Where do you go, when you're here?

Here

but removed

and I can not reach you.

Enclosed in thoughts that don't include me.

A landscape I can't enter in.

Where do you go, in your mind?

Swirling mists

in rain forest glens,

or valleys of desert sage.

Where kestrels soar

on thermal breaths

that lift the wing.

I am here 

and I am not.

 I 

am not welcome

on that journey.

I sit here and quietly study you

but 

I am not worried

Because I know, wherever you go,

you'll return to 

me.

A handful of patience is worth more than a bushel of brains. ~ Dutch Proverb

While everybody else was out doing their Black Friday thing, I spent the morning putting up my and Dear Hubby's little Christmas tree.  And my grandson Cooper came over because it was Garbage Day today and Cooper loves his Garbage Guys.

Here he is, patiently waiting, for the trucks to start coming around the corner.

Home

"All around me are familiar faces...." ~ "Mad World" lyrics by Naoto Tanaka

It happened to me again last Friday evening.  I was attending a Ladies Christmas Tea at a local church my friend Amy had invited me to and as I was being introduced to a woman at the table I'd never met before she said, "I've met you before."  Amy looked surprised and said, "No, I don't believe you have."  And the lady said, "Well, yes.  Her face is very familiar."  But I knew that no, we honestly hadn't met before that evening.

You see, I have a familiar face.

Either that, or I have an awful lot of lookalikes out there running around in the world.

This has happened to me many times.  I've been told I was spotted in downtown Portland walking up Broadway on a weekend evening.  In fact, I was told many times in Portland that I'd been spotted in a lot of places I'd never been to before.  The strangest incident was when I was at a fast food restaurant with my kids one afternoon and a man walked up to the table and said, "Hello, Cheryl!"  I kind of looked around like, "Who, me?!" and when I realized he was speaking to me I said, "I'm sorry, sir, but I believe you have me mixed up with someone else."  He was very adamant.  "No, I know you're Cheryl.  You used to babysit my kids all the time when you were a teenager."  Again, I said no, that wasn't me.  He shook his head like he still didn't believe me and said, "Well, I'd swear you were her.  You look just like her!" and he walked off muttering to himself.  I think he still thought I was playing a trick on him.

All my adult life I have had complete strangers come up to me in stores and public places, especially people who can't speak English, and gesture to let me know they need help with something.  Of course, I always oblige and do whatever I can for them but after that had happened yet again I said to Dear Hubby, "Why do these people pick me?!  There might be half a dozen other people around me and they always zero in on me."  Dear Hubby looked at me and said without hesitation, "It's because you look so friendly.  You have a very open and approachable face."  He said, "If I was a stranger and I saw you when I needed help, you'd be the one I'd pick out of a crowd, too."

Isn't that weird?

I look at myself and I see a cross of my dad and my mom staring back at me in the mirror.  I don't see anything remarkable or worth remembering.  I just see....me.

This has been happening for so long I'm not even surprised by it any more.  I try to handle it with grace and kindness. 

So if you're out and about and you see a silvery white-haired lady with glasses on and need help or directions, someone who reminds you of your grandmother or Aunt Gertrude or your best friend from high school or the teenage girl who babysat your kids 10 or 15 years ago, feel free to go up to her.

It might be me.

He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things which he has not, but rejoices for those which he has. ~ Epictetus

A big crock pot full of homemade stew...what better meal on a cold, blustery, and now very rainy day!  Dear Hubby and I ate a fairly early dinner.  We'll be on our way to the airport soon to pick up our son and his wife.  They flew to Portland on Friday and had a very whirlwind trip filled to the brim with visiting family and friends and attending the company's annual Christmas luncheon that was held on Saturday afternoon.  My son wrote on Facebook earlier that they had a great time seeing everyone but he couldn't wait to get home!  Well, I can't wait until they land safely on the ground again.  I never rest easy when loved ones are up in the air.  When my daughter-in-law and I came to Detroit last January to do some house hunting it was the first time I'd flown since 1974.  She likes flying but isn't a fan of turbulence so when we hit some going over the Rockies I just smiled at her and said, "Just rocking in the arms of Jesus, Casey!"  That got a smile out of her.

