This is just me testing Open Live Writer, which is what Microsoft replaced Windows Live Writer With, but didn’t mention it anywhere, but luckily some random dude did on his blog, which I happened upon after an hour and a half trying to work out why Windows Live Writer didn’t work on any of our new Windows 10 machines. Lucky me!
Books to read…
That last post was so full of hope and optimism! How funny! Now, we are a couple of weeks into the Presidency of Donald J Trump, and what is clear is that while he thinks he knows how to run a business, he hasn’t a clue how to run a government. America has followed Europe down the right wing path, and our lovely President has issued Executive Order after Executive Order, trying to recreate US Policy single handedly, and doing nothing with the Congress, where he might face a little opposition. Instead, he only wishes to play the role of king. And this megalomaniac has got his finger on the button? What the Hell happened? Did so many people forget that during the elections? 14 days after the inauguration General Mattis threatened nuclear war with North Korea. Trouble with that is Kim Jung Il is as bad as Trump, both believing they are indestructible, and that bad things do not happen to them. Meanwhile, are we foolish enough to believe that China or Russia will not seize the opportunity? Would it not be in their best interests too, seeing how there is only one country that has used nukes thus far?
Burning Down The House is playing downstairs right now. Yes. Soon.
I could go on for hours about the politics, but I need to have a space away from that because not everything is politics, and frankly, life goes on till it doesn’t anymore. So, in the spirit of keep on keeping on.
I am saving up some money to replace this slow old computer I have from 2009. It is time. I plan on going used. I also plan on using it for relatively little. Yes, blogging in one thing, and Photo management. E-mail, obviously. I need to keep the machine pretty clean for the sake of keeping it running up to spec. I’d like an Office suite as well. That’s about it. If I ever do get a weather station, I would like to hook it up to the computer too. This biggest thing is properly running my farm sites and putting up more informative things for others to read and learn. What else is life about? My kids, of course. Missus too. The farm itself, too. Look, blogging about a farm is a popular thing to do these days. There was hardly anyone doing it when I started in September 2010. But even with so many people doing it, our voice and style is unique! So, onward!
Tomorrow brings an historic day, and an important day. Tomorrow America votes, and finally puts to rest this seemingly endless charade we have called the 2016 Presidential Campaign! And should Hillary Clinton win, then the loud, clear message will finally be heard, that the Presidency is no longer limited to only half of the inhabitants of this country. After tomorrow, little girls will be able to dream of one day becoming the elected leader of this country, and those girls with their dreams will have to be taken very seriously. To that end, all I want is equality and humanity!
On the other hand, America may not vote to pass the mantle, but to toss the club to someone who will likely bash the whole nation over the collective head, and run away with all the money.
Too tired to keep going now. Sleep required!
Kelsey J Bacon
Today I took the girls out into the little pasture and let them each take a turn at launching a model rocket. Kiry went first, and we lost that rocket after the chute failed to deploy. Khallie launched the second rocket, and we retrieved that about 500 to 600 feet from the launch site in the Robert’s field behind the house. I launched the second rocket a second time, having the girls spot it, and it came down in the direction we thought the first rocket went in when it got lost.
Oh, also, when we left our place to search for that second rocket, I ducked the barbed wire first, then turned to check the girls as they came through, but forgot about the electric cow fence the Roberts keep. I would not call it painful, but it sure as Hell wasn’t what I’d call the shock I got. I hit that wire, and that sonofabitch hit me back like a ton of bricks. It jarred me with such force that even now, 13 hours later, I can still feel the jolt throughout my body.
This evening while we were feed ing the animals and watering the plants, I spotted the first rocket in the front yars, about 50 feet from where we launched it. How did we miss that? I’ll never know.
Scattered Clouds, 72°F
These last few weeks have been busy, and hot. We have been feeding three Jersey calves. At leat one of them has nearly died. We have been cleaning out the granary too. It has been overfilled and pretty much useless to us in any capacity other than storeage. I have been retrieving firewood frm the mountains when I can, and bringing it back, splitting it, and piling it up. Missus has been working on sorting the stuff from the granary, and painting in the house. We bth did the girl’s bedroom, and moved rooms around so everyone is sleeping and eating somewhere new. It has been so much that today I took the day to rest, because I coud not push through the grog an yuck of the day. I hope to be up for it all tomorrow. There is so much to do to prepare for winter still. I want to be more of a help than I was today!
Clear Sky, 67°F
Laying in bed, thinking about tomorrow’s tree chopping expedition, and trying out this journal writing software.
Mom would have called today her birthday, even though it was celebrated on the 11th of July for most of her life. After years of believing it was the 11th, she got a copy of her birth certificate, which stated it was on the 7th. Unhappy with her mother for getting it wrong for so long, she started celebrating it on the 7th in spite of her mother saying “it was the 11th. I ought to know, I was there.” In the end, mom decided her birthday just went from the 7th till the 11th. Well, happy first day of your birthday mom. I love you!
I still find it so difficult to look at your pictures. You were supposed to be here another 20 years or so. You would be turning 64 now. Instead… Instead I just hurt inside. Instead, I have a hole in my heart. Your father lived till he was 90. His funeral was two years before yours. At his, you sat and you cried on the very spot you would lay only two years later. Momma, these thoughts! They kill me inside. I have such sorrows at that cemetery in Duschene, Utah. At your father’s funeral I spoke to Nancy, and remembered him, though I was only five when he died, and it was shortly after that that I remember being at that place. And how I still think the kids and grandkids at you father’s funeral should have thrown back shots of whiskey atop his coffin, to honor him as the man he was, rather than the sunshine we tell eachother at funerals.
