..Knee deep in water

 

fire and water

When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze

Isaiah 42  

These days I feel like I am in the middle of a smoky leaf pile as it is just starting to be a full on fire and my legs are in water 2 feet deep and rising..

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                                                            Jelly Roll and Celine Dion

                                                                                        

fire and water 

  

My Hometown

T racy Chapman and Bruce Springsteen "My hometown"

 It is July and harvesting is stirring things up in Pike County Illinois. Tractors are on the road; pickers are going down rows to collect the summer's corn.  Hay balers are out in the sun, stacking bales, and sweating up a storm.

My mother always spread a table of sweet corn, meat loaf, mashed potatoes, tons of foods.  And then, she laid out her pies.  Four pies?  I don't know.  I was the bus boy, the dishwasher, and the general cleaner.

What wonderful memories.

                                        Crosby, Stills, and Nash  1970s

 Our home.  Our house, Our hometown. Even though we have grown, moved on, have our own house those videos are in my mind.

 Jason Aldean   Try that in a small town.

 I grew up on a farm surrounded by corn fields, and a smattering of small towns. Without a doubt, every farm has at least a double barrel shotgun, a rifle, and maybe a handgun. Wild animals and wild dogs roamed and attacked livestock throughout the year, even a farmwife could stand with the farmers.

I once joked that if the BLM came rolling to our town, there would be roads of tractors and trucks blocking every entrance. On those and on buildings throughout the business town there would be hunting rifles in the hands of farmers. 

Now, I have no jokes about this being cast as offensive, "Try that in a small town".

See what you think.  I am curious. 

 

Fly information cards and buckles

  

What year is this flight? 

Having 2 grandchildren who live in the other side of the world and 3 toddlers on the other side. makes giving hugs and kisses to be overwhelming.  Flying to Switzerland: 11 hours, and to Chicago 5 hours was much easier ten years ago. 

The flight crews make life interesting. Lord knows, life needs these talented people. 

Nothing else can be said about this post. Enjoy, and wonder about our time on an unending flight. Next time we fly, I seriously told my husband that we are taking first class, or at least I am taking it. I don't know what he will do.

 

Times Have Changed

The world is a scary place in this generation.  Perhaps it has always been scary, but in the 1950s, it did not seem so. 

“Baby Boomers” all share stories of the freedom we had in riding our bikes from the house to remote places, returning only for meals.  The neighbors knew us and we knew them.  We also knew who the strangers were.

Technology gave us radios and televisions, which opened a world view known by our parent after a horrible war.  Documentaries showed us what happened beyond the streets of our town.  We didn’t know, we just hadn’t known.

Recently my daughter shared a video that details perhaps the scariest and frightening of all the world has shown us.  Here it is:

In all the scariest experiences seen in our time on earth, this is the closest to home.

Six Sentences: Patsy

Source

Patsy shivered in the new home, despite the heat and the friendliness of the other occupants and the happy sounds, despite the good food waiting for her, despite…everything.

She had never, in her whole life, been in a place where she was welcomed and where nothing was expected of her.

Someone approached her and Patsy reflexively ducked her head and curled up, waiting for the first strike and subsequent kick, over and over again.

Instead Patsy found a kind hand and quiet reassurances that she was home, that this was now her home: love, friendship, food, and a warm bed were hers if she wanted them.

If she wanted them?

Patsy licked the offered hand and gazed into the gentle eyes, with her tail wagging for the first time in a long time.

This is a post from 5 years ago, when I started to feel a sense of confidence as a writer.  

Yellow Sky

Source:costiq

Dan watched a mustard yellow sky and listened as sounds of birds silenced.  Rain had been pelting grain fields hard the past few hours with wind sweeping across the farm.

He had always been known for his honesty and degree of readiness in storms like this.  The last time the sky was yellow and the air heavy, Dan recalled how specific he had been about getting the family to safety, telling them what to do when the tornado touched down. 

Back then the funnel had lifted his heaviest truck and ripped the bottom carriage right off, flinging it to the neighboring farm.  Tornadoes flagrantly pass through, shredding a life’s work in a matter of seconds.

Dan watched for Jenny and the kids, praying for them to be safe.  As he headed to the shelter, the old Toyota tore into the drive.  “Now!  Get in now!”

Dan wrapped his arms around Jenny and his children in the shelter as the roaring monster touched down.  “Safe. Safe…” They all prayed.

Source: Photonut

Many thanks to Delores @Under the Porch Light  for her challenging words.  Please please please check her site for other participants in her Wednesday Words.

Tornadoes are horrific terribly destructive monsters of nature.  Many fellow bloggers have been affected by them.  Always pray for those in the path of a tornado.

What Do People REALLY Need?

What do people really need?  Need to have a satisfying life?  Nothing is said about happiness, but simply satisfying?

This is a tough question, since it has so many possible answers.  Here is a starter list:

A place to call home

A good memory to which to cling

A Plan for their life

Hope

Friends and love

Source

Minions (I saw “Despicable Me”with gr-kids; it was awesome!)

Source

A place in which to play freely

A tunnel through which to escape (Despicable Me)

Source

Safety

Kindness given and received

Okay…What do you think one needs to have for a satisfying life?  What would you add to this list?

·.

Home!

All through my adult life I have known there were options, if I ever needed to make a change and make it quickly.  I could close my eyes and see my parents’ home on the farm, and know that in a matter of hours, I could be there.  I could go home.

No matter what happened, the image of home hung in my mind, and I could face anything.  Just knowing that helped me find ways to work through a harsh situation or painful reality.

Built in 1860s, I think

Home meant that my mother would be making a pie in the kitchen and my father would be pulling into the driveway on his John Deere tractor.  We would sit at the kitchen table and talk, drinking cup after cup of coffee.  Dad would tell a greatly embellished story which I had heard a hundred times, but my children would listen to it and laugh.  He would sit with his long legs in front of him, and his feed cap tilted to one side, rakishly.  My mom would laugh, and hold one of my children on her lap, helping him/her to eat that last piece of pie.

Our old barn, wooden nails and all

Home meant that we would sleep upstairs with the windows wide open.  The silence would be broken only by a dog’s bark, or the sound of the hog feeders opening and closing.  I would listen to the sounds an old farm house makes.  I used to think that the old house would groan at night because its joints hurt; maybe they did.  My children would be safe in bed while I struggled with the dilemma that sent me running home in the first place.

North porch, Dad's boots

The old cistern and Mom's cactus

But now I find myself in a peculiar time of my life. The place I always called home is gone.  Gone.  When my father retired from farming, they left the farm and moved into a nice house in town, near wonderful neighbors.  The farmhouse was bulldozed away by new owners who built a modern home, and it won’t groan at all.  The house in town, which held together the concept of home, is now up for sale, along with all the precious things that defined home for me.  My parents are together in heaven, their new home.

So now my generation has the role as the keepers, the guardians of our own children’s concept of home.  My home is the place they will close their eyes and picture at the desperate times of their lives, and feel a rush of relief.  They can come home.

Now, I close my eyes and hear the sounds of my own home, enjoy the memories of my children running through the hall and eating my pie at my kitchen table.  My home.