Cogito, ergo sum

"I think, therefore I am."   René Descartes

I Sit Beside the Fire and Think

  By: J.R.R. Tolkien

I sit beside the fire and think of all that I have seen

Of meadow flowers and butterflies in summers that have been

Of yellow leaves and gossamer in autumns that there were

With morning mist and silver sun and wind upon my hair

I sit beside the fire and think of how the world will be

When winter comes without a spring that I shall never see

For still there are so many things that I have never seen

In every wood in every spring there is a different green

I sit beside the fire and think of people long ago

And people that will see a world that I shall never know

But all the while I sit and think of time there were before

I listen for returning feet and voices at the door

A Nostalgic Rabbit Hole

 

It has happened again. A daily jigsaw puzzle pulled me down a rabbit hole....this one of the Casa de Mateus in Vila Real Portugal. 

Just the mention of Mateus has the power to take me back more than fifty years. It was my first and favorite wine.

I new I had blogged about it before and didn't want to repeat.

A search of past blogs about wine led me to the one from September 2, 2012.

As soon as I saw the photo of me with my dear friend Kristina the words miss you, miss you, miss you formed in my mind.

It is a poem I have previously posted. That one was about missing my mother. (November 16, 2012) 

Interesting - both posts from 2012.

Time for me to get on with my day.... but first another read of David Cory's poem:

 Miss You

Miss you, miss you, miss you;
Everything I do
Echoes with the laughter
And the voice of You.
You're on every corner,
Every turn and twist,
Every old familiar spot
Whispers how you're missed.

Miss you, miss you, miss you!
Everywhere I go
There are poignant memories
Dancing in a row.
Silhouette and shadow
Of your form and face,
Substance and reality
Everywhere displace.

Oh, I miss you, miss you!
God! I miss you, Girl!
There's a strange, sad silence
'Mid the busy whirl,
Just as tho' the ordinary
Daily things I do
Wait with me, expectant
For a word from You.

 Miss you, miss you, miss you!
Nothing now seems true
Only that 'twas heaven
Just to be with You.

  

Celebrating From One to Ninety

 

Our youngest great-grandson, Henri, is now one year old.

He wasn't sure just what he was supposed to do with his 'smash' cake. With a little prompting he did finally get his hands into it.

At this point I think he was getting tired. He changes so much every time I see him, which isn't often. 

Henri shared his big day with his great-grandfather Pete, pictured here with his daughter Shalea.

I didn't think about it until we were on our way home, but we really should have gotten a photo of Henri and Pete together.

This cake was for both of them - "Happy 1st Henri"; Happy 90th Pete".

While Henri napped, big brother Louis participated in a chilly Easter Egg Hunt....

....along with cousins Ayden and Greyson.

Ninety eggs were hidden - 30 for each of the boys.

They were still looking for the final two or three when we left.

Somehow we even ended up with an egg.

Bud put it back for the boys to find after the picture was taken.

It was so nice to see everyone and help celebrate two very special birthdays.

I'm so grateful I felt like going.  Being with the little ones always makes me happy. And catching up with my adult grandchildren does too.

March '25 Books

 Ten books read this month.

Big Fish: A Novel of Mythic Proportions by Daniel Wallace was sent to me by my son Douglas.

The Christie Affair by Nina de Gramont is about the 11-day disappearance of Agatha Christie in 1926.

Fatal Intrusion is a collaboration between Jeffery Deaver and Isabella Maldonado. I've read a number of Deaver's books but none of Maldonado's. This was a good, well written, crime novel.

The Grey Wolf is Louise Penny's latest (#19) in her Inspector Gamache series. She is one of my favorite authors. He is one of my favorite characters.

The Country of the Painted Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett was first published in 1896. I do not remember when I read the book the first time. I just remember how much I liked it and how impressed I was that a book written that long ago held up over the years. This edition, with wonderful illustrations by Douglas Alvord, was published in 2000. 

I have my own version of the painted firs. Various photos of which I've shared on FB many times.

Eleanor Oliphant is completely fine by Gail Honeyman, a new author for me. I really liked this unaware, socially inept, character. 

