Descent of Summer

 It's been a strange day today.

I woke up, fully rested and restless, at 6 am. That's usually the time of deepest sleep for me. Washed dishes, changed garbage bags, carried garbage out, pulled some weeds in flower beds. Then I sat on my porch for a while, watching and listening to the birds and bugs (and the cars and children across the street at the day care) and breathing in the lightening scent of the new day. Smells like good clean growth.

I seem to have something in my eyes, although I've rinsed and washed and flushed it out. Time for the allergy pills, I guess. Kind of tired of my eyes crying without the essential me involved in the act!

Did take a couple-hour nap about noon to two, then here I am, headache, yawns, crying eyes and all. Watching tv, working puzzles, reading, and writing, among other things. 

The big H is back. On the weather maps, that is. The big H for heat, humidity, and headache. Ha Ha. 

In other words: Summertime. "Roll out the barrel" and all that fun stuff.  Commercials for Memorial Day "buy a bed" sales. Couches and recliners will be next. Maybe cars, but they may wait until Flag Day or the 4th of July for that. 

It does bother me that most of our patriotic observances are devoted commercially to selling the big ticket personal items. I've written about that before, and most likely will again. 

The air conditioner is on, and running constantly. It's not set that low. 

Last week we were having frost advisories. 

Summer has descended upon us, like a plague of --

CICADAS. 

Because, yes, that's happening, too.

Welcome to my weather.

September

I love the autumn.

Not just the beauty of the color changing tree, of the land slowly baking under long days of slanting sun.

There's also the scents -- dry, dry, dry leaves, grains, grasses, weeds. The washed earth as the harvest is gleaned from the depths. The wood cuts and stacks for winter warmth.

I love the feel of the air on my skin. A lingering caress as warmth says a lingering farewell, with reminders that it will return -- someday.

I love the tastes of fresh produce, the good clean tangy taste that is in the air, not the mouth. (I'm not real crazy about the taste of pumpkin spiced everything that has become a cultural norm, but I like that it exists and is everywhere to remind me that it is again glorious Fall.

I like the sounds; the plop of fruit dropping from trees, the crisp crunch of leaves, the crickets drowning out the cicadas. (This is the first summer in my memory where I have ever sat on the porch and heard the crickets and cicadas together in concert.)

 I enjoy these other senses as I do wait for the visual changes. The sky is shading into that deep October blue shade, but the trees and plants are only just beginning to turn. For now they are yellow, brown, withering.


Will this be a Golden Autumn, with trees of gold and yellow and orange?
Will it be a flaming autumn, when the leaves are red and copper and magenta?

Will the green tarry a while, or will it vanish over night?

I can't wait to find out, and yet I must.

The season itself cannot be gathered until ripe.

I Like Trees.

There are many visual delights, especially in rural living. Many people like to look at clouds, or rivers, or the reflections of clouds in rivers.

Me, I like to look at trees. Okay, I do enjoy looking more if there's water nearby, a nice reflective surface. That way I can see both sides of the tree.
I like their asymmetric symmetry.
I like trees that arrow into the air, pointing, thrusting skyward, ready to penetrate heaven itself.
I like trees that branch out in so many places it looks as if whole spread out hands have thrust themselves through the hard hard ground and are grasping at all the air and all the space they can find.
I like trees that grow into full, fluffy or bushy circles  so that they look like huge green lollipops.
I like trees that burst into bloom to greet the sun as it warms the air.
I like trees that say "good-bye for now; Farewell" with bright blasts of red and gold before they are wrapped in crystals of ice or snow.
I like  trees that stay green year round.

I just like trees.

Trees are strength.
Trees are growth.
Trees give, even when they die.
They shade us, they feed us, they cool us, they warm us.

Trees are always trees, but they are never the same.

What would our lives look like -- or at  -- without trees?

Summer Family Fun.

Today, my sisters are going to a family reunion. It will be the first Schmidt family reunion since my dad died. (I think. I could be wrong about that.) It will be odd  to have his family there and he is gone, but life is a winnowing out process, and the sad truth is he wasn't the first to go.

We have lovely weather for the event today. The heat has backed off, the storms that reduced it to cowardice have moved on to vanquish elsewhere. The sun is shining, skies are blue with puffy white clouds. There will be trees and a lake and restrooms and paths and picnic tables and a playground.

A perfect day for a family to reconnect, however briefly.

It grieves me that I won't be there. I love some of my father's sisters, even though I haven't been around them for years. I love them although I know little of their lives and they know less of mine.

Saturday we will be having another family party. This one I'll be able to attend. This one I will attend. Good lord willing and the creek don't rise -- an apt qualification in this case, since the party is being held near Red Oak Creek in Ripley.

