumbers and the beans. Plus the weeds. Then I can till it up and make it ready for the coming winter. I have already removed the fence that kept the deer out for the past three years. We finally got the creek bank protected with a stock fence and there have been no deer incursions since we got it up. So we are removing all the internal fencing around our garden and flower beds.
And, thinking about the deer, we have had three of them killed just at the end of our road within the past month. We live next to the state highway and there is a hollow up past our house and one across the highway also. So the deer use the hollow roads as a pathway from one area to another. It is not unusual to see herds of as many as six or eight deer going back and forth at any time of the day or night. So some are naturally going to fall prey to the high speed traffic.
The creek runs behind our house, about fifteen feet from the back wall. I have never sen the creek come over the bank right here at the house, but it does do so occasionally upstream and downstream. A few years ago, when Ivan came through, we had the highest water I have ever seen in the twenty-eight years we have lived here. It came over the bank upstream into the field below the garden and went back into its banks about thirty feet upstream from the shed on the back of the house. Then it came out really bad just on the other side of the private road that goes up our hollow, and out into my neighbor's field. At that time a slip had blocked the ditch along the highway and forced water from the ditch all over our front yard. So it really looked like we were surrounded by the water. But our driveway and private road were passable all through it.
We had a birthday cookout for my granddaughter yesterday at her father and step-mother's house (my daughter and her husband.) All six grandkids were there as well as their parents, my wife and I plus her aunt and her kids as well as the grandmother from her father's side. All told about twenty or so people, including boyfriends. A good crowd, good people and lots of laughing and fun.
And this Saturday my brothers and their wives and families all get together at my brother's house in town for our reunion. So I guess it will be family time for a couple of weeks. I've not decided whether to fix ribs or a blackberry cobbler. But at least I have narrowed it down to those two.
I guess I must be regressing. I find myself referring to the local university as Marshall College these days. I was in the second graduating class after it was made into a university back in 1962, but I still refer to it as Marshall College, after years of forcing myself to call it University. Old habits come back to haunt us as we grow older.
As a back-up to my reading materials, I keep a copy o0f Frank Herbert's "Dune" and all the various sequels to it available. I began re-reading it back in early August, as time permits and as I feel the urge. I am about one-third the way through the original book so far. In the meantime I have read about six other novels, as well as starting Wilder's series. Some of the others have been McCaffrey and her son's novels about Pern. And some have been small volumes of poetry (no, I've not written any myself.)
And I watched a lot of the celebrations of the two major political parties. I can't bring myself to call the 'conventions' as they were not conventions in the conventional sense. And I'll let that dog stay asleep.
But it is now almost seven o'clock, and time to be out and doing.
Some other time, maybe.
posted by tanstaafl | 6:14 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home