Today I recieved a photo to verify that 2,000 Buffalo Soldiers, the 9th Cavalry, from Fort Robinson in 1889, went to Camp Crook South Dakota to be instructed in plains maneuvers and Indian fighting. Who would have know it! My Aunt Liz had written about seeing the fort as a child in the early 1900's. I had to prove her correct and she was. These cavalrymen were African Americans recruited to fight Indians after the Civil War.
Lord have mercy. Be careful what you wish for. I have groaned here about being cosmically lonely. Tomorrow a son moves home. I once told a granddaughter that perhaps the test of family was loving adult children no matter what their issues were. Now I get to practice what I preach.
I would show you the 2,000 Buffalo Soldiers at Camp Crook, but the photo is a courtesy of the Nebraska State Historical Society, and I must gain permission, and pay for it, if I publish it.
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
The Horse Fair
Our neighbor across the street moved to a retirement home after her husband died a few months ago. I visited her, her son, and a daughter who had come back to finish the house clean-up. It was sold to another neighbor, who now owns three houses across the street.
As you can surmise, we live in a neighborhood in transition. Nora, across the street seems to stay, as we do. Her grown children, three in town, others quite a distance away plead her not to sell the beautiful home that they grew up in. We stay because we love our stuff, like good Americans, and cannot bear to ease our lives by leaving.
Yesterday I went to visit the 86 year old friend that I used to walk with, who invited me into a County Extension Club, who was a confidant for years. She is keen, logical, compassionate, and I have missed watching for her drapes to open in the morning.
As the son was carrying things up from the basement and into the dumpster in the driveway, he showed me some pictures and asked me if I would like them. Of course I did. I say people who love books, paintings, and plants can never have too many. One of the framed lithographs is "The Horse Fair" by Rosa Bonheur. It had come out of the immigrant school house from the 1800's. It is sepia of course, and a little tattered at the top for they had used the frame and glass to hold graduation pictures of the 1960's. Underneath them was this marvelous lithograph.
Rosa Bonheur was radical in her personal life, artistically conservative in the 1860's.
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Casper the Ghost
A little above and to the left of Orion's Belt in the January sky is M78 aka the Casper the Ghost.
The Royal Astronomical Society of Canada does a nice job and starts The Sky This Month-January 2008 this way: "The constellation Orion is synonymous with frosty Canadian nights. With its majestic collection of bright suns and overall size, it truly owns the winter sky. Orion the Hunter...holds the deed to 594 square degrees of celestial real estate." It is an article that is lovely to read and illustrated as well. I love the winter sky. Actually I love winter...as well I should as today is my birthday.
Monday, January 21, 2008
Don't Jump on My Couch
SOMA has rescued this for your viewing pleasure. Don't get it wrong, Barak isn't the only wild and scary guy!
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Monkey's Fist by Grog
We all know when it is time to get a life. Here I am fooling around on the Internet thinking I need a piece of rope so I can bedazzle my friends by my knot tying ability. A Monkey's Fist would charm the socks off of a five year old, don't you think? The header on the home page indicates this site or CD is something for Yachtsmen; Climbers; Fishermen; Scouts; Arborists; and Search & Rescue Workers. Not a word about gma's trying to charm little boys and girls.
I asked He Who Must Be Obeyed why they taught Boy Scouts how to tie knots. "They are life saving," was his matter of fact answer. Or not, in the explanation of the granny knot and the better square knot there was a disclaimer stating not to rely on either of them to hold one's body weight. This page has automated rope tying itself into all sorts of splendid knots. Find the fast/slow button on the bottom or else go through the steps one at a time.
Surely this would be just the thing for a sluggish brain in dark January.
I asked He Who Must Be Obeyed why they taught Boy Scouts how to tie knots. "They are life saving," was his matter of fact answer. Or not, in the explanation of the granny knot and the better square knot there was a disclaimer stating not to rely on either of them to hold one's body weight. This page has automated rope tying itself into all sorts of splendid knots. Find the fast/slow button on the bottom or else go through the steps one at a time.
Surely this would be just the thing for a sluggish brain in dark January.
