Measels & Woodchucks, Buns Berry Baseball, Death.

“I saw a measel! This morning. One my way back from the Dr….” I tell Brigham this as I swelter in the raspberry patch clad in candy-striped pj bottoms and a long-sleeve gray inside-out Tee. There isn’t a breath of air, not a single tree leaf stirs; it was in the 90’s before 8:00am when I went for my hip/back appointment; as Hippy Bill states…it’s hell-hot now. Fry-able.

(“Kansas has 2 temperatures” in the World According to Bill: “Hell-Hot or Bitch-Cold. Nothing in-between.”)

Brig raised a slight eyebrow, unimpressed by my new mammalian species… “I couldn’t tell if it were a muskrat or a weasel-thing…” I offer this explanation, but it’s too oppressive to talk. 2 nights ago I’d seen a rare woodchuck, the 3^rd in my lifetime, and excitedly began that tale, but he burst my bubble when he asked if it were down by the old ball field… Harrumph. He’d spotted it too. “So. How much wood was it chucking? MINE was chucking baseballs…”, I say. But he didn’t find that worth conversing over either.

He’d Appeared Out Of Nowhere moments before, startling me like a damp orange apparition as I swiped the sweat from my eyesnoseears, teetering and diving down again for another purple/black elusive clump hidden in the still, mosquito-laden understory of humid silver leaves.

“Get those 2 big ones! Right there!” he points, but I‘m not Stretch Armstrong and he won’t grasp for them himself, preferring to nibble the already-picked, outer edge-of-the-patch redder-tarter ones. He has on a scissor-mutilated, debilitated-rehabilitated faded orange Tee, cut to expose his biceps, back and ribs: “Dangerously Cheesy” it exclaims, from the “It Aint Easy Bein’ Cheesy” cartoon cat, now crumbling from multiple washings since 7^th grade.

Mr. Cheesy certainly will not risk a sharp raspberry scratch from an evil thorn, having experienced enough pain from last week’s tattoo claw. He’s hot. He’s tired. He’s all scratched out at the moment. Seeing that I’m not risking my careful footing to stretch for the biggest bestest berries, he harrumphs himself back indoors.

I, on the other hand (foot), continue precarious hippo ballet, wallowing delicately amidst the canes. I look for secure footing—one leg astraddle a low-lying clump.

This reminds me of my doctor-visit stance: “Stand up against the wall for an X-ray. Not facing the wall. I’m not going to frisk you! Have you ever been frisked?” Caught off guard by my incompetence (why are you x-raying through my stomach??), I find myself turning forward wondering ‘HAVE I ever been frisked?’and then gasp aloud, “NO!” “Don’t stand with your feet TOGETHER...” he says, “ keep your legs apart as wide as your hips and your knees straight.” I perform this and am still deemed unsatisfactory. “Closer together”. “Closer.” “Closer—Your HIPS are not THAT wide!”

I look down at the space between my bare feet. “Well, they ARE in my MIND!” I tell him. Aloud.

He leaves to go x-ray my solid parts, my bones; my thoughts are safe and can’t be read with his super human ray-gun. Harrumph. I’m disgruntled, having been told “NO MORE LUNGES” and “No attempts at running EVERY day—you’re NOT A MARINE.” I’ve questioned his “No more lunges” statement and he’s told me that the glute muscle works TREMENDOUSLY HARD during a lunge. It strains. It contracts. It squeezes. “Why do you think I do them?” my impertinent, invisible and un-x-rayable mind thoughts say.

Later, as my eyes burn from salt-sweat and Biofreeze (Brig wasn’t obliging when asked to rub my butt muscle so I did it myself-- accidently touching my face), I think that I probably AM doing some gluteus maximus straining anyway with this raspberry balancing act. Super-achy an hour later, I decide to stop.

Swimming away the heat at Paula’s, floating, dreaming, envisioning more unpicked berries—Brig calls from the Mall, cool and sociable once more. A fellow track-relay-mate, on the 4 x 400 one year, has committed suicide that morning. The boy, 3 years older, reminded me a lot of my own son when they both sported a goatee, same short stature, dark-haired and handsome. I had already heard this rumor from Paula’s dad minutes before. Brig always seems aggravated that I ‘know everything before he does’. (“Moms always know everything” I’ve told my kids numerous times. “And we always find out.”)

I am sad that sometimes moms find out things way too late. Way, way too late.

Now he doesn’t really know what to say. Things like this are BEYOND COMPREHENSION. I am the older, the wiser (?) so now I say the things that need said because this is truly such a waste of life and a heartbreaking devastation.

