Perhaps this too was strange...

To get to the point of this short tale, you have to come along with me for a while and get a feeling for my day. It won't take long, as I seem to leave most of my stories between my brain and the keyboard, expecting the reader to fill in the missing pieces. Someday I will reread before publishing...


Anyway, the day started with rain and strong winds, making me glad that I had tarped my pickup before going in last night. It was jammed with booty for the dump. Everything from drywall to old shock absorbers to shreds of clothing worn by members of my family no longer living.


You see, there was this place in the family barn where my parents "put stuff". Yesterday was the 2nd stage of cleaning this area in anticipation of rebuilding this part of the barn. This part of the barn is fairly open to the elements but dry enough to stop most rot and allow only a little rust. It is the 2nd floor, kind of a mezzanine sort of affair. Unfortunately this area was also very open to someone tresspassing in our barn, something that a lot of cherry pickers and renters had done over the last few decades. So things got broken, disappeared and were scattered from their original boxes. No one seemed to care. This spring, as we looked through the contents, we only found junk - oh look, a whole album of 331/3 Sachmo records - only to find them all broken into many pieces. There was a very cool suitcase that bees had been living in for many years - it still remains in the barn and should be in a museum.


Anyway, almost all of that stuff got in the truck and today it was going to the Marion County dump. After arriving at the dump, while I was removing my tie downs and straps so I can remove the required tarp, I watched a middle-aged woman attempt to backup her SUV with a trailer full of trimmings. She was so not going to be successful. Oh so many people cannot back up - to me, it is not even nice to watch someone failing to backup, the suffering is so great. Just as I got my tarp off and was about to go offer my services, another gentleman offered assistance. And lordy, I don't think he had backed up anything before...


As I pulled out old stationary bikes, bike frames, broken pottery, shredded clothing and broken glass, there were no surprises (I had loaded it after all...), it was satisfying to throw them in the pit. The dry wall was on the bottom, beneath the 50# mirror that we got from Randall's dad, Lefty, for some reason. I had just got the last piece of drywall in the pit and was picking up pieces and a small picture frame came to my attention. It was about 2"x3" as I turned it over, I found inside a perfectly preserved picture of me, just prior to graduating from high school.. Cool! a find! although I did happen to still have the same picture and in fact still have the high school album that it was taken for but still, it was in good shape and a find. Here it is:




Thinking that was about it, I picked up some broken glass, a few this and thats and then picked up the last piece of paper, turned it over to find another picture of me. This picture shows me sitting in a rocking chair, a chair currently in my living room. It was probably taken when I was 12 or so. I have no memory of this picture and probably have never seen it before but now I have it. Curious.

This was a very nice day

It started early, somewhere around 6am when I awoke from a pleasing dream. The light was strong outside and the sun was a tryin' to get here. As usual, the three boys were waiting at the bottom of the stairs, talking about their dreams and their excitement in starting a new day too. Of course they get fed first and then I washed up and dressed in the hallway. Good day to wear my new shirt I decided and as I get ready for bed, that was a great choice. It's one of those loggers pullover shirts with the zipper about half way down and heavy fabric and long tails. Leave it out of the jeans cause it is long enough to sit on.

Since I had bacon and eggs yesterday, today seemed like a yogurt, juice and pineapple morning with just a bite or two of that great meatloaf that Roth's makes. Nothing like cold meat loaf to help the day get going. It is good to chow it slowly though. Oh yea, needed a glass of water too.

The paper did not hold much interest for me this morning. I decided to read it later if there was time. The comics did catch my eye though and for once For Better Or Worse pulled my heart strings with thoughts of Karen. In this strip, the father comes into the room, says nothing, gives his wife a big kiss and then says "it is you I love" and leaves. Such a nice moment and in a cheesy comic strip.

Before much else could happen, I was outside looking for stuff to change. I weeded here and there, walked around the place and noticed the dew was leaving the grass and it was going to be a great day. Somewhere around noon, a neighbor's alarm went off and did not stop. Thinking it might be something I could help with, I left to investigate. It was Jensen's - Bill took off on a Sunday drive with Christine and no one knew their number. Talked to Keith and Joanie some - Joanie said it was my day for Aspargas! My first! Keith is doing fine and the visit reminded me of how much we are like them - similar tastes, similar values, similar chioces. Just can't seem to get close to them.

After eating a fine lunch of meatloaf sandwich stuffed with lettuce, it was off on the mower for a few hours only to be driven back to the barn around 4 or so. Gave me a chance to do some barn cleaning and sweeping - no limit to the work that shop can use - and some more pruning on that bird planted apple tree by the shop. Off to Joanie and Smitty's to get the Aspagas - it was all picked and everything. Such a treat. Smitty showed me where the patch was and how to get it in shape. He just bought a fork lift - such a convenient thing. Then the sun broke through again and back on the mower till 7pm. Such great fun although the grass is a little tall. It is so hard to keep up with five acres of mowing this time of year.

Dinner was excellent - best there was since K left. Aspargas cooked just right, a huge salad with mixed greens and carrots and all the stuff that makes a salad good, a little satchel of meatloaf (almost gone now) and a big bowl of tomato soup. Very pleasing dinner and then I watched "The Lake House " - kind of sappy and definitely a chic flick but still worth the hour. The best part of the evening is sitting on the couch with the three boys snoozing around me. They have learned how to get along here without complaining and ever so often have to be bad to get a little attention. Lately the 'badness' has been in emptying pieces of paper out of small waste baskets - something I find amusing and certainly tolerable. I mean, if that is as bad as they need to be, then I can certainly put up with it.

And now to bed.

Lets celebrate - the vineyard is planted

Well, it is almost all planted. There was quite a tussle when Karen remembered that Emmy Domes wanted tight bunched red grapes and set aside two plants for her. Ryan and I and Jaden thought she should just wait but knew Karen was right. Also you see, the row we were planted needed at least six more plants to get done and removing these two ... well, it just didn't seem right.

And when we were done, we had over 72 new young plants in the ground. What made it so much fun was that Karen was so into it, Ryan and Jaden made sure they were there with their shovels and can-do attitude, I was almost over my cold/flu thing, the day was wondrously beautiful, the ground was ready, it was about the last weekend we could plant without being crazy late with planting and, and, and - everything was a few degrees past fine!

We still have to do a lot of stuff this spring, like get wire and anchors and dig holes and put in the black locust posts we cut (more on that later), prune the old grapes so we have more stock for next spring planting, water in the plants, put straw on the last row, etc.

By taking this piece of ground in hand and changing it in 06-07, we created another set of stories, another family memory, another thing to take care of as much as we want and something for someone in the future to remove and renew or enjoy and maintain.