July continues to resemble a Haiku poem that my sister wrote during her high school years. I recall her words as follows: On this dry-blown plain, parched and chapped beneath the sun, a lark's liquid notes.
Our land is, indeed, dry-blown; the cows are certain that their feed is unacceptable and they vocalize their displeasure at the gate each morning, before they move off to graze on crunchy fare. The corrals and lane swirl with dust at the beginning of each day, when ewes move out to graze, and at the end, when they return for safe-keeping through the night. I am unable to repress thoughts of the dust pneumonia that killed livestock and people during the '30s.
Like our surroundings, we are parched, shriveled, chapped, and raw. We close and then open windows and blinds in the house in tandem with the dawn build-up and subsequent evening retreat of each day's heat. Thus far, we have resisted the temptation to install a window air conditioner; instead, we pretend that our house fan, a'whirr non-stop since mid-June, provides sufficient cooling by merely moving air within the house. I note that Jim checks email messages often, seeking respite in the cool dark basement office. I routinely shed some outerwear upon entering the house after doing hot outdoor chores, so please, don't drop in for a surprise visit without first knocking. Smoke from wildfires burning to the east and west of us obscures our view and tarnishes our sky, and our long-range weather forecast for continued heat and wind is worrisome.
Despite our heat-induced exhaustion and drought-caused anxiety, we've celebrated often during July. Some of those celebrations are mere moments of gratitude, as when cold water for livestock water troughs splashes from hoses and hydrants, though it should be noted that we fill troughs more often than necessary as a precaution against the very real possibility that our community water system will shut down for hours, or even days. Likewise, our garden provides daily joy, thus far yielding lettuce, zucchinis, yellow crooknecks, cucumbers, and tomatoes--both slicers and bite sized--in abundance adequate to share with neighbors. We celebrated marketing the majority of our lambs mid-month, and are proud that they weighed a hefty 100 pounds/head. Our stack-yard is full to capacity with hay--a source of much hard-earned satisfaction--even after having sold several dozen round bales. Based on news that we hear and read, drought-related shortages could cause all-time high demand and prices for hay. We chose not to capitalize on that prediction. Rather, we sold at a price that seemed fair to us and to the producers on the other end and trusted our sense that fair dealing trumps predatory opportunism. Regrowth of sanfoin under the pivot looks promising for a decent second cutting of hay, but we're not counting that potential celebration until it hatches into bales.
That mixed metaphor (or is it a muddled adage?) reminds me to mention our pleasure in seeing thirty or so pheasant chicks flustering about in the middle of the road nearly every day. Though fun to watch, they would be better served by a convention center less vulnerable to traffic and raptors. Just north of the pheasant convergence is a pair of short-eared owls that have returned for the past several years to hunt a particular field. Their irregular floppety flight and diurnal schedule are distinctive. As for the lark noted in my sibling's Haiku--its "liquid note" providing juicy contrast to the desiccated first and second lines--surely she had in mind a Western Meadowlark perched atop an old post in our south lane, busting its yellow buttons with joyous bubbling song.
As for personal celebrations, we managed two: a quiet dinner at home for Jim's birthday early in the month, after which he began baling hay on our lease to the north, baled through the night, and finished at 10:00 AM the following morning, and then a luxuriously air-conditioned restaurant dinner for my recent birthday, timed to get us home before dark in order to make needed irrigation set changes.
Certainly the fact that we each remembered to renew our driver's license is worth a celebratory high-five.
On the art front, I am thrilled to have one of my paintings accepted for MT Watercolor Society's juried national show. That makes my third acceptance in the past thirty plus years. The first was at least twenty-five years ago, followed by a long hiatus from serious painting in order to focus on family and career. After retirement and a return to my palette, I made it into last year's show and now, Watermedia 2017. Yippee! Included is a photo of the painting, Prairie Island Winter Glow, that I took shortly before making a small change in the shape of the butte. This third acceptance qualifies me for signature membership in the society. You may be excused for thinking that the right to add MTWS to my signature on future paintings is a trivial achievement. Certainly, you are justified in pointing out that my journey toward that signatory addendum has been overly long and convoluted. At the very least, however, the change to come in my membership status provides immutable proof of my dogged perseverance. I plan to celebrate my long-awaited return to painting, and, yes, my stubborn stick-to-itiveness at the opening reception and banquet in late September.
We are hopeful that by then our summer of high-pressure oven-broiling will have yielded to generous rain, late-season green up, and sweater-comfy temperatures. A juice-filled plumping of our soils, cells, and surroundings would warrant a statewide party. We'd like to celebrate by roasting marshmallows and toasting the future rather than roasting and toasting our habitats and inhabitants.