When I woke up the morning of April 9th, everything was normal. Four agonizing days later, your favorite drawing was a stark reminder of you. Your mother took off to Denver without me, and without asking if I wanted to go. Add it to a long list of things for which I’ll never forgive her. You, always the peace maker, would tell me to. You’d lie and say you had, then drop it, and try to forget it. You’d mean it well enough to be convincing. I’ll never know the truth. I’ll only know that you were always a better person than she, even though you worried deeper, and more that you were not.
Happy Birthday mom. Unhappy Birthday mom. I know you suffered so much. I am relieved that you are relieved of your pains. I’d be so selfish to want you back to continue your suffering just for me. I know you’d do it in a minute if you could. I know you would tell me to tell your grand babies every single day that you love them. So, I am so selfish. I wish so much you could just tell them yourself!
Dammit Mom!
Tonight I just want to make a journal entry, rather than a blog post on one of the blogs. I have started writing Dispatches From the Farm as letters to and old friend, which has helped in getting a post out now and then because it makes me feel like I have been writing something to someone. These Journal entries here are more like letters written to myself, and that is easy enough for me. Dispatches started out in a mindset of writing something akin to a Laura Engles story or a Tales From Lake Woebegone. And while I’d like to give such personalities, I don’t want to cross lines of privacy with the people around me. So, I keep it mostly about me, and on the farm.
Another failed aspect of Dispatches and all of my blogs, really, has been images. It turned out to be a technical issue that had no resolution till I happened on a setting in the application I use on my Android that was preventing me from posting photos. I adjusted the resolution down, and next thing you know…
…our lives on the farm are in living color! And that is pretty exciting!
Our second child, Dylan, announced on Independence Day that he is moving out and moving in with his girlfriend into a house they will be renting in town for $1,000 a month (which is really high for town, and for a place in need of as much work as they say this place is). Then, after two years of perfect payments, the owner will finance the house to them as a sale. It will cost enough of their income that they have to rent a room or two out to friends. Of course we have advised against it, but this is advice given to the guy who spends more than half his monthly income on a car he bought on loan without telling us he was doing it. And they had already put the money on the house by the time they told us.
They are running tight on money, and testing friendships in ways they never have before. They are much braver than I am.
So, with just us and the girls at home after this week, there will be some room changes going on. No charge expected on how much we talk to Dylan, because he never says boo to us anyhow. We have not existed for him since he was what, six? The girls will move into the room the boys had, after freshening it up, and the rooms the girls and we are in will be used as a suite, which is great because they have to walk through our room to get to theirs anyhow. We will put our bedroom into their current room, then make our current bedroom into a sitting room, complete with hide-a-bed to convert it into a guest room when required. I’ll put in a sink and coffee station, and maybe we will round up a viewscreen for movies and such. The seating will make for a nice place for bedtime stories! And there is a balcony with full sliding glass for a great view, and a cozy hangout to watch snowfall on winter evenings.
Katrina has worked out a deal with a friend of Jordan’s to buy a truck off her. It is an ’82 Ford F150. Jordan thinks the engine is a 351, making it the little brother to the engine in my truck. That will give us two trucks to get firewood with, or hay, or haul a trailer with, or whatever. It should make a good animal getter too when we find something to buy. It has two fuel tanks, making it potentially better for those long trips. My folks had a van with the same engine and fueltank setup when I was learning to drive. It was good. Katrina is excited that it is four wheel drive and has an automatic transmission. It has a hitch reliever, so we will have to set her up with a hitch ball. That won’t be a problem! It may be a lot better for getting firewood with than my truck stands to be. And, she can paint the her logo on it. Mine can have the farm logo on it without guilt!
Well, it is bedtime. Our three year old is in our bed tonight. She has been sleeping on our bedroom floor, which was progress…
I am still so damned unhappy with mom dying when she did. Sure, I am ready to do life without her. She did a good job, and raised me right. What I am not ready for is days without being able to have a chat with mom when I want to hear her say, “I love you,” in the way only she ever did. I am not ready to go months without being able to chat with her about what is going on, and what we have planned next, like I used to do. I am not ready to go on without hearing her say how beautiful my children are, so I could know how happy they make her. I am not ready to live without sharing joy with her. And that’s what I miss above all. Sharing joy with mom, the way we did for so many years.
I miss her smile, her laugh, her willingness to pack away all the negative, and look at the bright side, just to make others smile, even when she had lost all hope already. I miss what she gave of herself. I miss what she was. I miss her simple beauty. I miss her complexity. I miss her voice, and I miss her silence… her deliberate silence. Her silence now was not intended. Her silence right now is never ending. And in her words, it sucks.
I try to tell myself she was just being her usual self and not being a burden on anyone for her end of life. Truth is, she would be damned well a burden on any and all, just to be with her grandkids, her kids, her family. The truth is, her death kills. Her burden bears heavy. The cold box where she decays does not need her, does not deserve her, but the bastard wants everyone, and takes all. I don’t resent it for wanting me. I resent it for taking her too soon.
To the ethereal memories of the one I have called Mom. Happy Mother’s Day. This is the first one without you, and you have been gone less than one month. If I could write you a card, and you could read it, there is one thing I would want you to know. You mattered. No matter how small this world makes us feel, by literal size, or in how short a while we get to live here, you mattered.
I am to the point where I do not cry every day now. It is not easy. I think of you, and when I do my heart flutters and instantly my eyes want to water up, and I have to change the subject of the conversation I have with myself in my mind. I cannot hardly see to write this now. But that’s something I just have to work with.
Also, I thought today that if ever someone might ask me how my mother was, I may tell them, “She was young, and that is all you need to know.” It refers to ‘Only The Good Die Young.” I also makes me wonder why I didn’t ever see it coming. I should have always known.
Happy Mother’s Day, mom. I love you. I miss you so much.