Thursday, January 17, 2008
January Flowers
He Who Must Be Obeyed brings red roses every once in a while. They are uplifting as is having a two year old in the house on a snowy and cold day.
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
To Procrastinate
John Maeda, of MIT, in his "Simplicity" blog writes of Necessary Procrastination. It is a kinder and gentler approach to my curse than the over a million hits on just the single word. Most of those are "how not to" advice. When I am in this January funk I get into in spite of myself, I go back to the Simplicity blog to the right of this, hunt up March 29th, 2006 and balm the rough edges of my sore wounds of procrastination.
All of my edges are jaggedy at the moment. I am not good company, I am not a good companion, my housekeeping suffers, I suffer, it is a deep, dark, uncomfortable place. I went for my January physical and got put on an ACE Inhibitor for a blood pressure uncontrolled by two other meds. I think the new pill flushes me and I just lay about and read.
My reading isn't very uplifting either. "The Shipping News." I know it is years since it hit the outstanding book lists. Dismal isn't it, for a former librarian to be so slow at getting to the Pulitzer Prize winners. Dismal is the story of Quoyle, a hack who is writing the shipping news for a small Newfoundland town newspaper. I would kind of like to see the movie, surely as dark as the book.
It is kind of a wonder about how Proulx winds "The Ashley Book of Knots" into the chapter beginnings. Once I wrote about Frank Troxell showing us how to tie the hardest knot and I put a photo here to show it. I have had some hits by folks using "the hardest knot" that have found their way into this place. I always wondered why. Now I know. I asked He Who Must Be Obeyed, who was a scout leader long ago, why the Boy Scouts needed to know knots. "They are life-savers," he told me while he was re-stretching our 25 year old carpet.
All of my edges are jaggedy at the moment. I am not good company, I am not a good companion, my housekeeping suffers, I suffer, it is a deep, dark, uncomfortable place. I went for my January physical and got put on an ACE Inhibitor for a blood pressure uncontrolled by two other meds. I think the new pill flushes me and I just lay about and read.
My reading isn't very uplifting either. "The Shipping News." I know it is years since it hit the outstanding book lists. Dismal isn't it, for a former librarian to be so slow at getting to the Pulitzer Prize winners. Dismal is the story of Quoyle, a hack who is writing the shipping news for a small Newfoundland town newspaper. I would kind of like to see the movie, surely as dark as the book.
It is kind of a wonder about how Proulx winds "The Ashley Book of Knots" into the chapter beginnings. Once I wrote about Frank Troxell showing us how to tie the hardest knot and I put a photo here to show it. I have had some hits by folks using "the hardest knot" that have found their way into this place. I always wondered why. Now I know. I asked He Who Must Be Obeyed, who was a scout leader long ago, why the Boy Scouts needed to know knots. "They are life-savers," he told me while he was re-stretching our 25 year old carpet.
Saturday, January 12, 2008
Why I am Happy?
Last night I watched the 20/20 program on Happiness and it didn’t surprise me to learn that in their research they found Denmark to be the happiest country on earth, nor was it much of a surprise to learn the U.S. is 23rd. I suppose they thought the Finns were a little too melancholy to be first…however according to the stats Iceland is 4th and Finland 6th.
Business Week's October 11, 2006 issue has a link to click to view each of the happiest countries. To take a tour of the world's happiest countries, click the thumbnails at the end of the article. Our neighbor to the north is 10th.
I have google alerts on several subjects, “Finns and Finnish” for example and yesterday it hit a blog in which the young author wrote this: “One thing I found odd in Finland was that there was no generation gap. The young people liked the older people. The old people liked the younger people. The children liked their parents. The parents liked their children.
Not only that, but there was no gender gap. Men and women liked each other. Feminism was something that Finnish people laughed about as an American invention. Finnish women were equal to men, and always had been. If a tire blew on a car, it was not at all unthinkable for the woman to jump out and fix it, without a thought. Not only that, but everyone Finnish seemed to like Finland altogether. They felt they had won the lottery by being born Finnish.”
October 27 of 2004 I wrote on this blog the 10 things that make a Finn happy. If that Finn, whose grandparents all came from Finland, the 6th happiest place in the world, lives in America, the 23rd happiest place in the world, does that make them less happy?
