BOOKS



I've sorted my books and have four boxes to go OUT.  This is a second sorting, as I've already disposed of several boxes full.

Hopefully I'll hve a chance to take them to the bookstore in Bemidji where my daughter Heather lives before I get so totally fed up with all the clutter around here that I simply take them to the dump. 

That bookstore is great!  They'll take your books (the ones in good shape) and use them as a discount on the books you want to buy. 

Depending on how many of the books that are filling my four boxes meet their standards, I figure Heather might be able to get at least a few for herself and Zachary (her son) and Bob (her husband) at a mighty fine price. 

I've got about 350 books left after the weeding out process. 

As my grandchildren learn to read they will inherit most of the older books if they want them, a lot of which I grew up with.

Now that I have spcae on my bookshelves I can begin to gradually search for, buy, and shelve more of the books I really want to have on hand.  Over the course of the years, and all the moves, many of my favorites have been lost or left behind along the way.  It's time to replace the ones I love and find others to add to that collection.

WOOLY BEARS WERE RIGHT THIS TIME

Last fall I posted when I found a wooly bear caterpillar in SEPTEMBER (as opposed to June the year we had an AWFUL winter).

Now that I can be pretty sure that our 'winter' is over I can probably safely say that the little guys were right about it being a nice winter.

I have for a long time paid attention to when I saw them migrating for their winter hibernation - early is bad; late is very good; August is about normal.  Naturally this has been solely my own hypothesis and totally NOT based on anyone else's ideas or logic. 

I used to make the drive to the Valley on a fairly regular basis, which is where I generally saw them, crossing the highway.  Because I think they're cute little things I avoided running over them (as opposed to salamanders, which I WILL run over every chance I get) and so watched for them. 

Then I heard that they are harbingers of the winters, and began paying attention to when I noticed them first. 

Having no idea at the time that the size of the stripes was supposed to be what I was looking at (not to mention that it would have considerably slowed down my drive time had I stopped to examine every one I saw) I just kind of unscientifically noted the general time of year I could expect to have to avoid running over them. 

Now, of course, I have researched the hteory and tend to agree with those who say the stripe is a fair indicator of the winter PAST, not the one to come.  That only makes sense to me. 

HOWEVER ... having said THAT, the fact that I saw none crossing any roads last year until September (the winter before was a terrible one and I was afraid they had all perished) together with the fact that last winter was mild (to put it mildly) encourages me to be on the lookout for them this summer, just to test my personal hypothesis. 

We shall see what we shall see I reckon.  I hope not to see THEM crossing my path until at least very late August, but if I see them any time soon, I'll start getting my wood pile ready, invest in lamp oil and candles, and stock up on other winter necessities.

Garden Update!

I have a beginning on my garden!

In the big flower pot (and I do mean BIG) I planted onions and potatoes, both of which are coming up.  The onions are bigger than the potatoes right now, but that is likely to change.

In the pots I used to have geraniums in, flanking the front door steps, I this year planted carrots, which are coming along nicely although still very small.  They aren't flowers, but their tops are very ferny and will be lovely right up until I pull the carrots!

Beets are barely poking through the dirt in one of the front flower beds; hopefully they'll take off and grow like crazy pretty soon.

Along the back yard fence hang small gunny sacks.  Inside the gunny sacks are big pop bottles with the ends cut off and the tops removed (bottom side up) filled with potting soil and sprouting onions at this point.  I'll add carrots as soon as I get more of the sacks constructed and buy more potting soil. 

Buying more dirt (what a concept - I live in one of the best farming areas in the world!) will also mean I'll be ready to put the tomato, pepper, bean, cucumber, and squash sets into their containers as soon as I buy them.

More dirt will also allow me to expand the tire container up a notch with another tire as soon as those potato plants are big enough (it will be a while yet; they're still pretty little) and then yet another notch in due course.  It's a technique I heard about years ago but have never tried - so this year I'm going to see if it really works! 

