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Turning Back

I checked the weather forecast, both an hourly list and an animated map, before going out to walk. There was a 5% chance of rain, and the rain clouds should have been diverted by mountains. Halfway to the creek, moisture was falling through the air. I couldn’t see it except on my glasses. It was a percentage of rain, not just a chance of rain. Truly, the droplets were about five percent of the size of rain! I started down the steep hill and turned back. Those silly clouds were watching me, and they were not to be trusted. Sure enough, shortly after I got home, the gutters were gurgling.

I took a photo from the front porch, which shows that a dogwood tree and a row of burning bush plants are gearing up for Fall.

092518 Gloomy day in early Fall.JPG

Local Emergency News

As we walked near the firehouse, a volunteer fireman called a greeting to us. He was taking his boots and some other things inside. He teased us about exercising, and we began to chat. We like hearing about volunteer fire departments, since we know several volunteers. Two are named Dennis, one in Stony Brook and another upstate NY. My brother was also an active one when he lived near Charlotte.

This man said they had a busy week last week. There was a house fire with one dead, a car fire, and one other event that John and I couldn’t remember. When we showed interest, he explained that the house fire was probably caused by propane. They think the man accidentally turned on the stove without realizing it. John heard his soft comment that alcohol could have been an issue. Those were sobering facts, and we didn’t probe. John asked about the average number of calls per year. The answer was 700! That would work out to almost two per day! We may live out in the country, but we generate our fair share of emergencies.

Jonathan Creek fire station.JPG

We walked home, appreciating our peaceful breakfast on the back porch. For the foodies – we had fresh-baked cardamom muffins and hot coffee.

Play Dates

I’ve decided you’re never too old for play dates. John’s date to go to the train club had been on the calendar for weeks. He left early one morning and planned to return late the next day. From something he said, I think the men were changing the track and had to deal with a large tree root. That would not be pleasant in high heat and equally high humidity. My weather, on the other side of the mountains, was much cooler. We found out after we moved here that East Tennessee tended to be hotter than Western North Carolina. What a year-round blessing that turned out to be!

I met neighbor Marla as she was walking Albert, and I opted to stay with them. I did two laps of the street instead of going to the creek. Marla claims morning is not her best time of day, but she always has interesting things to discuss. For some reason, we got on the subject of war movies. She knew a lot more about them than I did. I was very happy to hear about them without having to sit through one.

Marla happened to mention to her mother (Connie) that I was alone. Connie called, and we had a spontaneous play date for coffee. We went to Panacea, a roaster in Frog Level. (You can tell you are in the South when you see area names like that. I grew up in West Tennessee near Frog Jump.) We chatted about many things, including technology, siblings, cell phones, and grandparents. I was very interested in hearing about her weight loss – 50 pounds since spring. Isn’t that marvelous? Of course, I wanted to celebrate that with a photo and she graciously obliged.

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Albert, the Vacuum

Albert, neighbor Marla’s German Spitz, loves to sniff around Bob’s car when we meet at the bus stop. Bob invited the dog in, saying there were some spilled Cheerios he could clean up. Albert was delighted and set to work as we humans talked.

092018 Albert vacuums Bob's car.JPG

Logan (8) was out of sight, running back and forth from the car to the end of the street. We laughed when Bob said quietly, “I feel sorry for the teacher.”

When the car was clean, Albert was petted before heading in to breakfast.

092018 Albert petted after cleanup.JPG

All that activity was in sharp contrast to the beginning of our walk. A deer paused to look at us through the heavy mist, well before the sun burned off the moisture.

091918 Deer on Woodmore before foggy dawn.JPG

Near the creek, John said, “My hair is wet from the mist.”

I replied, “Mine is, too.” Laughing, I said, “I had to touch my hair, didn’t I? It’s like wet paint! You see the sign and have to check to see if the paint is dry.”

Focal Points

We had two points of interest this week – Hurricane Florence and Logan’s getting on the bus.

