Where seeds of thought have room to grow
Category: My Country Life
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Our front porch resembles a playpen these days, with toys scattered from one end to another – a big puppy playpen. Belle has been busy, recovering from the woods stuffed creatures long buried and forgotten … along with some of Tom's leather gloves and tools he left lying around, forgetting there's a scavenging puppy on…
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Another birthday has rolled around somehow. Fifty-one just seems anti-climatic, doesn't it? Not nearly as exciting as fifty, but still just as unreal. Age really is just a number … now I understand. For years I've taken my Birthday-Day off to spend as I please, a gift for myself. Tom often takes the day off,…
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Yeah, yeah, I know. Chores, lists, bills, a book, all waiting for me, starving for attention, calling my name like a bunch of squabbling kids as soon as I step through the door. I ignore them – I'm getting good at that. Actually, I think I've always been good at that. Instead, I call the…
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"Stay, Belle. I'll be home soon." She looked up at me from her cushion next to the front door, surrounded by Max's entire collection of stuffed toys, plus the ones Daniel and I brought home from our shopping trip yesterday (a fish, an abstract Santa, a lobster… we learned the hard way not to…
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I felt Tom slip out of bed early this morning. Heard him go out the front door, out onto the porch right outside my window. Smiled, hearing his voice venture close to baby talk when greeting Belle (he'll deny it.) He crossed the length of the porch followed by Max, their images passing by the windows…
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There's a war going on, all around us. A war that is fought every year, that sometimes gets violent, with flashes of light, rumbles of thunder, hailstones, flash floods. But some battles are quiet. You have to pay attention… you have to open your eyes to notice the green growing stronger day by day with…
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Like Sasquatch, Max emerged from the shadows of the woods when I drove up to the house. I wasn't fooled – he was waiting for Tom, not me. But Tom was late. Max figured I was better than nothing. Yesterday's blog post was fresh on my mind…all the to-do lists…all the squeezed, stretched, crowded minutes…but…
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It's always a shock, isn't it, when you find out your sweet, perfect child…or pet…isn't quite as sweet or perfect as you believed? Alas, we've discovered an aggressive streak in our funny, goofy-looking, sociable guinea fowl Frankie. At first, I just brushed it off when he dashed in and pecked at the back of our…
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A familiar rumbling, snorting, clanking…a glimpse of John Deere yellow through the trees…and yep, there it is, our old friend coming around the bend and up to the house. How long has it been away from home? 3 years? 5? It was a bittersweet homecoming for our beloved backhoe yesterday, though. We have plenty of…
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It's Spring Break. There's no such thing as routine anymore. My drums will gather dust. Lately I've been stealing a few minutes from each morning to bang around on them before leaving for work – just one song a day from my "new to me" Mp3 player, still loaded with my daughter's playlist. Right now…
Long Hollow 