The Comfort of Crows, A Backyard Year by Margaret Renkl is the only non-fiction book on this month's list. Described as "a literary devotional: fifty-two chapters that follow the creatures and plants in her backyard over the course of a year". This book makes me very grateful for the time and place I grew up in and extremely sad for what has happened in/to our world since the 1940's-'50's. What happens when all the pollinators are gone? This was one of the most caring and beautifully illustrated* books I've read. (*One for each of the 52 chapters by the author's artist brother, Billy Renkl.)

The Wilds by Sarah Pearse is another of her Detective Elin Warner mysteries. 

Infinite Country is the first book I've read by Patricia Engel. It is an all to familiar story of a Columbian family separated by borders and deportation. Stories like this are hard for me to read, but, I feel, an important reminder to keep in mind those less fortunate.

By Any Other Name is Jodi Picoult's newest novel. It is the story of two women, centuries apart, who are determined to realize their dreams of writing poetry and plays regardless of the prejudices against them. I've said it before, any book by this author is good reading, no matter the subject matter.

All in all, another month of good reads. 

How Green Was My Valley

 

A nice rain (a third of an inch) and overnight, it seems, everything is greening. It looks like spring, but the temperature feels more like late winter.

My post title refers to the 1941 movie. I was going to post the photo of me in front of the typical Irish cottage constructed for the movie until I realized, wrong movie! 

It was the 1952 movie, The Quiet Man, not How Green Was My Valley that was set in Ireland. How Green Was My Valley was set in Wales. 

But Maureen O'Hara starred in them both. Perhaps I may be excused for my confusion.

The willows are also showing some green.

As are some of the other volunteer trees along the railroad right of way.

This area is such good habitat for the birds and other creatures that I enjoy seeing.

Yesterday I made a start at cleaning off the flower beds. It only took about 12-15 feet to rake up enough leaves to fill one 39 gallon black plastic bag. A good start, but enough for the first effort. It used to take me only a couple hours to do it all, now I have to pace myself.

But oh, it felt so good to be working outside. To quote Margaret Atwood: "In the Spring, at the end of the day, you should smell like dirt."  💚

When 'Mushrooming' Was A Family Affair

 

 

I'm not sure how old I was the first time I went mushrooming but it was with my parents and siblings, grandpa and grandma Ridnour, my aunt Lois, uncle Alvin and their kids - my cousins. We went to a large timber east and south of Guss. I have always loved being in the woods, but tasked with hunting something was a new experience. Before I knew what I was looking for someone had to find some to show me.

What I remember about that first time hunting morels is that we all came home with sacks and sacks full. The first thing Mom did was put them in a dishpan of salt water to soak overnight - to get the bugs out. The next day they were cut in half lengthways, patted dry, dipped in seasoned flour and then in eggs whisked with milk and fried in butter or oil. They were so good. 

After that, there were a few years we went to a timber south of Brooks. Then it was just our family and Grandma Lynam. There was a little creek on the property which we mostly stayed on the south side of. There may or may not have been some wading across to the other side. Usually you found a single mushroom here and there but I do remember finding a fairy ring of morels once. Some years we would find enough for a 'nice mess' other times we might not find any.

Some thought the tan morels were best, others said the little gray ones were better. I didn't see a difference. They were all good. 

Remembering the last time I went mushrooming with my mother is what prompted this post. It would have been, I think, the early 80's when the kids and I lived in 'The Little House'. It was a lovely spring day. We, Mom and I, drove east of Bushville about a half mile, parked the car in a field driveway and climbed over the fence into some woods. We didn't find any morels, but we saw many spring flowers - Mayapples, Jack-in-the-Pulpits, Sweet William (Phlox), Trillium, Dutchman's Breeches (which we always called 'britches') and, of course, my favorites, Violets.

But the thing I remember most about those woods were after we had walked into them quite a distance, there was an almost perfectly round hollow 15 to 20 feet across. It wasn't like a pond, just a depression in the ground. We could not fathom what had caused it. I did not think it looked man made. It is something I never forgot; something I still wonder about. 