I am not one to get all gungho when it comes to the holidays.  Early in my marriage they became so stressful trying to please everyone and not pleasing anyone that it truly ruined the joy and beauty of the Christmas season for me.  For years it was just something to endure and get thru every year.  But as our grandsons came along and I began seeing Christmas again thru their eyes it's gradually softened my heart again.  I went and did a little shopping yesterday.  I picked up a 4-foot artificial tree that I'm going to place in the center of our big picture window.  I'd had a small fiber optic one last year that I'm giving to our daughter for her first Christmas in her apartment...very pretty, and one she won't have to worry about causing a fire.  When we purged and got rid of so much stuff last year I almost tossed out my box of Christmas decorations, thinking I'd probably have the fiber optic tree forevermore.  I even stood there with the box in my hands for a few moments, in the valley of indecision, and my daughter who happened to be with me said, "Don't, Mom.  Keep them."  I had already gone thru the box a few years beforehand, giving the kids whatever ornaments they wanted to keep.  It's funny....you hold on to things forever, thinking your kids will want everything.  But when it came down to decision time, I think they both took each an ornament or two and that was it.  Ornaments that had a great amount of sentimental value to them.  That was what was important in their choices.

When I purged thru 28 years of stuff from living in our old house...actually, 36 years of married 'stuff'...I really cleaned house.  I'd been dragging things along since I'd left my hometown at the age of almost 13.  Things I thought maybe my daughter might like someday....doll furniture both my grandfathers had made for me...that ended up never being played with.  Just sitting in dark corners of the basement gathering dust.  You know what I did?  I either donated it or threw it all away.  About 5 drop boxes full.  Well, one big drop box outside along the curb that I'd fill to the brim and over, only to go out in the morning to find 'pickers' had basically cleaned it out.  So...I'd fill it again.  Do you know, it wasn't hard.  It was liberating.  It was so nice to just clean house.  When we packed up the big semi that moved both our household and our son's 2/3 of the way across America, whatever we had of our things were those that meant something, truly.  Sentimental value.  Not just....things.

So...I know what shelf in the basement that box with the ornaments is stored on.  I think the day after Thanksgiving I'm going to go find it and bring it upstairs.  I'm going to assemble my little Christmas tree and hang those ornaments on there.  And I'm going to sit down after I plug in the lights.  And I'm going to savor the moment.

I just think it's important to be direct and honest with people about why you're photographing them and what you're doing. After all, you are taking some of their soul. ~ Mary Ellen Mark

Where I write.

Where I leave part of my soul

on every page.

Where I dream.

Cameras are not the only thing

that takes a part of us.

Words come from the very depths.

"Even though I have neglected my daily writing, I am grateful there are still those of you out there still blogging." ~ Debbie

This is the wonderful thing about blogging.  No one sees you.  And I must admit when I sit down late in the evening, which is usually the time I do most of my writing, this is pretty much how I look.  Just picture her with silvery-white hair and glasses and that would be me.  Oh, and a tall glass of iced tea.  If I drank coffee that late at nite I would never sleep.

I got another comment that's sticking with me by a reader named Debbie.  I quoted it above in my title.  You know, I've read here and there the past few years that blogging is a dying art, just like snail mail letters.  I wish I had a dollar for every snail mail letter I've written in my life, as well as every one I received.  I got my first pen pal when I was 8 and I acquired hundreds of pen pals between that time until a few years ago when email seemed to take over for the world's postal services.  Then I went the route of email pen pals for a while but that was never as satisfying as finding a true-blue real honest-to-goodness letter sitting in my mail box.  Something besides bills and junk mail.  And then there was the deliciousness of getting a cup of coffee, sitting down on the couch, opening the envelope, and reading news from some friend or loved one in their own individual handwriting.  Knowing they'd actually touched the paper or stationery, had taken the time to sit and write it to me.  I'm sorry, but there just isn't that magic in some words typed on a screen, no matter how nice, no matter how much you enjoy hearing from someone.  Then along came MySpace.  Bebo.  And the monster of all mega-monsters, Facebook.  Don't get me wrong.  Facebook is a lifesaver for me as far as keeping in touch with family and friends 2400 miles away on the west coast.  I am thankful for it.  But I'm just sayin'.