I threw some chive seeds into a corner of my courtyard, back by the poppies.  If they grow, I'll have a nice chive plot to harvest when I cook out there.  One definite advantage is that they (like onions) produce pretty purple flowers when they're allowed to grow all the way up.  Round purple spots of color will be great in that corner if they manage to survive and thrive. 

Well For Heaven's Sake!!!!!

Blogs are wonderful things.

I was just reading some of my older posts and realized that I have more to do than I remembered. 

Nothing like a nice long LIST to keep me busy, huh? 

A couple of the things I had almost forgotten about doing are projects that I can do with my feet on the GROUND (as opposed to roofing) so I'm thinking I should maybe get to them on one of these windy days when I don't want to have to depend on my lifeline (a great big rope) to keep me on the roof while the wind tries to whoosh me off of it.

One of the 'back-burner' projects is turning that window into a door. 

Getting it done will:  1)  Give me a very satisfying immediate access to my courtyard, and this is the time of year to thoroughly enjoy it; 2)  Get the door and frame OUT of the kitchen (out of my way, in other words) and into place in the wall where it belongs; and 3)  Allow me to mark at least ONE of my projects off my list in a matter of one day, as opposed to the MANY days it's going to take for most of the rest of them.

Here I've been letting myself feel discouraged at the lack of noticeable progress, and the solution to THAT is right there in front of me every time I go into the kitchen. 

Sometimes I have to wonder about myself.

Back Porch Demolition

Half wall and door area gone.

One set of scaffolding so I can reach the roof.

The floor has to GO!

Beginning a debris pile.

It's a dirty job, but I've got to do it!

Roofless.

The debris pile grows.

Supervisor.



Time For WANT TO ... Enough HAVE TO Already!

2012 MAY

I HAVE A NUMBER OF BLOGS GOING 

One of them is like a catch-all blog, where I tend to put any- and every-thing as I go along, and then eventually go through them all and try to figure out which ones go where. 

I’ve got Shiela Branson, that’s the main one.  Then there’s Poetry, Artwork, Youth Fiction, Photography, and Short Stories.  I’m going to have to start other sub-blogs for my family tree stuff, yet another one for the Vignettes I’ve written along the way, and one where I can post some of the newspaper articles I wrote back when I was doing that on a regular basis. 

In my main blog I have a fairly large number of drafts; I’m trying to garner the courage to put them out there but it’s a challenge. 

At any rate, there are photos that I have to add to a lot of the ones I’ve already got written.  It seems such a CHORE, adding them all. 

Well, geez.  It wouldn’t be such a CHORE if I’d just put them in as I go along.  Yeah, yeah, I know.  I just have to DO it! 

Once in a while I look at the different blogs and realize that I have dozens of things I want to add to them.  I tell myself I’m going to JUST DO IT.  And then I turn around and do something else instead.  There are too many things I HAVE to do; as soon as I get caught up on all of them I’ll be able to do some of the things I WANT to do. 

Hmmm … I can see that I’m going to have to figure out some kind of compromise here.  Right now there’s no BALANCE; except for the rare times I go visit one of my girls, my life consists of the HAVE TO and the WANT TO just isn’t anywhere in the picture. 

So there’s one thing I need to focus on for just a bit I reckon.  Finding a balance sure would be nice.

PHOTOGRAPHIC MEMORIES - EVENTUALLY - I HOPE - BUT NOT TODAY

2012 MAY SORTING OLD PHOTOGRAPHS

I could spend far more time than I have available doing this, let me tell you!

There are several good-sized boxes of photos waiting for my attention, and part of me is eager to get into them!  I want to see what’s there, to have a chance to ‘visit’ once again people who are now gone but whom I still love as dearly as always.

And I have to laugh at myself.  Because I know that I had better NOT give in to that temptation any time soon – there are projects I have to get done before I can reward myself. 

I must be STERN with myself!  I must be STRONGER than the temptation.  I must RESIST. 

Mm-hmmm. 

I’ll do the best I can. 

No guarantees.

One of these days I’ll set aside an entire day for scanning pictures, just to see how big a dent I can make in one day.  I already know it’s going to take a lot more than just that one day, so don’t get excited about immediate results! 

