Guess I should post...

I am chastened by Grandmére Mimi’s observation that I’ve not written much lately on my blog. Actually, I brought that to her attention when she asked if I had a blog (we were dealing in real names vs our blog names), and I told her that I did, but had ignored it lately. She took a peek and dryly agreed.

Thus, here I am at the laptop on a windy South Dakota Saturday.

Just returned from dropping off my quilt at the dry cleaners and a visit to the local farmers’ market. The planting season was delayed here due to record amounts of much needed rain, so there were only seven or eight booths at the market. Some of those were ranchers selling corn fed beef (ugh), bakers, or jelly makers. But there was bounty to be found nevertheless. Even picked up some freshly laid eggs!

I don’t know why I haven’t blogged lately. I could blame it on my new job, my recent trip to see the grandchildren, or even having to iron more lately as my usual summer wardrobe is cotton and linen. But none of those things take tons of time. I think rather it might be due to the fact I’m doing lots of interior work at present and do not wish to write those things down for anyone to see. I don’t even want to see it. I’m beginning to acknowledge some things in my life that I’ve kept buried for a long time, and it is painful.

Besides interior work, I’m doing some exterior work. I mentioned a while back that I joined Weight Watchers. I needed to get healthy again after my cardiac arrhythmia stuff that basically took me out most of the winter. I’ve lost 30 lbs since January and am at my goal weight—the best thing about this is the rediscovered energy that I thought was lost forever. Also, over the last couple of months the arrhythmia essentially has stopped, so my heartbeat is normal again. I still take my medicine, and still have a few odd beats if I overindulge in wine, but otherwise my heart beats steadily and evenly. So with this newly recovered energy, I’m out racewalking, hiking, and I’ve even joined a yoga studio.

I am reestablishing my former discipline of praying the Divine Hours. That got me though tough times before and I don’t know why I stopped. My church has not been a place of comfort lately (so many places have not been), and I’ve found myself pulling away. Part of the problem is the fact that the informal leadership of the parish is focused in very few hands, and those hands have decided that I should not be at this church. These folks handpicked me to run for the vestry as they remembered me from before as someone easy to control, but now that I am on the vestry I make my own decisions and this is the payback. I was being harassed by one of those people via email, and just when I decided to take action, it stopped. The fact that I am on the Vestry is the reason we have not started to look for another church. I was elected for three years, and have served only six months!

Otherwise, my recent trip to see Only Son and his family was wonderful. I actually felt at home there. I had an added bonus of seeing my only surviving aunt and her husband, who were visiting my mother while I was there. Those two are really positive role models of how to live an engaged, vital life in elderly years. They are lovely people and I was so happy to get to spend quality time engaged in good talk. They don’t yell and scream and pass that off as conversation.

My friend BB is due to give birth any minute now, if she hasn’t already! She is so cool; if you look at her blog, she has been out playing disc golf each day, although she is over 40 weeks’ pregnant! You go, girl!

Enough of my rambling for now. I’ll try to keep up a bit better!

Back from New York

And I had a great time. My friend BB is consumed with her new business, Savor NY, but it isn't all work. Her premise is to serve as a clearinghouse to promote quality New York made products, so there is alot of research to do in the quest to discover quality NY made products. For example, we found Shaver Hill Farm, which produces maple syrup via a reverse osmosis process and also sells some of the best quality maple drops I've ever put in my mouth. We loved their sign, which is a 280 gallon syrup can.

We also found an Amish dairy farm that sells raw milk and cheese. I've never had raw milk, and found it much lighter than the homogenized and pasteurized whole milk that you get in the store. It didn't leave that cloying film in the mouth. Taciturn, the physician, was panicked that I drank raw milk but it is inspected, so I wasn't worried. The processing plant was there for all to see and it was clean as could be. The farmer is very willing to work with BB so she will promote his products. The cheese was great!

BB heats her house with wood stoves, so I did a bit of wood toting and stoking fires. That is different for me.

One of the most wonderful events of my visit was the trip to the Cooperstown Farmers'Market. What bounty! Any kind of apples you want, any kind of vegetable (seemed like, anyway), fresh eggs, cheeses, breads, and incredibly beautiful and crisp lettuce. We bought lots of fresh veggies and ate what BB calls "real food" the rest of my visit. Simply prepared and fresh, I was sated and happy after a meal of roasted beets with blue cheese and orange dressing, beet greens sauteed with fresh leeks and garlic, and a small but perfectly seared strip steak. Most of the other meals followed that theme.

And the fall color was spectacular.

It was a great place to enjoy what God has created. I hated to leave, but there is that pesky thing called wanting to see my husband again.

Now, to catch up on Life. I have other things to blog about, but the dirty house, empty larder, etc, beckon.