Business Week's October 11, 2006 issue has a link to click to view each of the happiest countries. To take a tour of the world's happiest countries, click the thumbnails at the end of the article. Our neighbor to the north is 10th.
I have google alerts on several subjects, “Finns and Finnish” for example and yesterday it hit a blog in which the young author wrote this: “One thing I found odd in Finland was that there was no generation gap. The young people liked the older people. The old people liked the younger people. The children liked their parents. The parents liked their children.
Not only that, but there was no gender gap. Men and women liked each other. Feminism was something that Finnish people laughed about as an American invention. Finnish women were equal to men, and always had been. If a tire blew on a car, it was not at all unthinkable for the woman to jump out and fix it, without a thought. Not only that, but everyone Finnish seemed to like Finland altogether. They felt they had won the lottery by being born Finnish.”
October 27 of 2004 I wrote on this blog the 10 things that make a Finn happy. If that Finn, whose grandparents all came from Finland, the 6th happiest place in the world, lives in America, the 23rd happiest place in the world, does that make them less happy?
Thursday, January 10, 2008
A Time for Everything
Ecclesiastes 3
1 There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under heaven:
2 a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
4 a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
A dear cousin died on the 3rd so unexpectedly. Death catches one with the force of a great storm. So, so slowly does the gale blow off; calm doesn't come quickly. One wishes to be near his mother and siblings at this sad time and it is not to be. The phone and email are close and immediate connections. Karl was an official whale watching guide and much, much more.
1 There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under heaven:
2 a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
4 a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
A dear cousin died on the 3rd so unexpectedly. Death catches one with the force of a great storm. So, so slowly does the gale blow off; calm doesn't come quickly. One wishes to be near his mother and siblings at this sad time and it is not to be. The phone and email are close and immediate connections. Karl was an official whale watching guide and much, much more.
Sunday, January 06, 2008
An Epiphany Baby!
An Epiphany! A baby is born. Camryn Elizabeth arrived early today. The happy parents are Courtney and Bryson Gonzalez, our granddaughter and her husband. 
Saturday, January 05, 2008
Epiphany
Tomorrow is Epiphany. My intent is always to keep Christmas until the 12th Day. I don't think I ever have been able to hold out till then. It sounds a lot like my New Year's Resolutions.
"But the more serious issue is that every Christmas we put up our trees and get out our ornaments and trot out tidings of peace on Earth. Then, after a week or so, we take down our trees and put away our ornaments, and peace on Earth goes back into storage until the following year. And it seems that the escalatory violence that is such a part of our normalcy is endangering the human species and our world more and more. So what appeared in the sky above Bethlehem that first Christmas 2,000 years ago was an early, distant warning that said, you can never achieve peace on Earth through victory—only through justice. For me, that’s the enduring message of the Christmas story."
The quote is taken from John D. Spalding's interview with John Dominic Crossan about his collaboration with Marcus Borg of the book "The First Christmas."
"In “The First Christmas,” Crossan and Borg argue that the nativity story is far richer and more challenging than familiar sentimentalized versions allow. Not simply tidings of comfort and joy, the gospel stories of Jesus’ birth are also edgy visions of another way of life, confronting the status quo and demanding personal and political transformation."
Perhaps I am a little too liberal in my quotes from SOMA.
"But the more serious issue is that every Christmas we put up our trees and get out our ornaments and trot out tidings of peace on Earth. Then, after a week or so, we take down our trees and put away our ornaments, and peace on Earth goes back into storage until the following year. And it seems that the escalatory violence that is such a part of our normalcy is endangering the human species and our world more and more. So what appeared in the sky above Bethlehem that first Christmas 2,000 years ago was an early, distant warning that said, you can never achieve peace on Earth through victory—only through justice. For me, that’s the enduring message of the Christmas story."
The quote is taken from John D. Spalding's interview with John Dominic Crossan about his collaboration with Marcus Borg of the book "The First Christmas."
"In “The First Christmas,” Crossan and Borg argue that the nativity story is far richer and more challenging than familiar sentimentalized versions allow. Not simply tidings of comfort and joy, the gospel stories of Jesus’ birth are also edgy visions of another way of life, confronting the status quo and demanding personal and political transformation."
