Rain, Rain Come and Stay.

This a pic Soph and Dad....I thought they needed their picture taken with the pretty azaleas.

Can I tell you how happy I am it is raining!!! It has to help! I have never had pollen allergy troubles here until this year...I have had it in Illinois (ragweed). Yesterday, by bedtime I was starting to panic because I wanted some AIR and I couldn't seem to get enough.....took another Musinex and it finally got better, but I don't feel normal taking stuff like this. Usually, I eat local honey from the Old Wheat Barn and I didn't this year. Maybe that was the problemo. The idea is the content in the honey will inoculate a person from the local allergy villains. I kept forgetting to go and get some. I had a big jar that lasted like five 0r six years. (I am not a huge honey eater....) I might still go get some even though I think we are over the worst of it. I also spent a lot of time out in the pollen this week tramping up and down to the yard barn to put stuff in the attic....and then there was all the time standing around waiting for little sister to pick her spot. So maybe I was out in it more than usual. I don't know, but Thank You Lord, for the Rain!! I have already been out in it for one of Soph's pit stops and the damp cool air smells cleaner...and I don't hear the familiar wheeze coming from my chest.

This rain is gentle....don't want it too hard to wash away the grass seed Jim put in to cover the place they dug to run the electric down to the barn. Also, don't want to knock all the dogwood flowers off the trees sooner than they need to. They are sooooo pretty and are at their peak for sure. I wish they could stay all summer....but then we probably wouldn't love them like we do. I just love their snowy appearance.

We got a chance to revisit the tradition of eating at Old Mexico with the Fraziers Sat. evening. Randi's parents have moved to Texas so it was good to see them and catch up. We all went early and beat the Sat. night crowds and then back to Dogwood for some blueberry pie and a tour of the barn. (Jim loves to show it to folks.) They also wanted to see how Sophie has grown. They are doing great and enjoying another adventure. They have moved several times in their married life so they are old pros. At least they have not wandered too far away. We are going to go check out their new digs once school is out. Their town is about the same size as my home town so I would probably love it there. (I felt like I was in a big city when I moved to Ruston. Yes, that is true!)

Tomorrow is back to school and I have already started to pray. Once we get to April there are always some students start thinking school is over. It is a mental thing so I am praying for them to keep their focus and remember school is not out for two more months. I remember getting Spring fever when I was in school so I totally understand.

Looking back at the last week it went by soooo fast, but I slept late...depending on how many times I was up in the night, and I kept busy when I was awake. I got a chance to blog more than usual but there are several things I wanted to do and didn't. For example, I only finished one book and I brought home three. I always have so many new books to preview and I really wanted to read them. At least I caught up on my sleep and am rested up and ready for the home stretch. Now if it will just rain gently for a few days and keep the pollen out of the air it will be a big help.

Time changes things...

This picture is from 1996...Junior High. Toby Terrier is also in the pic...a puppet friend, who is boxed up in the closet for Josh to introduce to his kids someday. His friends were always entertaining to me. Smart, interesting and funny these young people were always welcome. There could be some drama from time to time...but those were some good times. Maybe those pictured would not agree. I know Junior High is not a time I would revisit if I had the choice. So what brought this up you ask...well...

Josh and Randi are in Ruston for the weekend and it is always so good to see them, but sometimes having Josh in the house conjures up all sorts of feelings..all sorts of memories.

Yesterday....Josh came for about an hour while Randi was getting a hair cut. He comes in, looks in the fridg for a snack and sits down and I look at him and I see this Josh guy who is now so much the same and yet so different. Sometimes it is surreal and the passage of time seems so sudden. He was telling Jim and I about his latest comedy find. He has a DVD so we can see for ourselves. It is a comedy series on HBO called, "Flight of the Conchords". We have had this same conversation before....insert different program titles like "Seinfeld", "Curb Your Enthusiasm", "Arrested Development", and going further back, "Animaniacs". He is essentially the same, the house is the same, Jim and I are the same....or so it seems to us...even the sofa is the same....but everything is changed.

I can't really explain the emotion I felt. It was not sadness, but it was a keen awareness that despite how much we want life to go in a same comfortable way we are always moving forward in time....changing. I was also aware that I am so blessed to be able to see my son Josh so often. I guess because of his age, I find myself thinking of the mothers of those service men in the Mideast who don't see their sons often, or worse, will never be able to see their sons again. Yes, I am ever mindful of my blessings.