Today I found a SMALL box of old pictures, from my own archives.  That alone took me several hours to go through. 

Maybe it took so long because I was popping into and out of various abodes lining my Memory Lane, spending a little time in each. 

Fear

In 1673 did Maggie say to Bill, "Oh honey, I'm sooo afraid of water you know, and I'm not feeling too well right now, with the baby coming and all, and what if there are no good midwives in New Jersey?  And, you know, Nate and Tommy are only two and three years old, they'll miss me something fierce if I go with you on this trip!  And if they come with us, who will watch them?  I won't be able to run after them, you know, and they really are so VERY active!  I'm afraid for them, and for me, and for the baby, and what if something happens to you?  I really think that it's impossible for me to face all this!  How about I just stay here in Sunninghill where it's safe and I'm not so afraid?" 

No.  Well maybe, but she delivered her third son on March 12, 1673 in New Jersey.  If she was  afraid, she didn't let it stop her.

In, say about 1715 or so, did Beth say to Tom, "I'm scared to leave New Jersey, and really I think six sons are enough children for us, so why don't we just call it good enough, stay where we're at, and be done with it?"

I have my doubts on that one.  Somehow, I don't see Elizabeth Day Branson fearing much of anything, although the time and place  would no doubt have given ANY woman cause for concern.  The fact remains that she did NOT stop at six sons but had six more children, three of which were actually girls - Sarah, Mary, and Elizabeth.  There MUST have been times when she was afraid, but she managed anyway.

In 1735 or thereabout, did Becky Borden Branson say to Junior, or to herself, "WHAT was I THINKING?  I'm NOT cut out for this!  I want to go back to my father's home and let someone ELSE do everything for me!  I just can't DO this any more!" 

If she did, we'll never know.  She did what she had to do and that was that.

The time of Keziah Hough and Eli was just before, during, and after the American Revolution.  Do NOT try to tell me that she never felt fear.  One of the few ways we have of figuring out where Eli was at any given time is by looking at the birth dates of their children.  Those were troubling times in more ways than one.

Still, she made it through and lived to a ripe old age.

In the last part of the 1700's and first part of the 1800's, did Sarah Jones Branson fret John about relocating?  Was she afraid of the pioneering, the traveling from the Carolinas to Ohio to Illinois?  Did the prospect of the frontier frighten her?  Probably. 

She went.  She raised her eleven children during their westward trek; it could NOT have been EASY, and HAD to have been downright SCARY at times.  But she did it. 

The first half of the 1800's belong to AJ and Susannah Wilkinson Branson.  They were in Illinois and things were changing right and left around them.  They both died about ten years after the Civil War wrapped up; relatives must have been fighting on both sides but I doubt neutrality was an option.  The whole thing must have been intense and difficult, to put it mildly.  A nation torn apart; families shredded; loyalties divided. 

Susannah lived through it, frightened though she must have been. 

Emily Francis Cole Branson and Levi get the second half of the 1800's; they were in Illinois still although Emily had been born in Kentucky.  They had eight children born in the 1850's/60's, right during that Civil War Era when everything was so chaotic. 

Emily made it through in one piece. 

Mary Jane McCord Branson and Samuel Levi were my great-grandparents, and the last half of the 1800's was their time.  States were settling, people were moving west, and they were in western Kansas when they were raising their family and they had a potload of kids, including my grandfather.  I can be reasonably certain that there were times that Mary Jane was scared half to death, what with one thing and another. 

Mary Jane did not give up; she did not give in. 

My grandparents were born early in the 1900's and had a very young family during the years of the Great Depression.  Do you reckon maybe Helen Gibson Branson might maybe have been terrified a time or two? 

Helen Gibson Branson did not let fear paralyze her.  Her words to me:  Keep Your Chin UP.

My mother, Wauna Lee Blanton Branson (married Robert Samuel) not only kept her chin up, she took on her world and beat the ever livin' crap out of it.  Not literally, but there's no way this woman will be able to EVER come close to her accomplishments, which she achieved despite some quite very bad times. 

