The little red trike

A little fuzzy--they must have been speeding

A picture popped up today on the memories Microsoft or whoever send you that tugged at my heart—it’s Jacob riding the little red trike that was so much a fixture of my grandchildren’s young years, with his cousin Morgan trying to dislodge him. There’s a story behind that trike. It was given to my children when they were very little by my ex’s senior partner, a man I came to rely on and one who always had my back when times got rough. He was probably in his sixties at the time, maybe seventies—he’s been gone a long time—but he told me he had that trike as a child. We figure it's now at least a hundred years old.

It had obviously been repainted with “loving hands” and there was a big hole in the solid rubber front tire. Maddie riding it one day looked down and intoned in a true Texas accent, “There’s a hole in my tire.” It almost sounded like a line from a c/w song. The hole never stopped the action, and for years the trike lived in what was then a playroom in my house. The room was eventually stripped of hobbyhorse and trike and all other childish things and converted to a TV room.

But the trike went to my oldest son and resides somewhere at his house now, waiting for the next generation to fight over it. It brings sentimental tears to my eyes to think of all seven grands, only seven years apart, playing together in my house, always underfoot in the kitchen and fighting over that trike. Good times, good memories.

Nature is showing off for me today. This morning, when I first woke up, the adobe house across my yard was bathed in a rosy glow, and I thought it meant a sunny day. Not so. But the first time I looked out the window by my desk, my eyes landed on two gorgeous blue jays, their colors bright and vivid. They pecked around in the flower bed for a while and then took off—I couldn’t even tell which one was mama and which papa because they were both so colorful. So much for the drab female!

Tonight, the sky to the north was a blend of soft peach and blue-gray, colorful and pretty, but to the west it was a dramatic fiery orange—breathtaking. I tried taking a picture with my phone, but it didn’t capture the colors at all.

Otherwise, President’s Day was pretty much an ordinary day, with lots of catch-up details on my desk. I didn’t cook a lot over the weekend but did make a really good chicken dish last night. Jordan had been out of town for the weekend, so I thought to make a dish with one of her favorite ingredients—cream cheese. Of course, I missed up the order of things and forgot to sauté the onions and garlic before I deglazed the pan with white wine. So I let the wine cook down, added the onions, and swished them around—and they took on the most wonderful deep golden tone, mostly from the browned bits of chicken on the pan. I think I’ll do it that way from now on. Chicken broth, a bit of Dijon, and cream cheese made a creamy rich sauce—really good. Jordan is always on the lookout for dishes that Jacob likes, so she requested I put that one into our rotation. It’s a bit of work, but not too much. And the leftovers were so good today.

I’m excited that I have the cover for Irene Deep in Texas Trouble. Ta da! Watch this space for a cover reveal tomorrow!

Things I wish were different

 

A Chinese pistache tree

It was a picture of a painted bunting that started me on this train of thought. The beautiful little bird had landed on someone’s bird feeder, and they, struck by their good luck, got a good picture of it. And suddenly, there I was, thinking about the things in my life that I wished were different.

No, my wishes don’t involve riches or great wealth, homes in Santa Fe and Scotland, servants to cook my meals and clean my house every day, and certainly not the huge house I once, as the mother of four, dreamed about. Today, my wishes are much more modest. But they are also, I realize, things of the past—bits of knowledge and habits that I wish I had cultivated years ago. It is now too late.

I have long wished I was knowledgeable about trees and birds. Oh, I can recognize an oak, even a post oak, or a pecan. But there’s a tree trying to grow out of the fence behind my cottage—and I would have called it a catalpa. But those are the things from back home in Illinois that grew long “cigarettes” that we pretended to smoke as children. Lots of leaves on one stem. A mimosa? When Christian said he wanted a Chinese pistache, I had no idea what he was talking about. I envy those people who can look at a tree, tell me what it is, what’s wrong with it or not.

