Mornings, first light, we fire up the old camp stove that took our family through a bout of homelessness in 1993 -- homelessness, Dooley style, in which we got to play in the lake and ride bikes and move our tents every two weeks to keep the park folks from catching on. (They smiled a lot as we "fooled" them.)
Next I take the water buckets and empty water jugs down to the creek and fight the cradads for the deepest pool. I wade in, wearing my pink crocks that I found in the dollar bin in the local junk store. They are too big, but they are so practicle, I don't much care. I wade into the cool water in the early morning. Can't see too well as I've broken my glasses and haven't have a moment to replace them yet, so I watch for movement rather than form. Only ran across one snake so far, but they are on my mind.
I wrestle the gate open and hold it with a foot as I put all the water containers into the yard. The cows are often in the field in front of the house, and they'd love another shot at those straweberries they ate the day I left the gate loose (they were nowhere near, I swear).
Honey and I go work on the fallen trees. We've got hickory, cherry, oak -- good wood for this winter. Our woodpile is growing and it'll take it all, come winter. This new house is big. It's too big for us, right now, but I know there'll be a need for these extra bedrooms. We've got folks coming one of these days. First, there's patching and painting and charming the place up a bit.
After a turn at the wood for a few hours, we go in and he peels and fries potatoes and I fry eggs and we top it off with whatever we can find. Gave up margerine years ago, gave up butter while electricity is off, so we use a bit of olive oil on the fried toast. A goodly breakfast at the Goodly Homestead.
I've got mint hanging in the window to dry. Our garden is doing good, but in need of rain. This is the garden in Rainelle. We've only been in our new old house for 11 days and we don't have a garden here. Got in too late to start one. I don't know how much of the Rainelle garden we'll get to harvest. One neighbor strolled by to tell us he'd taken the onions. That was nice of him...?
I took out two mice I caught in traps at the new old house. I used to relocate mice, after catching them in live traps, but the same ones come in again when you do that, so I gave it up. I am not above squaching an occasional spider either, but mostly, I catch them and flip them outside, except one with whom I've made an agreement. She catch bugs and doesn't get into things or jump out from hidden places. She's someone I can live with -- and she leaves my mint alone.
It's nearly 9 o'clock by this time and we're off to the big city, either Lewisburg or Rainelle, or most days, we'll work inside the house in the hottest part of the afternoon. Today, it's Rainelle to finish emptying the house there, to raid our own garden (before the neighbors do), and bring back as much as we can.
First there's a shower with a gallon of creek water in a big yellow plastic waterer. That's cold, even in the heat of the morning.
Evening, another run at the wood and then we'll light the oil lamps and bring in the solar lamps and play a little guitar and dulcimer. And I've got roving to spin and stars to look at. It's a good life.
This is how we're spending the power outage -- a goodly life.
No comments:
Post a Comment