The last time I went mushrooming was 2005 or '06. Ron had begun dating Marge and wanted me to get acquainted with her. She wanted to hunt for morels. At the time I was working in the Industrial Park. One of the guys who worked in the same plant had been going across the RR tracks into a wooded area and finding mushrooms there. So I invited Marge to meet me after work and she and I went to the same area. We did not find any morels but I did discover a plant I'd never seen before. It had heart shaped leaves. Beneath the leaves were brownish-red flowers.  

After much searching I discovered it was wild ginger.

I have not seen it anywhere else. But I'm always happy to discover new plants.

Morel season is only a few weeks away. Good luck hunting them.

Alas, my mushrooming, new plant finding days are over. But the memories remain.

Do You Remember?

 

I pulled this recipe out of Mom's recipe box a year or so ago, intending to make it. This was a salad that my sister-in-law Ruthie often brought to family dinners - kinda like my go to Cranberry-Raspberry-Pineapple jello salad is for me now. 

I remember really liking Ruthie's Jello Salad. Who else remembers this salad? Did you like it? 

We are invited to a family lunch to celebrate a couple birthdays in three weeks. I think instead of Ramona's Famous Pea Salad, I will take Ruthie's Jello Salad. Or maybe both?

This recipe not only brings back memories, so does the handwriting on the card. It is my Mom's - also a Ruth. Both were excellent cooks.

"Preparing and serving food is a way of expressing our love for others. Long after the last bite is eaten, we remember those we shared the food with and how it made us feel." 💖

Meet Your Business Men #33

A little over seven months ago, articles from the (late?) 1950's Adams County Free Press entitled Meet Your Business Men began being featured in the Facebook page You Know You're From Corning, Iowa If.... which was created by my younger brother, Les Lynam, in August, 2011. You do have to be a member to see the posts but becoming part of the group is easy, just apply.

This week's article is about the father-son partnership of blacksmiths Cliff and Dean Driskill. Their shop was on the west side of Davis Avenue (main street) in the part of downtown Corning known as Bottle Row. If my father, Louis, needed something repaired, he took it to Driskill's. I know he considered both men as friends, but probably more, Dean, who was closer in age to Dad.

I do remember the sadness surrounding the death of Dean's youngest daughter, Madeline, when she died at age 11 in 1952. The cause of her death was a burst appendix. Because the symptoms of appendicitis are the same as other ailments, her's wasn't caught in time. 

Madeline's death was on Dad's mind two years later when my older brother, Ronald, complained of intense pain in his abdomen. As I remember it, Dad did take Ron to the local doctor, worried that it might be appendicitis, but his pain was on his left side, not the right side where the appendix is almost always located. The good doctor did not think it was appendicitis. Thank goodness Dad wasn't taking any chances. He took Ronald to the hospital in Creston where Ron's appendix was removed before it ruptured. (Abount one in 10,000 people have an appendix on the left side.)

The only other thing I remember about this tale was that when Ron was coming out from under the anasthesia there was a young candy striper in the room, straightening his blanket, asking if he needed anything, etc. Big brother must have been impressed - he told her: "I love you." Oh, the effect of drugs. I could remember her name for a long time. Ron might still remember, he got teased about it a lot.

February '25 Books

Those brutal, bitterly cold days were good for something - nine books read this month - all but three from Reese's Book Club. 

Maybe Next Time is the first book I've read by Cesca Major. For an idea of what the book is about, think Groundhog Day - the same day, over and over.

The Last House Guest by Megan Miranda is the second book I've read by this author. Both were so-so psychological suspense novels. 

The Most Fun We Ever Had is the first book I've read by Claire Lombardo. It is a multi-generational novel centered around the four daughters of a couple married in the 1970's. Sibling rivalry is a real thing but this book has too much of it for me.

Firebird and Sarah's Window are both by Janice Graham. They are books I've owned more than twenty years. Both are set in the Flint Hills of Kansas. Firebird made such an impression on me. I know I've read it several times, but it had been awhile. In my opinion, it still holds up. Sarah's Window was and still is good - just not quite as good as Firebird.

Truly Madly Guilty by Liane Moriarty is the last book of her's my library has. I have enjoyed these books set in Australia.

The Club is the first book I've read by Sherry Lloyd. Let's just say I don't/can't identify with the rich and famous.