I much prefer the semi-silent conversations that auger forth imaginary measel creatures and light-hearted, trivial thoughts of baseball-playing mammals on a hot summer day…

American Beauty: Flint Hills

I prepared myself for a K-State Ag class 2 weeks ago by a visit to a steep embankment and a walk across a Flint Hills pasture while Bailey’s in-laws were searching for a calf.

I think I am one of those people, who, if not careful, would waste entire lifetimes away by dreaming.

I’ve already wasted away so much of mine.

I can’t help it. I can sit down to examine a flower or a unique seed pod and while needles of soul-piercing sun race up and down my arms, I am oblivious…a minute can turn into 20…or 30… and I watch the tiny gray weevil snuffling along a stem, a minute periwinkle butterfly probing a golden peppered blossom, an alien whitegreen crab spider contemplating a dinner gnat…

Hours I waste. And yet I feel so hugely awed by the smallest and simplest of things; is it so wrong to just waste time? I adored Fairy Tales: Thumbelina sleeping in a walnut shell, images of pixies clad in petals… I could sit there forever, moving a few feet at a time, and still not SEE everything.

It had to be coincidence that American Beauty was on later…the odd boy, the strange boy with his camera, filming a dancing plastic bag, and a dead bird… Ricky says it all:

“Sometimes there's so much beauty in the world I feel like I can't take it, like my heart's going to cave in.

and

Why are you filming that dead bird?

Because it’s beautiful.

That was amazing.

What was amazing about it?

When you see something like that, it's like God is looking right at you, just for a second. And if you're careful, you can look right back.

And what do you see?

Beauty.

Is it only dead things?

No. Not at all. No, it's everywhere. You just have to be open to it.”

So its really not that crazy to be fascinated by the foot of a grebe or the claws of a snapping turtle. In honor of Father’s Day, I saw a rare scissortail this morning and I still remember our dad carefully bringing in a dead specimen. As little kids, we ooh’ed over its long feathers as he carefully wrapped and laid it to rest in the freezer…

So, I must post these few pics from Barry and Sandy’s place above their home—and remember, they do no justice to the actual beauty found with the bright fresh air and time and space…

Gumby and Pokey!

Oh!
That blog I wrote under this? I failed to mention the worst part--Gumbyman sits down opposite of me EVERY time he comes in, folding his hands on the table (like churchalterprayer) and STARES. He STARES and STARES and STARES. Its enough to drive me berserk. I do my best to hunker down and duck behind whomever happens to sit in front of me, but Gumby moves about to reposition his view, so its about 20 minutes of Adult Peek-a-Boo before I've had enough and walk out. (Either that or adulteress-gossip'll begin when I find myself nearly leaning on 'ol Coach Guy or something!)
Gumby, I'm ready to Pokey your eyes out!

Gumby Grumble

When I heard I was being ‘badmouthed’ at the gas station last week, I didn’t think much of it until I discovered the miscreant. I raised my eyebrow, “Hmm. Interesting.” Turns out that ‘Gumbyman’ is riled over my raccoon daycare services. What a heel! What a cad! What a lout! Everyone else seemed so fascinated by baby Mogely; he’s adored and becoming vastly popular.

Gumbyman isn’t a true ‘regular’ coffee drinker—he’s lately ingratiated himself upon a somewhat wary and suspicious group of us—most of which get up and leave after a few moments of ‘Cliff Clavin’ rhetoric. Gumbyman knows all. Unfortunately, I heard a few tidbits of one of those ‘back in the war’ stories, which chaps my hide. For godssake people, what is with these men who bemoan their horrible days in ‘Nam—when they have never been there? ! Do they think women fall for this? If only I was a fast thinker—I’d whip out a clever retort—but alas, my brain moves too slow. Since Gumbyman (he’s missing all his teeth by the way) is MY age, perhaps I should view him with AWE! “Oh, Gumbyman, how unawares I was that our very own US government had a such a secret weapon—did you, too, train like the child VC’s?? Were you learning to lob a grenade?? My, you must have had some muscles! (It’s obvious he didn’t fare well socially, being deprived from parental care at the ripe old war-faring age of 9. Or war just does that to a pre-teen soldier.)

In KS it’s illegal to trap a raccoon—(furbearer license needed) and we’re not harboring a wild animal; we are helping to rescue an orphan. Mogely is not in a trap or cage. He is free to curl up under the couch or my collarbone or even in my basket of laundry; thus my excuse if the Game Warden comes knocking. (Good thing we sent him a ‘get well’ card when he was ill!)

Look at darling Mogely—he follows like a puppy, purring and twittering, and playing just like a real baby. He discovered his back feet! Brigham claims when Mogely fell asleep by my ear I was wearing his tail for a moustache.

Not true, but he’s the reason I haven’t blogged much!

Here we are getting ready to plant Lily of the Valley from Grandma...