Perhaps I am a little too liberal in my quotes from SOMA.
Thursday, January 03, 2008
Saving Clowns
Tonight as I was taking out the rubbish, which is a much nicer word than 'trash,' I had a sudden change of heart about the clowns from the ghost hole. They are in reprieve at the moment and I may haul them back to the dark corner above the garage.
It is said that absence makes the heart grow fonder; that may be so. To be sure, I won't be alone much longer, as HWMBO is on his way home and again bringing back a load of Black Hills quartz. Making even low retaining walls of it is a heavy task, but it is so much more attractive than quarry stone.
One might think of the Hill City Dakota Stone Company was our main attraction there. If you click on that link, you will see the dinosaur I am related to...well not quite, a cousin's son found it and it is named for him, the T REX STAN.
It is said that absence makes the heart grow fonder; that may be so. To be sure, I won't be alone much longer, as HWMBO is on his way home and again bringing back a load of Black Hills quartz. Making even low retaining walls of it is a heavy task, but it is so much more attractive than quarry stone.
One might think of the Hill City Dakota Stone Company was our main attraction there. If you click on that link, you will see the dinosaur I am related to...well not quite, a cousin's son found it and it is named for him, the T REX STAN.
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
Clowns in the Ghost Hole
Am Vets saved my day yesterday. They called to remind me that they were picking up household items and usable clothing that was on the curb by 8 A.M. this morning.
Because I am not exactly the Holy Fool that one might admire or wonder about; I immediately decided I would get next to Godliness in the way I know best.
I cleaned the ghost hole over the garage. It took six hours or more and I moved many boxes full of items to the end of the driveway in the dark last night. Part of cleanliness is being able to sleep well after a ghost hole rampage. In my last rampage, I stepped on some sheet rock over the garage and ended up to my knee through it. A little caution is wise when in ghost holes.
I have almost as much stuff to sack up to haul to the curb for the city trash collectors, one being a huge sack full of clowns.
Because I am not exactly the Holy Fool that one might admire or wonder about; I immediately decided I would get next to Godliness in the way I know best.
I cleaned the ghost hole over the garage. It took six hours or more and I moved many boxes full of items to the end of the driveway in the dark last night. Part of cleanliness is being able to sleep well after a ghost hole rampage. In my last rampage, I stepped on some sheet rock over the garage and ended up to my knee through it. A little caution is wise when in ghost holes.
I have almost as much stuff to sack up to haul to the curb for the city trash collectors, one being a huge sack full of clowns.
Tuesday, January 01, 2008
2008! A Year of Change
Happy New Year. That rings a bit hollow, even though I try as hard as I can to be enthusiastic and optimistic; it is a gong instead of a ring. Where is the happy part?
After we were settled in bed for the night on the 30th, the phone rang and He Who Must Be Obeyed spent the night rearranging his plans and by morning he was preparing to leave for the Black Hills. This morning before 6:00 he left with a kiss and a "be careful on the ice."
He is once again attempting to rescue bi-polar R from her fears and habits. But not before he sent his 51 year old niece,once a legal dependant, a sizeable money order, and paid half of 28 year old A's mortgage and a share of her monthly expenses. Is it taking care of business? Being compassionate and generous? God only knows. I have no say in any of it...but then, never have had. Holy Fool comes to mind.
The wind chill was -6' when he left. At least he has a butt warmer in the pick up.
Happy New Year...Happy Humbug.
After we were settled in bed for the night on the 30th, the phone rang and He Who Must Be Obeyed spent the night rearranging his plans and by morning he was preparing to leave for the Black Hills. This morning before 6:00 he left with a kiss and a "be careful on the ice."
He is once again attempting to rescue bi-polar R from her fears and habits. But not before he sent his 51 year old niece,once a legal dependant, a sizeable money order, and paid half of 28 year old A's mortgage and a share of her monthly expenses. Is it taking care of business? Being compassionate and generous? God only knows. I have no say in any of it...but then, never have had. Holy Fool comes to mind.
The wind chill was -6' when he left. At least he has a butt warmer in the pick up.
Happy New Year...Happy Humbug.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
