Still giving thanks.

These colors belong to my first cousin once removed.

I shared Thanksgiving dinner with her and sixty-five others, between the cattle and the prickly pear in Central Texas.

Sixty-five first cousins twice removed, second cousins once removed, and even some third cousins, all of them connected to three sisters born between 1910 and 1922. I knew and loved the laughs and crinkly eyes of all three sisters, once they had grown into grandmothers and great aunts. I slept on their carpets, ate in their kitchens and wrapped my lanky-girl body around their window unit air-conditioners, hiding from the scorch of many a Texas summer.

We didn't need the A/C for Thanksgiving, but we didn't need coats, either. I got up while it was still dark, making sure to slip shoes over my bare feet before padding toward the bathroom. Earlier, between turkey and dominoes, we had stomped a few scorpions on the floor of my uncle's big "party barn." You know you're in Texas when you're trying to keep bare feet away from scorpions on Thanksgiving.

When we weren't marvelling at scorpions or at how each others' kids had grown, we found time to do a lot of talking and listening,
a lot of game playing,

and a lot of laughing.

Brothers laughing.

Sisters laughing.

The sister below wasn't laughing in the cool of the morning. While John and I chose to share beds in the loft with nineteen of our nearest and dearest, Kate and my cousin started out the night sleeping in the great outdoors. Perhaps they thought the coyotes would be quieter than the snores. They were wrong.

These are my uncles and cousins, rattling the cowboy breakfast grate.
This is my one-eyed niece, Laura. She looks a little like Violet on The Incredibles. Also like Violet, she will now and then surprise you with amazing things.

Laura didn't spend much time in the party barn, as she was too busy digging bones out of the Texas scrub, asking cousin Audrey for help with identification.

Laura and her mama drove a long way to attend. We did, too---our van has made this drive so many times that it automatically stops at the best barbeque anywhere close to I-35 in Oklahoma. It also knows exactly how far north you can go and still find Blue Bell ice cream in the C-stores. We usually stop at least once for Blue Bell: pistachio almond fudge, pecan pralines and cream, moollennium crunch, chocolate mint chip.

You've already seen my best photos of the day but, if you were there and happen to want to see more, I've put a slide show up on the web. There are lots of photos and they may take a few minutes to load, so click on the link and then go stir up some hot chocolate in the kitchen while the computer catches up. http://www.kodakgallery.com/ShareLanding.action?c=369nb64i.aa1zhiiq&x=0&y=-xuy9tw&localeid=en_US&cm_mmc=site_email-_-site_share-_-core-_-view_photos_button

Enjoy. And y'all come back!

1 degree Fahrenheit, 22 mph NW wind blowing across the Nebraska plains

...as long as we've no place to go, let it snow, let it snow, let it snow. :)

A Woman's Mind

A long time ago, my stalwart Grandmama said to me, "A woman's mind should be well furnished. She will spend much time alone in it."

After she died, I tried in vain to discover whether the line was a quote, or original to her.

A little bit after that, I found out that it was true.

The Friendship Myth

The girl next door got married last summer. Her fiance/husband had to disentangle himself from a number of female friends that he had acquired over his few years as a young adult.

It was a bit awkward, and a bit painful for those who didn't wish to be loosed. "You mean we can't even talk on the phone anymore??" they asked incredulously. "You mean we're not going to email any more? We're not going to Facebook?"

A look back through history indicates people have long known that it simply doesn't work for adult males and females to spend much time alone together and remain "just close friends." And yet, in media portrayal and in practice, this generation seems to think that young ladies and young men can be close, one-on-one personal friends, without the dating/mating mentality and hurts creeping in.

Call me skeptical, but I still think not. I had written quite a bit more on the subject when Rachel pointed me to an article that says it much better than I did.

http://www.boundless.org/2005/articles/a0001200.cfm

It is well worth the read.

---

Kissing a lot of frogs probably doesn't find you a prince; it just makes you slimy.

