A CERTAIN TIME OF YEAR
Autumn in the US Midwest is the painters' time of year. The leaves are turning to their wide palette of hues of reds and yellows. (Anu Garg's A.Word.A.Day – wordsmith.org – featured such words this week: ecru, russet, sorrel….) On the other hand, daytime is usually a brief slit of mostly cloudy skies between periods of darkness. Temperatures sometimes approach freezing. And football games have commercials for
As you will read below, Mrs. T's sister Ruth came for another visit this year, alone this time. She is just about the perfect house guest, very low maintenance. We think she enjoyed her time here because she was away from all the normal stresses that family places upon her back home; Ruth truly enjoys all those grandkids but alone time is nice too.
In addition to the adventures described, the two drove to
The handsome gent you see in a couple of pictures is Ruth's husband Rooney who dropped her off and picked her up as he drove to and from Canada.
On to Mrs. T's story.
My sister Ruth visited us for a little while and she and I had a good time talking over old times. Dan drove us to the Longaberger Basket Company and we enjoyed watching them make baskets. He patiently (or perhaps the correct word is resignedly) waited while we checked out the gift shops and bought a few items we absolutely had to have. Then we went to visit the corporate office which is built to look like a huge basket! I was impressed.
Ruth and I discussed many things among which was the necessity of making lists. We both are list makers, perhaps because our Mother was a list maker. I make lists of things to buy and so on but every week I make THE LIST. This is what I need to do in the next week. I never let it get above 40 things because I know that is the absolute limit. If I have more than 40 things I take a few of the optional ones off. I almost never get the list finished. But if I get it down to 10 or 15 I am doing pretty well. A woman's list should exceed her grasp or what the heck is it for.. One day something came up and I had to spend a lot of time on it.
"Did you mark it off your list?" Ruth asked.
"I can't because it wasn't on the list," I explained.
"Well you should add it to the list and mark it off," my very wise older sister advised. "After all you did it and it did take a lot of work."
This made sense to me. Why had I never thought of it?
One week I went for my monthly shrink visit. I was talking with my counselor about my list. He looked at my list and said "I notice the last things to get done are the things you enjoy. Things like painting and walking in the woods."
"You don't understand the other things are important," I replied.
"Oh I think I do understand," he said.
Hmmm.
Ruth and I called Rita, our other sister, on her birthday. We had a nice talk. Rita seemed quite happy although busy. (Happy _0th Rita! dt)
"You know by the time I get finished doing the things I like to do I never have time to do the things that need to be done on my list," Rita said.
So here's the thing. Why are both my sisters still smarter than me? Am I still the little sister? At least I no longer have to wear their hand-me-down clothes.
One day Dan called me to see a couple of vultures. They were standing on a large horizontal tree limb outside our patio. One would take a couple of hops toward the other and flap his wings. Then the other would take a couple of hops and flap his (or her) wings.
"What do you suppose they are doing?" Dan asked.
I was pretty sure I knew. (And in fact was surprised that Dan asked, given his proclivities.) Ruth joined us and was quite disapproving. She wanted to advise the birds that fall was the wrong season to start a family. At any rate they hung around our house for about three days and then flew off, whether incensed by my unsuccessful attempts to take their picture or impressed by Ruth's logic I can not say.
I have started planting ginseng. This is my get-rich-slowly scheme. Ginseng is a plant that is supposed to be good for you. It grows in the shade of trees and on hillsides. Well we certainly have lots of shady hills around here. The current rate for ginseng roots is $450 a pound! There are people in the area who make quite a tidy sum out of ginseng roots (make that thousands and thousands of dollars). There are two drawbacks. The first is that it takes from five to ten years for the roots to grow to harvestable size. The second is that there are poachers who will come along and dig up your ginseng. (Sort of a plant variation of cattle rustlers.) At any rate I ordered three pounds of ginseng rootlets and have been planting a few every day. If I still remember I have them in five or ten years it will be a nice little sideline. My thought is to keep planting them every year so that in a few years I will have a rotating crop. Dan is pretty dubious about this plan but he has been wrong before. I have signed up for a ginseng workshop at our local soil and water conservation office but by the time of the workshop I will have all of mine planted. If I learn I did it wrong I have no intention to go out and dig them all up again!
We have started packing and planning for our yearly migration to
"Well," Ruth responded, "would you rather have him know you were leaving for two months and still not be ready so that you had to leave a day late?"
That was a stumper, as that would drive me crazy too. (This was in fact what happened with Ruth's husband Rooney).
We each decided we might as well stick with the devil we know, so to speak. I suppose no husband is perfect.
At any rate we are loading up two bags apiece, one carryon and one personal item actually, hoping to cram everything in there so we do not have to check anything. If push came to shove I think we could manage with one carryon full of meds. But some extra underwear is always nice. And shoes - we cannot forget shoes.
This posting has been a bit long in process because we have been prepping for departure since Ruth left. R has lists for that as well. But here are a few pictures from the above adventures including a visit to a garden in
http://www.flickr.com/photos/9151458@N07/sets/72157622423632255/
Hope you all are enjoying the fall season in your part of the world. Happy Thanksgiving to our Canadian friends. And a very special Happy _0th Birthday to BN. Our next report should be from the condo.
Dan and Rebecca
www.casa-de-terrible.blogspot.com
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