haiku==dulcimer lady

eyes closed  voice strong
the ringle jingle of  strings
sings old times  to life

silen Sunday with some flowers from the yard

july 19th full moon

First moon after the Solstice, though it doesn't seem like it,  as lightening crackles across the sky, and the heat and  humidity increases, we are inching closer to the cold, bleak days of winter.  The  Buck Moon, a name given to this full moon suggests strength,  this is the month when the antlers of both deer and Moose begin to grow.   In the late fall the rutting season will begin, a new  generation of fawns will begin, as the winter deepens the antlers will be shed, and when spring arrives the fawns will drop, beginning the cycle of life all over again. 




Thunder moon, Lightening moon, Heat moon
Summer Moon, Blackberry Moon, Berry Moon

Hay Moon, , during the first week or so of the month the hay is cut and left to dry for 3 days{or more} and then bailed up for winter fodder. Berries, begin to ripen, raspberries, blueberries and the earliest blackberries are ripe under the Gathering Moon.

The Green Bread moon, is my name for Julys full moon because the heat and humidity always make the bread go moldy.

haiku~~~no doubt

``

Use it up, my toys
wear it out, wagon wheels, tractor parts
made it do, no doubt

Silent Sunday fungi

Go ahead, ask me how I feel

Go, ahead ask me how I feel, I dare ya, because I will tell you.

I might tell you that today I am soaring with the Turkey vultures.  Or that I would rather be asleep.  Who knows what I will say, and that includes my selves, err I mean myself    I could be finer than frog hair, or lower than a turtle in a ditch.  Tickled pink or wondering if anyone got the license number of the truck that hit me.    Somewhere along the life's line, I decided that the standard  response of "fine and yourself?' was a convention of society not an honest answer.  That doesn't mean I believe that a litany of woes is a good answer either...it's good  have a positive attitude and speaking your mind can result in a much more spirited conversation.  Since I don't know how to text I'm forced to us plain old fashioned words, which includes the charms of  inflection  and nuance.


I also love it when people ask me what I am doing, they don't expect to hear making jam, folding laundry, sorting dried beans, they expect to hear "not much" or "nothing"  At one point someone said to me, "I ask you what you are doing because you are always doing something interesting."  I replied something like I was washing the floor.   In fact even those of us blessed with interesting lives have to do some cleaning once in awhile, of course no more than necessary, because housework really is unhealthy, all those nasty cleaning chemicals, falling off step ladders, getting ones finger caught in mouse traps, mouse traps carry Hanta virus!!!  I know this to be absolute truth because I made it up.

But I digress, often actually, my deep and abiding feeling is that "nothing" or "not much" is something  one says to mitigate any sense of interrupting someone's day, on the  part of a  caller who doesn't have enough to keep them occupied.  Or may-be not. who knows?  Especially  necessary on days when one has convinced themselves that they will do some task that they just plain don't want to do.

I know that this picture has nothing to do with what I was rambling on about, but I always liked those little wax bottles filled with sweet syrupy stuff. 

haiku~~~painting with fog

fog close to the ground
painted by the breeze and sun
 ever changing scene

Sorta silent Christmas in July

It's time for Christmas in July again,  with  Christmas sales in stores  and Christmas movies on TV, I am told that the first 'Christmas  in July' was a tactic for attracting customer to ski resort in Australia, where it is wintertime at this time of year,  Christmastime is during their summer.  I  feel certain it's popularity has something to do with the heat and humidity of our summer. 

Breath in the glorious day

Breath in the glorious Day!!!!

The sun warms my face and my aching back, the sweet smell of fresh cut hay, singing birds and tiny little green tomatoes. Breath it in savor it and save it for those long , gray, snowy winter days.  But then breath in the glorious days, with the fresh smell of falling snow, and the soft light filtered by low clouds, the hushed sounds,  save it for the sweltering hot nights, when sweat runs down you face when you are sitting still,  lightening dances across the sky , thunder rolls and finally the rains come.  

Breath in the glorious day,  the smell of soil as the snow melts and the sound of birdsong and  insects wings,   Enjoy the freedom from heavy coats and stretch your legs, walk aboard and watch the earth wake up.   Breath it in and save it for the day when the leaves are falling , rattling down like rain,  the air is crisp and spicy under a brilliant blue sky.  And then save it for the  day when the spring rains.

turn the paths to mud and chill you to the bone.  Breath it the glorious day and save it, savor it .

haiku~~ watching for rain

and still no rain falls

flies are biting, birds calling

air smelling of dust

the woman in this picture is Laura Ingles Wilder

Happy 4th

Travel back with me to a time when being a kid was very different.  Back when the "4th of July" was a kid holiday filled with noise.

The neighbors started off their day by lighting firecrackers, sometime put in tin cans and place under a sleeping sibling's bed.  Considering they were nearly middle aged, ancient by my standards then, and had done this every year for decades, I thought they were pretty darn cool.   There were never firecrackers at my house, which was probably a good idea with a daredevil like me around.

Yes, well, we were content to light those little black pellets that

 when lit with a match  burned and grew into slightly smelly black shapes that looked a bit like snakes, my Dad brought them home in his lunch pail,  we used so many of them,  I can remember going into town on the 4th to buy more because we ran out. And that was a terrible thing!!!!!    The little black marks left on the sidewalk lasted for several months, and that was also a part of their charm.  I tried to save the 'snakes' in a cigar box once, but before long they were nothing but black dust.

If it wasn't raining my Dad would let me put Little American flags into the holders  affixed to the posts on the front porch.  I didn't know why exactly we did that, but I thought it was beautiful, like a parade.  Going to the parade was pretty neat, for a few cents one could get a red white and blue plastic rosette, those pins were worn until they fell apart, right next to our Heinz pickle pins.
  Every house on our street had at least one flag. 

When we weren't lighting snakes we were playing cowboy, firing our cap guns and pretending to hunt down the bad guys or robbing pretend bank so we could be the bad guy.  You always had your cap gun, but rolls of caps were pricy and generally, at least in my neighborhood reserved for the 4th of July.  By the end of the day we all had a fine crop of  red marks and blisters caused by the sputter of igniting black powder,  anyway those kids who were lucky enough to have several rolls of caps did.

We were also afflicted with ringing in our ears from the sound.  But that came in handy later that evening when the deafening fireworks went off.   At some point there were hot dogs and hamburgers, but that was a minor thing because we were all having too much fun to eat.          Lest I forget before the fireworks put on by the city there were the Roman candles and Fiery Fountains set off by the grown-ups for the delight of children of all ages.    Can't forget the sparklers  we twirled and whirled the glowing wire core as the sparks stung our hands and arms. That glowing core that we tossed carelessly could make unwary flesh sizzle or start a fire in the lawn.   One year the newsstand sold sparklers that were a yard long, what a delight that would be, if only the heat they generated didn't melt the wire core sending molten metal dripping to the ground.   One year we hadcolored sparklers, which weren't really colored even if you used you imagination.

The first volley of professional fireworks was set off at about 9:30, to see if the sky was dark enough.  Soon 'Oohs and Ahhs" would echo all throught the valley as the glorious lights exploded, then floated back to earth like so many tiny stars.    Soon the sky filled with what looked to me like glittering flowers, the sound was overwhelming and I could feel it in my feet, and my chest,  and then it was over.
The valley became still , traffic started moving again, the excitement disappeared and couldn't wait for next year.   It would be even better I was sure of that.