The Sanatorium by Sarah Pearse is set in an isolated hotel high up in the Alps. Once a hospital to treat tuberculosis patients, closed and boarded up for years, it has been renovated into a five-star minimalist hotel. An English detective and her boyfriend have been invited by her brother to attend his wedding at the hotel. As an atmospheric thriller, this one is pretty good. A who is it to the very end. My library does have another of her books. I've added it to my list.

The Secrets We Kept is Lara Prescott's first novel. I love historical fiction based on fact. During the Cold War, the CIA selects some of their typists to become spies and operatives who helped get Boris Pasternak's novel Dr. Zhivago published. This was such an interesting read, my favorite this month. 

Never Too Old To Learn Something New

I was 'yesterday' years old when I learned....something I should have known from the time I played office as a young girl and knew I wanted one day to be a secretary. Yesterday I started a new book, The Secrets We Kept, about two women secretaries in the CIA's typing pool who became spies during the Cold War. On page eight I read: "Secretary: a person entrusted with a secret. From the Latin secretus, secretum." How did I never make that connection? Me, a lover of words and their etymology.

Even my innate curiosity never caused me to delve into the meaning of the word. It had to be because I knew what a secretary was and what she did. But never did I associate the word secretary with the word secret. I feel like a dunce. But I also feel delighted. I have been a secretary. I have been/am a keeper of secrets. 

Wanting to know, to understand, to be aware also turned me into a news junkie. Eight years ago when cheeto became the top banana, I read all the headlines and stories about his most current faux pas. I would get upset, incredulous, etc. But this time around, during his second administration (and even worse actions) I skip reading anything about the turmoil he promotes, opting instead to read stories like these:

All about the plan to move the Locust Creek Covered Bridge to Pershing State Park. 

Look Bud. They're moving our covered bridge. 

We stopped at Locust Covered Bridge State Historical Site between Laclede and Meadville, Missouri in July, 2019. I wrote about it here: https://rilynam.blogspot.com/2019/07/a-natural-leafy-bower.html

Bud took and shared this photo of me on Facebook saying I was "looking for Clint Eastwood". Referencing Clint's roll as Robert Kincaid in The Bridges of Madison County.

The General John J. Pershing Boyhood Home State Historic Site is located in Laclede. I doubt my children remember stopping there to see the home of Black Jack Pershing in the mid 1970's, but I do. Just as I remember learning about his military experiences and achievements in grade school and high school. I doubt he is mentioned in today's classrooms.

Pershing State Park is three miles west and south of Laclede and covers more than 5000 acres of wetland prairie, a meandering stream, sloughs and a bottomland forest. I'm going to assume the covered bridge will be situated across the stream somewhere in those 5000 acres. 

I'm not too old to learn about the plans for the Locust Creek Covered Bridge; just too old to see it in its new location.

A "Light Snow Winter"

I don't keep track of our snowfall as I do the rain we get, but I know it has been an exceptionally snowless winter so far. It seems we will make up for that this month. Wednesday we had 7 inches of light, fluffy snow. Forecast for tomorrow is more snow, but of the heavy wet category. The amount we are to get keeps changing, so....? It is the bitter cold and way below zero wind chills that have me concerned.

February's Full Snow Moon - February 12

I had to wait for it to snow before I could share this poem by Mary Oliver:

Snowy Night

Last night, an owl
in the blue dark
tossed
an indeterminate number
of carefully shaped sounds into
the world, in which,
a quarter of a mile away, I happened
to be standing.
I couldn’t tell
which one it was –
the barred or the great-horned
ship of the air –
it was that distant. But, anyway,
aren’t there moments
that are better than knowing something,
and sweeter? Snow was falling,
so much like stars
filling the dark trees
that one could easily imagine
its reason for being was nothing more
than prettiness. I suppose
if this were someone else’s story
they would have insisted on knowing
whatever is knowable – would have hurried
over the fields
to name it – the owl, I mean.
But it’s mine, this poem of the night,
and I just stood there, listening and holding out
my hands to the soft glitter
falling through the air. I love this world,
but not for its answers.
And I wish good luck to the owl,
whatever its name –
and I wish great welcome to the snow,
whatever its severe and comfortless
and beautiful meaning.