Nuzzle.

No writing at the moment! Too much to do...look at this darling with his little claws and trills and purrs--just like a cute kitty:

In Which I Pet a Giant Fish....

My bragging about Friday's hot weather on Facebook inevitably led to the chillydrablackluster rainy weekend we are experiencing at this time. I pulled on another sweatshirt around 8:15 am Sat (Yes, I'd already had my coffee/crossword fix), to see who was pounding at my door...

Surprisingly, it was 'Dozer Davy', Pott County's competent bulldozer man. I say 'competent' because the other dozers around this county play with little hills of dirt for days on end causing much eye-rolling and many caustic comments about their so-called dirt-moving 'abilities'.

And our county 'Pott' is short for Pottawatomie County, not the 'smokin pot' pot, but the Indian/Native American Potawatomi or Pottawattamie, which actually don't even really reside here, but in the next county over-- Jackson County actually has the 'Indian Reservations'. (I have my reservations too.)
And KS pot is/was called K-Weed back in the day, but ya didn't smoke it-- you pulled it out of the creekbanks and fed it to your pigs. Only idiots tried to smoke it, but the law caught too many people in the 70's that were trying to grow the South American kind and got their panties in a bunch trying to distinguish between pothead pot and k-weed and banned everything that looked like a japanese maple leaf, thus denying pigs a good food source and making extra work for the farmers who had it all cut down. It still appears here and there in patches and ditches (and in the back of Paula's sr pictures as she leaned against a farm rail fence) No, we are not potheads!

But I digress. Dozer Davy had something to show me, so curiously, I jumped in his truck due to his rare enthusiasum. He's normally a man of few words, although if he's talkative he'll resort to bantering with the other local bluecollar men-- things like "Well, kiss my ass on Broadway" and other assorted farmer slams and quips. Knowing that he likes to set bank lines, I've been harassing him all year to take me along one morning. He failed to do that this weekend but he wanted me to see what was in the big fish tank, thus appeasing his guilt.

We drove out of town and tiptoed across someone's newly planted lawn to look at a monster. Petting the head of a 65 lb flathead was kind of cool; I even tried to stick my fingers by his gill, but not wanting to get my arm ripped out of my socket should he get riled, I withdrew my hand out of the cold water. A 30 pounder lay nearby all but shadowed by this grandfather fish that picked it's unlucky day to bite at a baitfish on a bankline. Noodling would be crazy--people that do that are darn lucky they're not drowned, but a large one like this is probably pretty rare. I'd only seen heads before, nailed on a shed by my cool Uncle Darrell...

I posted a generic pic of a 57 lb fish, as my battery was dead in my camera...

Influences...

Yesterday afternoon, Brig’s friend stopped by to tell me that his dad has inoperable brain cancer…we talked for quite a while and it was pretty sad. I heard more news of the same caliber when I went for coffee this morning, so I decided to run by a pan of cinnamon rolls to Brig’s friend, who enjoys ‘mom-made’ baked goods, as his parents are divorced. The dad himself (age 65) answered the door—tears streaming down his face…It was hard to talk and say the right things especially when you don't know the person very well...

After that, I decided to drive over to the town of Wabaunsee, small enough that one can raise chickens in your yard, if one so chose, without much comment from any neighbors, as they have them too, and maybe even goats!

Wabaunsee is the home of Jaguar Joe, the only guy in KS that I know whose living room (which faces the main road) opens up to encapture whatever Jag he’s working on at the moment. We also come to this town for gun purchases in a guy’s basement, and other than that, I am not aware of any other ‘business’ here.

Jaguar Joe, a Vietnam Vet with white Einstein hair, bought this abandoned old limestone grocery back in 1983. The very next year, he was awakened when the back wall crashed away from the structure…as he restored the property, he extended the home and added many tall southern windows—this area is his art studio where he creates his wax sculptures to be cast later in bronze in the backyard.

There not being many (any?) Jaguars in KS, its easy to spot him coming, especially when his Jag was painted as a huge red/white/n blue wavy flag—with large paintbrushes and house paint. Up close, you can even see the texture!

I hadn’t seen him in a couple years, since I had stopped going to the Columbian Artist Group, but since I heard he has cancer too, I had to visit. “Damn! If this is what makes you come see me, I need to get cancer more often!” and “Listen bitch! Stop using your ‘lost glasses’ as an excuse and make some new art!” He’s very vocal and opinionated! Despite his pain, Jaguar Joe was very inspiring and showed me some sculptures-in-progress, some websites to visit, and the spirit to get motivated on some new art.

I will definitely drop bye more often, re-join the Artist’s Group, and yank him along with me to keep his mind on art and away from the pain!

If I can…

: )