Just a Selle Blend

This scene pretty much said it all to me yesterday as I was watering the flowers in the manure spreader and watching black and white dogs frolic around the north lawn.

I had to move my spinning Border Collie yard art to another part of the manure spreader cuz the columbine have gotten so tall that the doggie can't spin.

It's added quite an attraction to the north lawn.  

This shed may not keep the Wood horses totally dry but it saves them from the flies, which were both abundant and aggressive with last night's warmer temps.

~~~~~~~~~ 

The past two days have been Selle-filled, not only with pretty scenes along the roadsides and around the Lovestead but also with oodles of good visiting moments with neighbors.

Yesterday I learned that the best place to catch up on what's happening in Selle is at the local polling place on a slow election day. 

I cast my votes and then enjoyed some quality time visiting with the staff and talking about a few new developments in the extended neighborhood, including the logging job around the church where we do our voting.

Bill did some timber cruising on that job over the winter, and then the logging began.  The opening up of that large timber stand has created some beautiful new scenery and lovely views around the church. 

We also talked about a great story where a former Selle-ite is moving back after a career in the military, and he will be our neighbor.  

We talked chickens and health issues and all the stuff that comes up when neighbors haven't done any catching up for a while. 

Later, I enjoyed a lovely visit with some other neighbors who live very close to us.  Wes will be working at home with his new laser machine which, for example, cuts out quilt squares with great speed and accuracy. 

Add Brian Wood to the visiting mix.  Last night we talked about horses----when things go bad and when things are exciting, like a new Appaloosa from Texas. 

This time of year brings out the best in natural beauty and the best in opportunities to enjoy the people who live around us.   

It's always nice in the spring to get out and to see that folks have wintered well.

They are known as weeds, but I still think buttercups are pretty. 

Longtime friend Brian Wood, owner of Wood's Crushing and Hauling.

When Brian turns off the ignition in his truck, you know you're in for some good visiting. 

Brian's young horse enjoying some fencewire. 

The young' uns always seem to need something to occupy their lips or teeth. 

This chicken never did cross the road, but it was munching some goodies on the roadside near its Forest Siding home. 

CB may have been looking for his ball. 

His very own will be coming either today or tomorrow.

Then, he will have a ball!

How can Jerry Kramer's program at the Panida tonight fit in with "Selle Blend," you may wonder. 

Well, that's an easy answer.  Could be Jerry may even have traveled up our road a time or two on his way to visit the relatives.  I know his sister Carol has.

Jerry's family includes our neighbors to the north, Mark and Janice.  

Plus, there may be a few residents out this way who grew up with Jerry. So, that's why. 

And, it's timely.  As you'll see from the photo and the information below, Jerry will be at the Panida tonight. 

His appearance does benefit the Daybreak Center, which is a lifesaver for families dealing with Alzheimers/dementia.  The place provides meaningful activities for those suffering as well as a break for caregivers. 

So, even if you can't make it to Jerry's program tonight, remember the Daybreak Center whenever you wish to donate to a very worthy cause.  

Here's the full scoop about tonight's program.  

From Sandpoint Online:  . . . don't miss Pro Football Hall of Famer Jerry Kramer and his friends telling stories on each other as part of a special fundraiser for Sandpoint's Senior Day Break Center, Memories of a Legend with Jerry Kramer, TODAY, Wednesday May 22. 

Tickets are $8 to the event at 7 p.m. (doors open at 6:30 p.m.) in the Panida Theater. Sponsored by the Sandpoint Area Seniors. Get tickets at the senior center, Panida.org, and the door. Word to the wise: buy early, this may be a sellout! 

For All Who Love Lilacs: Let Poetry and Pictures Talk

In the dooryard fronting an old farm-house near the white-wash’d palings,

Stands the lilac-bush tall-growing with heart-shaped leaves of rich green,

With many a pointed blossom rising delicate, with the perfume strong I love,

With every leaf a miracle—and from this bush in the dooryard,

With delicate-color’d blossoms and heart-shaped leaves of rich green,

A sprig with its flower I break. 

.................................................................

(Nor for you, for one alone,

Blossoms and branches green to coffins all I bring,

For fresh as the morning, thus would I chant a song for

you O sane and sacred death.

All over bouquets of roses,

O death, I cover you over with roses and early lilies,

But mostly and now the lilac that blooms the first,

Copious I break, I break the sprigs from the bushes,

With loaded arms I come, pouring for you,

For you and the coffins all of you O death.) 

from "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomed"

                                                    

                                                                                     ---Walt Whitman

Sprig Of Lilac - Poem by Hyam Plutzik

 

Their heads grown weary under the weight of Time—
These few hours on the hither side of silence—
The lilac sprigs bend on the bough to perish.

