two weeks later...

        dear everyone -- Two weeks seems like a long time, but I know it's just a blip. I have been out making hay - not really -- but I do like making hay photos this time of the year.  I can also walk up and down my Sideway Road in the evening, since it's neither too hot nor too cold.  And, so far, not too buggy --  no cicadas to speak of! 

       Since I do have a bunch of recent photos, and one short quiet video, I'll get started.

 

sharing yellow lines -- the field in this photo looks like mine does now

 

field of hay and the moon!

hay rising on the hill

hay getting more seasoned

hay -- with wind

 

 

 

two photos from the swampy area along my road:

pond cattails also growing

Here's a tribute to my namesake, Queen Anne's Lace -- though actually I just happen to like this photo, made with my iPhone when evening was turning into night.

Preston's tractor overnighting at my neighbor's  house

I call this a Kentucky Yucca tree. Ha ha. I have no idea how it stands firm in its bank. 

     And now the video!  I had planned to have two videos, one before the hay was cut and one during, but Preston arrived and got to work while I was at the dentist!  Next year he wants to come earlier, in May, so stay tuned.  

 

 

 

By the way, I don't have any reason to go to the trouble of making a single bale of hay, so I am mainly keeping the field open and "fed" by the decomposing that takes place. The turkeys enjoy it too... and the deer and other animals. I hope this very basic video works its wonder once again.  Enjoy --- and come again in two weeks, on July 11. Maybe I will even have had another video opportunity by then. You even have time by then to go get vaccinated if you aren't already.  Take one for the sake of all.   Ann

 

Poetry and photo-trie, a connection

              I'm currently doing some thinking about my photos for a talented good friend whose book of poetry will be published within the year.  There might be one image that works for the cover of the book!  She grew on a working farm, so we agreed to start with some of my "hays and fields", which I have because they happen to fascinate me. So I thought I would share some of them on this week's blog, to kind of mimic seeing them in print.  (Summer's early mowing will start before we know it.)

 

 

 

an earlier version

made a few summers later, and at mid day, which doesn't always work this well

         

first of three -- this one has the outhouse and a tractor

This one is the cropped version of the following one.

The graves on the top of the hill show, if you know what they are.

 

Many of these photos have been on this blog before, but I have never before brought them all together. And there are more. It is wonderful for me to have an excuse to look at them, one after the other, most of them fairly near my home.  There's a reason why I never get bored driving to and from anywhere nearby. Enjoy. Be thankful for hard workers. And for poets who can do so much with words and insights. Here's to harvests all around. 

 

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.  

practicing seeing, noticing, sharing a moment, wondering, being amazed

post #478 -- on a sunny but cool day, getting ready for more rain tomorrow
        I hear this often: "you see things", and I do. Not everything, but the details of where I happen to be have always fascinated me. It makes me a slow walker, even without my camera. At my best, I am a stop and go walker.  I don't like to miss something even on a subway or down an aisle in the grocery store. When I drive, if I don't make a wrong turn, I can usually recreate the directions to a place. Once I make a wrong turn, however, I'm very likely then, the next time, to remember that way as well.  (What's hard for me is leaving a gas station in the direction I should be facing. My visual clues have been tampered with. It's helpful if I'm with some of my road trip buddies who are aware of this idiosyncrasy of mine. The easiest way, of course, in this case, is to switch drivers during the stop!)
          I searched out a few examples of "seeing while being me". Tonight's ones are recent. I was taking a walk, which included a non-road segment, over a field and on a tractor path to that field. But I started from the road, with seriously long shadows of late evening light.

ME

me again, looking back over where I had just walked from the road, putting the sun behind me

         What makes these holes, in these eastern Kentucky mowed fields! I should know, but I don't:

 tonight's horizon, now looking toward the setting sun from about the same location:

This is the major TREE for this week's hommage. I can do better with it under other light conditions, and I am sure I will because I love the way it stands out and over most other nearby trees on my walk along the road. (There is not much traffic on my road.)

          I also want to share these two photos of my granddaughter and the hoverboard she handles with such ease. She loves it. The second photo includes the wood stove that came with the house 45 years ago. A treasure. Several years ago I included several photos of the stove on a post for this blog.

        For some reason I really enjoy this photo from this week's walk. I've saved it until the end. I like the light, the lightness of the leaves, the having to walk around it on the path -- so I took a photo on the way. I was just using my trusty 6s iPhone; I was surprised by the depth of field it shows. I don't usually get that when using my phone. I'm glad I noticed these leaves, up close and personal. Thank you, trees, as always.

       I have wanted to explain that some of the times I mention American politics in my posts are because I have viewers in many countries. I want them to know we have points of view that may not always be obvious. For example, this week there were one or more page views from the UK [England], Indonesia, Switzerland, Germany, France, Ireland, Netherlands, Portugal, and "unknown region." Usually I have Russia on there and Ukraine and Canada. Most, however, are in the USA.  I don't know how to figure out which city, but it amazes me how there are good ways in which the world has opened up -- along with the troubles that can also occur. 
        Please, everyone, remember how essential truths are, as is kindness to one another.

photo stories #3 and a blast from, well, only 2010

post #472
         Today, in one of my other projects besides this blog, I found a thumb drive with photos from 2010 and 2011.  I was curious to see them again, since I have always had a bad sense of time passing so it could be interesting. 
        The first photos were of my granddaughter T., newly born! One day soon I will get to show them to her myself. Then I decided I should take some of the other photos and post them on today's blog. I'd say I was really into mist on the mountains back then, or else the weather has changed so that it no longer happens as often.  
         So, please enjoy. 

a favorite photo, titled "Black and White in Color"

another favorite -- I made this in a Farmers Market on Martha's Vineyard while I was there for a week's photo workshop. 

a neighbor's front yard. I had forgotten I made this photo, glad to see it again.

a wet summer so lots of very green fields right after mowing

daisies are always so cheering

This antique horse drawn hay rake was more picturesque than helpful. We didn't keep it in the end but it always hurts to not provide a rest home for such helpers after their years of hard work.

from the bridge, looking over Laurel Gorge, in Elliott County, Kentucky

across the road and nearby to where I lived

two views on this wet day from the same spot on Jean's farm, and I like them both

 

Jean's barn

patient summer companion, on the front steps