In Memorial

Yesterday was Memorial Day, so as we do every year, my DH and I made our way over to the services to remember the veterans who died fighting for our county.

I've always found this a hard holiday. I certainly don't see it as a celebration. I view it as a day of mourning. Many of my family have served in the military. Many are serving now.

On Memorial Day I think about my family and my neighbors families and all that we have lost. Not a happy occasion.

But a good time to reflect and remember.

Dreary

9 times out of 10 I can find the "good" out of my day. From a latte to our pup, there's always something that makes that silver lining.

Today was the 10th day. I was reminded today of everything that is horrible and awful about living in the city, the worst of commuting and the abject evil that is within some people.

I'm not sure what tomorrow will bring. But hopefully since I've spent today living "the 10th day", tomorrow will be one of the nine!

Take Me Out to the Ball Game

This weekend our local farm team faced off against the neighboring town in a battle for glory on the diamond. Well, not really. It was a nice friendly game.

It was special because for the first time they had a real scoreboard that lights up! The money was raised by the volunteer fire department in a baseball tournament honoring one of our town's long time baseball fan/umpire/cheerleader/all round good guy.

Even though it was lightly raining, a good sized crowd showed up for the dedication ceremony and stayed for the game that followed.

The admission was free, the hotdogs were delicious and a good time was had all around.

This is one of the things I love about living in our bucolic manor. Watching a ball game on a beautiful afternoon and chatting with friends and neighbors.

Texture

When I look at things in the city it can be overwhelmingly homogenous. Everything blends together. It's almost too much to take it all in at once.

But each little piece of it is done with artisanship and care. Someone took the time to design it, to build it, to make it last for years with heavy wear and tear.

When I look at the small pieces it really has a beauty to it that for the most part seems to go unnoticed.

Waiting

Even with so much going on in my life these days, I still find the time to wait. Wait for the train, the bus, the bathroom sink. There seems to be an abundance of time built into every day just for waiting.

I suppose that someone somewhere has figured out how to use all of these little minutes effectively. Adding them up until they amount to something worthwhile.

Me, I'm enjoying the waiting for now. It's my peaceful moment stolen from the rest of a busy day. A chance just to notice something not on the schedule.

Right now I can use a little waiting.

New and Old

I'm finally getting a chance to get out into the gardens and do some cleaning up, pruning and weeding.

Part of me is loving being outside and seeing such immediate results from the work, but the other part of me is screaming NOOOO!!!

Again this year I am faced with the realization that I love gardens, but could really do without the whole gardening thing.

I HATE WEEDING.

Okay, time to get over that and get some more weeding done.

In the News

One of the great things about this blog and having done the "post a day" for a year was that it really gave me a chance to practice my writing skills. Not that I couldn't write if I had to, just that it would take me a long time to write anything.

And then edit it.

And rewrite.

And edit some more.

So having finished the year of posts, I have a lot more confidence in my ability to kick out an article for the newspaper

And that's just what I did.

It's not my first one, its actually my third! But I felt good about how it sounded and I was able to just sit down, focus, and write it up. This one is in the garden club lectures. The others were about a yarn crawl and training dogs. I know you probably don't think they're related, but in a way they are. Dogs need training to stay out of the garden and what better way to train a herding dog than with sheep from which wool comes. See! It all fits together. Sort of.

Well it's a happy day at any rate because my article made it into the paper. Not the front page - more like page 8 - and I think that's very cool!

Light & Shadow

Sometimes my day is all about contrast. The obvious one is country vs city. Flowers you can pick vs flowers you can't. Grass you can walk on vs grass you can't touch. People who drink from coffee cups vs those who use them for a wallet.

Sometimes I spend a lot of time thinking about these differences and the depth of each situation. Who decided that those flowers needed a fence around them? Why would you let someone walk on your lawn especially in spring when you could really do some damage? What is so different between the man drinking from the coffee cup and the man holding it out?

Sometimes it's not so clear. I look at one thing and see another. Like this fire escape. I could have sworn it had a little angled side. I had to look again before I realized it was just a matter of light & shadow.

Go figure.