The hurricane was a non-event in our area, unlike the flooding in eastern North Carolina. We noticed one 10-mile-per-hour gust of wind that lasted 30 seconds. Big whoop! One full day of steady rain made Jonathan Creek rise. I was texting with friend Karen when John walked in and asked if I wanted to drive to the creek. We rushed there and took a few shots to share with her. Karen is one who usually walks to the creek with us when she is here, so she had a vested interest in it. We caught the water at its highest point.

John checked the rain gauge when we were sure all the rain was over. Despite being warned that we would have 10 to 20 inches of rain, we could muster only 4.

091718 Rain gauge Hurricane Florence.jpg

A video clip of our street at 7:40 would show everyone converging at the bus stop. We try to time our walk to be there, and Marla comes out with dog Albert. Logan jumps out of his car, not so much to join us, as to run circles around us. In the photo, Logan had already greeted us at Marla’s driveway and run onto the neighbor’s lawn around the telephone pole.

091818 Converging on Bob's car.JPG
Logan is the blur to the right of the pole.

Logan circled around to pet Albert as we began to talk to Bob in the car. There was a pause as we watched the boy leap onto the bus, and we scattered as quickly as we gathered. Another day was off to its proper start.

091818 Chatting before the bus came.JPG

John’s Birthday

To celebrate John’s birthday, we went to the restaurant where grandson Nathaniel worked for the past two summers. As the camera came out, son John $ adroitly offered to take our photograph, thereby getting on his preferred side of the camera. I took comfort in knowing I could erase anything I didn’t like.

091418 Birthday dinner at J Arthur's.JPG

John likes that restaurant for one particular dish, which they do well. All their food is good, but I go there to bask in reflected glory. One of the owners generally cruises the dining room, and John lets her know we are Nathaniel’s grandparents. Last year she beamed on us and told us what a marvelous worker he was. This year she called over the other owner, and he joined her in praising our favorite chef-in-training. Their words were glowing, and I took in every syllable. I looked at my plate and took myself down a notch. If Nathaniel had been working there, he would have peeled the potatoes.

Later we had John’s favorite dessert, angel food cake with strawberries and whipped topping. As we sat on the porch, we told $ that we’d heard coyotes howling in the pasture the night before. We’d never heard them so close or so persistent before. Although we were not frightened, he assured us that no coyote had ever killed a human.

091418 John's birthday cake.JPG

The next morning, John saw the single candle left from the night before and stuck it in a biscuit. It was his official birthday, after all. Normally I cannot do two things at once, but I did that time. I pulled out the camera to take a shot of this shady character, and I sang Happy Birthday.  $, right beside me, declined to sing. If you listen carefully, you can hear his silence.

091518 Birthday biscuit.jpg

New Shoes for Logan

We (well really, it was I) puffed up the steep hill on the morning walk. John simply sauntered up without breathing deeply. We expected to see neighbor Logan (8) waiting for the bus and Marla chatting with him and his dad. The street was empty. We wondered if they all overslept, but soon Logan’s car came rushing down. Marla appeared at the same time, and the street was peopled as it should have been. We learned a while ago that daybreak is not a stellar time for either Bob or Marla. They manage to bear with our jocularity and puns without hitting us.

Logan jumped out of the car with his usual energy and bounded across the street. John spotted a square tag on the boy’s shoes, as I noticed they were not the neon-green pair. Bob rubbed the sleep from his eyes and said he probably shouldn’t have worn his new sneakers. Logan submitted to John’s cutting the tag off before jumping the ditch.

“Your shoes aren’t tied,” John said.

Logan sat down to demonstrate that the laces were not long enough. He gave a halfhearted attempt at tying them and jumped up to run again. John wouldn’t give up so easily and verbally wrestled him to the pavement. I think Logan got the shoes tied as the bus pulled up. So began another school day.

