Puppy!
May 9, 2012 § 1 Comment
No, she’s not mine, but she does live here – which means I get to pet and play with her as often as I like, without having to deal with training and chewing. She belongs to Cella and Emmet, our animal husbandry farmers, and her name is Rue. This half husky/half golden retriever is exactly the same color as Tassie, and she absolutely LOVES to follow her “big sister” around. Isn’t she a doll?
Let the dogs out
February 28, 2012 § 1 Comment
The nice thing about rural areas? Hardly-traveled dirt roads. Ditches and fields. Places for dogs to be off the darn leash without all sorts of regulations.
Miss T. loves it out here. Even if the other two are best buds and she is the old girl who stays closer (and listens when you call).
Let ’em play.
Home, family, and traveling
February 28, 2012 § 1 Comment
Do you want to hear some good news? I am getting interviews!
Yesterday my mom and I drove to Cedar Rapids to pick up a truck – a red Chevy Silverado! – for my dad. We had our usual fervent discussions about life, faith, art, careers, personality types, travel, and the future. In the midst of this my phone rang and Interview #3 has been scheduled for the week. None of these jobs may pan out, but then, one of them might! I smiled for five minutes. Finally, the resume is doing what it was designed to do.
Iowa is brown, flat, hilly, barn-speckled. We drove through many tired-looking small towns. They fascinate me with their combination of rustic-ness and run-down-ness. Sometimes I like them in their familiarity. Other times I want to give them a good New-England-style overhaul. I like small towns, but I’m more of a quaint village kind of girl. Things can be small AND pretty.
(European countryside. Yes.)
One day when I settle down in my semi-remote (or maybe not remote?) wherever, it’s going to be lots of fun to consider how I can help make my nearby town (or neighborhood) veer towards quaintness. If they let me. Once they learn to like me. I’ll give it the good ol’ stubborn Dutch girl try.
So, anyway, I will be rambling around for the rest of the week. I aim to take a few photographs to show you some of these places. The fun thing about getting into photography is how you take on this mission to find things that are beautiful and interesting wherever you go. In unexpected places. From otherwise unconsidered vantage points. It gives one a new sense of purpose.
Around here, in the log-house-that’s-for-sale, we have been taking walks with the dogs, planning future books, planning future Etsy shops, baking, cooking, sweating in the sauna, trying out new hairstyles, and writing down to-do lists both ordinary and ambitious. I have ordered a proof of my novel, which will soon be available in paperback! Today is one of those days when opportunity seems within reach. Despite the gray skies and the ice that fell all night long. Despite getting home in the wee small hours of the morning and waking up later than industrious girls ought to do. Despite this tangle of hair on my head and the laundry waiting to be folded.
I have a Pinterest board full of dreams, and seed catalogs in the cupboard.
What is happening in your world?
Half-packed
January 28, 2012 § 1 Comment
I have two and a half days left in Colorado. I’m stopping to visit a friend in Nebraska. But don’t ask me about much beyond that. When I see what’s around the next bend, I’ll fill you in!
For now, I am sitting in an apartment filled with boxes. Everything is half-packed. Unsettled, once again. This is an adventure, but adventure tends to have its discomforts and unease. In this moment I take comfort in the sound of the dryer (which I will soon, hopefully, be selling) and the even breathing of the dog lying on the floor next to my computer.
I am grateful for rhythms. Rhythms have a reassuring sameness. And yet even rhythms can be interrupted, reset, altered. (The dog must breathe faster when she is running, which is an important thing.) And you know? That might make for a more marvelous world. It might produce more wonderful music.
Snowmelt
December 29, 2011 § 2 Comments
It was not a white Christmas. On Thursday Colorado got a heap of snow, and on Friday I drove out of it to a balmy, brown Iowa, and on Sunday I drove to an equally balmy, brown South Dakota.
No one complained about being outside without a jacket on, however!
Today I am back in Colorado, where we have had an interesting morning. You try moving 34 horses through a slick, sloppy mess of mud and ice – and add some powerful gusts of wind! (Forecast predicts the winds will get up to 80 mph today.) It’s a bit of a workout. At least the weather is warm. At home I poured a cup of peppermint tea, stretched out for a short rest, and decided Miss T. deserved a walk.
So we went outside to watch the snow melt.
There is sun and blue sky and water running, running everywhere. The snow sort of crunches and slides beneath your feet. We splashed through puddles at every intersection.
Miss T. gave herself a bath with more than one satisfying roll in the lingering patches of snow.
And we found evidence of snowmen . . . who had seen better days.
Despite the cone-laden evergreens, twinkly decorations, and a pile of newly-opened Christmas presents, can I just say that it feels like spring?
Kinds of Honey 