Me, if all I have to worry about is a fear of heights and getting my roof fixed and finished all by my lonesome in spite of being scared, I think maybe I can manage it.  If they could do it, so can I. 

One thing about having a family history, even only one branch of it, is that it helps put things into perspective.  I have bits and pieces of all those women in me, in my DNA, and knowing what I do of the times they lived through, all the things they would have had to cope with - and the fact that they DID cope - well, I'm sure as hell not going to be the first of my line to give up or give in to FEAR. 

So there.

MY MOTHER

She nourished me with her own blood from conception through birth.  She has nourished me with her spirit ever since.
She loved that scrawny squalling little 'blue baby' and kept me alive.  She prayed and an angel touched the hole in my heart that wasn't supposed to be there and it closed up.
She held me and rocked me and walked the floor with me.  She wept and prayed, wept again and prayed some more.
She shared her other daughters with me. 
She read to me the classic books of childhood, and taught me to read.  She understood my anguish over Polly Pepper's stove and rejoiced with me over happy endings. 
She gave me art, precious gift, so very very precious a gift. 
She loved me at my most un-lovable.  She loves me still. 
She made sure I was able to go to college.  She taught me to use my wings and prayed when I used them to fly away. 
She showed me how a woman can ride like a Comanche, tangle with barbed wire, and never even wince at the resulting wounds.  She allowed, encouraged, horseback riding and never EVER told me I couldn't. 
Her voice soared in song.  She gave me music, sweet beautiful gift. 
She drove, and drove, and drove - countless miles to ensure bonding with grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. 
She stayed up more countless hours stitching special clothes. 
Her authority was superceded only by God, although I don't remember any disagreements between the two. 
She cried the day Jack Kennedy died. 
She knows and loves my soul, approves of my spirit, applauds my successes, hugs me through my failures, grieves for my losses, loves me through it all. 
She told me, tells me, that I'm too intelligent to ever be bored. 
She turned me loose outside and wondered audibly at bathtime how much was dirt and how much was tan. 
When I was old enough she gave me summer space, which perhaps saved her sanity as well as mine.
She rejoices in my family.
She taught me to make an awesome pecan pie and to not neglect the blackeyed peas and greens on New Year's Day.  She shares family traditions with me so I will be prepared to share them with the young'ns.
She showed me that no matter what the world throws at you, it's your own kindness that matters. 
She taught me to protect my own self.  Not that I learned it all that well, sigh.  I do, however, know how to take care of  myself, which is not exactly the same thing.
If I asked her a question she told me to go look it up.  THEN maybe we could talk about whatever it was. 
She wanted me to go to Law School, long before all the aptitude tests and interest inventories said so too.  Maybe one day I will. 
She has high standards which I don't always live up to but I do always give it my best shot and that's what counts most. 
She knows what tears my soul to shreds, what pierces the thick steel walls I surround myself with, and is gentle with me.
My mother has other daughters, this is true.  I have only one mother.  I am one of hers; she is my only.
I love you Mom, quite very much.  Thank you.

I Tell Ya ...

Communication is a fascinating phenomenon. 

I once tried three different times to tell someone something that was important to me.

Having had experience with this particular person, I ought to have known better. 

But this was IMPORTANT TO ME. 

It's the ME part of the equation that should have clued me in, but she had just gotten through telling me that if I ever needed anyone she was there for me. 

Indeed. 

So I called her on the phone.  I had something I wanted to talk to someone about and needed her to be there for me, as she had adamantly vowed she would be. 

Unfortunately, my call went out with bad timing.  She TOO had something on her mind that she wanted to talk about.  As the call progressed I realized that the only words I could get in (even edgewise) were brief words of sympathy and support for her. 

I gave up and tried again down the road a piece. 

Second verse same as the first. 

Third verse likewise. 

Eventually I wrote her a letter to which she not only did not respond at the time but in the lo! these many months has yet to refer to (even to acknowledge that she got it, and yes I know she did receive it) in any way, shape or form. 

For a moment I was wondering why this 'incident' came to my mind. 

Then I realized that once again I have something on my mind and was considering giving her a call. 

NOT GONNA HAPPEN.