No longer in my vocabulary

On first day of each new year, I spend a bit of time thinking back on the year gone by, and the changes in my life. I usually pull out last year's journal and read through it, thinking about my work and projects, time off, time spent with friends and family.

This time it struck me how many words are no longer in my vocabulary, now that I'm not working. It's not that these words and phrases have no meaning, it's just that the meaning is different. At any rate, I'm liking this.

Let's face it, the Commute is just gone. It only has meaning if I'm trying to get somewhere on the freeway during everyone else's commute. Which is just bad planning on my part.

I still have a Daily Driver, but since I don't have to drive anywhere on a schedule set by someone else, I need another term for my favorite car. Maybe my "where should we go today" wheels?

What do you call a Vacation when you're retired? I've given this a lot of thought over the past 9 months, but can't come up with the right catchy term.

Sick Leave is irrelevant, and not just because I don't need to take time off to be sick. Since I quit working, I haven't been sick once. Nada. Not at all. No flu, no colds, no sinus infections, no stress. No taking my co-worker's "sick" home, because they aren't smart enough to stay home when they're sick.

Hump Day is no more. Wednesday is Wednesday, just another day of the week.

Lunch Hour. Since I retired, I don't usually eat lunch. And if I did, it would last as long as I wanted, thank you very much!

Day Off. See Sick Leave above. The concept is the same, minus the germs.

My new Career is being a homebody, a traveler, a gardener.  I am still, and always will be, a writer and photographer.

Vivien Claire

This is my newest great-niece, who was born in September, and shares my middle name. Even her Uncle Dave is smitten; she spent a lot of time on his lap today.

 

She was the center of attention all day long (as was her big sister, Ella). There was never a lack of fond aunties to hold baby Vivien. I love her very expressive face, with rosebud mouth and big blue eyes. And she's a very good baby too... always smiling (when she isn't startled by the camera flash).

I couldn't get enough of holding her, and when I wasn't taking pictures or helping Anna fix dinner, that's what I was doing.

Dwarfed by a tree no more

November 2012

When we bought our small farmhouse almost 30 years ago, we knew this day would come. Still, it was a hard, sad decision to make. Cutting down a healthy tree should never be done lightly. This one just got too big, too close, and was starting to cause damage. So it had to go.

The crew arrived early in the morning and got started. The limbs came off first, twenty or so courses of huge branches, many the diameter and height of small trees. We saved most for firewood, stacking them in the yard, and chipping the ends and greenery. I'd dug up all my perennials and herbs from the garden around the tree, but a lot of limbs hit the ground harder than expected, and even I didn't expect these branches to be as long as they were. I was scrambling to find buckets to cover plants I thought would be out of harm's way.

The tree was about half limbed up in this shot; you can see how massive the trunk is when compared to the 6 ft. guy up there on the tree. You can also see how close the tree is to the garage and house.

When the tree was just about halfway shorn of its branches, I walked down the private road and took a shot to compare with the first one.

The tree is finally topped about noon; time for a lunch break. The crane arrived and set up, Mark headed up the tree, and started cutting it into chunks.

The first chunk of trunk was cabled off, and to my horror, the crane operator lifted it right over the garage on its way to the truck. Yikes!  Mark looked down and saw the look on my face, and called over to the operator. "Swing it around the other way next time!"  This log is ours, destined for firewood.

The last three sections of tree went into trucks to be hauled away. At 5-6 ft. diameter, they're too big for us to split for firewood.

This huge chunk of trunk was lifted straight into the steel-walled truck, where it rolled to one side and promptly bowed the sidewall out. Oops. Out came another loggers chain saw, and one of the guys hopped up into the truck and started cutting it into slabs.

This section of trunk was the last one we kept, and I stood next to it to check the diameter...  it came up to my waist.

This section went onto a flatbed truck, and it looked just like a log in a toy truck as it drove out the driveway.



The last section of trunk was the shortest, and the heaviest at 5400 lbs. The base of the tree was 6 ft. in diameter, so you get an idea of how big this hunk of tree is.  It went straight into the big chip truck, and the crane operator managed to get it nearly all the way inside, even with a partial roof on the truck. Dave got out the tractor and pushed it the rest of the way in.

The house looks a bit naked now, without its sheltering Douglas fir,, and I will always regret the necessity of taking it out. But I'm loving all the light that now makes it to the ground, and come spring, this flower garden will be happy to have sunlight.

Soos Creek reflections

I missed a great photography moment today... a little girl running to rescue three goats, enticing them to follow her by scattering goat kibble. Really. I couldn't make this up. Wish I'd had my camera in hand, but I'd left it in the car when I went to herd the goats off the road. Oh, well... lesson learned.

I guess someone felt sorry for me, because when I parked and walked toward the trail, camera in hand, something told me to walk to the bridge railing and look at the creek. And the light and clouds and sun and reflections were amazing.

First snow in the Olympics

Every fall (and sometimes more often) we spend a whole day driving up to Sequim and Port Angeles, then driving back on WA-101, which runs down the west side of Hood Canal. It's a drive we both love, especially in the MX-5 with the top down!

