Archive for September 2013
Before After
I searched my archives for an image of what the area behind the barn looked like last fall when we arrived here. Do you remember when I discovered the eagle statue that had been hidden beneath brambles? That was right on the corner of the barn. Actually, it was the excavator who pointed out the eagle to me, when he was surveying the area for the project we had in mind.
The new access has turned out very much like we hoped and imagined. Success!
That pine tree in the “Before” image on the left is now back in our brush pile to be burned. We had thought about trying to save it and relocate it, but then the 18″ snowstorm we were smacked by on May 2nd tipped it over and broke the roots. That was the only “keeper” tree sacrificed for this project, and the storm made the decision for us. I cut out a bunch of sumac and trimmed up that butternut tree quite a bit. Of course, the different seasons make the images a less than exact comparison, but you get the gist of it here.
Before
After
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Here is a shot from the day we were working on clearing the brush out in preparation for the arrival of the excavator:
Grass Babies
A new crop of grass has sprouted on the bank where Cyndie was battling Delilah to get her off the new seed. We have been blessed with some rain in the last few days, which is a big sigh of relief, but far from enough water to end the stress our trees are suffering for the second year in a row. The grass seed is able to drink it up because it is so close to the surface. It is really nice to be growing something other than weeds around here for a change.
Speaking of babies, twenty-five years ago today, our youngest was born on the day of our 7th wedding anniversary. September 19th is a special day for us. Thirty-two years ago, the number had no particular significance beyond being the Saturday far enough in September to hopefully have some fall color, yet early enough to hold a fair chance of being pleasant weather for an outdoor ceremony. It was both. In 1988, our day became doubly special with the arrival of our son, Julian.
Happy Birthday, Julo, our other jwh!
Just Know
This deserves to be a blog post. The question posed was about how to stay positive despite the scary amount of negativity in the world. Far be it from me to come up with a concise reply.
I knew how to answer it for myself, but I had to think a moment, about how to communicate my process to another person. It was a wandering explanation, as each insight I explored seemed to spawn another that deserved mention.
What came to me right at the start was that having a positive disposition isn’t something that I do, it has become something that I know. The rest of my rambling response was an attempt to provide enough background to give the words more weight than just a routine platitude. It doesn’t seem logical to me to offer advice along the lines of just needing to “know” that things are not as bad as they appear to be. On the other hand, does it suffice for me to proclaim that they simply need to live through enough experiences to gather the insights I have acquired?
I don’t think I can reclaim everything I came up with at the time, but the simplified version of why I know things are not as bad as it seems is this:
I have overcome a history of depression. I have mended a dysfunctional relationship with my wife. I have almost completely eliminated my exposure to commercial broadcast media. That alone, probably makes the biggest difference on the amount of unwelcome news and energy that was previously bombarding me.
I have become aware of energy that we emanate and absorb. This one isn’t as ‘out there’ as may appear to some people. Science has proven that emotions are contagious. It is easy to notice that a depressed person in the room can bring people down, an angry person will spread bad feelings, and a happy and pleasant individual can lift the spirits of those with whom they interact. I have witnessed the impressive distance our electromagnetic heart field energy radiates, during my time working with horses in Arizona when I joined Cyndie for the conclusion of her apprenticeship training.
Our energy is a powerful force. We should arm it with something positive and profound. I have always felt in my core that love was the vital component of all human interaction. We know to “love thy neighbor” and many of us believe we should love our enemies. I believe love is the way to heal, to bring peace, to raise healthy individuals, and, radiated in advance, to engender best possible interactions with others. Let love be the primary vibe riding on your projected energy field and you shower all in your vicinity with good will.
All of these things combined, provide a sense of knowing, despite all that seems wrong in the world –and think about it, people have been predicting that the ills of the world indicate ‘the end is near’ for eons– we hold unbelievable power for good with our love that can blossom if we alter our focus from all that is wrong, dwell on all that is right, and develop our skills to radiate healthy love in every direction. It magnifies. Love begets more love.
Try it. You can’t help but have a positive disposition when you put your attention to it!
Deflating Balloon
You just never know what you might discover when you step outside your door. After dinner, we headed out to tend to a few last things before the sunlight disappeared completely. I had just moved my car down to the shop garage to load up a batch of cardboard to be recycled, when I noticed a surprising sight on our horizon. A fully inflated hot-air balloon was one field away, just beyond the tree line. It was surprising, because we hadn’t noticed anything at all, and then suddenly, BAM!, there it was, in all its colorful glory. It seemed as though it was on the ground, but not having seen it coming or going, I couldn’t tell for sure what was going to happen next.
I didn’t have time to even get my camera pointed when it became obvious that it was being deflated. I took this shot as fast as I could, catching but a hint of the shrinking balloon, and a pair of moons in the fading light.
Pet Pics
Maybe I am compensating in advance of getting horses, (because I expect to be taking a lot of pictures of horses in the near future) but I found myself taking a fair number of pictures of the dog and cats this past weekend.
It is not uncommon to find the cats napping on our bed in the afternoon. Most of the time, they pick their heads up when we enter the room, but every once in a while, they are so zonked out they fail to stir, even if we are being noisy. That happened Saturday, and I was in and out of the room several times when I decided to grab the camera and capture Mozyr with his paws all curled up. On the second image, he managed to open one eye to see what was going on.
