not getting over all those daisies

post #495
          This week in the news has been hard. Alarming peaks in the virus cases. Lies and lack of taking responsibility from our so called leaders. More incomprehensible murders by those supposed to protect us. Governors who don't listen to science and who worry instead about "what will he think." Deaths that didn't need to happen. Our citizens not welcome to travel to other countries because we don't even take care of ourselves. 
           This all means also that we are held back from solving the spread of the virus enough to get back to work sooner, and to be able to hug family members, and give essential healthcare workers a break from so much sickness. 
          Through all this, I am still marveling at the daisies this year.  I haven't been able to quit taking photos. I decided to post a lot of the photos today, many whicih you may have already seen. This is both because each one speaks to me in some way but also because these flowers persevere.  Every year.  Not always this abundant, but always there.  We can learn so much from paying attention to plants and to animals. We can even learn from that to care about lives other than just our own.

          And we can try to be ready for the next crop, of black-eyed susans, now blooming where before there were daisies......

         Please be safe, and, if you want reassurance about why masks are worthwhile and very important, seek out the essay by my daughter's friend, Lisa Jensen Thomas.  The title of her well written words is I've Been Sick for 100+ Days, and You're Making Me Sad. It's on Facebook.
         Believe in masks, and help heal our hurtin' world.

mid June -- tractor time, with day lilies

post #494
          Longtime visitors to my blog know I'm regularly entranced by hay rows and hay bales and golden fields and all patterns pertaining to this time of year. The weather has cooperated for this year's annual ritual. For example, we're currently enjoying a long and mostly dry spell after a cool, often rainy growing season.  
         Sadly I can't spend all my time hunting up evidence of all this, and I hadn't planned to put a single field on my blog this June, but here I am, not quite true to my good intentions. During an evening walk from home, I discovered the first field had already been mowed, baled, and cleared, which I hadn't known even though I kind of live across the road.

looking from one field into another,

looking NE from that same spot -- the same opening at the far end can be found in the next photo as well

The next night, I walked from one end of the field to this edge along the road, since the field had been mowed that day, but not yet baled.  (I came home with only a single deer tick!)

along the way, that day

     Then there are my current tractor adventures... A great guy mows my field twice a year, and he showed up several days ago. His tractor is huge, and my open area is not that large, but he makes it work. Except this day there was more moister mud along the pond, and the tractor totally unexpectedly got stuck, with one of the eight wheels in the pond. Very interesting.  A friend of his with a proper winch on his big truck came over, and they pulled the tractor up and out!  Pretty exciting for me during these days of being #HealthyatHome where "nothing happens". Even the red-winged blackbirds currently brooding in my pond seemed to survive the excitement.

I don't know whose tractors these are, but they were riding by when I went down to get the mail yesterday,

I even got to make a trip to the nearby Kubota Dealer yesterday where they had hand sanitizer and social distancing in the showroom/office! I've had such an adventurous week.

 

I want to end with these day lilies, which come up every year no matter how hard I manage to ignore their progress. I made these three photos this afternoon. 

I've decided I'll take next Sunday off from the blog since I am finally having my first cataract surgery -- electives are now allowed in our local hospital -- on Wednesday.  My eyes might not be on the same page, so to speak, next weekend. I can't wait to see what this blog looks like once both eyes are done!

 

This photo features tomorrow's blooms! Imagination time!

       For this post, I've been trying to stay off politics and all the terrible stuff, but my heart hurts. I wish everyone could have some beauty in their lives, or at least maybe find some here in my fields and flowers and the sky above.  Be safe.  Thank you for sharing tonight's small offering.  

some fun in these very hard times

post #493
          I'm so aware that our nation, and perhaps the world, is in a particular time of transition -- which rightly implies upheavals, routing out systemic evils, and even guaranteeing  the very air we breathe and depend upon. It makes no sense to hide ourselves away. Rather we should be talking and planning and risking new perspectives. I say all this not only because I'm thinking about it every day, but also because I want to share some recent photos that have tickled my fancy, as the expression goes. I hope these first rather straight forward six photos provide a moment for sparkle and joy. These are the only photos I made at that time, since this wasn't staged -- I had just arrived for a short socially distant visit. Thank goodness for sun, fun, love and family! 

The sky is so forever interesting.

Then there are trees, also so interesting:
 

redbud tree

on the deck, under the black walnut, a moment in time without some seed or flower or nut falling on us --- and just the blue sky above and the blur of a bird

The following is the label I have attached to my mailbox:

             The Post Office is just one more thing to keep our eyes on in this time of the constant testing of the strength of our democracy.  Along the way there's so much to be grateful for, including the hard work of postal employees.  My rural mailbox is amazing, and yet it seems we can't take it for granted, which is cruel to contemplate. It's also possible that its essential role in mail-in voting is the target. Here again, at the least, are my thanks for the long hours and the heavy work postal workers do in all kinds of weather. Here also is the hope that more of us can vote safely this year with universal use of the post office. I already have the ballot I sent for.
             Stay safe everyone, VOTE, don't forget the virus but don't let it be the boss. Just outsmart it.  And wear a face mask, especially in crowds. We will all need to be working together for a long while yet.