The heavens do declare God’s glory, and I love to listen. I live in a flat land with lots of horizons, clouds, moisture in the air and water to mirror the sky. I am always seeing something that nearly takes my breath away, usually when I’m driving. I have to pull over and watch
Notice the question mark after the title. I want feedback from anyone who has experience with blogging as an adjunct to a legitimate business – you go to their website and on the top bar along with “account” and “shopping cart”, etc… there is an option called “blog”. In your experience, who goes there and what are they looking for? What functions should the blog serve for the business? What kind of writing is most effective? I am going to find out the answers to some of these questions through trial and error, probably, but it would be wonderful to hear from some wise ones and not have to re-invent the wheel – just sayin’.
I have the opportunity to write for a small family business (not my own) and am so intrigued by this new challenge I can hardly stop thinking about it. The business has grown steadily over the past few years but now with an upgraded website and the desire to use social media to the fullest, the business blog is soon to be born. I suppose that as I learn about the business, other people might also want to learn the same things. So… is it to my advantage that I know almost nothing about it? I hope so.
Another thing that would help me write for them would be to know if you have ever received an award for who you are or something you’ve done. What did it mean to you to have a tangible object of appreciation, something useful or beautiful, given to you?
I want need crave comments.
Today I will think of all the spent hours of your life that translated into food for my body, clothing to cover me and as much security as you knew how to create. Today I will consider that you started out as a teenage man with little instruction in family life, except that you grew up in a family yourself. I will think about the times you changed your path and the uncertainty you must have felt as you searched for a better way to provide. I will think about why you would fall asleep in your chair at the end of all those long days – not from laziness or drunkenness or escapism, but because you were physically exhausted.
I will realize that as a human you probably experienced sadness, frustration, anger (oh yeah), despair and doubt and yet you never bothered us children with any of it. We had little knowledge of your struggles because you were a man and we were self absorbed children. You taught us how to work alongside of you, but you always worked harder and longer. And yet I can remember that you sang in the barn, and whistled and tried to yodel. You modeled that it was possible, and desirable to enjoy work. You gave me the idea that sometimes when trouble seems overwhelming the best thing to do is just go out and work at something. Sometimes the trouble loses interest and goes away unfulfilled. And at any rate, working is better than worrying.
As you’ve grown older with so many limitations ganging up on you, your persistence to do what you can inspires me (and scares me, but, hey… how can a nearly blind man on a rider mower cause any trouble?) I see you teaching lessons of humility (when Mom is right and you are wrong), lessons of love (when you rub Mom’s feet and wash the dishes), lessons of trust (when you put those unsolvable things in God’s hands). And you still whistle now and then and have Pandora playing on your cell phone, announcing your presence as you go. I honor you for all of that.
Today I will grieve that as a society we have almost lost the concept of honoring our fathers for anything. Temptations are everywhere, expectations are high, psychology focuses on faults and there is nothing that cannot be blamed on a father. I will remember how hard it is to be the head of anything, particularly a family. I will be thankful for you – that you have not run away, that you are my dad, my father.
I was only two steps ahead of a giant lizard who had gained entry into the dorm and was sucking up hapless students as they tried to figure out what was going on. That one had Jurassic Park written all over it.
Last night I dreamed. I probably dream every night but I rarely remember any of them. For some odd reason I remember two dreams from last night. I willed the Jurassic Park one to go away and not come back. It worked and I slept again. But the second dream was different and I hung on to it in wonder.
We, myself, my two girls and my mother, were in a large medical building waiting to be called for appointments. My youngest was only about three and I was carrying her. I was feeling kind of like a mother who has been denied custody of her children and is suddenly reunited. I asked if she wanted to get down and run around but she said no and we hugged closer and smiled at each other. We sat down since the wait was interminable, but we were still content. My oldest daughter leaning against my knee and the youngest snuggled close on the chair beside me. It was the most pleasurable situation and I remarked “this is the way it should be”.
The strangeness of the dream is that we do not have a broken home and I have never been denied custody. My children are grown and live far enough away that I do not see them often but they have moved on in very natural ways. I wanted them to grow up and have lives of their own. They have done that successfully.
It was like a little gift – to have that time back again so vividly – when arms were wrapped around my neck and a small head rested on my shoulder. I’m just sayin’ that I would like a regular subscription to that dream. 
I am a person of excess. I think I’ve always been this way but it is more noticeable now that I have fewer people setting boundaries for me. I have only the husband and myself to please most of the time, and even he is a big boy and can manage by himself. So I […]
Busy people (like me) are able to procrastinate in pretty nearly every area of life. Cutting back on my work schedule allows me the opportunity to look for these “put off” things and experience the wonderful satisfaction of getting them done after months of having them on the “to do” list. If you have never gone through this cycle you are missing out.
Having made great headway scheduling my “every 7 year” physical exam, this morning I turned to the oneacrewoods, which has been… well, neglected at best. If you don’t love nature, gardening, dirt and sweat go read somewhere else right now because you won’t understand.
It’s the compost bin. The compost bin is where you can put all your vegetable scraps, lawn clippings, leaves, etc… in the hope of making new, rich soil. Presumably you are making this soil to put somewhere else where the ground needs improvement. However, if you never do anything but put stuff in the bin, there is not much point in doing it. Ideally it should be fluffed up, turned over and watered once in a while too but I never get around to that. And because I have such a big yard I actually have two compost bins to play with. Lately they have been looking full. I can’t remember that last time I emptied them. It’s a nasty job.
Did you know that cockroaches fly? Did you know that some of them are actually white like albinos? They love, love, love compost piles and when disturbed they take off in flying, jumping swarms to find some new place to hide (up a pant leg, under a shirt collar, in hair, aaaghh!) I have absolutely no cockroaches in my house and I think it’s because I provide this much more favorable place for them to live. I think of it as pest control.
