Slow Summer

This summer is proving to be slow and uneventful. Lack of money is the main reason. I don't even drive to the nature reserve because I don't want to use up gas. I suppose I could go to our local arboretum but since they sold off 30 acres to be developed into shopping centers that means only 2 trails worth walking and I've walked them to death. The third trail (with the bird sanctuary) now looks at the back side of a hardware store and even the birds stay away. I might take in the local park but all too often there's trash floating in the pond. The current owners don't keep it up very well and the employees spend their day finding a spot to parc their trucks and sleep the day away. Quite a disappointment.
I do manage to sit in the back yard and observe the nature around me. This summer I've enjoyed watching the birds teach their young to get their own food. I.ve had my feeders a few years now and it seems as if my place has become a 'family tradition' for many birds. The grackles bring their young, hop around, pick up food, place it in their mouths and then the young attempt to pick up. Once in the beak, however, they don't quite know what to do with it. The mother will take it, chew on it, give it back. This goes on until the baby figures out he has to chew his own food. They seem quite excited when they finally figure it out. Blue Jays, on the other hand, fly to the tree and call out to the young. They want them to zero in on their call to find their way to the tree. They squak back and forth for sometime. I suppose they will get it right in a day or so.
That's about all the excitement I've had this summer. The weather has been quite cool these past few days. If it keeps up it will be good weather for sitting around a campfire at the weekend.

Allison's Debut

My neice, Allison was in her very first play Saturday night. Civic Theatre's production of Little Women. The very first time she tried out for a play was The Hobbit. That was a few years back. This time she had inside contacts. She was working as a volunteer to help paint the dressing rooms and such. A project she chose on her own when she had to pick some sort of public service after being elected class president. All of the kids in her school like her with the exception of the girl she beat on the race for the presidency. They used to be best friends and now the girl won't talk to her. Some pre-concieved notion that since she's an honor student (a grade ahead of her own age even) , top of the class and all that, She sould have been the one chosen for president. There's no honor in being a sore loser. Back to the play. She only wanted to try out for a small part because she didn't want to get her hopes up and she just wanted to go on stage. Her friend (a different one) wanted to try out for one of the lead roles. She didn't get it but Allison did. She got the role of Beth, the shy sister who becomes ill during the play. Perfect part for a beginner. It's easy to be shy your first time in a play. She didn't do too bad her first time out and she did a real fine job playing sick.

Troupe brings beloved classic to life pal-item.com Palladium-Item

Does anybody really read these things? Perhaps my life is so dull anyone who might begin to engross oneself in something I've written would fall off into deep slumber. Like Rip VanWinkle.

A neighbor of mine, working on a school project, had to enter view people on their experiences with death. It brought back quite a few memories. The two that stand out are the deaths of my brother and my father.

When I was 20 I had a dream. In this dream it was dark and rainy and there was sorrow in the air. My mother couldn't stand on her own so I walked on one side of her and my brother the other. It was a short dream but in the morning I awoke with a sense that something tragic was about to take place and I would need to be strong. Two days later, in the wee hours of the morning before daybreak, there came a knock at the door. My grandfather had answered. It was the police come to tell us there had been an accident. My older brother was walking home from a bar (he always followed the tracks home) and had passed out on the trussel and been hit by a train. I knew this was the tragety my dream had foretold. It was as if I had swithched gears and became another person while deep inside I felt ill about it all. My mother was living in another state at the time but when she arrived she could hardly walk due to an injury sustained to muscles in her back. If not for the dream I don't know if I could have been as strong through it all as I was. The year after that we lost my grandfather to an annurism. I was with him when it happened. The ambulence came. Nothing could be done. He had known about it but didn't tell anyone. The year after that my grandmother passed.

Five years ago my father passed away of a heart attack in his home. I had called him to let him know I was on my way to pick him up for our Tuesday lunch and he didn't answer. I knew something was wrong because he looked forward to our visits. When I arrived at his door I didn't even knock. I slowly turned the key and opened the door when my worst fears came to be. He was face down in his chair. I had worked four years in a nursing home and had seen death up close before. I calmly went to the building secretary and told her what had happened. They were very upset. He made a lot of people very happy. Not only his cheerful personality and his music but he helped a lot of people overcome addictions. All the irritable early mornings I used to awaken to the sound of a piano as he would play notes as they came from his soul and write them down on paper are now very much missed. When I miss him all I have to do is play arecording of his music and he's there. I'll always remember the sound of his voice as he read A.A. Milne to me as a child and how I would have to move my legs twice as fast to keep up with his strides on our walks to the college campus and back.

The tree swing on campus. He would always push me in it.