I'll see people there that I know, know of, and maybe a couple that I don't know. New victims to observe, new cadences to hear. All within the safety of a family network, and of course an easy exit in case of overwhelming anxiety.

First week of August is busy with birthdays in this family -- thank goodness they aren't all celebrated individually with parties. A person would be constantly on the run (although birthday parties would be more pleasant running than doctor's visits, hospital tests and trying to get prescriptions filled.)

There are fairs, too, and church festivals. It's my firm belief that the only reason it rained three days this week is because Adams County Fair was in progress. It will rain three days the last week of September, when Brown County Fair is in progress. That's just how it works in this part of the country.

Summer is a good time to catch up with everyone. The hard part is catching up with yourself and your own.
Having family is important, having fun is important too.

Having you is important to me.

Have fun and take care. 

To the Motorcyclist

To the motorcyclist on Tri-County today: You were a joy to drive behind. You maintained a steady speed,  with no swerves and no sudden stops. You stayed in your lane. Not only did you stay in your lane, you stayed straightly in your lane, no riding from side to center and back again.

I have seen motorcyclists do all these 'fun' things. I understand the urge, but when I am the following driver, it worries me. When I am the approaching driver, it scares me.

There's been a lot of news stories about motorcycle accidents, and how to avoid them. There are Facebook and e-mail pleas to watch out for the motorcycles. It's good for drivers to be aware, but the cyclists themselves often take risks that don't have road safety in mind. Weaving from edge to centerline, making sudden turns or stops, speeding up and slowing down. Part of the freedom of riding, but unsettling to other drivers.

So you were a joy to follow today, from Mt. Orab to Sardinia, to Macon, where we parted ways.

And, after having followed you, when the road opened before you, and you met the challenge, your shirt billowed like a sail -- ah, then, I wished that I were you.

Lawns are Overrated

This summer may be as memorable for its Lawn Mowing Crises as it will be for its No Bathing scenario.

When last we mowed, the riding mower  wasn't starting, so not running, and our quasi son-in-law had been mowing when the push mower decided to oil both him and the yard, as if from a cut artery. Rex went to a yard sale and bought another push mower. The Doofus mowed, but before he finished, he managed to break a ceramic guard off the newly purchased mower.

Rex managed to start and run the rider a few times, through the magic of jiggling and wiggling the fuse box, so the yard was done after a fashion. Not that he has had any business outside in heat and humidity, throwing up clouds of cut grass and pollens.
Earlier this week he was mowing on the rider when it quit cutting. It was running, but it just quit cutting the grass.
His diagnosis: a bearing on the deck went out. (Later he said it might be a broken or stretched-out belt, but of course the first thing he thought of was the most difficult and probably the most expensive cause.) We're waiting for Doofus to come and help him check it out, since it isn't something Rex can do alone or with my feeble assistance.

Yesterday I got out the push mower. I couldn't start it. Starting a push mower requires more co-ordination than I have ever had, and a fair bit of strength. I had hoped to have some mowing done by the time Rex woke, but that wasn't going to happen.

The sad thing is, he no longer has the strength to push/pull/hold and start the mower. At least, he didn't yesterday. It may have been a bad day for him. More likely it is his chronic illness catching up with him.
He's not ready to concede that, and it will take something from his spirit when he does.

What's so important about mowing anyway? Have you ever tried letting your lawn grow and seeing what Mother Nature will provide when you don't scalp her abundance to nothing?

There are shy little white flowers, with sprinklings of gold fairy dust that will creep out from the exposed roots of trees. There are exquisitely tiny johnny-jump-ups that jump up from nowhere. There are, of course, the golden sun discs of the dandelion. The white-to-pink-to-purple fronds of clover. There is the weaving waving sinuous grass-in-the-wind. And that's just the plant life!

Lawn mowing is overrated. It's too bad that so many towns require a certain amount of lawn mowing, because Nature provides a nice variety of textures and colors and scents and sounds and general liveliness that will never be felt, seen, smelled, or heard in a properly manicured and subdued lawn.

I cherish the variety Nature provides. I also cherish my husband, and I mourn with him that he cannot do this one thing that he has taken pride in being able to do -- keep his yard looking nice. If we cannot fix or replace his rider, or get a push mower that doesn't need starting (my first brother suggested an electric mower -- a wonderful idea for the purpose), then we will have to look into a different living arrangement.

Different indeed, with no lawn for him to mow or me to watch nature grow. It will be sad to leave the roots and wonders, but a joy to leave the(before, during, later on) malfunctioning machinery behind and have it out of our lives.


When that day ever comes. It's taking its time, as Nature takes hers, and fills my yard with flowers.

Flow of Family Fun

My brother's wedding Saturday made me think of how we, as a family, handle the ebb and flow of these get-togethers. Summer means there will be a few, and maybe a few more.