And so...back to blogs.  I read when I first began blogging in April 2005 that a million new blogs were being created every day at that time.  And if you had even one visitor stop by you were really lucky.  It took me a few weeks to finally get my first comment and I was as giddy as a kid with a new toy.  Somebody was reading what I'd written!  I remember lamenting to my daughter, "No one seems to be reading my blog!" and she shook her head and rolled her eyes and showed me where the stats were on Bravenet at the time.  I'd had almost 1000 visitors!  I was flabberghasted!  And now...6 1/2 years later...I've had close to 3/4 of a million.  My little peanut brain can't wrap around that number, just like it still can't wrap around the reality of living in Michigan yet.  But even if it had ended at 1000 I would've been happy.  That's a 1000 more people than I ever dreamt I would reach.  And even if the numbers die off and dwindle down to nothing, this is for my most important audience of all...my grandchildren.  I'm not here to spew out my political views.  I'm not here to change the world.  I'm here to record my simple life, day by day, and to teach my grandchildren the beauty and the wonder of Life.  To try to teach them to embrace each moment of every day because Life is a gift. If I am able to leave them that legacy, every word on this blog has been worth it.

And so another day has come and is slipping by at greased-lightning speed.  It's beautiful outside and time for a walk.  But first...thank you, Debbie.

I'm the strayest dog you'll ever meet. ~ Daniel, @blindedpoet

                                

I really need to go to bed.  I'm so blurry-eyed I can hardly see straight.  And I don't think I have my photo of the moon before sunrise aligned correctly on my page here.  It didn't want to cooperate and I'm too sleepy to really care.  Whatever.  There isn't any particular reason why I used this photo.  It doesn't illustrate anything I'm going to write about tonite.  I just like it...the dark velvety blueness of the sky.  I love the sky.  Sunrises, sunsets.  Stars.  Cloud formations.  The midwest sky is so vast I never tire of looking up at the clouds.  It can be raining in the east, sunny to the west, big puffy clouds to the south, wispy horse tails to the north.  All at the same time.  And the clouds billow...and billow...and billow....upwards.  Way upward.

I had what was, to me, a very interesting comment left from a reader on a blog entry the other day.  I'd written something about lurking on Facebook and she got brave enough to speak up and admitted lurking on my blog.  She said she hesitates to say anything to me on here because she's afraid she'll interrupt my flow of words.  That caused me to sit back in my chair for a moment when I read that.  And I thought on that for a while.  Ruminated...one of my favorite words.  To meditate or muse.  To ponder.  I do a lot of ruminating.  And that has stayed with me ever since I read it.  Just like a comment long ago from another reader who told me she thinks the reason very few ever comment on here is because I make people think.  I do?  Ha, if you only saw the contents in my head on any given day, I would think not.  But she said it, so it must be true. For her at least.

Writing is a strange undertaking.  Especially when you want someone to really get what you're writing about.  To have them understand what it is you're trying to say.  There is no body language involved.  No one can see you grimace or frown or smile or roll your eyes as you type words down.  They don't know if you're trying to be funny, or if you're dead serious because they can't see you.  So if you decide to write you have to come up with the words that will describe to them the emotions you're trying to convey.  That is not always easy.  I've mentioned before how sometimes I'll write something from the very bottom of my guts, something that has great meaning to me or has had a profound affect on me, and people will respond like "No big deal.  Have a nice day."  And other times I've written off the cuff, nothing major to me, and someone will tell me, "Oh, that touched my heart!  I can't tell you what that meant to me!"  And I'm left sitting here scratching my head and wondering, "What?!"

But one thing my blog is, totally and unequivocally, is me.  My family tells me it sounds exactly like me.  And I've told blog friends I've met that "What you read is who I am".  My style of writing, if you can call it a style, is sitting down here at my keyboard and just taking off with whatever is in my head.  Like tonite...I didn't know I was going to write about writing.  But that's what it's ended up being about.  And that's ok.