Though each for its own sake

is beautiful,

In each is the greater, the

remembered beauty.

Each is exemplar of its

ancestors.

Within the flower of the present, uneasy in the wind,
Are the forms of those of the years behind the door.
Their faint aroma touches the edge of the mind.

And the living and the past give to one another.
There is no door between them. They pass freely
Out of themselves; becoming one another.

I see the lilac sprigs bending

and withering.
Each year like Adonis they pass through the dumb-show of death,
Waxing and waning on the tree in the brain of a man.

                                  

                                  Lilacs

                                                                  by Amy Lowell

Lilacs,

False blue,

White,

Purple,

Color of lilac,

Your great puffs of flowers

Are everywhere in this my New England.

Among your heart-shaped leaves

Orange orioles hop like music-box birds and sing

Their little weak soft songs;

In the crooks of your branches

The bright eyes of song sparrows sitting on spotted eggs

Peer restlessly through the light and shadow

Of all Springs.

Lilacs in dooryards

Holding quiet conversations with an early moon;

Lilacs watching a deserted house

Settling sideways into the grass of an old road;

Lilacs, wind-beaten, staggering under a lopsided shock of bloom

Above a cellar dug into a hill.

You are everywhere.

You were everywhere.

You tapped the window when the preacher preached his sermon,

And ran along the road beside the boy going to school.

You stood by the pasture-bars to give the cows good milking,

You persuaded the housewife that her dishpan was of silver.

And her husband an image of pure gold.

You flaunted the fragrance of your blossoms

Through the wide doors of Custom Houses—

You, and sandal-wood, and tea,

Charging the noses of quill-driving clerks

When a ship was in from China.

You called to them: “Goose-quill men, goose-quill men,

May is a month for flitting.”

Until they writhed on their high stools

And wrote poetry on their letter-sheets behind the propped-up ledgers.

Paradoxical New England clerks,

Writing inventories in ledgers, reading the “Song of Solomon” at night,

So many verses before bed-time,

Because it was the Bible.

The dead fed you

Amid the slant stones of graveyards.

Pale ghosts who planted you

Came in the nighttime

And let their thin hair blow through your clustered stems.

You are of the green sea,

And of the stone hills which reach a long distance.

You are of elm-shaded streets with little shops where they sell kites and marbles,

You are of great parks where every one walks and nobody is at home.

You cover the blind sides of greenhouses

And lean over the top to say a hurry-word through the glass

To your friends, the grapes, inside.

Lilacs,

False blue,

White,

Purple,

Color of lilac,

You have forgotten your Eastern origin,

The veiled women with eyes like panthers,

The swollen, aggressive turbans of jeweled pashas.

Now you are a very decent flower,

A reticent flower,

A curiously clear-cut, candid flower,

Standing beside clean doorways,

Friendly to a house-cat and a pair of spectacles,

Making poetry out of a bit of moonlight

And a hundred or two sharp blossoms.

Maine knows you,

Has for years and years;

New Hampshire knows you,

And Massachusetts

And Vermont.

Cape Cod starts you along the beaches to Rhode Island;

Connecticut takes you from a river to the sea.

You are brighter than apples,

Sweeter than tulips,

You are the great flood of our souls

Bursting above the leaf-shapes of our hearts,

You are the smell of all Summers,

The love of wives and children,

The recollection of gardens of little children,

You are State Houses and Charters

And the familiar treading of the foot to and fro on a road it knows.

May is lilac here in New England,

May is a thrush singing “Sun up!” on a tip-top ash tree,

May is white clouds behind pine-trees

Puffed out and marching upon a blue sky.

May is a green as no other,

May is much sun through small leaves,

May is soft earth,

And apple-blossoms,

And windows open to a South Wind.

May is full light wind of lilac

From Canada to Narragansett Bay.

Lilacs,

False blue,

White,

Purple,

Color of lilac.

Heart-leaves of lilac all over New England,

Roots of lilac under all the soil of New England,

Lilac in me because I am New England,

Because my roots are in it,

Because my leaves are of it,

Because my flowers are for it,

Because it is my country

And I speak to it of itself

And sing of it with my own voice

Since certainly it is mine.

Monday Minutiae

I'm not a multi-tasker, but this morning I've had to try.

I'm not complaining at all. 

When you're carrying on a conversation with one person in Hong Kong via Messenger and another in Dublin over WhatsApp AND trying to get going with your blog, it gets a bit challenging. 

Nonetheless, I thoroughly enjoyed the challenge. 