Our land is, indeed, dry-blown; the cows are certain that their feed is unacceptable and they vocalize their displeasure at the gate each morning, before they move off to graze on crunchy fare. The corrals and lane swirl with dust at the beginning of each day, when ewes move out to graze, and at the end, when they return for safe-keeping through the night. I am unable to repress thoughts of the dust pneumonia that killed livestock and people during the '30s.
Like our surroundings, we are parched, shriveled, chapped, and raw. We close and then open windows and blinds in the house in tandem with the dawn build-up and subsequent evening retreat of each day's heat. Thus far, we have resisted the temptation to install a window air conditioner; instead, we pretend that our house fan, a'whirr non-stop since mid-June, provides sufficient cooling by merely moving air within the house. I note that Jim checks email messages often, seeking respite in the cool dark basement office. I routinely shed some outerwear upon entering the house after doing hot outdoor chores, so please, don't drop in for a surprise visit without first knocking. Smoke from wildfires burning to the east and west of us obscures our view and tarnishes our sky, and our long-range weather forecast for continued heat and wind is worrisome.
Despite our heat-induced exhaustion and drought-caused anxiety, we've celebrated often during July. Some of those celebrations are mere moments of gratitude, as when cold water for livestock water troughs splashes from hoses and hydrants, though it should be noted that we fill troughs more often than necessary as a precaution against the very real possibility that our community water system will shut down for hours, or even days. Likewise, our garden provides daily joy, thus far yielding lettuce, zucchinis, yellow crooknecks, cucumbers, and tomatoes--both slicers and bite sized--in abundance adequate to share with neighbors. We celebrated marketing the majority of our lambs mid-month, and are proud that they weighed a hefty 100 pounds/head. Our stack-yard is full to capacity with hay--a source of much hard-earned satisfaction--even after having sold several dozen round bales. Based on news that we hear and read, drought-related shortages could cause all-time high demand and prices for hay. We chose not to capitalize on that prediction. Rather, we sold at a price that seemed fair to us and to the producers on the other end and trusted our sense that fair dealing trumps predatory opportunism. Regrowth of sanfoin under the pivot looks promising for a decent second cutting of hay, but we're not counting that potential celebration until it hatches into bales.
That mixed metaphor (or is it a muddled adage?) reminds me to mention our pleasure in seeing thirty or so pheasant chicks flustering about in the middle of the road nearly every day. Though fun to watch, they would be better served by a convention center less vulnerable to traffic and raptors. Just north of the pheasant convergence is a pair of short-eared owls that have returned for the past several years to hunt a particular field. Their irregular floppety flight and diurnal schedule are distinctive. As for the lark noted in my sibling's Haiku--its "liquid note" providing juicy contrast to the desiccated first and second lines--surely she had in mind a Western Meadowlark perched atop an old post in our south lane, busting its yellow buttons with joyous bubbling song.
As for personal celebrations, we managed two: a quiet dinner at home for Jim's birthday early in the month, after which he began baling hay on our lease to the north, baled through the night, and finished at 10:00 AM the following morning, and then a luxuriously air-conditioned restaurant dinner for my recent birthday, timed to get us home before dark in order to make needed irrigation set changes.
Certainly the fact that we each remembered to renew our driver's license is worth a celebratory high-five.
On the art front, I am thrilled to have one of my paintings accepted for MT Watercolor Society's juried national show. That makes my third acceptance in the past thirty plus years. The first was at least twenty-five years ago, followed by a long hiatus from serious painting in order to focus on family and career. After retirement and a return to my palette, I made it into last year's show and now, Watermedia 2017. Yippee! Included is a photo of the painting, Prairie Island Winter Glow, that I took shortly before making a small change in the shape of the butte. This third acceptance qualifies me for signature membership in the society. You may be excused for thinking that the right to add MTWS to my signature on future paintings is a trivial achievement. Certainly, you are justified in pointing out that my journey toward that signatory addendum has been overly long and convoluted. At the very least, however, the change to come in my membership status provides immutable proof of my dogged perseverance. I plan to celebrate my long-awaited return to painting, and, yes, my stubborn stick-to-itiveness at the opening reception and banquet in late September.
We are hopeful that by then our summer of high-pressure oven-broiling will have yielded to generous rain, late-season green up, and sweater-comfy temperatures. A juice-filled plumping of our soils, cells, and surroundings would warrant a statewide party. We'd like to celebrate by roasting marshmallows and toasting the future rather than roasting and toasting our habitats and inhabitants.
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