And now I really am heading to bed.  I've got a busy day running errands for Dear Hubby tomorrow.  I need my beauty sleep.  Desperately.

Travel and change of place impart new vigor to the mind. ~ Seneca

A long time ago I was really into animated gifs.  I found this one in my archive of pictures and graphics.  I have so many stashed away that even tho they've all been used at one time or another on my blog entries most readers wouldn't even recognize them.  I wonder if the animation runs out eventually?  If I remember right, these little fat men used to do the Russian dance where they'd squat down and kick out their legs?  It was pretty funny.  But now they're just standing there like suspects in a police line up.

  Maybe they got tired.

Their dancing was that energetic.

Oh, to be energetic.  I think I've forgotten what that feels like.

This is going to be one of those rambling posts, I have a feeling.

Rambling is good.

I was talking to my very lovely neighbor Donna recently.  I was saying to her I find it kind of weird how people here seem to have no interest in Portland, which is where I'm from originally.  Oregon, that is.  She kind of shrugged her shoulders at me and raised her arms and said, "But, Kris...it's so far away!"  That took me aback a bit.  It is?  Far away?  Well, yeah.  It is.  It's almost 2400 miles to the west.  I remember I used to think LA was a long way from Portland and it was only a little over 800.  But when I moved here I got on a jet and I was in Detroit a little over 6 hours later on the day we moved.  Didn't seem very far at all.  I was talking to Dear Hubby about it later over dinner and he said, "Let me tell you, it's a long way!"  Three and a half days of hard driving.  Which he should know, since he and our daughter-in-law drove it together coming across the country.  It was the only way they could get the kids' family dog to Detroit. 

It sure is funny how perspective can color a person's perception of what is and what isn't.

Because I never have driven that far and I probably never will, Portland will always be a 6 hour flight away to me.  I can't seem to wrap my mind around any other concept.  It will always be a patchwork quilt of miles gliding past below the clouds.  Never the Rockies and Iowa and Nebraska seen from ground level.  No Mississippi River bridge to cross.  No Chicago.  Well, I take that back...I've been to Chicago, but only heading east to west, not west to east.

But I do sit and ponder that every now and then, how an experience that has changed my life and Dear Hubby's so profoundly, was viewed so differently in the process of getting from there to here.

Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak whispers the o'er-fraught heart and bids it break. ~ William Shakespeare

I have a little gadget at the bottom of  the sidebar on my blog that is called a Feedjit.  I don't know how accurate it is but it shows thruout the day the various cities and countries people live in who come and view my blog.  As I was looking it over this morning I noticed someone had gone into my Archives back to some time in 2009 and it got my curiosity piqued:  Why 2009?   So I clicked on it and I went back in time for a little trip down memory lane.  It was good to do for a couple of reasons.  In the comments I found two fellow bloggers I used to comment back and forth with all the time who I'd lost contact with along the way.  (Never enough hours in a day to keep up with everyone.)  The bad thing is, I started reading what I'd written and I just cringed.  I don't know why it bothers me so much to go back and reread what I've written.  Maybe because I'm looking at it from hindsight now and there's so much water that's flowed under the Bridge of Time since then.  Maybe it seems so juvenile and so...non-writer-like.  Just drivel.  And dribble.  And then I begin to second-guess myself.  I know I've mentioned many times on my blog thru the years an Anonymous commenter who said to me when I first began writing, "Why do you think anyone would be interested in reading about your boring and paltry life?"  I must say that pretty much shattered me and almost caused me to quit right there...but close to 2000 entries later, I guess I still feel the need to share all the boring and paltry and day-to-day ordinariness of my life .  If someone wants to read it...fine.  If not...fine.  I'm not twisting anyone's arm to make them come here.  Besides, this is basically a 'living journal' I've been writing for my two grandsons, started before either one of them was even thought about.  I remember a long time ago I either bought it for myself or received it as a gift...I know this, because I recently found it in the bottom of a cedar chest I have...a journal book about "Grandma's Memories" for grandmothers to record their lives in for the grands.  I am and always have been miserable about keeping hand-written journals because my hand can't keep up with my brain.  But since acquiring a computer and having a keyboard and being a very fast typist...well, when my daughter suggested I start a blog, it was kismet.  Like introducing peanut butter to jelly.  Or hands to gloves.  A perfect fit.  I have to record my life for my grandsons.  No matter how boring.  No matter how paltry.