Similarly, I wish I knew more about plants. My dad spent his weekends on his hands and knees, wearing grubby clothes with huge, ugly rubber pads wrapped around his knees to protect them. We owned the lot next to our house, and it was Dad’s garden—the place where he could unwind, let go, dig in the dirt, and be perfectly happy. He was the president of an osteopathic college, but he didn’t care one whit if a student came by and caught him in gardening clothes.

Me? I can barely tell a hosta from a hydrangea, though Christian has done much to educate me. Oh yeah, I recognize pansies and petunias, roses and geraniums, and I  once was sharp about recognizing poison ivy, but bougainvillea were a whole new experience for me. I’m learning, but not at a fast enough rate. And now that a challenge to my mobility keeps me from gardening, it seems a bit pointless. Oh, who am I fooling? I never much wanted to garden. I dabbled in it, but I am perfectly content these days to pay for a lawn and garden service. What I really want is a classic English garden replacing our front lawn where grass is always a problem—good some years, a disaster other years. Don’t tell me it’s Texas and too dry—I saw a picture today of a Fort Worth acquaintance’s garden--a lovely, wild English garden in front of his house--and I burned with jealousy. But I can’t do the work, I doubt the lawn service would do it, and Christian is wedded to the idea of a conventional lawn. I’m at least hoping to get him, one year soon, to consider clover because it’s cheap, lasts a long time, and is better for the environment—doesn’t require so much water.

And then there are the birds. I sit at my desk in the early morning or twilight, listen to them sing, and wish that I could link the song to a specific bird, but it’s beyond me. I can recognize bluejays (love when they visit) and cardinals—we have a pair that live in our yard, though I haven’t seen them yet this year. But I know the saying that when they do visit it means someone from beyond is thinking of you and I always think it's my parents.

At one point, a friend gave me, at my request, a guide to birds that I kept by my kitchen sink, back when I was in the house and had a greenhouse window over the sink and a bird feeder right outside. But I was never good at spotting birds—eventually the tree that held the feeder had to be cut down, and I moved from the main house to the cottage. We have hung hummingbird feeders out here, but to no avail. If my dad was the gardener, my mom was the bird person. She had a bird feeder right outside the dining room window in their retirement home, and I sat in the window many a time watching the hummingbirds whir and fight and eat.

But when I think about these things, I remind myself to think about the things I am passionate (and knowledgeable) about—books and reading and publishing and cooking, politics with a humanitarian slant, religion though I tend to keep quiet about that. In listing the things I regret, I am by no means complaining. I have too much in life to be grateful for. It’s just that sometimes I notice the things that have slipped by me.

Want to talk about the mystery genre and the various subgenres? I can probably hold my own in that conversation.

 

Sunday—some good, some not so good

 

My Tomball family on the way to the slopes at Wolf Creek
Colin driving, Lisa, with Kegan peeking around his mom, and Morgan

A Sunday omen that I thought was good—this morning I saw a cardinal and a blue jay in my yard. The blue jay is only an occasional visitor, but all Fall we had a mama and a papa cardinal. They tend to choose one locale and stay there, and I was so pleased that these chose our yard. They also mate for life, apparently doing a lot better at it than many humans. But then came that terrible spell of sub-freezing weather, and I hadn’t seen them since. Today it was papa, but mama must be nearby. You do know the legend, don’t you—if a cardinal visits, it means someone from Heaven is thinking of you.

My church is gearing up to return to in-person services, starting with Palm Sunday. I have about decided I will continue to attend virtually, especially on Easter when all the once-a-year visitors attend. (I have a friend whose husband calls it Amateur Sunday.) I just don’t think I’m ready for the combination of a crowd, even well-spaced out, and my walker. So this morning I went to virtual church alone because Jordan was busy. The minister touched on the Church’s (as he said, “Big C, the over-arching church) obsession with things that don’t really matter and the attempts to force decisions on those things on church members. Okay, he used sex as an example—the church is overly interested in who’s sleeping with who, and where, and how, and when. Such obsessions, he claimed, are driving people, especially young people, away from the Church.

