TERRY
AS I start to blog Terry is just waking up as the clock shows 9:10. That is unusual for her. When she is fully awake I will bring in the paper and that will give her something to do for the next half hour or so. I would say she is going along at about the same as in the last many days. She did eat more yesterday. I bought lasagna at Costco, which I had never done before, and it is about a B- compared to homemade but with a grade like that it is OK. The problem is there is TOO much of it so we have to keep half of it frozen for a time.
As I write it is 84 with a high today of only 90. AND no rain in the forecast. As I look at the week there is a 50% chance of rain each day which is pretty normal for this time of the year. I say that but I have NEVER been here this time of the year before. BUT that is what they say.
There is nothing planned today except I may get Terry in for her cover shot as she has not had one. I will have to ask her if she is up to it. She does not like to get out and about.
Sundays have become a time that I tend to sit back and think. Sometimes that is good and sometimes that is not so good. Today memories of family long ago come to mind and yes there are so many happy times to think about but for some reason the sad things often come to mind. One could guess that "for sure" Ronald, Janet, Mom, Dad and Dave come to mind. On this Sunday my mind is mostly on the summers of 1960, 1961 and 1962. The summer of 1960 was the first summer that Dave was not home. He had finished his sophomore year of high school at Sargent Central and I had finished 7th grade in Cayuga. Up to that time our summers had been "Dave & I" most of the time. We played ball together, we picked rocks together, we ate chokecherries together, we biked up to the lake together almost every evening and things went on and on. If Mom were here she would probably tell you about the times I raced past the kitchen window with Dave in hot pursuit and Mom thought maybe that was the end of ME!!! But those times were few and far between as most of the time we were doing something together.
Then it happened. As school came to a close in May of 1960 everything changed. Even though I am sure Dad thought more of Dave than me they often were like oil and water. It came to the point in early June of that year that it was decided ( I know not who) that Dave was expendable on our farm and would spend the summer working on a farm near Kulm where Ronald and Glorine were. I think Janet and John were still there too but not sure. So the summers of 1960 and 1961 were a time of transition for me. No more Dave which meant that bike rides to the lake, ball by the corncrib and much more was a thing of the past. I don't really remember that it meant more work for me but it must have to some degree. Then came May of 1962. Dave graduated from high school and not too many days later he loaded pretty much all his belongings in his new used car and he was off. I am not sure he even looked back as he wanted out of the farm life that he had been in for so long. I am not saying out of all farm like, just our farm!
So it was time for me to figure out what/ how/when I should do things. It was during those years that I cleaned up the foundation of the old pig barn. That HUGE slab of cement had been an eye sore for many many years as the building had come down way before I was born. So it was a huge job to break up the cement floor and drag all the many pieces down to the rock pile with the "M" pulling these boulders like pieces with a log chain around them. After all the cement was cleaned up there was dirt to bring in by using the scoop behind the Ford and then leveling it out. I still remember the day I finished. Of course it had been an ongoing project for weeks but the day I finished I rushed into the house and asked Mom to look out the west window! She was so pleased and that made me happy.
Then there was also the golf course I made with the hole in the ditch near the mailbox. I drove the Ford to the lake with the scoop attached to the drawbar but I made sure Dad was gone when I did that as I did not know IF it was legal or not!
Then there was the cleaning up of the garage that had blown down in the spring of 1956. I think much of that was done before Dave left for the summers.
So during those years of 60, 61 and beyond I was able to keep myself busy with projects when there was not field work to do. At times like this, now, I sometimes think and wonder what would have happened if we had been progressive farmers??? Would someone from the family still be there? Of course that would not have changed the time when the farm burned but when that happened Dad still owned the land to the west and the land to the east. I THINK some times the mind goes too many places!
So I think it is better for me IF I try to keep my mind in the present! So here it is 2021. Life is so so so so different than 60 years ago. Is it better? Well there is no need to go there. Time marches on in everyone's life and to go back and question is just not a good thing to do. Now one can and should live in the present and plan for the future.
I was interrupted so here it is noon time and in another time it would be the time to tune the radio in to listen to Paul Harvey! But today it is time to sign off and maybe get some things in order that have been sitting around for way too long. I will close with a couple of pictures that family will see in the 2022 calendar.
This is Helen a FEW years ago. Pretty darn cute I would say!
No comments:
Post a Comment