Speaking of grands.  I have become a lurker.  Now, lurking and I usually don't get along because I know I have a huge audience of lurkers out there who never speak up.  It doesn't necessarily bother me after all these years of blogging but I'm a friendly sort and if I read something somewhere on someone's blog I have a tendency to speak up and at least say hi.  But I'm not lurking on blogs.  I'm lurking on Facebook.  And if the parties involved knew I was, they'd probably report me to the police.  Seriously.  You see, they're my two nieces and their children.  And 19 years ago there was a huge rift in my family that caused the girls and their parents to completely cut the rest of my family out of their lives.  And even tho I've tried countless times to make peace with them they are unforgiving in their hearts.  So...thru a lot of 'dectective' work, I've found them on Facebook and I go and check every now and then.  I don't know why.  Curiosity, I guess.  I found two grand-nephews today I've never laid eyes on before and here they are in their later teens.  Lifetimes lost.  I sit there and I look at their pictures and I look at the other grand-nephew and grand-niece and I feel...hollow...inside.  I tried one last time not too long ago to reach out to one who I found out quite by accident actually lives in Ann Arbor, which is practically next door to where I live and, again, no response.  The poison runs deep and generational.  I made my mind up then I will never try to contact anyone in their family again.  But I still look.  And wonder what might have been.

Who can hope to be safe? who sufficiently cautious? Guard himself as he may, every moment's an ambush. ~ Horace

I'm at the point in life where I don't like to watch the news much any more.  I am sickened about the sex scandal at Penn State, just as I was with all the cover ups concerning molestations within the Catholic church.  Having been a child who was molested...only one time...and knowing the devastating affect it had on me, I can not imagine what it must be like to be repeatedly violated.  I never told my parents what happened to me for 7 years.  It's amazing how the attacker can make an innocent child feel like it's the child's fault, makes the child question themselves as to why they were the one the pervert focused on and not some other child.  In my case, it could have been dozens of others who might have been...and probably were....violated by this man.  He was a person whose home was open to children from all over town.  His wife worked days, he worked nites.  Perfect scenario.  Along comes me, a little girl of 9, and he targets me while a bunch of us kids were playing Hide 'n' Seek at his house and I was "it".  Those minutes on the floor of his living room alone with him will never be erased from my memory.  When everyone called "Ready!" and I had the chance to get away, I fled from that house as fast as I could and I never went back.  And I never let him within 20 feet of me ever again.

And I kept that secret bottled up inside until the day I was 16 and I finally unburdened myself to my parents.  Naturally, they were aghast and were horrified I'd kept this from them..."Why didn't you tell us?  We could've gotten a hold of the police!  He could've harmed lots of kids!"  True, true, true.  But how do you put into words something that happened to you before you even knew what sex and perversion were?  Seven years later, we had moved 140 miles away and he had died of throat cancer.  Good riddance.  And to this day, 48 years later...well, I have to forgive him because I'm a Christian but I get sick to my stomach whenever I think of what he did that day and how he took my innocence away forever.  We forgive, but we never, ever forget.

And so....

I'm at the point in life where I don't like to watch the news much any more.

In my soul, I am still that small child who did not care about anything else but the beautiful colors of a rainbow. ~ Papiha Ghosh

My collection of paper dolls.

Barbie, Midge, Skipper.

Janet Lennon.

Connie Francis and Lucille Ball.

Haley Mills.

Patty Duke.

Kate, Bobbie Jo, and Billie Jo from "Petticoat Junction".

I do not know

where Betty Jo disappeared to.

Tammy, her Mom, brother Ted, and sister Pepper.