But back to this reality of change. I confess I don't like change just because it usually means there is the element of the unknown. I look to the future and I know we have many wonderful times ahead, but there is also the knowledge that if you live long enough there are also difficult times as well. Early in my life this was evident because when I was 11 my father was killed in a car accident and suddenly everything changed for our family. This has probably shaped my personality somewhat because I know you can be going along and BAM you will have to change direction and you didn't have any choice in the matter. In hindsight I do see the Lord's hand in it all, but it was scary and it was tough. Yes, all things do work together for good for His children....so I hang on to this fact. I alos have little saying which hangs in my bathroom so I will be reminded each morning that, "I know not what the future holds, but I know who holds the future." Because I know it will ultimately all be good...but I confess it is hard for me not to know exactly what the journey will be like. Is that lack of faith? I don't think so... but maybe it really is.

Around the (Port Allegany, PA) Area....in 1991

Josh on the back deck with "Nama and Papa" having their annual "mustard and cheese party". I think this picture was taken more like 1994. I was allowed to photograph this sacred ritual, but then retired to the back of the house as not to intrude on this grandchild/grandparent rite. Josh made it clear that I had never attended one before and it just wouldn't be the same it I were to stay. I understood completely and was happy he had this close relationship.

My step Dad was the editor and chief of The Reporter Argus....our home town newspaper for most of his life. He always wrote a column......for years it was called "Yea Ramblins" and later years "Around the Area". It was the equivalency of blogging only you were sure to have quite a few readers and it was a hard copy delivered door to door. Neat. I wish I had copies of all those old columns. Now they are difficult to find. They would make a good book for those people familiar with the happenings of Port Allegany, PA in the late 50's, 60's and 70's.

As I was looking through boxes and drawers of memorabilia I found one of the later columns I had saved. I saved if for Josh to have.....well, I guess I am the keeper of the memories in my family, so I have it. Here is the 17 year old column:

If there 's a more seasonal topic for early August, yours truly can't imagine what. And as of 7:00 this morning, Nama and Papa Boller saw the finish of five weeks-plus with an extra person in the Katherine St. hillside home.

Grandson Josh joined us back on June 22 (seems a long time yet not a long time ago) for several weeks' stay in the Pennsylvania hills, away from his actual residence in the piney hills of nothern Louisiana.

The very pressence of this eight-year-old young lad in the homestead made if feel very much like vacation time to both of the grandparents, as it does each summer season about this same time.

Somehow, a boy or girl in pre-teens can really take one back with memories of earlier years when several in this category blessed the homestead. Been a decade now since youngest gal "left the nest". Matter-a-fact, she'll be back this very weekend for her tenth year reunion of ther PAHS Class of '81.

So it seems that having youth in the household for a significant period of weeks does indeed rejuvenate the grandparent figures.

'Twas indeed a joyous experience to transport Josh to things like swim team practice at Community Park pool and to watch all the young swimmers in the various competitions of the Tri-County Swim League.

Climax of all that ws the Tri-County Championship Meet at Bradford's Barcroft Pool this past weekend. Spent a delightful day in Callahan Park there witnessing and cheering for the Port swim crew as they took a significant share of the honors to come out in third place over all the competition of nine teams from a three county area.

Swim team practice and competition were not the only "back-to-youth" happenings of the past few weeks. In addtition, there were many afternoons at the park pool with Joshie, his parents and/or aunts who came visiting. And a couple of these visitors including grandgal Maura from Sharon, a little fem favorite of this writer whom you've heard about before. Possessing few water skills, yours truly and missus need such incentive to frequent any water recreational spots.

There were a couple of brief forays into the forested area which surrounds the home property at the east end of Baker's Acres, limited this summer by extreme heat of most of the five-week period. (Didn't manage to visit as far up as "The Rocks", which we vow we're gonna reach sometime this summer season, after the fruitless effort to do so last vacation time).

Yes, they joke about how great it is at this point in life to have the kids and/or grandkids visit, then what a relief it is when they depart. Somehow, relief isn't the emotion yours truly feels as he bats out thies week's comments in the almost deafening silence of the house this morning.

Confessions of a pack rat....

I think I have finally gotten to the bottom of my inability to toss things out....it is fear! Fear I will forget whole chapters of my life. My hard drive is not what it used to be and although there are plenty of things I would like to forget, I have been blessed in this life and have a lot of things I want to remember. Maybe this is a librarian thing, but getting rid of books is the hardest. Good grief I have my psychology book from Psych 101 to this day. I read every dang word in that book and highlighted about 1/4 of them. I like looking back through every 10 years or so. Why? I don't know!! If I get rid of this book maybe it will be like it never happened. Now that we have the Internet this is all insanity. Plus we have amazing data bases at school and World Book online! I have got to get with it....