But I digress because what I really wanted to mention was my fascination with the organist. For these virtual services, the camera shows us what we would never see sitting in a pew—including the organist’s intricate footwork on those myriad pedals, even while playing the keyboard. I once took pottery classes, and while I could work on an electric wheel, I never mastered working on a manual. I had to focus either on what my feet were doing or my hands, but I couldn’t do both. Sort of like patting your head while rubbing your stomach—try it. And yet our organists make it seem so effortless, even when you know there are years of study and hours of practice behind the performance. Fascinates me every Sunday.

The bad part of this Sunday is that everything in the cottage is broken—well, not everything but some essential things. You know they say trouble comes in threes—my Apple watch was acting wonky (seems to have fixed itself), my Windows program has lost all the quick access icons and I have no idea how to get them back plus it won’t keep programs open so I can go back and forth, and my TV screen has a snowstorm with the message, “Weak or no signal.” Now I go hours without looking at the TV, but I like to have it on—and without it today, the cottage is so quiet. I can’t get to the reset button—a problem of furniture in the way of my walker—so am waiting for some helpful soul to come along. Fortunately, my Jamie is coming tomorrow—he can fix the computer. But for a bit there this morning, it seemed all my communication methods were out of order. Fortunately, the cell phone still works.

And how did everyone fare losing an hour of sleep? I didn’t sleep well last night, partly I guess because I was aware of that different time pattern, though I always welcome Daylight Savings Time. Love that extra daylight in the evening. I had seen a Facebook post last night, on my wall, about how Biden could never have rolled out the vaccine if trump hadn’t had the Warp Speed program and pushed to get the vaccine invented—that is so wrong that I lay awake framing my reply to the sender, who is the son of old friends. We have an ongoing political discussion, approaching the subject from opposite ends of the spectrum, and it baffles me how he can believe what he does. Finally, Sophie didn’t sleep well because of her doggie version of post-nasal drip—I gave her Benadryl about six in the morning, and we both finally slept until almost nine the new time. Still, I’m sleepy and ready for an afternoon nap. How about you? Needing that nap today?

Crowing Hens, Barking Dogs, and General Confusion

On this lovely morning, I worked with the French doors open. It always feels to me like those open doors bring the outside in. This morning they brought in a cacophony of bird song, including one hen who was apparently indignant about something. No kidding—she crowed so loudly that it sounded like she was in the cottage. I did get up to check that she wasn’t caught in the fence or in that narrow enclosure between her yard and my cottage. All appeared fine, but when the hens crow that much, the dogs bark. It was a bit noisy around here for a while.

We have lots of birds in our back yard this spring, several with songs so distinctive I wish I could identify the birds. I have discussed this with Sophie, but she has been of little help.

I spent much of the day grappling with life’s little problems, mostly those associated with being a homeowner. We are plagued by dirt washing onto the sidewalk every time it rains. The yard guy has tried taller edging, mulch, etc. but nothing helps. Today he announced the problem comes from runoff on the roof where there is no gutter. Strikes me as logical that we were looking at the end result of the problem and not the root cause. We do that so much in life.

Lewis Bundock took a jack hammer to the jagged concrete in the driveway where tree roots have created a great chasm in the driveway This has been an ongoing dilemma, and what he did today was a temporary but most welcome fix. The problem won’t go away, and the tree continues to grow. We are reluctant to take it down because it’s a beautiful tree and it casts wonderful shade over the house. I’m sure years ago, long before my ownership, it was a volunteer that someone let grow too big. Taking it down now would also be big-time expensive. Meantime, tonight friend Subie tested it when she came to pick me up and said it is much improved.

The floor man was here today, and I am gradually getting a grasp on how replacing the floor will go, what the time frame is, etc. It will take about three days to rip up the carpet and put in the new floor. I will have a moving company come take the two or three heavy pieces of furniture and store them for that short period of time. I will sleep on the hide-a-bed in my living area while the work is done. Got to figure out what to do with Sophie—I think her crate will come out of hibernation for this project. Cost? I don’t want to talk about it. Fortunately, thanks to Lewis Bundock, the carpet is almost dry and there is no mildew or mold odor. And the a/c is fixed and supposedly won’t do that again.