Veterans' Day at the Nursing Home

The vets got applause and boutonnieres, the girls played patriotic music, and everyone got a chance to remember that freedom isn't free.

Freedom isn't free. The Bible says, If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed. Jesus paid a price to make us free from the corruption that dwells within. The corruption is huge; the price paid for deliverance equally hefty.....death to the innocent son of God.

Web photo

Another bit about freedom is inscribed on the Tower facade at the University of Texas.

Web photo

Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free, it says. The planners lifted a phrase from the Word of God and stamped it on their building, but failed to mention the source of the truth that buys the promised freedom. The full sentence in the Bible reads: Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. Too bad U.T. doesn't give credit for truth and freedom, or for the quote about them, where credit is due.

Many people have died to buy our political and religious freedom. God's own son died to buy our spiritual freedom. Thank you to all of them.

A Little Rain

The power that men enjoy for a brief space on earth is not without the cognizance and the will of God. If we fall into the hands of men, and meet suffering and death from their violence, we are none the less certain that everything comes from God. The same God who sees no sparrow fall to the ground without his knowledge and will, allows nothing to happen except it be good and profitable for his children and the cause for which they stand. We are in God's hand. Therefore, "Fear not."

--Dietrich Bonhoeffer

The Cost of Discipleship

(thanks to Jim T. for the reminder)

Buttoning up the Fall Garden

In the wide world of cornfields that surrounds my house, the big boys are still havesting.

But here at home, we have gathered the last of the pumpkins,

piled squashes on the picnic table,

patted soil over next year's garlic crop,

hidden spinach and brussels sprouts from winter's blast,

and said goodbye to gardening.

In the blink of an eye, February's flurry of seed catalogs will hit the mailbox

and we'll start again.

But for now, it's time to rest.       Time for ThanksGiving.

Curious Dog

Apple Picking

Isn't this sweet? Great family time in the fall sunshine, with three generations picking apples from my generous neighbor's generous tree.

We wound up with enough apples to dry, enough to can applesauce, to make apple cake and apple crisp, enough for two batches of apple jelly.

I thought we were all working nicely together picking apples, when, suddenly, an armed native appreared in the tree.

Then my own father turned on me.

He muttered something about Tom Sawyer. Yes, picking the apples had been my idea, and yes, he and the others were doing the lion's share of the work.

But somebody had to take the pictures!

More House-Hugging Critters

Audrey tells me that this, a praying mantis, is the only insect that can swivel its head. I snapped his portrait from numerous angles; everywhere I went, he followed me with a robotic pivot.

Rachel asks if the ladybug was really there, or a figment of my Photoshop imagination. It was there. I cropped this photo and bumped the contrast; other than that it is unedited.

In the Dry

John and the farrier worked in the machine shed last week. They talked about horses and homeschooling over the whisper of grey drizzle falling on the tin roof.

Midnight

Watch ye therefore: for ye know not when the master of the house cometh, at even, or at midnight, or at the cockcrowing, or in the morning:

Lest coming suddenly he find you sleeping.

And what I say unto you I say unto all,

Watch.

Mark 13:35-37

Keeping the Creepies Out

The down trend in the outdoor thermometer means lots of creepy crawlies are trying to get into my house. This guy slept on the front door for half a day, taking life from whatever warmth radiated through the glass. The worst autumn offenders are the mice who find their way in. They are nasty and destructive. The war rages every year---I'm armed with traps; the mice with determination and a will to survive. But this fall I have added a new and powerful weapon to my arsenal.

We don't usually keep cats indoors, but Sage had a mishap that fractured her hip. The vet prescribed six weeks' of house confinement. Midway through, John saw Sage padding across the floor, a mouse tail dangling between her teeth. And I have seen no sign of rodents, even though October is generally prime real estate season for mice hunting new winter digs.

Sage has earned a cozy place indoors, even though her hip is long since healed.

And, with winter coming on, I might just get used to having this personal heater at the foot of my bed.