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Delilah was being a fun playmate and playing tug-of-war with me. I prefer chasing her when she plays keep-away, because she always gets me laughing, but she often morphs that game into tug-of-war by finally running right at me and getting me to grab whatever she has clutched in her jaws.
We continue to exercise her to condition her to come when called. For the most part, she appears to be responding well. That doesn’t preclude her from still wandering into the neighbor’s field if we lose track of her for too long. It makes doing chores a little more complicated, because when she is off-leash, we need to pay almost constant attention to what she is doing.
She tried to be all innocent, on one occasion when she took a long time to return, but her feet smelled so bad from the manure that had been spread on the field, it was a dead giveaway as to where she had been. That earned her one of several baths she ended up getting over the weekend. I captured a shot of her in the sun, revealing some of the wave her coat gets when wet.
It’s Sunday
It is Sunday, and we’ve got more things on our mind to accomplish today than there is time to achieve. It is both wonderfully exhilarating, and frustrating. Luckily, we are pretty used to this scenario, and tend to roll with whatever pops up, consciously choosing to not let it frustrate us too much when we don’t get it all done. Not being able to get it all done is one of the reasons it has taken us this long to get where we are.
At the same time, we frequently hear messages that we have accomplished a lot in the short time we have been here. It is a relative perspective, eh?
Last night, Cyndie got a text from her niece, questioning whether we had gotten horses yet. No, not yet.
I’ve been dabbling with getting a web site created for Wintervale Ranch and creating a logo. I know what I want, but need to learn more of the functional manipulation of vector graphics and using Adobe Illustrator, which somehow Cyndie has on her computer. I think that is funny, because she has no idea how to use it. I know just enough to quickly get entirely frustrated (gee, there’s that word again) over not knowing how to achieve the outcome I can visualize in my mind.
I need to learn how to properly manipulate files to load our Wintervale site with pages. Time in front of the computer screen is time away from the work that remains to be done on the property. (And time on the computer doing Wintervale web site work is time stolen from composing Relative Something posts…)
Yesterday, Cyndie brought home additional panels for Delilah’s outdoor kennel. We want to expand it to give her enough space to be comfortable relieving herself in a spot that is away from her “living” area. Currently, it appears she waits all day for us to let her out, which really defeats the purpose of her having an outdoor kennel.
Delilah is doing great, by the way. We have mostly kept her leashed since her run into the neighbor’s field where she found the carcass that kept her from heeding our commands to return. We are exercising her on returning to our calls, providing treats and praise when she obeys. Repetition, repetition, repetition. She is a great dog, and excellent companion, so it is well worth our effort.
The cats are less enthralled with a canine companion, but they are making the best of the situation. Since the dog is mostly confined to the front room of the house, I am always surprised when I find her balls in the bedroom or bathroom. I think the cats enjoy being able to confiscate them. I have caught Mozyr eating out of Delilah’s food bowl more than once. When the dog’s away, the cats do play.
We have noticed evidence of a bat in the house (droppings and scratching in an inside wall), but have not seen any in flight, lately. As the season continues to shift toward winter, I wonder if the dog and cats will deter the likely onslaught of bats and mice, in case we get anything like what stormed our fortress last year.
It’s Sunday. I’ve got to get out and join Cyndie in some work. Hope you enjoy your day!
Soil Sample
There are some places on our property where we have some really nice black dirt for top soil, but this isn’t one of them. This spot, on top of the ridge of our front field, is beneath a gate in the fence that was just completed. To connect the electric fence across the opening where there is a gate, they dig a trench and bury a wire. I was looking down at the filled-in trench and captured this shot to show the clay of our soil.
Precious Present
Our fence contractor called the other day and during our conversation he asked if we liked dill pickles. Of course we do! But do we like them a lot? That’s a hard thing for me to measure. How much is a lot? Next time he stopped by, he unveiled a gift of a gallon jar filled to the brim with fresh homemade dill pickles. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a jar of pickles that big. It looked like A LOT!
After Cyndie and I unsealed the jar, we quickly decided that it probably wouldn’t be enough pickles to last us very long. There is something about them being homemade, produced locally, by someone we know, presented to us as a gift, that enhances the essence of a food beyond anything a commercial product could ever achieve.
I think there is a feature related to the fact that there are so many pickles, we are subconsciously moved to grab two every time the jar is opened… because there are plenty! We happily oblige the urge.
By the way, the fence around the front field was completed yesterday. That’s a milestone I was wondering if we would ever see. We’ll take a breath and then start plotting our next phase. We are contemplating whether we have it in us to take on doing some of the next fence work ourselves. The main disadvantage I see in such a plan is that we’d lose the opportunity to be the beneficiaries of some pretty spectacular homemade foods.
Tom and Sue Sherry of Best Built Fence Company have been very, very generous about sharing produce and custom concoctions from their personal kitchen. It is a wonderful gesture, and has produced some very precious presents for us over the past 10 months.
We are hoping that we have made a connection with them that will last well beyond our initial client/contractor relationship. Looks like we are off to a good start, as we have been invited to their “booya” at the end of this month.
Relative Something 