I opted out of many family events because I wanted to avoid conflict with my dad, who is gone now. He and I were on opposite ends of the ideological spectrum, and he was always outspoken about his beliefs. I don't think he ever meant to start any fuss and bother, he just wanted to convince everyone of how he believed.

Add to his firmness, the fact that he was deaf, and whether one agreed or disagreed, one had to shout and make prolonged eye contact to converse. I don't know how it works for others, but shouting, even over innocuous topics, ends up with me becoming angry. Shouting as a physical function, raises the blood pressure, which causes a flood of other reactions.

Anyway, because of the situation, I avoided. Didn't stop my girls from knowing their grandfather, did prevent them from seeing me act like a shrewish lunatic with him.

Now, I see my own daughter mirroring this behavior. Because of work and also because of some personal issues with family members, she has avoided the family get-togethers. No one wants to be involved in a fight, or to be the person everyone in the family fights with or becomes angry over the fighting.
Anyway, she has chosen to abstain from the possibility of conflict.

But she worries about her child not getting to know this side of her family, and the solution Tam reached was the same one I did. To allow the child to attend in the care of another family member. (In her case. me.)

Maybe it's wrong, but it seems to me the best solution. Not in every situation, not for every event, but in general it's a good thing. It acknowledges the importance of family, it keeps up traditions. even starts a new one -- tradition by proxy.

Like all families, we disagree. Sometimes we take sides against one another, and we'll talk to a third member about how stupid so-and-so is about whatever. We can be vicious or angry, or vicious and angry.
But when we get together as a group, we try to enjoy one another's company without conflict. We aren't perfect, sometimes a forbidden topic slips in and someone feels attacked.

We respect one another. We know we are available to each-and-every in at least some way. Making an effort to keep the young ones connected even when we can't teaches them, by example, that family IS important. The events that Family is Fun. No matter if it's you or they who are the stupid or wrong ones. Family IS.

As the worldly world whirls by, as weather wreaks havoc, as all our institutions are besieged, there can be no stronger message to leave our children.

Fear of Phobia

I'm becoming, I'm afraid, a borderline agoraphobic.
No, I have become a borderline agoraphobic.
The becoming I'm worried about is the full blown phobia.

I don't think that will ever happen. I have too many chores and a granddaughter. That should be enough to keep me getting out on a fairly regular basis. And there are doctor's visits for my husband, and going to the pharmacy, and grocery shopping.

Those things should all keep me going, keep me out and about. I'm not so sure they will. Even if they do, I'm not sure that some of those things count. I don't enjoy them. I don't relish going to Walmart after prescriptions. I don't stop at this store or that and peek and poke and just enjoy myself, just enjoy getting out, even though God knows I rarely get alone time except in the car. Maybe alone time isn't really that important, anyway. I can always be alone inside myself. Inside my computer, or lost in a book. (That's not really alone, though. There are people in those books, and some of them are stupider than the ones in real life. Who'd've ever thought that was possible?)

In some ways, I feel I've been heading that way -- this way -- for all my life. I've never been able to easily or naturally speak to other people, sometimes not even those I know well. I have had my electricity and my water shut off because I was unable to make the telephone calls to make arrangements to pay. (Many years ago; not recently.)

But now I leave reluctantly. Not even my writers group holds the same interest for me, because my life has so changed. For a year I had limited contact with the real world.
I had no telephone and no internet. Because of Rex's hospitalization, and his doctor's and medicines, and having to pay other people gas money, the bills got way behind. So there was little talking with anyone, except when I needed something. That doesn't encourage socializing from either party involved. At least I didn't feel that it did. .

No car -- I had to get rides, or arrange rides, everywhere and anywhere. Few trips were worth the trouble. My writer friends were the ones with the most available help, but my sisters were always there also. The writers happen to live and work closer.
But even with their help, I was isolated and alone, and there's too much to handle alone, but I did it.



I did it all, from the safety net of my home.

I'm afraid, often. I'm afraid to leave because I worry about Rex getting sick or falling when I'm gone. Some nights I can't sleep, because I'm afraid I'll wake up and he won't be breathing. I'm afraid to drive anywhere, because what if I'm involved in an accident and get hurt? What will happen to Rex when someone else brings him that kind of news? Who will take care of him while I can't?
My God, what if I get crippled?
What will happen to Rex if I get killed?

Rex, bless his heart, encourages me to go to my group, and to go to family events, if he knows about them. I usually don't tell him, because he won't /can't go. And I don't want to leave him alone for hours at a time. All the what-ifs come alive when that happens.

I can't let this progress. It must not be allowed to get any worse. Even I cannot live that self-contained. There are chores that must be done, errands that must be run. And what kind of example am I setting for Hailey if I turn myself into the Hermit Grandmother? It's bad enough that Pappaw is already that way.