Another Valentine's Day together and another beautiful bouquet from the wonderful and thoughtful Hubby Dearest. 💞

"Every love story is beautiful, but ours is my favorite." 💗

January '25 Books

 Launching a new year with an average number of books read - eight for this month.

the Husband's Secret and Apples Never Fall are by Liane Moriarty an author I have been reading my way through. It looks like I have one more of her's to get from the library.

The Blue Hour, a Good Morning America Book Club pick, is another suspenseful tale by Paula Hawkins. Her novels seem to have the most surprising endings.

On The Rooftop by Margaret Wilkerson Sexton is another of the Reese's Book Club picks.

As is Outlawed by Anna North. This book is a whole new take on the Hole in the Wall gang.

The Island of Missing Trees by Elif Shafak was my favorite read this month. To quote Goodreads: "A moving, beautifly written and delicately constructed story of love, division, transcendence, history and eco-consciouness." With my love of/for trees, this book was wonderful.

Wrong Place Wrong Time, also a Reese's Book Club pick, is the first novel I've read by Gillian McCallister. A hard-to keep-track-of time travel tale.

The House In The Pines by Ana Reyes is the same as the above - new author; Reese's pick. So far, I am not overly impressed by any of them.

Hopefully February's reads will be more stimulating.

What I Was Born For

To look, to listen, to ask why, to dig, to explore, to be aware, to figure out - I believe I was born with it - curiosity.

Sunset - January 30, 2019

Mindful By Mary Oliver

Every day
I see or hear
something
that more or less

kills me
with delight,
that leaves me
like a needle

in the haystack
of light.
It was what I was born for -
to look, to listen,

to lose myself
inside this soft world -
to instruct myself
over and over

in joy,
and acclamation.
Nor am I talking
about the exceptional,

the fearful, the dreadful,
the very extravagant -
but of the ordinary,
the common, the very drab,

the daily presentations.
Oh, good scholar,
I say to myself,
how can you help

but grow wise
with such teachings
as these -
the untrimmable light

of the world,
the ocean's shine,
the prayers that are made
out of grass?

Sunrise, Nags Head, Outer Banks, NC 

Burns Supper and The Selkirk Grace

 

January 25 has always meant one thing to me - my Mother's birthday. She was born 106 years ago today.

Choosing this photo of her to share is the first time I realized how much my sister Betty looked like her.

It is also the birthday of our friend Carter. He celebrates his 53rd today. 

We became friends of his after he and Kari met when she worked at Barnes and Noble in West Des Moines.

His personality is of the "Hail-fellow-well-met" manner. I doubt he has ever met a stranger.

Well known Scottish poet Robert Burns was also born on this date in 1759. Scots celebrate Rabbie Burns Day or Burns Night with a traditional Burns Supper which begins with his Selkirk Grace:

Some hae meat and canna eat,
And some wad eat that want it;
But we hae meat, and we can eat,
Sae let the Lord be thankit.

Probably Burns' best known poem, and my favorite is this one:

A Red, Red Rose

O my luve’s like a red, red rose,
That’s newly sprung in June:
O my luve’s like the melodie
That’s sweetly play’d in tune.

As fair art thou, my bonny lass,
So deep in luve am I;
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
Till a’ the seas gang dry.

Till a’ the seas gang dry, my dear,
And the rocks melt wi’ the sun
O I will luve thee still, my dear,
While the sands o’ life shall run:

And fare thee weel, my only luve!
And fare thee weel a while!
And I will come again, my luve,
Though it were ten thousand mile.

Putting Up With The Cold Weather

 

Cold Poem By Mary Oliver

Cold now.
Close to the edge. Almost
unbearable. Clouds
bunch up and boil down
from the north of the white bear.
This tree-splitting morning
I dream of his fat tracks,
the lifesaving suet.

I think of summer with its luminous fruit,
blossoms rounding to berries, leaves,
handfuls of grain.

Maybe what cold is, is the time
we measure the love we have always had, secretly,
for our own bones, the hard knife-edged love
for the warm river of the I, beyond all else; maybe

that is what it means the beauty
of the blue shark cruising toward the tumbling seals.

