Ramble On

Well, tonight's post is just an exercise in rambling.  A spillage of random and erratic thoughts.  My normal way of thinking in other words, not cleaned up and organized to fool ya'll into thinking I know what I'm talking about.  I'm not sure if it's the rain, the bugs or the humidity that has destroyed my enthusiasm lately but I'm just bored out of my gourd and lacking any energy to do anything about it.  I've tried to get a few photos of the garden and things going on around here but it's either raining like hell, complete with lots of lightning, or you are so busy fighting the mosquitoes and deer fly, it's almost impossible to focus on photos.  Everything has the musty, sopping wet feel of an old sponge that's been laying in a kitchen sink for a few days.  We either go to sleep hypnotized by the flashing of distant lightning or are woken in the early morning hours, the house trembling from the close proximity of the hits.

I often wonder what the chickens think about the lightning and thunder.  They are never deterred by the rain though.  They remind me of little pigs with feathers.  They actually seem to relish the mud, scratching and flinging it with abandon to find worms and other goodies.  Then they run to me with their little muddy feet and heads.  Why doesn't she want us to sit in her lap today??  They stay out in the showers enough to let it wash all that away though and when the heavy downpours come they'll all rush under our trucks to sit and preen and re-oil everything again.

I guess my mood isn't help much by the fact that I've been going through photos trying to pick a number of them to be printed.   And I have lots of picture frames to be filled, or given away.  Seeing all those photos makes me want to go, of course.  Maybe I should have been a photographer for a travel magazine!  or a newspaper or anything where I worked on the road.  But, I've been there partially.  It gets old sometimes.  I think I did figure part of it out though; my restlessness.  As beautiful as this hollar is, I think it's somehow confining to me.  I can't see the horizon.  I've always loved that distance.  Those wide open spaces.  They make you feel free.  I think that's why I love a sparse house; it's open and uncluttered.  Just space.  I love the shade here, the flowing shady creek..... but I can't see over that hill.

People don't talk to you on blogs like they used to.  That's one reason I like to sometimes read back through old posts from a few years back.  Lots of conversations going on.  I fear we are entering a time when people really don't communicate anymore.  There is the semblance of it but no real substance.  Used to have your 15 minutes of fame, now you have your 15 seconds of contact.  Just enough to make us feel there are other humans around us but don't ask me to sit with you in person.  That thin digital mask is always present and all it takes is a swipe to move on.  Gotta have something fresh to hold my attention.  I might be missing out on something really good.  All the while something really good walks by as we are all looking down. 

Speaking of old posts, some of you may remember ol' Ernie, Allen's bloodhound.  Well, he passed on from this old world yesterday evening.  Ernie was pretty old; he was a stray that came up here a few years back and Allen took him in.  He was terribly aggravating at times and produced incredible amounts of saliva but he was a good ol' dog at heart.  He just wanted to be petted and a bone to chew on.

So, now that I have depressed you all I shall go to bed.  My work here is done.  Ha!  Hopefully I'll be back soon with something better to report.  If anybody's even listening.  And if you're not that okay; it gives my brain something to do so that, hopefully, it won't set up into a big chunk of nothingness.