This Week's Firsts - Spring 2009
photo credit: Carolyn McDonald
~First frog calls in the pre-dawn morning
~First sighting of snake trails across the dusty gravel roads
~At the Prairie Preserve during my morning’s gaze to the N, S, E, W, sky, and ground, I put my bare hands into the yellow thatch of prairie grass and it felt warm for the first time this year
~With my hands in the grass and I heard wild turkeys gobbling for the first time out here
~First mosquito – honest
~First new lights out on the prairie- a new hog confinement unit with three bright yardlights startled me a few days ago shining a few miles off across the prairie to the NE of our house (I’ll have to drive and check that out)
~First green grass sprouting out of the flood flattened grass on the SE corner of the farm
~8 of the 10 Aronia berries (chokeberry) I planted put out new growth
Comments
In the past week or so, I spent around 16 hours raking rock out of "grass", cleaning up the yard..tromping on gopher mounds and mole tunnels...Kelley came over cross country with her 4 wheeler and trailer..we moved 5 or 6 loads of the black dirt pile to various new locations...evening rains came, still light rain around 2 AM...and miraculously this morning the green grass appeared!
This past weekend, I went to Crossings to hear Carolyn read her latest poem...(She got the best audience reaction of all) That was Friday night, last night I went to see "The Nerd" at Mantorville Theatre,(David Derby was the nerd) good show and then today I went with the church group to see "Hello, Dolly" at Rochester Civic Theatre, stopped at GreenMill for supper, had a great time yakking to some more "elderly" (why do I hate that word so much) women, and laughed more than I have in months...Had one lady laughing till tears rolled down her cheeks. Where's your nearest opportunity to enjoy the same?
Posted by: Mom | April 19, 2009 11:11 PM
What a great weeekend to savor. Friends, family, laughter, and art. Sounds delightful.
I enjoyed a show as well. Alma made a fake remote control out of paper, sat me down in the lazy boy and I was able to watch a few different channels of tv. Jens was a weatherman giving the weather (very funny). When I decided to switch channels, there was a ninja fighting movie on -- guess who was the ninja fighter. When that got old I clicked channels to a country music video that was surprisingly good (Alma singing obviously). It was a very good performance -- even when I started clicking the channels pretty fast (Ninja, weather, and singing going by in a few seconds each!).
Someone asked me what I missed living out here. Well, honestly with little kids the worlds narrows down to them- no matter where I live. I wouldn't have been able to take in all you took in last weekend anyway. Not unless I had a live in nanny and didn't mind spending a lot of weekend time away from the kids.
But I eat fine food (a mild curry over rice, squash, salad, vegetable stew, etc.), drank some chokeberry wine, laughed, played a little (not as much as I should have.
And now here they come down the stairs... At least the early rising one.
Posted by: Kathy | April 20, 2009 5:34 AM
And that early rising one would be Ernest?? By the way, the credit for the photo, I believe, should be given to Ernest. He wanted to take a picture with my camera! Note the camera cord in the corner of the photo. I think it adds a lot!
Posted by: Carolyn McDonald | April 23, 2009 8:12 PM