October Begins

October is my favorite month of the year, so it is appropriate that several pleasant things happened. We are always amused at neighbor Logan (8). As we walked toward his bus stop, he came running to us. In an instant, he bent down with his hands behind his knees and was making funny sounds. Something about his attitude made me wonder if he had been told not to do it. Still, it was very funny, and I asked him to repeat it for a video. His focus shifted to something down the road, so all I caught was the side of his head and a halfhearted squeezing of one knee. That may have kept us both from getting into trouble.

100118 Logan makes noise with hand and knee.JPG

Our church had a special dinner honoring our pastor’s 35th anniversary of his ordination. We were told it was going to be special. What a surprise to find the gym transformed into an event tent by a tank parachute! Twenty-two of us were asked to bring a home-baked cake for dessert. I thought the instructions were brilliant. We were asked to cut our cakes into at least 10 pieces before bringing them in. The organizers knew there would be enough to go around, and all they had to do was put the cakes on a table for people to help themselves.

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John knows I love day trips in the mountains, so we visited Weaverville north of Asheville. What a charming town! We went in a little shop that advertised antiques and food, a pairing that grandson Nathaniel would love. The proprietor handed round little cups of peach tea to six customers. I said we should have a toast, and a man near me raised his cup and said, “Here’s to a lovely afternoon for everyone!”

We looked in several restaurants as we walked up and down the main street, and we went in a shop that displayed pottery in the front and had potters working in the back. We knew we had hit the right spot for lunch at the Well Bred Bakery. Lovely sandwiches and pieces of quiche were displayed in large cases at the back, while the front cases had the most delectable desserts tempting us. We each had a piece of bacon-cheddar quiche and ate it slowly. Feeling satisfied, we chose desserts to take home. John took one of his favorites, carrot cake. I opted for a chocolate fudge cake to make up for not having the devil’s food cake I took to the church dinner. We ate cake instead of a meal in the evening and felt almost virtuous.

100118 Well Bred Bakery in Weaverville.JPG

Advice to this Walker

I was surprised a man approached me near the cafe as he walked in for breakfast. I recognized him as the one who took over the iron-worker’s shed halfway up the steep hill. In the past few weeks, he greeted John and me with several sentences of a Southerner’s standard greeting as we walked past. (“How y’all doin’? Mighty fine day! Y’all have a good un!”)

092818 Shed on the steep hill.JPG
Ironworker’s shed now houses lawncare equipment.

Today he said, “I wanted ta tell ya ta be careful. T’other day y’all just got past my place, an’ a cow came bustin’ outta the woods. Run right across the road inta the cornfield. Ya need to be aware of what’s goin’ on around ya. Ya never know what’s gonna happen with animals around here.”

Please note that I am not making fun of his accent, because I sound a lot like him, only at a higher pitch. Blogger Kate Crimmins (https://coffeekatblog.com/) can vouch for that after I jangled her ears with my normal speech. Kate herself sounds like a normal person with a nice Pennsylvania accent.

I thanked him, and we had a good laugh over crazy animals that get loose in the area.

Going up the hill, I stopped to chat with Nancy at the first house on the right. She had been concerned at not seeing us for several days. I found out the big RV parked in the yard belongs to her niece from Missouri. She and her husband and crazy dogs are going to move here and open a commercial cleaning business.

Toward the top of the steep hill, next-door-neighbor Dawn stopped her car and wondered why a vehicle with a flashing yellow light turned around in my driveway. The only thing I could think of was someone delivering the newspaper. I came home to find papers for three days in the box. A sheet inside explained that our carrier quit, and another person will deliver to us after doing his own route. With news three days old, we might as well be on Colonial time.

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.

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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.

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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.

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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.