To name a few.

They moved with me from my hometown

in 1966

And they have come with me on every move since then,

to 12 different houses

in

45 years.

When I take the shoe box off the closet shelf...

any of the many closet shelves

they have lived on...

and I open it

and take them out

I am once again a little girl

who spent countless

hours

sharing my childhood

with them.

When you look at your life, the greatest happinesses are family happinesses. ~ Joyce Brothers

I finally figured out how to upload my phone photos onto my blog!  But I haven't figured out how to put them on here with space for the captioning, sigh.  Truly, I am a dinosaur when it comes to techie stuff.  Even so I am so thrilled I can share some photos from our 8 month odyssey -  so far  --  here in Michigan.  Please scroll down the page and you'll see a hodge-podge of photos in no particular order.  Amazing how much Life we've lived here so far!

November sunset.

Someone found a spot in the sun on an October afternoon.

Morning rush hour traffic along I-75 south of Grayling, Michigan.

A tree we pass each day walking to my grandson's school.

Awesome cloud formations over our house just as the most violent thunder storm of the summer hit.

Early Autumn morning in my son's back yard.  The leaves have just begun to fall.

A misty late summer morning sunrise thru the trees in my son's back yard.

The beautiful Au Sable River in north central Michigan.  This was taken at Canoe Harbor.  Notice the rainbow I captured around the sun's reflection on the water.

God's Autumn gold.

A little boy on a walk thru the neighborhood on a beautiful summer morning.

The first week of October and still warm enough for bare feet.

My darling Dylan, lost in thought.

Garbage Day!

Cooper and his garbage trucks...waiting for the REAL ones to arrive!

"Painting" the sidewalk with water one warm summer morning.

My first trip to Lake Huron in the Spring.  My first visit ever to a Great Lake!

This is a lavender glass bottle that Dear Hubby found glinting in the sun in the high desert of central Oregon.  It was almost completely buried in the sand.  He brought it home for me, and inside of it I have agates and rocks that I'd collected at the beach as a memorial for my mother after she passed away.  I have it on my kitchen window sill and every time I look at it I think of her.

Dear Hubby drinking coffee and reading the paper in the kitchen.  I don't know why, but this is one of my favorite photos of him.

Watching the chipmunk Dylan named "Whoppy" eating at the bird feeder just outside the window.

A summer morning before sunrise when the moon was still bright in the dark blue velvet sky.

Eating noodles is hard work!

Transition: n. 1. change or passage from one state or stage to another

I have an ongoing love affair with words.  I have been trying to share that love affair with others since I was 8 years old.  My second grade teacher tacked up a poem on the bulletin board that I'd written about having the measles.  And it was also that year when I got my very first pen pal.  I even remember her name:  Cathy from Buffalo, New York.  That led to many more poems, many more pen pals, and yesterday without realizing it, I'd hit another milestone on my blog.  A milestone to me, anyway.

My 1,100th entry!

It's taken me a while to get from 1000 to 1100.  A lot of changes in this past year that have happened at whirl wind speed.  But I keep plugging along.  I should go back and read the last 100 posts but I'll save that for another day.  I'm too busy living it right now.

And isn't it ironic, don't you think....

It's kind of the way I feel today.  Oh well, so what if this doesn't get done today?  Oh well, I don't care if I do this or don't do that.  Oh well, life goes on.  Oh well.

I took my daughter out to lunch today.   We connected so I could borrow her laptop for a few days.  As we sat in Taco Bell on Wayne Road with the sun streaming thru the big plate glass windows it felt good to relax and enjoy the beautiful day.  Felt good to just chat about everything and nothing much.  Just one of those mother-daughter kind of days. 