I chopped and shoveled through both my bins (after the roaches left) and there was some pretty good soil in there. I added it to my small garden area which is fallow – fancy word for nothing growing in it – because we are already in the hot season here. Lots of things do grow in this season but not many traditional vegetables. I’m preparing for September when it cools off. One more thing off my list, and truly, it was so beautiful outside this morning that I didn’t even mind the roaches, much.
For the last six years I have not darkened the door of a doctor’s office, except on behalf of my employer. No check ups, no mammograms, no anything. I suppose that is not the best example for a nurse to be giving, but honestly, I feel like I am probably safer and healthier for it. These days it’s almost like doctors feel they must intervene in some way, usually a pill of some kind, or you wouldn’t be coming to them. And many of their interventions come with weird side effects and complications that end up being worse than what you started with. So I’ve been trying to stay away from those places sick people go (waiting rooms, yuck!). There is also the poor excuse of being busy, which I have been, oh and yes, I was also mad at my doctor. When I get poison ivy and turn into a fiery itching, oozing mess and need a prednisone pack to save my life I don’t like being told that they can’t find 10 minutes somewhere in the schedule to write me a scrip. Go to a walk-in clinic? No, I’m thinking – why bother having a family physician if that’s what they’re going to tell me?
But there are some things that need checking up on occasionally, especially since they are in my family medical history. It is time. Actually it is past time, but I would have recognized if anything urgent had come up, right? ’cause I’m a nurse… .
Last month I laboriously went through the process of hunting up a new doctor. Laborious because I can’t just pick any doctor. He or she has to be younger than me so I don’t have to worry about them dying before I do and not being around when I need them. However, that’s not the biggest problem since almost everyone still working is younger than me. Biggest problem is whether or not they are still accepting new patients. I will confess that I spent a bit of time looking for someone whose picture I liked (cause I have to look at them, right?) and whose name I liked (some names sound more dangerous than others… Filesticker? what’s with that? sounds dangerous.). And when I narrowed it down to two possibles, I called and neither one of them were accepting anyone new.
I needed a different process. I started calling offices alphabetically and asking if they took new patients. I ended up with Dr. Kassabov. I don’t know what to think of that name but at least I’m not afraid of it. Bring on the needles, the scopes, the x-rays. It’s June and I want to get this over with. Just sayin’…
Today is a thanksgiving holiday for me. I’m just taking a day off after two weeks and several thousand miles of travel to be thankful for making it there and back once again. I have “that thought” every time I leave home that I might not be back again, ever. I’m not upset or overly morbid about it – it’s more a realization that there is no promise of longevity or a trouble free life given to anyone. Stuff happens, no matter how careful you are.Read More »
So, my employer takes full advantage of anyone going from Atlanta to Sarasota on I-75 in June and asks them to turn off at Georgia exit 142. Five miles west is Lane Southern Orchards. The family has been operating their store/packing company for five generations and it has become a very impressive place, and a wonderful side trip for travelers. Early peaches are being sold now and that is what my employer wanted me to get for her. I had to get a couple boxes for myself as well.
We had some vicious rainstorms during our travel that day and got to Lane Orchards just in time to load up the peaches and have supper at their cafe. My salad was so big I had to divide it into two meals to conquer it. And of course, we had to have peach cobbler, with ice cream. Of course. The husband’s only complaint was that there was too much peach and not enough cobble. I didn’t mind that.
This is the second day since we bought the peaches and they are just starting to get soft enough to enjoy eating. They are soooooo good and if you are local to me you are probably going to want to stop in at my place and have a peach. Do it. I don’t mind.
Back in the tiny, little car (with great gas mileage, ok, I should be thankful) for a full day of travel in the midwest. Wisconsin is a long state going north to south. Illinois is even longer. Adding to it’s longness is the fact that there is very little to break the monotony of the landscape . “Oh, there’s a field! Oh, and there’s another field! Oh, oh, there’s a barn!” It continues like this for hundreds of miles in a mind dulling, flat way. However, it is spring so at least it is green and the fields are planted. In August when it’s hot and dusty and dried up you don’t even want to be there.
As evening rolled around I saw a sign for a Dutch Kitchen restaurant and thought the husband might enjoy stopping for dinner. It was an Amish community of about 3,000 population, Arcola, Illinois. I think a town has to have at least three Amish people to take advantage of the label “Amish community”. Right away the husband is wondering if the reality show with the Amish mafia has done any filming there. We left the interstate and drove into town where there were real brick streets and beautiful, big, old two story frame houses with shady lawns. Main Street was where we found the Dutch Kitchen Restaurant and had our meal.
The husband decided to try out his Penn Dutch heritage on the waitress. He asked for some dish in another language and got a blank, “deer in the headlights” look from the very young waitress who had no clue what he was saying. Of course, this was an opportunity to educate, which he did fairly thoroughly. She came back and asked if she could just bring him a dish of cottage cheese and he could put his own apple butter on it. We repeated the lesson later when the owner came around to check on us.
But who would have guessed that we had landed in a place with such a claim to fame. The pictures on the wall in the restaurant were full of the history of the town, including one from 1898 when a castle built entirely of broomstick corn was erected on the street right outside the restaurant (see pic of pic). They have a broomstick corn festival at the end of the summer. And when I went outside to get some photos of the town I learned that the inventor of Raggedy Ann and Andy was born in Arcola. They have a festival for the dolls every year (see pic below). Two festivals for one town! And there could be more for all I know. The streets and buildings were classic old midwestern town and really quite interesting.
I’m just sayin’ it can be kind of fun to pull off the road and spend a few minutes in some small, unheralded place, on a whim. Do it.
I Just Have to Say... 