"The best rooms were on the left-hand side... for these were the only ones to have windows, deep-set round windows looking over his garden, and meadows beyond, sloping down to the river." ~ J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit Things that made me happy in July: Tim's Fourth of July party, and how he is the Gandalf … Continue reading Sunflowers, Potatoes, & Cherry Tomatoes
May you wake to the sun that wakes the bees in their boxes and by which you can see your work and spot the queen laying her eggs in golden wombs of light. May you hear the hum of all twenty-nine colonies and may it harmonize with the song of the robins and the breeze … Continue reading For the Beekeeper
One Sunday morning last summer, I came around the corner to the coffee pot to find Sammy and Mr. Bill looking befuddled. When Sam saw me, she said the words squash bugs, and at once, I understood. Any gardener in July would. “My zucchini plants were beautiful,” she said, “and just like that--- gone.” “I … Continue reading The Mortification of Squash Bugs
The pond shrinks this time of year, when at high noon, the sun brings all the water scraping away from the muddy banks and leaves them to crack under the sun. Papa Jay uses the drought season to find the holes where the pond leaks, and he has done so for many years. A leak … Continue reading But the Sea is Not Full
"And I think to myself, What a wonderful world." ~ Louis Armstrong Things that made me happy in June.... Reading Anne of Green Gables to Elsie in the hammock Memorial Day cornhole, Spikeball, and Frisbee Late phone call in the hammock and a bright moon in the branches A buttoned skirt and white hair ribbon … Continue reading Roadtrips & Ragtime
“Today is the longest day of the year,” Mom would say one evening late in June, then shoo us out the back door to drink up every last drop of light, because, she said, the evenings would only be getting shorter from now till December. So I’d lie over the swing after dinner, brushing my … Continue reading The Longest Day of Light
The carnival tent on Fifth Street was as hot as an air balloon. The old men wore shiny shoes, and there was one woman in a dress with piano keys all over it. Ragtime wafted from pianos all over town—from the mainstage on Fifth; from somewhere up in the banisters of the Bothwell Hotel lobby; … Continue reading It Began in Sedalia
Good writing is many things, and you won’t often know until you’ve wrestled it yourself and pleaded like Jacob, "I won't stop until you bless me!" Until you’ve wadded up a few hundred pages and given up on all the stories you began, only to be socked with inspiration when you least expected it. I … Continue reading Good Writing Is
"And on the banks... there will grow all kinds of trees for food. Their leaves will not wither, nor their fruit fail, but they will bear fresh fruit every month, because the water for them flows from the sanctuary. Their fruit will be for food, and their leaves for healing." ~ Ezekiel 47:12 Visiting the … Continue reading Honeybees & a Wildflower Market
There were many things I did not know about Helen McCallie, but none of them surprise me. For one, I didn’t know she had hiked across Central Africa as a single woman in the sixties. I didn’t know she played classical piano, or that she attended the opera--- though I remember how her laugh sounded … Continue reading Goodbye, Helen
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