In Company with Family 2021

  How did it get to be late so soon?

It's night before its afternoon.

December is here before it's June.

My goodness how the time has flown.

How did it get so late so soon?

Dr. Suess  

Thanks to all the women and men in the health community who worked tirelessly to save lives, so families and friends could once again be together for the holidays in 2021. 

Our spring began as fall ended with yard clean up, rains, and damaging hail storms. Jack fell down and rather than break his crown he busted his ribs, and we discovered the rush of adrenaline when 911 is called for a loved one. 

By June and two vaccines we felt our feet on the ground and moving along with life, slower than the years before but moving ahead. Murphy entered our lives on May 1 and we felt younger and laughed harder than we have in years. 

The beauty of this puppy is that he MUST walk daily or we end up playing ball for hours on end toward evening, when all we really want to do is sit and read, or sit and watch television. So, Jack walks him every morning that the weather allows. No rain since October and warm temperatures have kept Jack walking and getting in better shape than before.  So much to be thankful for, and so much more fun than a nagging wife. I walk the afternoon shift when Murphy is slightly worn down, but I'm not as faithful as Jack.  

Letty, Katy, Shaun, and Two Bit; Isaac, Ann, Mike and Jack 

 In August our sons arranged for a family gathering at a vacation rental home on Lake Eufaula, Oklahoma. It was the first time all three of our children and their families gathered together with us in several years, and they were happy. They laughed together and at each other, they fished, told stories, stayed up late and had fun. Our hearts were filled with thanks to God that we had built a strong blended family. Mike, Ann, and son Isaac live in Dodgeville, Wisconsin. Katy and Shaun Bledsoe live in Oklahoma City with our two grand dogs, Two Bit, and Hope. We love Hope. Matthew divides his time between New York City and South Florida.  They are each healthy, happy, and have terrific careers. 

Letty, Katy, Matthew, Isaac, Ann, Mike, and Jack

In January Mike celebrated his 50th birthday, and in September Katy celebrated her 50th birthday. She and Shaun traveled to Savannah, Georgia to make it memorable. She succeeded in twisting her ankle in the sand....and making it memorable.  

Matt will celebrate that number in 2023. 

On our way to Mineral Point and Dodgeville, Wisconsin we stopped to spend the night in Omaha with our niece Jennifer Gatlin and her family.  The house was filled with love, children, teens, four adult nieces, husbands, two dogs, and one uncle and aunt. When the Watt family gathers there is always food and fun, and her charcuterie board was a delicious treat. Grilled burgers and hot dogs reminded us of years long ago when we gathered at grandma's place.   

How do you explain how meeting your adult nieces when you remember them as tiny babies? They are wives and mothers now; artists, career women, and wonderful women who make the word a better place to live. 

We drove east and north the next day and watched the warm sun turn to gray, cloudy skies that spewed snow on us for the next four days. A Wisconsin winter blast. 

The next day we arrived in Mineral Point, Wisconsin and stayed at a boutique hotel, The Mineral Point Hotel, in 1857 as the William Lanyon Building and on the National Register of Historic Places.  The black and white flocked wall paper brought back memories of the old Country Club's elegance.

Mike, Ann, and Isaac joined us the first night for a cold snowy stroll around the quaint town and then enjoyed a delicious meal at their favorite restaurant, Popolo, and everybody else's favorite because the next night we wanted to eat there but the waiting list was too long.

Jack and I awoke each morning and walked to either the Cafe 43 or the Red Rooster for a yummy breakfast.  The kids, who live up the road in Dodgeville, joined us for most meals and shopping in the arts district. One night we ate at the Midway Grill at the Bowling Alley, located mid-way between Mineral Point and Dodgeville. We had so much fun making memories, thank you Mike and Isaac for throwing the ball backwards and creating an uproar of activity for the bowling alley.  

Home Again, Home Again, jiggery jig...

Thanksgiving was quiet and thoughtful. Jack and I cooked a full meal that we shared with my sister, Jonya, and her husband Bill. But Jack's birthday the 28 of November was anything but quiet.  

We invited neighbors and family for a come and go birthday celebration and of course, no pictures. We spent hours sharing stories, eating, and opening gifts. It's always fun to put names with faces when meeting friends and families.

Murphy didn't get his own Christmas tree, but he managed to keep us to small pencil tree with decorations starting up over the swishing tail line to protect the red bulbs. 

  

I turned 70 again for the fourth time. Each birthday gets sweeter.

Joan invited me to play golf on my fourth 70th birthday to celebrate the day and date. How to dress for 70 degrees in December in Oklahoma was a conundrum. 

Thanks friends for all of your love and support this year.  

We will end the old and begin the new with our large family "Dirty Santa" on January 1.  

How did it get late, so soon?

PS. If you have already received this story please excuse my mistake, but I think the April Fool Monkey jumped on my posting. 

I am closing the door on 2021...

Opening our eyes to 2022..