Thank goodness for summer, for the season of picnics and reunions and weddings. Thank God for sisters and friends and other family who will coax me or bully me out of my little blue hole. They, more than anything I can do, are what keeps me straight, keeps me trying. Keeps me on the sane side of the line,

I can thank none of them enough. Ever.

The Summer Sunday Parade

Wrote this a couple years ago; it's a personal favorite. And while it is Easter weekend this year, not Memorial Day, the brrooomms and bzzzes of the neighborhood, raised voices and banging doors makes this selection seem appropriate for Now. I hope you enjoy reading this.

The Summer Sunday Parade

It's quiet in my part of the world today. A peaceful, storybook Sunday morning. So far. But this weekend is the unofficial first weekend of summer, and the 'parade' has already begun,
Not the parades that will be tomorrow -- those are official things, but along with the unofficial meaning of Memorial Day, comes the unofficial parades.
Every town has not only its own traditions, but also its own little habits. Winchester Ohio has one that I've not seen before.

Like most small Ohio towns, Winchester has one gas station and a half- dozen or so churches. The Sunday morning peacefulness is due in large part to these churches. Parking lots overflow, the curbs are 'fully loaded' yet there are no people anywhere, not even annoying loud-mouths on (or off) their skateboards, standing in the middle of the streets blocking traffic.

On Sunday, even the lawn mowers have a peaceful hum. And everyone knows that, because Sunday afternoon in Winchester is the time to take your lawn mower to the gas station. Not take. Sunday afternoons are when we drive our lawn mowers to the gas station.

Yes, the Summer Sunday parade has begun. Church is out, dinner has been eaten, and it's time to fill up the lawn mower for the week ahead. All afternoon, I can sit on my porch and watch as they trickle by. Even with gas over $4 a gallon, it's easier to take out the lawn mower than take out the gas can, put it in car, drive the car, take gas can out of trunk, fuill it up, put back in trunk, drive home, take can out and empty into mower. Besides, it's much more fun to meander slowly down the road, wave to neighbors, enjoy the fresh air and sunshine.

Impractical, yes.
Energy-concious, not so much.
But, sometimes, life should just be savored, and a Sunday drive on a lawn mower fits that definition just fine.

Sandals hurt

Last summer, there was article after article about how wearing sandals hurt your feet, or are bad for your feet. (Yes, just like they keep saying about high heels.) The articles had a lot of bullcrap explanations for why this is so.

Yes, bullcrap. Sandals are not bad for our feet because they lack support -- we were created to walk barefoot upon the earth. Where's there support in bare feet? Sandals are not causing back injury because they make us walk without support. Support for walking is usually a cane or a crutch, although more and more injuries are requiring a 'walking boot' device. (Which might not be needed so often if the patients had ever walked barefoot and let their muscles support them.)

Not one article even suggested what I think is the true cause of sandals causing problems. Not one.

It is the way the sandals are made. No, I take that back. It is the material used in making them. That awful rubber stuff. I don't know what it is, or how it's made. Sometimes it looks to have been rolled out in sheets and cut off to conform to the feet-shapes. Other times it looks extruded or injected between layers of materials.

I don't know if this rubber-stuff is used to make materials last longer, or of there's a delusion of support, or exactly why it's being used. In every pair of sandals designed or created for the last several years.

What I do know is that when I wear sandals with this material, it hurts me. Walking on this bouncy stuff throws my back out, splays my hips (that's how it feels), ties my thighs in knots, and cramps my calves. And that's before I get to the car!

Every time.
Every pair.

The sad thing is, I can't find any sandals that do NOT have this filling. Occasionally I'll run across a pair of huaraches that are made of natural materials, but they are usually beyond my budget.

Let's not blame the sandals for our pain. We could blame ourselves, I suppose, but the real blame belongs to the makers. And to doctors who want to blame us instead of doing what it takes to find the real cause.

Let's walk away from summer sandal pain.

ENJOY!

It's supposed to be 80 today.  Not even the middle of March, and eighty degrees. And it's nice. So often eighty is hot and sticky and just plain miserable.Not today.

Today has that "it's summertime and the livin' is easy" feel to it. Enjoy it while it lasts. If we're getting a comfortable 80 degrees before the middle of March, it's not going to be long before the' hot and sticky' sneaks in. Too soon the eighties will be the uncomfortable low temp, while thunderstorms rumble and tornadoes strike in the night.

I sit on the porch and watch my granddaughter playing in the yard. The grass is green, the trees are budding, the neighbors are dragging out their porch furniture and sorting it into front porch and back porch. It's a sunshiny day, with a kiss of breeze.

It's summertime, and the livin' is easy.
Enjoy.