2014: A Good Year: And Also With You

It's New Year's Eve, and I am setting up a wireless mouse and wireless keyboard for my PC. It's nearly 2014.

Way back in 1988, we were a family of four. Two adults, one working on his PhD, and the other, working on her motherhood skills with two daughters under the age of three.  Back then, we also had an office with a computer. It had a very, very  slow DOS operating system. I do recall that I started learning about "email" that year. I didn't see its worth over a letter sent n the mail.  (And in 2013? I still LOVE a personal letter in my rural mailbox!)  My mother was so far beyond me in computer know-how.  She embraced the new frontier of computerland.  I eschewed it.  She was my To-Go person for all things Windows. She had all the answers!!  And if she did not know outright, she knew in a matter of a minute or so, where to find the answer.

It is incomprehensible how far the computer age has traveled in only a couple of decades.  But - not unlike the science of air travel, right?  Who, besides Da Vinci and probably a few more folk, could have seen the future of human flight?  And now, we have amazing aircraft that few could have imagined even half a century ago!

Do you wonder about the next fifty years?  I do.  I cannot imagine.  I hope that there is more good than bad. (Don't we all, each of our generations?)  I think there will be amazing medical advances, curing diseases on which we have not yet got a handle.  Amazing science discoveries.  I hope that there are amazing movements of peace and acceptance in the world, but I also hold a pessimistic thought, that peoples in the world will refuse to accept others.  Case in point just now, 2013 -  the Tibetan people in China. 

In fifty years...I think the United States is so young compared the rest of the world, it might suffer some in its government.  I don't like writing that.  I dearly hope that I am wrong.

So, well, here we are in rural Kansas; personally, our family is doing pretty darn well. 

And so, in world-wide terms, I can only utter,

"Thanks be to God."  "And also with you."

The Sixth Day of Christmas

Today is the Sixth Day of Christmas.  I made cheese fondue this afternoon - such a treat in this cold and snowy afternoon.  Tonight I went out to feed animals, and lo and behold, there were eight eggs in the duckhouse!  It's like "Six Geese a-Laying" but without the geese.  And more eggs.  Our ducks moulted late this fall.  When they moult, they usually quit laying eggs, too.  I do not know the whys and the wherefors of this, but that's apparently how it's done.  I am so happy to be back in eggville - once one enjoys free-range duck eggs, it's difficult to enjoy the storebought, papershell, teeny-tiny, pale yellow chicken eggs in the grocery store.

Here is a cute photo; see the boy holding the calico kitten?  That's Puzzle.  Jasper, other kitten, and Bear, big dog, are dearly departed. 

And another cute photo: Claire and Puzzle, some seventeen years later...

And yet another: College Boy Graham titled his photo "Two Puzzles".
He took this when he came home from uni two weeks ago.  She is sitting on the game table, on the jigsaw puzzle. 

And finally:
When we put up the Christmas tree in mid-December, Puzzle opted for that special place to sleep in her elder days, by the heat register, under the tree, among the packages.

I took this photo two weeks ago, and emailed the kids as to how cute she was, snoozing under the tree!

 Last week, the night before Christmas Eve, Puzzle died under the Christmas tree. 

Twenty years ago, I got a call from a university Vet Med resident, who also helped us as housesitter on many occasions. 

"There was a litter of kittens dumped at Vet Med this morning.  You really need to come see them."

"No, we really do not need a new kitten."

"No.  You REALLY need to come see them."

So we went, and brought home a gift which has lasted twenty years, and whose memory will make us smile much longer.

The Fourth Day

I have a cold today.  I am not sick.  Over Christmas this past few weeks, we, the kids and I, discussed the definition of "sick" and "having a cold".  Since the kiddos have fledged our nest, occasionally one or the other or all three have mentioned by phone or email they they were sick.

SICK?!!!  Mother Me would panic.  Major maternal panic mode!

And come to find out?  They just had a cold.  A measly, snibbly cold. Sniffles.  A tiny bit of a fever.  Nothing that they should write home about.  Take a long nap.  Drink lots of water.  Eat some garlic.  Gargle.  Vicks.

This morning, I began sneezing and wheezing.  I thought it might be allergies, but what in the world could I be allergic to in single-digit temperatures?  After lunch, I lay down on the sofa for a quick 20-minute nap, as is my sometimes practice.  But that 20 minutes ended up to be a two-hour marathon coma. Complete with really vivid dreams.

And I continued to sneeze.

I sneezed out in the snow in the pasture as I herded the pups out for their evening romp.

I sneezed in the art room as I completed some art works.

I have a cold.

I am not sick.

Today is the Fourth Day of Christmas.

Mel Torme wrote this song when he was 19 years old:

MEL TORME: Good King Wenceslas

1. Good King Wenceslas look'd out,
    On the Feast of Stephen;¹
When the snow lay round about,
    Deep, and crisp, and even:
Brightly shone the moon that night,
    Though the frost was cruel,
When a poor man came in sight,
    Gath'ring winter fuel.

2. "Hither page and stand by me,
    If thou know'st it, telling,²
Yonder peasant, who is he?
    Where and what his dwelling?"
"Sire, he lives a good league hence.
    Underneath the mountain;
Right against the forest fence,
    By Saint Agnes' fountain."

3. "Bring me flesh,³ and bring me wine,
    Bring me pine-logs hither:
Thou⁴ and I will see him dine,
    When we bear them thither."
Page and monarch forth they went,
    Forth they went together;
Through the rude⁵ winds wild lament,
    And the bitter weather.

4. "Sire, the night is darker now,
    And the wind blows stronger;
Fails my heart, I know now how,
    I can go no longer."
"Mark my footsteps, good my page;⁶
    Tread thou in them boldly;
Thou shalt find the winter's rage
    Freeze thy blood less coldly."

5. In his master's steps he trod,
    Where the snow lay dinted;
Heat was in the very sod
    Which the saint had printed.
Therefore, Christian men, be sure,
    Wealth or rank possessing,
Ye who now will bless the poor,
    Shall yourselves find blessing.

Wherefore, Christian people, know,

    Who my lay are hearing,
He who cheers another's woe
    Shall himself find cheering.

The Third Day of Christmas

Here we are, the Third Day of Christmas.  I keep coming back to the Kings College because, well...they sing "Christmas" to me!

Tonight in rural Kansas, it's warmish (read: 40º F) and the stars are out.  The stars are brightly shining.  Here's some nice music:  O Holy Night

Reindeer Games

Today is the second day of Christmas.  The kids have come and gone.  After Little Family Christmas, we six drove to Oklahoma for Big Family Christmas, the singing of the Messiah, and a Christmas Dinner made by the Younger Generation - three days and nights of holiday madness happiness.  We shot arrows and scavenger-hunted. There were races and bike rides, tennis matches, and even an ice storm.  Holly Jolly!

Scavenger Hunt:  Two teams drove around the rural Kansas county, searching for photo opps for their team.  This clue: "Un burrito".  The team competitors got extra points if their faces were in the photos...

 ..."un burrito"...