These two people at opposite ends of the planet (at least from the Sandpoint perspective) used to play together often as children. 

Always busy, always creative in their busYness:  that was Josh and Annie.  

 I can remember comments made by one parent at the time that these two were gonna do great things some day.

Well, Rae, they both have, and they continue to do so.

Visiting with Annie as she sat in Dublin Airport on a layover in her Berlin to Seattle flight and Josh Wilund in equally far off Hong Kong made my day. 

I told Josh that I can't wait to see an "Annie Love-Josh Wilund" sitdown where they talk about their respective life journeys which are far from conventional. 

Josh sez that visit will happen!

Anyway, Annie is on her way home, and yesterday offered another cosmopolitan thrill.  

Olivia, the mom of Willie and Debbie's exchange student Emma, picked up Annie yesterday after her geocaching event, took her on a tour of Berlin and then to dinner. 

Another circle of our extended family not to be broken.  

Loved it, and thanks, Olivia. 

Except for my multitasking communications adventure, life is fairly relaxed around here this morning. 

Yesterday was weed-eating, lawn-mowing day, so, happily, today offers the opportunity to work on a variety of projects. 

Bill just left to attend a Sandpoint tree committee meeting, and I'll be out watering soon and putting out some more young plants. 

Earlier this morning, it seemed to be "Focus on the Menagerie" day.  Poor ol' Foster and Kiwi got left out in the mix of pics as I did my morning chores. 

My friend Helen said she hadn't seen Festus in a while, so he was happy to pose for a photo. 

And, I cannot say enough about that Sunny, the queen of the barn.  Every morning while I'm brushing CB while he eats his grain, Sunny suddenly appears from her perch up on the hay stack. 

She thinks she needs to be in the stall with CB.  I tell her I think not.  I do believe she has a growing and kindred relationship with the horses, and I think she probably does a lot of commiserating with them overnight. 

Actually, for Sunny, no need to commiserate.  I think she's found the Feline Ritz!

Speaking of comfort zones, Mr. Liam has his on the bed, which is usually covered with towels as is the living room furniture. 

In short, life is pretty good for each and every beloved here these days.  I hope we can keep it that way. 

Happy Monday.   

Annie and Olivia in Berlin yesterday. 

A Putzy Sort of Saturday

Horse racing, hamburgers, fresh asparagus, greenhouse exits, new fencing and a Caribou Creek evening drive. 

We enjoyed a mixed bag of "things to do" yesterday as it drizzled off and on all day at the Lovestead.

It was time to start unloading potted starts from the greenhouse, so an assortment of flowers and 'mater plants spent their first night outside last night. 

There's more to go, but I'll take my time deciding where and when to empty the entire inventory. 

Looks like the tomatoes made it through the night just fine. 

While I worked at various garden spots, Bill started a fencing job on the west side of the hay field. 

We're not harvesting our hay this year, so the horses will have pasture aplenty, and I'll be switching them from one pasture to another for the next few months. 

Usually, they graze in the hay field in just the fall.  The west fence with some of the remaining electric wire has been patched off and on for 13 years. 

So, with them spending more time down there, it seemed wise to bring in some new and sturdier fencing for those predictable days when the "grass is greener . . . ." 

Bill put up most of a roll of woven wire, and with a few more trips down that way, the job should be completed soon.

Another project Bill attended to this week involved the old Ford tractor, which has been in need of a new wheel and tire for the past few years. 

On Tuesday, a Les Schwab service man came out and put on the rim and tire.  We are planning to sell the old classic, so having four working tires is helpful.  

Yesterday, we also spent a couple of hours watching the Preakness.  While watching all the advance info and features about the race, I silently hoped for my Kentucky Derby favorite to win, and, by golly, War of Will did just that. 

After a dinner of barbecued burgers and fresh-baked asparagus, we loaded up in the white pickup and took off for an evening drive to one of my favorite drainages off from Upper Pack River Road. 

Caribou Creek was running fast and furious both up above and down below. We saw snow on the hills above us, and it seemed obvious that down lower where the snow has disappeared, a lot of the forest plant life is just now awakening. 

I had my camera ready at all times in hopes we'd see a bear, moose or elk.  We did see some deer but had to drive back to our neighborhood to enjoy the elk which were grazing in a field about a mile from home.

Last night's drive gave Bill a chance to do a little fairly normal walking on a mountain road.  We're looking forward to many similar outings to come for short hikes and simple enjoyment of the back country. 

No more raindrops for a few days, so the hose will go back in to action for the next few days.

 With help from my sidekick Liam, I'm hoping to have an empty greenhouse, a lot fewer dandelions and some well-supplied garden spots and flower pots by the end of the week. 

May and its accompanying minutiae moves on!

Happy Sunday.