In the season of snow,
in the immeasurable cold,
we grow cruel but honest; we keep
ourselves alive,
if we can, taking one after another
the necessary bodies of others, the many
crushed red flowers.

I forget very quickly that we've had some above average temperatures this month and many normal days of moderate cold, but given a few days of bitter cold and below zero wind chills and it seems like it has been forever. 

Respite is on the way! A January Thaw! A few days of warmer temperatures. I associate a/the January Thaw with my Mom. She is the one I learned the term from and, in my mind, it always seems to happen right around her birthdate, January 25.

Beginning this afternoon our forecast for the coming week is highs in the 30's and 40's. Thanks Mom.  💛🌞

(Note: My photo is from January 16, 2022. We have had very little snow this month.) 

Happy New Year - Mostly cloudy and overcast with just a bit of blue sky peeking through here and there. Temperature of 28° with the wind chill, it feels like 18°. I drove up to Lake McKinley in a warm car to take HD's first of the month (also first of the year) photo. I was only out of the car a few minutes and about froze! Of course, as Bud said, I wasn't dressed for the weather. Mr. Iron Man (aka Hubby Dearest) walked almost four miles in a bit more than one hour. 

As has been my practice for many years, I do not make any New Year's resolutions, but, reading some of my January 1st journal entries from years past, it is obvious I was always looking to improve myself. 

January 1, 2000 was the big Y2K worry but the lights stayed on. The only problem at work was that the computer did not back up. Two weeks later I went to Des Moines to pick up my new car - Scilla - the sweet little manual 5-speed, '93 Ford Escort station wagon, with only 30,000 miles, that I had picked out, made the deal for and bought all by myself. 

January 1, 2001 - I was keeping track of everything I ate and how many calories were in it. (That must have been when I weighed almost 200 lbs.) 😔

January 1, 2006 - I was once again promising myself I would journal every day! (Didn't happen.) Only three others entries in January and then nothing until December. My entry on January 3 was this quote: "Regrets are a waste of time. They are the past crippling you in the present." (Federico Fellini)

January 1, 2009 - I was still "going to make an effort to write ((journal) more". But I was exercising! We had joined the Y when we moved to Creston. I was walking one mile, biking five miles, doing multiple reps on all the weight machines, at least five days a week.

In August 2009 I began writing a blog which has almost entirely taken the place of journaling.

In August 2020 I repurposed my Dream Journal to a Quotes Journal. Following is a sampling of some of those quotes.

"We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." (Anais Nin)

"Nature always wears the colors of the spirit." (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

"The leaves of memory seem to make a mournful rustling in the dark." (Henry Wadsworth Longfellow)

"These pictures of her, like everything else, are drenched in time." (Margaret Atwood in Cat's Eye)

"The who you are with others is not you. To be lonesome is to be who you most fully are." (Charles Frazier in Varina)

"The essential self is fixed well before the 13th birthday. It may be influenced by experiences but it is seldom changed." (P.D. James in her short story The Yo-yo)

"The grab bag nature of my mind." (Ivan Doig in Last Bus To Wisdom)

"Nature reserves some of her choice rewards for days when her mood may appear to be somber." (Rachel Carson) 

"Of all the paths you take in life, make sure a few of them are dirt." (Oscar Wilde)

"A lifetime isn't long enough for the beauty of this world and the responsibilities of your life." (Mary Oliver)

"Those who dwell among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life." (Rachel Carson)

"Poetry begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a loneliness." (Robert Frost)

"The child I was is with me in the present hour. It will be with me in the grave." (Mary Oliver)

"Within you, there is a stillness and a sanctuary to which you can retreat at anytime and be yourself." (Hermann Hesse)

"Writing is that oddest of anomolies: an intimate letter to a stranger." (Pico Iyer)

"True solitude is found in the wild places, where one is without human obligation." (Wendell Berry)

"To love someone deeply gives you strength. Being loved by someone gives you courage." (Lao Tzu)

                 

Lastly, as the first day of January winds down:   

"And now let us believe in a long year that is given to us, new, untouched, full of things that have never been." (Rainer Maria Rilke) 💖