Dinner tonight with the small ladies’ group that I always enjoy—Carol Roark, Kathie Lang, and Subie Green. We went to Doc B’s at Clearfork. I tend to avoid Clearfork—it’s kind of foreign territory to me, and I have never gotten comfortable with the restaurants—or their pricing. But we got there in time for happy hour tonight, so I had wine and a cheeseburger from the happy hour menu. Not my favorite dinner but good. Subie had a crab stack that looked wonderful. I’m thinking I may have to go back there again soon.

Whoosh! I’m glad this day is over. Tree, carpet, and runoff problems now in hand. Am I dreaming?

My Beautiful Black Dog

I missed Black Dog Day a couple of days ago. Can’t remember what was on my mind Sunday—probably not much. But last night, like all our nation, my mind was on the massacre in Las Vegas. I haven’t put that tragedy aside, but first I want to pay tribute to Sophie, my black Bordoodle (deliberate cross of a miniature poodle and a border collie). Why she came out of that cross black, or really black tipped with gray, I’ll never know.

At six, Sophie is into middle age but has lost none of her enthusiasm for chasing squirrels and other creatures that might invade her yard. She’s also enthusiastic about visitors, making her welcome plain. Woe betide the occasional strange she doesn’t take to—I am immediately suspicious of that person. In short, Soph has a zest for life that is a joy to see. And affection? She demands to be first in line, in front of the other two dogs.

Sophie has gotten more protective as she ages. If I go in the main house for dinner, she goes for a bit but then wants to come outside, where she stands guard at the cottage door until I return. Generally, she starts out the night by my bed, though during the night she migrates to the couch or her favorite chair. She’s had a little problem the last two nights. Colin has slept on her couch. When I got up in the middle of the night last night, she quickly appropriated the spot in the bed I’d vacated and expected to return to. It took a little coaxing to move her, and at that I had barely enough space to keep from thinking I would momentarily fall out of bed. But I had a warm body pressing against my legs.

Tonight, Jordan and I sat outside with the three dogs. Lovely evening, but every time Sophie chased a squirrel, Cricket, the older of the two Cavaliers, tagged along with a look on her face that said, “What? What should I do now?” June Bug, the one who’s been under the weather, just ignored them both.

A bonus to our evening happy hour—two blue jays flitted back and forth from the edge of the roof to branches of the oak tree above them. I know they don’t have a nest this time of year, so we were curious. And, oh rare occasion, we saw a hummingbird flitting about the hibiscus. Now if only the cardinal would come back.

I cannot get Las Vegas out of my mind—nor should any of us. I was appalled today to read that this was the 273^rd shooting this year, albeit much more spectacular (sorry, can’t verify the statistic, but it sounds reasonable).. Stephen Paddock earned himself the dubious distinction of being responsible for the largest mass shooting in American history, even surpassing the slaughter of Lakota Sioux at Wounded Knee. I worry now about who will set out to beat that record—a grisly thought.

Republicans have uniformly deflected calls for tighter gun control by saying, “Not now. This is not the time. This is a time for mourning.” My indignation knows no bounds. If not now, when? It’s appalling to me that these men and women callously ignore the rate of gun deaths in this country compared to other developed (and most undeveloped) countries. It is beyond acceptance with a shrug. We must vote these people out of office, make gun control a major issue in the upcoming congressional elections. The callousness of the Republican response baffles me. They seem, as a collective group, to be totally without compassion.

Even Stephen Scalise did not come forward, he who was critically wounded by an out-of-control gunman last spring. It’s like they never learn, they never sense the mood of the public. Makes me think more about where I want to live next—Canada? All those health benefits, tight gun control (no machine guns). Looks increasingly attractive.

Hmmm. Do you think I could get my family to go with me?