Murphy Doodle Walks

Good Murphy Doodle 

Good Murphy....

it sure is hard to be a good dog, i like to walk and sniff and p and pull and tug but letty likes slow g e n t l e walks, and i like letty

she does not know how hard it is for me to walk slowly,  but if i do not walk slowly and gently then my neck gets sore from tugging all of the time, i am strong and want to walk like a man dog, when i do sometimes letty just stops and talks to me, i hang my head, i don't want to hurt her, when i walk slowly she surprises me with a treat, i wag my tail and walk gentle after that 

actually jack walks are better and lots more fun, he lets me run ahead of him on a long lease and i get to sniff and p on every  mailbox and tree, but jack doesn't give me treats like letty does on her walks

i smelled a cat here but could not find it, when i see it i will chase it away 

on a day called christmas when there were children everywhere on bicycles, i walked a long way with jack and barked at that big reindeer with a red nose, i do not like to see him when he jumps around in the wind, i bark and bark and he will not go away, i bet he would like to fly away someday, if we were friends i would teach him to fly like i do

then letty took me for a gentle walk in the afternoon, i have noticed that the yards have objects all over them now and i get to p on little white trees, toys, and green trees, 

how can we have little trees and gigantic reindeer, it does not make sense,

i did see a new little white house that i wanted to smell but letty said no, no no,  i stopped and look and it was quiet all around, i did not even bark at it

what happened to the cold weather, my body felt so good when the cold wind blew but now it is back to summer and i am hot, even in the house, i want winter back

after letty rearranged the furniture so i could not fly around the room, she moved a table and put up a tree, she shook her finger at me and said no p, no p, off, off, off

i sniffed the tree and then pulled the blanket away from it, so i could sleep on the under the tree, she forgot that my bed has always been in that corner, so now i sleep beside the house tree

once again i heard Bad Murphy, when i ate a hole in rudolph's bag of gifts, whatever that means, i ate a hole because it tasted like candy goodies

i woke up on a special day and found a new blanket under the house tree just for me and there was a chew toy with it

i hope you found chew toys and blankets on your special day and a big bowl of food

Why the Trees?

Why have I spent my life enamored with trees ?

Survivor of Katrina, the Southern Live Oak stands alone. 

Is it their shapes, like the Southern Live oak I once danced around in Biloxi, Mississippi before Katrina tore them to shreds, or the limb I sat upon in the yard of the mansion where I dreamed I was a princess?

No, I was a child then.

Birnam Oak, Scotland

Perhaps it was the size and shape of the Birnam Oak in Scotland where ten people could gather 'round, and where several adults could hide inside the tent like opening in the trunk  that captured my attention. I could imagine the centuries of peoples who had loved this tree, who had touched this tree before.

The height of the giant Redwoods in Northern California fascinated our family when we spent the day gazing to tops of these historic native mansions. Our children stood there gazing upward, measuring themselves against the history of time. I wonder what my parents imagined as they drove through the heart of a giant Sequoia in Yosemite on their honeymoon in 1946. 

Hutchinson, Ks.

My imagination tells me that it is the curvature of their spines, the shapes I imagine living between those lines, especially when the winter winds clear the sky of leaves, and limbs, there I see a crooked heart leaning northward in the old ragged tree, worn from decades of bending and breaking from the southwest winds.   

 

On a hilly walk through a cold Wisconsin park, I encountered an old man withered from years of rains, ice, snow, heat; broken from storms and raging floods. His face felt smooth to my touch. He shared no words, but I felt his life deep in my soul. 

I watch the trees and wonder, when will spring arrive, oh, tell me please.

On a windy day my eyes see a glimpse of pink on the skinny flowering crabapple tree. Then one day the Oklahoma landscapes burst into color with while dogwoods, faithful redbuds, tulip trees, and Magnolias smelling sweeter than before. 

Trees have shown me that all greens are not equal, or was that Beatrix Potter, who told Peter to feast his eyes on green and helped me to see her world. While Beatrix watched from an open window and wrote, I walked among the trees wherever they might grow along my life's journey. 

My eyes absorb he green from the most yellow of greens to the bluest of green. As the sunshine hits or the winds blow,, greens glow in the different light and breezes. I smell spring and my heart begins to feel lightness in the air. 

In the steamy summer months it is the cool shade of the trees that offers relief from the burning sun on the golf course. In our backyard the shade from the silver leaf maple furnishes calm shade and serenity. 

Out my writing window I watch tiny birds gather round the bird feeder. I talk to the river birch and ask if the broken bark hurts; its roughness does not lend to rubbing. Last year our river birch lost its twin, attached at the base, but ripped apart by the ice storm. How painful I thought to lose something that close, yet the single river birch managed to survive and thrive. 

When autumn arrives the greens fade to dry yellows and browns, and some lucky leaves draw crowds to photograph their striking golds and reds with speckled designs.

Aspen grove in Colorado

Trees can heal us in so many ways. Rubbing my arm against an Aspen tree in Colorado may not have cured my aches that day, but I walked away with a vivid memory. 

Still I ask myself, why the trees. Why do I find them in my dreams, why do I search for trees when I travel, why do I sometimes feel rooted, strong and flush like an Evergreen, and other days feels old, writhed, wrinkled, and withered like the olive trees that Van Gogh painted?

Yes, still I stand tall.

 

Augusta, Georgia

That is it !

I realize now that I stand like a tree withered slightly from the storms of life. I have found the ability to bounce back from adversity. I bend in the wind and don't break, and still I dance among the trees and dream of far away places. 

 

*For other fascinations with trees check out these sites:

My friend, Martha Slavin, writes from Northern California on her blog

Post Cards in the Air

Beverly Herndon is trained in the ancient art of Chinese painting. 

Check out her work in the Norman Transcript article:

Baroness of Brushes