My day, too, began in typical fashion, as my camera demanded to record a sweet scene.

091418 JC advises Logan on tying new shoes.JPG

Cat 2!!

When we stopped by the little produce shed to buy tomatoes, the woman behind the counter said excitedly, “It’s a Cat 2!!!”

For once, I heard and understood a message that John missed. As he started to ask about it, I said, “The hurricane is now a category two.”

With weather apps, we watched this storm change course, slow down, get stronger, and dither about in the ocean. Its projected landfall was about 350 miles (563 km) from us. A week ago, we watched a reporter dramatically walk in the tiny waves breaking over his toes, trying to scare us. It was too much too soon. We cleaned our house and put clean sheets on all the beds in case friends or family needed a place to stay. I even had time to clean up the garden! I estimate we had enough food on hand to feed eight people for two days. It would have been a great way to clean out the refrigerator. Though no clouds were in sight, grandson Nathaniel’s classes were canceled in Charlotte, 200 miles from the coast.

I was on that woman’s wavelength, ready to hear news of a storm on the move.

We were so ready for the storm, that John said it might be a good day to drive on the Blue Ridge Parkway among fluffy white clouds. He was right.

091318 Blue Ridge Parkway view.JPG

We are home again and will wait another two days for the rain to begin.

Mamaw, Where did You Come From???

I was shocked to see a photograph of my mother’s mother in the newspaper. Mamaw died at age 89 about 39 years ago . Why would her likeness be published in a paper 450 miles away? John had already seen the picture and remarked on it. Brother Bob agreed that it looked much like her.

Look at these photos to see my real maternal grandmother in her early 80s.

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Mamaw at 81 with our daughter Lise

 

7306 Mamaw at 83 Kate.jpg
Mamaw at 83 with our daughter Kate

Do you agree she looks a lot like Sadie Berry below? Sadie still works five days a week in Swannanoa, a town out from Asheville. She turned 100 years old the day after Labor Day.

090918 Looks like Mamaw.JPG

Sadie is roughly 18 years older than Mamaw, as pictured. People really do age well these days, don’t they?

Face Time with Logan

Neighbor Logan (8) came over and asked if he could stay with us while his parents went to a meeting at their church. Of course, we were delighted. He and John played two games of checkers until we heard a storm approaching. The boy was very patient with me and the camera. I tried to focus on the bullet-boy as he ran on the porch, and he rushed up with a big grin on his face. I’m going to keep the image handy whenever I want to be infected with laughter.

090918 Logan's smile in your face.JPG

Logan ran one of our radio-controlled cars as we waited for the storm. He put it up to his face to feel the wheels spinning. I caught the smile, but not the action.

090918 Logan runs a radio car by his face.JPG

We first heard the heavy rain, and then watched as it approached from the mountain. For a few moments it was raining on Logan’s house and not ours. The fellows continued to throw a tennis ball back and forth until it escaped into the dripping bushes. Logan was all for chasing it, but John stopped him with a simple no.

090918 Logan tosses ball with John.JPG

Our ritual for a visit with Logan is hiding a granola bar for him to find. When we first began three years ago, he would ask for help after five seconds of looking. These days he is more observant and keeps hunting. I warned that this one would be difficult to find. Can you see it? It’s on top of the fire extinguisher.

090918 Cookie jar and hidden granola bar.JPG

Logan looked everywhere with his eyes before he began to climb on the counters. He moved things gently and searched thoroughly. I avoided looking at him, knowing my eyes would be tempted to glance at the hiding place and give the game away. He finally asked if I would tell him how high it was, which I indicated with my hand At last he ran toward us at the other end of the room.

“I found it!” he exclaimed. With bewilderment he said, “There are three others in the cookie jar.”

The response in my head? Aaaauuuggghhh! That had been my hiding place for all the bars since grandson Nathaniel found Friar Tuck in an antique store. Logan also spotted the bar I had hidden. It’s back to square one for Anne!