The Happy Picture

I loved horses and ponies, but I grew up in a place where it just wasn't practical to keep one.  There was one day, however, when the most marvelous thing happened.  A photographer came around our neighborhood leading a pony.  He asked my mother if she would like to have a photo of me sitting on his very gentle, trained pony.  She said yes!  The photographer was equipped with chaps, a bandana, and a hat, which I gladly wore.  As I sat on the pony, I was smiling on the inside as well as the outside!

The Wedding

I can honestly say that it was the most fun wedding I have ever attended.  And it was beautiful, outdoors, on the doorsteps of the Rocky Mountains.  Two of my favorite people were officially wed, a continuation of a committed relationship spanning seven years: my daughter, Debbie, and my new son-in-law, Jeff.  More of my favorite people were there, joining in the celebration.

Mike Morran, the Unitarian Universalist minister, encouraged Debbie and Jeff to write their own vows, which they did.  Morran added his own touch, with words that were downright poetic.  I wish I could remember it all, but something he said sticks in my memory:  Look at the beauty around you and think about whatever made it.

The wedding all came together, despite some tense moments beforehand.  The day before, some of the gerbera daisies had frozen in a friend's refrigerator.  The realization came that yet more granola needed to be prepared to fill the little bags for the guests.  The bride and groom got busy and made some more.  Amanda, the bridesmaid, was making decorations, and made countless trips to the arts and crafts store.  The mother of the bride was trying to create "something blue" by stringing tiny beads together, and they all came off the string and she had to begin again.

Then, miraculously, everything fell into place.  There was music, wine, food...  There were even a few bats flying around outside the barn where the reception was held, but they added an element of interest and didn't bother anyone.  There were toasts made by Jeff's brother, Andy; by Debbie's sister, Cindy; and a great slide show put together by Amanda.  No favoritism here, but I must say that Cindy did a great job with her speech.  I distinctly heard her remark, Debbie is the kindest person I know.  I remember the old days of sibling rivalry and I think, wow.

As I write this, it has been about a month since the wedding.  Today I was listening to a discussion from an online radio station.  A minister and teacher remarked about weddings, saying something to this effect:  I am asked to officiate at weddings, but I can't "marry" anyone.  They do this themselves.  It's a commitment, an inner thing, and most of the time it has been made well before the ceremony takes place.

I like that.

Best wishes to Debbie and Jeff. 

   

The Geographical Center of the Forty-Eight States

Marker made of native Kansas stone

The view east from the geographical center

The chapel and a pleasant place to picnic or sit for a while.

This was my second visit to the Geographical Center of the Forty-eight states.  Some would say there is not much there:  There is a small chapel dedicated to the memory of Elmer and Zeta Stump.  There are picnic tables, a shelter, benches and a small outdoor grill.  There are a couple of markers, most notably one made of native Kansas stone.  There is a small motel that appears to be unoccupied, but kept up.  The place is so nice, atop a prairie hill.


What I like most is looking down the road leading east, a two-lane asphalt road that follows the contour of the land, up and over undulating hills across the prairie.


I stand at the little park that seems mowed and tended and cared for, and know that at every distant direction there are traffic jams on the freeway, crowds shouting at the ball game, jet engines roaring, loud music, mud-slinging politicians, commercials trying to seduce us with triple cheeseburgers and worse, frantic buying and selling of securities, worries about deadlines, all that stuff.


Here at the center there is quiet, except for the song of birds and the prairie wind.


It is good to know that at the middle of this country there is a quiet center.

Solution: Fishy Basement Odor

For quite a while I have noticed an unpleasant odor in our basement.  The strange thing about it was that (a) it was never there when I would first go down to the basement, and (b) it began after I had been in the basement for, oh maybe five minutes or so, and (c) it was confined to one section of the basement.

I have even asked people about it, people who might know, like hardware store employees, and a handyman.  They looked at me like I was losing my mind.  I feared that the basement needed some drastic cleaning, like bleach on all the walls and floors.  I dreaded doing a job like that.

A few days ago I was down in the basement, and made the determination that the odor was like fish that had passed its prime.  Then I went to the computer and Googled "Fishy basement odor."  

What do you know!  Someone else had the same problem and had figured it out.  When plastic light fixtures like the one in the picture below get old and begin to deteriorate, they emit a fishy odor.  It happens after the light has been on long enough for the fixture to heat up.  I unscrewed our fixture and smelled it.  Sure enough, it smelled really fishy, and not in a good way.

It is such a joy to solve a problem like this!  I haven't been this happy since we had the dead raccoon removed from the window well.

Slope Style

Winter Park, Colorado:  Slope style, I gather, is an extreme form of mountain biking.  I watched in a mixture of amazement and horror as young males of the human species astride bicycles hurled themselves over a series of dirt berms.  I’d say they were airborne for a considerable part of the ride, performing upside down and sideways flips.  Oh my God.

Meanwhile, spectators could view the entire ride on a super-large TV screen.  And there were replays.  An announcer gave a play-by-play description, using phrases like, “Way to go, Dude!”  or “Nice ride, Dude.”  When one particularly talented rider began his run, a remote-control helicopter with a camera monitored his progress.  There was an enthusiastic shout from the announcer:  “SHUT THE FRONT DOOR,” which meant that’s the best we’ll see.  Nobody can beat that.

When another rider suffered a nasty fall, the announcer asked, “Hey dude, you all right?”  Medics came in.  It was determined that there was a dislocated shoulder, and it was not the first time it had happened.  First aid was administered.  It sounded oh so painful. I am glad I’m not his mom.

It’s a world I’ve only recently heard about, but it seems to have a considerable following.  Slope style is not a sport for the faint hearted, but it’s pretty amazing to see.

Big picture photo below shows rider slightly below center, big screen video at left center, Winter Park Resort, center right.

You Mean the Lights Aren't On?

Last night I watched the PBS program "Nova."  It was about the amazing and complex human brain and how it works.

It was said that all of this miraculous brain activity is going on in darkness, inside the skull.  I realized, of course, it must be dark in there.  But I had never before thought about it being dark.

The way I had visualized it before, the lights were on.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/body/how-does-the-brain-work.html

Greensburg, Kansas, Four Years After the Tornado

On May 4, 2007, a massive tornado destroyed the western Kansas town of Greensburg, Kansas.

The day after that, I made a note in my journal:  "News today: A tornado completely destroyed the town of Greensburg, Kansas, last night around 9 pm.  The path was 3/4 mile wide !! "

On March 22, 2011, nearly four years after the tornado, it was another windy day on the Kansas plains.  Tumbleweeds rolled across Kansas Highway 54.  By the time we stopped at Greensburg I had already experienced two close calls with losing my hat.  Our Kansas road map had blown out of the car at a rest stop; it sailed into the air, heading in the general direction of Wichita.  But this was only straight line wind.

The Greensburg tornado had been big news in the Midwest, so we wanted to make a stop to fill up with gas.  It was the least we could do to pay our respects to the people who had rebuilt.

This is what we saw: Little or nothing left of the older structures.  Maybe a bare concrete slab here and there, but that was about all.  The buildings were new.  The trees told the story, though.  A few--not many--main trunks and branches--the parts that survived the tornado--remained.  Four years of delicate new growth stood out in a feathery pattern.  The green leaves had not yet appeared; it was yet too early in the spring.

Kinda makes me think about rebuilding after a disaster.  What is it about home and about land?