We got to talking about friendship and we both came to the shared conclusion that friendship is a funny and fickle thing.  In moving 2400 miles away it's been kind of interesting and an eye opener to see who's kept in contact with us and who hasn't.  How some of those who haven't have shocked us and how some of those who have have surprised us.  "Out of sight, out of mind".  I must admit I haven't done the best job of keeping in touch either, especially with those who don't have Facebook.  Michigan is the 'here and now' of my life and I find myself becoming more enmeshed in daily life here.  Especially for those relatives who don't have computers it's next to impossible to find the time to sit down and actually write a letter.  Once upon a time a million years ago before computers and email became common I had hundreds of pen pals most of my life.  And then it gradually dwindled down to one friend who still kept in contact by mail.  But I believe she's dead now.  I never did get closure from her daughter letting me know one way or the other, but after not hearing from my friend for a few years now, I'm assuming that's what's happened.

Oh well.

Oh well.  Oh well.  Oh well.

Sometimes people don't exactly let you down, but sometimes they aren't who they seem to be either, are they? Or is it me?  Is it just the "Oh well" mood I'm in today? 

Christmas is a necessity. There has to be at least one day of the year to remind us that we're here for something else besides ourselves. ~ Eric Sevareid

Can it be?  Christmas is almost here?  Well, the stores have been telling me so the past few days.  Oh, how I loathe hearing Christmas music before Halloween is even here.  It takes away so much of the beauty and specialness of the season.  I can only imagine how retail store employees must feel by the end of the day on December 24th when they've heard "Jingle Bell Rock" for the 10,000th time.

My love affair with the midwest continues.  Halloween was amazing.  Like the Halloweens I remember from when I was a young child in the 1950s and early 60s.  Even the adults get into it back here, dressing up in costumes to hand out their trick-or-treat candy.  And I lost count of how many of them sit out on their porches and front stoops with big bowls of candy in their laps to give to the kids and "Ooooooooh!" and "Ahhhhhhh!" over all the little witches and Jedi knights and princesses and ladybugs.  We gave out candy to hundreds of kids.  I walked around my neighborhood with my son and his family and Dylan and Cooper got more candy going up and down a couple of streets than my kids used to get traipsing a mile or two in our area of Portland.  Glowing jack-o-lanterns everywhere, ghosts in trees.  Oh, it was wonderful!  I am so thankful my grandsons get to experience their childhoods here.  I've been using the term to describe it as living in Beaver Cleaver-ville.  That's just the way it feels.

It is a drop-dead gorgeous day outside today.  I wish I could figure out how to transfer my phone pictures to Blogger so I could share some of the Autumn splendor with you, even here in my neighborhood.  My mom grew up in New Hampshire and moved out to Washington State right after WWII as a brand new 18-year-old bride.  She was never able to return 'home' for 22 years...4 children and Life interrupted in those years.  She used to get so wistful around Autumn, so homesick.  The western Washington State autumns have their color, too, but once the rains set in around Halloween time and rarely let up until June  --  honestly, I am not exaggerating  --  the dreariness just....gets....to you.  Since I'd never lived anywhere else as a child, what I knew was what I had.  I couldn't begin to imagine the colors of the foliage, the crisp bite to the air, that she described.  Well, now I know.  And I have savored every day of it.


I had a very surreal moment last Friday.  I was driving west on one of the more-traveled side streets around sunset time and there was a big bank of low-lying clouds snugged down against the horizon.  They were the same height, the same distance, the same color Portland's West Hills would be at the same time of day with the sun setting behind them.  And for a moment I felt so disoriented, like, "Am I here, or am I in Portland?!"  And yet, in 8 months here now, life in Portland is beginning to be a little less-defined in my memory, a little fuzzy around the edges.  Oh, I'm sure if I was to fly or travel back and stand in front of our house there I could still find my way around to wherever I needed to go without hesitation.  But it's the daily life, the day-to-day things, where life is so centered and focused here in Michigan.  Even many memories the grandboys have are being replaced.  Tho Cooper did speak up the other day and say, "Grandma, the garbage men in Portland really loved us, didn't they?"  Yes, Coop....they did.  And I hope the boys never forget that, how kind Bob, Justin, and the "yard debris guy" were to them..

I have a throbbing headache, a touch of a flu bug today.  I think I'll go curl up on the couch for a while and rest.  I have homemade soup simmering in the crock pot and it smells so good.  A perfect fall meal on a perfect fall day.