2008-08-06

It had rained overnight, cleansing the air of a bit of the heavy-hanging humidity that is our lot in the southern summer's dog days. After Morning Offering Mick trundled out his mowers and set himself for the day’s work, returning only at bath time.

My morning was taken up with visitors, as Vara and her husband Sean arrived just after Mick left. We had a most pleasant conversation, catching up on all that had occurred since Vee left the climes of Kentucky for Georgia. The two are deeply and romantically in love and it was good to see Vara happy and contented. She will accompany Sean to Fairbanks, Alaska, where he will probably be deployed to Iraq with his unit. He is an army man, just recently having come through basic training.

His career goal is to go through the experience of serving a tour of duty in Iraq and then to finish his training – he graduated in psychology – and become a licensed psychologist. He feels that his field experience will make him a better counselor for army men dealing with post-traumatic stress disorder and other mental problems having to do with experiences in battle. I think it is an admirable intention. I just hope he survives Iraq!

I continued conversing with our web guy about a point of formatting on the Channeling Circle sessions but was unable to resolve the issue completely. We will talk on the telephone tomorrow.

I also spent a bit of time writing Lana L, who is starting to write a book on democracy and how we Americans need to mend ours. It is a very worthy project and she had intended to start it this week. No one could be better for this task that Lana, as she has had this intention for literally decades, but raising kids, dealing with relationships and a teaching career have always intervened. Now her slate is clearer, she is in a brand new home and it has a space for her to devote strictly to writing. The stage is set!

I watched two home videos from Rick and Dianne C, the author of The Maine Report which I so enjoy, and his wife. Maine in the winter, a red fox prowling their fields, Dianne blueberry picking and visits to Camden, Northport and Rockport Harbors were the subjects. I especially delighted in seeing the lobster men pull in their catch.

I received a surprise in the mail – Michelle T’s new book, The May Queen! She wrote saying that she had been thinking about me, and decided I needed a copy. It was so kind of her! And her book was already on my wish list, so I was doubly delighted. I sat down and wrote her a thank you note immediately.

I just cracked Papa’s Journal in the afternoon. It is 800 pages of reading, so I will be working on digesting it for a while! And I finished the work day by getting 51 letters out to my MacDuffie classmates. Gary had kindly duplicated the class update letter for me and labeled the envelopes. Mick helped me stuff them, stamp them and put return address labels on them, bless him!

My Great Office Clean-Up continues! I was unable to get the other two videos, one from Bob R and one from Talitha L, to play. They are probably just fine. I just don’t grok electronics.

I am rueful to say that I have never mastered even turning the TV on in the downstairs set-up. I am thick as a plank when it comes to this area of knowledge. I seem to have a mental block. This has been true all my life. Why an otherwise intelligent person would have these areas of utter lack of competence I do not know. It is inconvenient! Gary will be in the office tomorrow and I’ll get him to start me up with these after lunch.

As I move ahead, however clumsily, with these tasks, the list of chores to catch up is ever shorter. After I see these videos and read Papa’s Journal, I only have three items on the list: catching up our scrapbook, creating a loofah gourd flower hanging using Tom C's gourd and creating an indoor, year-round, hanging tomato plant from a kit. It’s great to see the list shrink. I will be able to start the fall with a clear slate in the office! What a good feeling.

Gary joined us for the Colbert Report and offered the prayer at the Gaia Meditation tonight.