Once we were cleaning out and accidentally threw out a box with several essay tests from college, a term paper from high school and an essay from Jr. High on "Patience"....(we had to pick out the most important trait a person could have.) I thought that was pretty well thought out and well written and would like to have it to show the students at school a sample of my work at their age. I had some blue book tests from American Literature....and I thought the ideas that popped into my head were rather amazing. We were never sure what we were gonna have to write about so it was amazing to me they turned out as well as they did and surprisingly I usually got an A....if my miserable spelling didn't do me in. I once wrote a test on J.D. Salinger's short story, "A Good Day for Banana Fishing"....I think that was the name of the story and I misspelled "banana" the entire way through. I think I had an extra ana or something...hahaha. I once wrote boweling for bowling. That was my most embarrassing essay....hahaha.


Back to this cleaning out fear....I also have boxes of cassette taped sermons from all sorts of people. I used to listen to sermons all the time. It was like I couldn't get enough of them. I had a lot of questions and these tapes were ways I answered some. Now some are good and sound theology, but in hind sight some of these might be a bit off....too much word of faith theology, but they kept the eyes of my heart and mind on Jesus and for them I am thankful. I guess I need to cull through these three boxes and keep a few that mean a lot to me. But some how it is difficult to pitch out Kay Arthur's teachings and Dudley Hall.....Dudley was with James Robinson and was one of my favorites. I finally got to meet him and he is just a regular guy... that is what I like so much. I have some Billy Spinks tapes, too. He was a friend of the Boersmas and his sermons were always enlightening, sound, and balanced.

Although, many of these tapes are old and brittle. One even wrecked a tape player I have. It got all tangled up and messed it up. So did I throw out the tape player, you ask. Heck no! It has a radio that works fine and I use it in the am to listen to WAFR as I put my face on. hahaha....I guess if you want to say something good about me and my hording problem....I am not wasteful.

What is sad is some day someone will come in here with a bulldozer and it will be gone. I remember when my Grandmother died and her desk was FULL of every birthday card she ever got. I guess I come by this thing naturally. Every once and a while I will happen across a letter or card someone has written to me and it really made my day. I had even forgotten that act of kindness.. so I am conflicted. I wish I had the ability to just keep it all in my mind.

Is there an anti hording drug? Maybe Prozac helps with this ....hahaha. I keep thinking of manna. I would have been trying to keep some for sure. I think some of my happiest days were when I had two pairs of Levi jeans, a couple dresses, a good warm coat and some chukka boots and some cute tops...and 10 books and a radio and a typewriter....and of course my earth shoes I wore every day all day .....and my camera. I have always had a camera near....but I could fit it all into one room and one closet easily and I was perfectly happy. Oh...I did have a stereo and couple orange crates FULL of a wide variety of albums....everything from Brubeck and Bach to Frank Zappa. All of it fit in the back of a Chevy station wagon....now I would need a huge truck and I am not even counting furniture. If I were in college today it would probably be different. I didn't even have car then....weren't allowed until Jr. year. Yes, less is better, I have no doubt, but yet I can't seem to whittle it down. Back to the stuff.....

P.S. I can pretty much guess what fellow blogger, Lora, will have to say about all of this. She doesn't have the hording gene....she has the pitch it out gene. I guess she has a better memory than I do or something.

Who will be the leader of the pack?

You gotta love this little face...reminds me of the way Sophie looks at Jim and I sometimes.

As I was cleaning out closets and hauling toys and dishes to the yard barn attic, I was listening to the news and to talk radio and all I heard ALLLLL day was about Hillary's memory lapse about her trip to Bosnia in 1996. I told Jim I was so tired of hearing it over and over.... he said the news was not that she lied. She has done this before, but the news was the "drive-by media" ABC, NBC, CBS and the New York Times, etc. were reporting it. If it were not for those who are pro Obama then this would have been swept to the side and printed on page 24 of the Times like all the other Hillary lapses. It really is all out war if the mainstream media sees fault with her. Now, I do agree that here is this woman who has paid her dues....big time. After all she stuck it out with her two timing husband all these years and now this Obama guy comes out the shadows and usurps her plan. She has shattering the glass ceiling one glass block at a time her whole life, but Obama is young, inexperienced, good looking, and quite the smooth operator so some how I almost feel sorry for her, but it is sorta fun to watch the whole thing unfolding. Sorta like a sporting event. But it is ON. Even James Carvell called Bill Richardson Judas! I suppose that once they choose their nominee at the Democratic convention all this will be forgotten....meanwhile we will all hear this junk until we are sick to death. I think I will listen to music tomorrow instead.