Posts Tagged ‘photography’
Relative Calm
For the most part, calm prevails on the ranch as we settle into a routine of rest and healing for Cyndie. With neither one of us needing to go anywhere, we can operate at a very comfortable pace, guided by the regular intervals of animal feeding times which I must act on.
Cyndie is capable enough now to take care of many things herself, so I don’t need to constantly be in her immediate vicinity. Plus, we continue to be blessed with the added assistance of her mother’s occasional visits, or the home-care nurses and physical therapist.
We received a dusting of snow after last weekend’s melt, making our views a bit more photogenic again, at least for this time of year. I was going through a bit of a picture-taking drought for a while there.
After walking Delilah yesterday morning, I grabbed my camera and headed back outside to see if I could capture some of the scenes that had caught my eye moments earlier.
The horses were so content, messily chomping away on the hay in our two feeders, that I was moved to take some extra time and linger among them. Both Legacy and Dezirea had rubbed their manes into a tangled “braid” that defies logic. I have yet to see how they do it, but it is a recurring phenomena —more so for her than him. They tolerated my interest in detangling their hairdos, continuing to munch at the feeder while I worked.
Delilah patiently waited for me in the barn, where I left her while getting hay. It’s a good day when she quietly waits for me there while I feed the horses. Too often I feel rushed to get back because of her sharp barks of protest for being left longer than she wants.
The only other thing that has disturbed the peace and quiet we’ve been enjoying is an invoice that came in the mail from the city of River Falls. In addition to needing to pay for the towing and repairs to the truck after Cyndie’s little rollover accident, we are also responsible for paying the public service emergency responders for responding. It costs $500.00 to have an accident in River Falls. It adds insult to injury.
Don’t do it, folks. It is not worth it. That money is better spent on groceries. It irks me to no end that they show up and park their cars with flashing lights while the tow truck works, and then bill you five hundred bucks. If they are going to charge you, they should at least inform you, and give you a choice of having them respond or not.
Talk about a dis-incentive for calling for help. Something is seriously messed up if our tax dollars are not sufficient to fund public services. And they have a monopoly. We should have a choice of more affordable options. If they want to charge for services, then privatize it and let us shop for a responder who charges the fairest price.
I told Cyndie that she is not allowed to have any future accidents in or around River Falls, WI. We can’t afford it. We’ve got horses to feed.
Speaking of the horses, that reminds me, it’s time to go back to grazing. I’m going to return to that place of calm. I don’t have to pay an extra fee to do that.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Where To?
As I strolled up the driveway yesterday afternoon, the eagle statue caught my eye and it occurred to me that I should consider moving it for the winter. We have placed it in a spectacular spot at the top of the driveway, but during the snow season that spot is right where plowing pushes the snow.
More than once last year, I accidentally hit the poor guy with the blade.
In pondering another location for the statue, I had difficulty coming up with someplace that didn’t also involve snow being dumped. There’s not a good place where it would still have its deserved prominence, yet be out of the way of clearing snow.
I suppose I could find a spot for him somewhere down by the labyrinth, but I’m a little afraid that if I did that, we’d never get around to moving it back up the hill again after the snow is gone, to this great perch by the driveway.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Image Option
There are times that I discover I have no story to tell when I sit down to write a post for the day, and frequently those occasions produce poems. Today I’ve got neither. That’s not unprecedented. I have been known to pull out a 3rd option when words come up short. A photo fills in nicely. I recently captured our Lamium purple dragon perennial ground cover with lingering flowers maintaining color amid the encroaching brown of fallen tree leaves. It does well to depict the straddling of seasons currently on display within our landscape. I like how the shadows at the bottom produce hints of dragon-like shapes.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Accepting Darkness
At our latitude, the steady transition from the extra daylight hours of summer, to the lengthened hours of darkness in winter, really begins to have an impact during the month after the autumnal equinox. That doesn’t take anything away from the initial anxiety that strikes when the trend begins to become apparent in the latter part of the summer. They are just different stages of the same phenomenon.
We tend to whine and moan when we notice the sun setting earlier and earlier, but day-to-day, the change is negligible. Early in the season, the impact on evening activity is minimal. Then all of a sudden, there comes a point when it seems like it is dark as night outside, and preparations for dinner haven’t even been started.
That happened to me yesterday, and I noticed a sensation of acceptance wash over me. Long hours of darkness are the way it is going to be for the next 5-months. Deal with it.
Somehow, I seem to find a way. Similar to how I now find myself automatically picking out a long-sleeved shirt every morning and accept it as routine, long hours of darkness becomes just the way it is for a while. It becomes normal.
Normal is definitely a relative perspective.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Autumnal Magnificence
This fall we have been blessed with an enduring array of spectacularly colored leaves, enhanced with a run of some wonderfully sunny, blue-sky days. I’ve been remiss in taking as many photos as the scenes deserve, so I made a point to find my better camera and go for a stroll yesterday.
We didn’t end up getting enough growth in our hay-field to warrant a second cut, so we have granted the horses full access for the past week, encouraging them to give it a final trim.
I walked out there with Delilah (on a leash <frown>) to break up some of the manure piles yesterday, and was able to linger among the herd for a while. I think it is funny that the shots of the horses didn’t catch the colorful leaves. It almost looks like two different seasons.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
New Fence
How many times will I say this? We have another new fence! Yesterday, they hung the wires on the posts creating the fence that surrounds our back grazing pasture. I discovered it is a case of “be careful what you wish for” because we have been wanting this fence for about a year, and now that I stand beside it, I feel a bit of a shock to have my ability to freely traverse that field impeded. What was I thinking!? (*start singing “Don’t Fence Me In*)
Honestly, it is going to be a special feature that will allow us to simply open a gate to give the horses somewhere to go when the paddocks become too muddy. In addition, it will grant them convenient access to what will be our primary grazing pasture. Also, it looks incredibly slick. I’m almost a bit embarrassed about how good it looks. I guess I’ve grown too accustomed to the look of the t-post temporary fences we have had to rely on prior to this.
I stood in the middle of the south run and took pictures in both directions, east and west, and have merged the results into one image. It is a bit of an optically disorienting look, making it seem as though there is a corner in the middle, but I like how it provides an equal view at the two opposite directions.
Today they will finish the installation by burying a wire beneath the gate openings to complete the electric circuit, and then they will hang the gates. We are recycling gates that were left here by the previous owners.
Our horses will be so happy!
I will be happy, too, but with the horses having so much access to pasture now, I will need to become more intentional in my efforts to get out and redistribute the manure drops they leave lying around. In the paddocks, we remove them, but in the pastures, I can get away with just breaking them apart with a rake or a good swift kick. I just need to get out there and do it.
This is one of the reasons that keeping some chickens remains on our radar. We have been told that they automatically spread out the piles by scratching for larva. You get a 2-for-1, because they help control the fly population while breaking up the manure droppings.
See how that works? I go from talking about a new fence, to getting chickens. I have come a long way from that life in the suburbs, don’t you know.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Relative Something 