Today we took the dead-end road to the oyster beds near Dewatto Bay, and as we rounded the curve, there were the Olympics above Hood Canal, dusted with the first snow of the season. What a beautiful sight.

The back road from Dewatto to Seabeck is a favorite of ours, especially this time of year, when the leaves have changed color. Much of the road is overhung with giant maple trees, and I love driving under the canopy of branches.

We stopped in Seabeck for breakfast at Barbie's, a tiny place on the end of one of the fishing piers. Great food, worth the drive. I'm more than a little partial to the fish sign that hangs over the door, and wish I could find one of my own to hang in the cabin. It's made of tin, handpainted, and is hollow. It seems the perfect sign for a cabin on a lake, don't you think?

Red wheel

Our next-door neighbor has a project: building a fence between our front pasture and theirs. Howard has been at it a couple of years now; first he had to tackle the towering jungle of blackberries that had taken over both our pastures. The original 1970s cedar and wire fence was flattened a decade ago by blackberry vines and winter limbfalls, and I didn't really mind as I no longer had horses to contain.

Today I went out to inspect our English walnut tree, our own fairly large project we'd like to get done before winter. Two massive tree-sized limbs came down in the February ice storm, and the plan is to turn most of it into firewood, plus a few projects of my own (walking sticks, rounds to dry for garden "paving" stones). Dave just mowed the pasture (and blackberries) so we can get to the tree, and once the weather improves, we'll start. I suspect this project may take as long as Howard's new fence.

It was a gorgeous day, so I walked over to check on the fence project. And I noticed a new addition to Howard's place: a tractor with a bright red wheel, peeking out from underneath a canvas tarp.  Rain... a lot of rain... is predicted for tomorrow. Should I walk back to the house and get my camera? Or wait until tomorrow? The urge to photograph the tractor won out. Good thing... the rain arrived on schedule, and the next day, the red wheel was gone, safely tucked underneath the tarp.

Toilet in a box

I've seen some interesting packing jobs in my life, but this was a hoot. It bears a bit of explanation: We live in an 89-year-old farmhouse in the middle of five acres of pastures and woods in a narrow valley. We've been there for 26 years now, and have never stopped loving it.

But buying an old farmhouse is not without challenges. Having fixtures wear out is part of owning a home, but when the upstairs bathroom toilet tank sprung a leak, we were stymied. You just can't go out and buy a replacement tank for a wall-hung toilet. So we did some online searching, and learned that our toilet was made in the early 1970s, and that we could buy a new tank for $600-700. Just the tank, without a lid.

Really? I don't think so.

More searching brought us to a guy who refurbishes fixtures from old houses and resells them. He had two used tanks with minor blemishes that would fit our toilet, for $80. Sold!

The tank arrived yesterday morning, right on schedule. When Dave lugged the box in from the front porch, we both started laughing. The seller promised it would arrive unbroken... I guess packing it in a box marked "Eggs" would just about ensure that!

I have to wonder what the UPS guy thought, as he lugged a 40 pound box of eggs to our front door.

Rain in the Northwest

It's raining today, the first rain in a very long time. This morning I built a fire in the woodstove... the first of the fall. It's been colder than this already in October. But there's something about a drizzly Northwest day that makes my bones shiver inside my skin, and I can't get warm unless the house is warm and toasty.

The cats love it too... instead of disappearing upstairs to sleep on the guest bed, James has stayed close to the woodstove all day. The window blinds are open to the view over the orchard and pastures, but it's gloomy outside, and has felt like dusk all afternoon.

This is one of my favorite photographs of autumn in the Northwest. It was taken near Preston last November, on the first day of snow in the Issaquah Alps. If you look close, you'll see the dusting of snow up near the ridge line. It was cold and windy and grey, a perfectly beautiful autumn day.

I've spent my day going through photographs in Photoshop, choosing new pictures for my blog header, and editing photos from our recent week in Bend, Oregon. I'll be posting a trip journal soon.

Socks and cats

Socks have always been a favorite thing of mine, right up there with soft, cozy sweaters. I think it's part and parcel with my love for fall. Each year, I can hardly wait until the heat of summer has passed, so I can pack away my shorts and tank tops, and make room for my sweaters. And even though I go barefoot as much as possible during the summer, my sock drawer never gets packed away. My favorites get mended, and I wear them until there's no saving them. (Thanks, Mom, for teaching me how to darn socks.)

I love all kinds of socks. Stripes and argyle, tweed and plaid, polka dots and flowers, cotton and wool and chenille. Even reindeer and Santa Clause and snowflake socks for winter.



My big blond cat loves socks as much as I do. But she's more of a plain vanilla kind of cat: she prefers Dave's plain cotton socks to my wild patterns. If I'm folding clothes, or packing a suitcase, if socks are involved, she's there. She'll reach out and snag the socks and pull them close, then she'll take a nap right in the middle

Waiting to pounce

Temperatures falling.

Leaves falling.

The locust and birch

fall in gentle drifts,

yellow and green, still soft.

The maple leaves hang on

until crisp and dry

Then fall straight down

with a rustle.

Overnight, summer has receded

leaving the feeling 

that winter is peeking

over my shoulder...

Waiting to pounce.