Hawaiian Winds.

 Hawaiian Winds.

 

Bought some bar shampoo from a lady on Etsy—Meredith Killingsworth from Aransas Pass, TX. Oh my! Smells good enough to eat! She included a coupon for 20% off the next order and a little botte of hand and body lotion called “Ocean.” Again! A delightful scent without being overpowering. Looking forward to washing my hair now! Her website is MKLonestarHandcraft. etsy.com in case you might want to enjoy some of the same. It does not bother me in the least to give someone a shout out when they produce a nice product or have a good bargain to share with others.

 

Got a text from Michelle Malay saying that she and her friend Kera would be here tomorrow. Really enjoy Michelle. She is such a sweet lady. Not sure that Kera has ever been around here, but if Michelle trusts her to take care of her house and critters, you can almost bet she is a sweetheart as well. It seems that is one of the better factors in life that good people gravitate toward other good folks. Or so it has always seemed to me.

 

Grandson Grayson is staying at his Aunt Sonny’s house to take care of her critters and her mother-in-law. This morning he got a call from the kennel where one of the dogs was being kept. The dog was ill, and he had to go get her. Of course, she did a bad thing in his Mustang, so he now has that little problem to clean up and try to deodorize. Oh boy! He and his dad both are “gaggers” who can’t stand the sight or smell of bad stuff. Lewis was like that, but he was also pretty good to just go ahead and gag and clean up the mess. It was a good thing, especially when the children were young. Waves of a stomach bug were never easy, but getting two or more down with the hupchucks at the same time was just about more than one person could handle. And we had children in the days before those throw-away diapers were a thing. None of the young parents today would have been able to care for kids with the gag-reflex and just plain wash cloths with cloth diapers.

 

Today children have no idea how to play outside unless someone like Chelsey Bahe or one of the other young people will take the children in their care out to explore and just BE in the parks and near a river or anyplace that is not perfectly groomed and devoid of broken trees, little puddles, small streams, or cattails near the edge of the lakes. We of the older generation may not be up on all the terms and wrinkles of the latest technology, but we probably know how to make a willow whistle from a willow twig or how to enjoy the airplanes from certain tree seeds—usually maples or one of the other older trees found in older areas of nature. Even our parks are really not quite as much fun as exploring was for us when we were young. Oh, we knew to watch for snakes and even recognized the different ones to avoid, but we also played with horny toads, striped lizards, and toads. And our children knew quite a bit about these things as they were growing up. Naming the songs and the different types of birds and how they nested and where was something we learned naturally. It was a different world in so many ways. Things certainly do change from one generation to another.

 

Sterling was talking about making a wind generator that could produce electricity. He has some kind of little motor thing that needs nothing more than wind to help it generate power. That is the sort of thing that has a fascination to it that should interest just about anyone! It certainly fascinates me! If we were suddenly without power for extended periods of time, do you suppose folks would learn to develop their own electrical power from other sources than those omnipresent wires from the electric company? Our dad was the kind of guy who could invent things and make them without a pattern sent to him by mail or certainly not by the internet. He explained how a wind charger worked when he was a boy at home. They had a radio that needed electricity, but no lines had as yet been stretched into that corner of Clay County when he was a boy. They had a battery that powered the radio, but that battery had to be charged by the wind charger. This was back in the day of “Fibber Magee and Molly.” To listen to an entire broadcast, Dad’s job had to have been completed—to charge up the battery with the wind charger. Can you even imagine being a young boy who cut a barrel in half, wired it together, and made a “boat” out of it for their stock tank? Then when all his play was finished, if he had not set the wind charger to work, he did not get to complete his day by listening to the radio. Bet he never forgot more than once!

 

Growing up in Petrolia, our house was probably the quietest in town except for some of the little old folks who slept most of the day. Our parents read lots of books, as did we children. We would be sitting in our living room reading and hear a bird call. Mom would look at us and expect us to say the name of the bird. Not all that hard since we did not have all that many strange birds in our area. But once in a while a bird of a different species would fly through and make us wonder. Here on Lake Wichita we have seen so many different species, even a Painted Bunting. But the silly grackles have the strangest calls and noises. And they never come in just pairs. They fill up a tree and the lines above until they make more racket than a house full of children or a bunch of old grannies at a quilting bee. Nature has her bounties in all different ways.

 

Guess my son-in-law is getting stronger finally. He can work at least half a day now without totally giving out. Will be so glad when his blood count gets normal and he can stop taking the blood thinner to get rid of the clot the IV caused. Honestly think sometimes that going to the doctor or to the lab can cause more problems than it can solve. Not sure they ever did find out why he was losing blood or where. Guess about the only thing to do is pray for healing and hope he takes good care of himself and doesn’t get cut or whacked at work or at home.

 

About as dumb as dirt today. Have not looked at whatever the internet calls news other than the usual mess of stuff about politics. Blood sucking, tax making, obfuscating dipsticks who love their own voices above all things: politicians.

 

Let us remember to pray for those in the Ukraine who have still no guarantees of freedom or safety. May God bless them and protect those who have stayed behind to attempt to live in that beautiful land.

 

Rest well, my friends. Appreciate all the blessings around you and beside you. You are loved.