Harvest

This spring Sam tilled up a little spot of sod in the lawn and hopefully called it my “herb garden.” I filled my “herb garden” with a nice assortment of pricey herbs.

A proud moment for me indeed.

Until the following morning, when nearly every plant had been uprooted, eaten or ravaged beyond recognition. After salvaging what was still alive, Sam put a little wire fence around the traumatized survivors. I added a tomato plant from Blackie Theobald—which I oh so imaginatively named Blackie.

This is my crop.

Sunset

With apologies and acknowledgement to mattlogelin.com



You know when the cellphone rings with “his” special ring
And you drag yourself off the couch
From watching the Twins game
To answer it.
And he says
“Have you looked out the window?”
“There’s the most beautiful sunset”

That he is truly the best man on the face of the earth.

So I put on my shoes and walk down the driveway

Even with all the trees
The blazing orange shines through
Gus the dog cannot believe his good fortune
And takes off down the road.

Part of the way down the hill
I realize that the corn is way too tall
To get a good look
Gus looks back over his shoulder
We both survey the majesty
Through the corn tassels.


We walk back to the house
And know that he will laugh
When I tell him that
Both of us
Had to pee on the way home.

Obsession

He's obsessed, seriously obsessed. To his friends and family, he appears normal. But a few of us have recently become aware that this man is fixated on, yea even infatuated with, his boat wake.

Now, we've always told him he had a great wake and for awhile that was enough. But now he is determined to capture and preserve the ultimate wake video. In the process, he is propelling this large boat driverless at full throttle, while he experiments with camera positions, lighting and theme music.

He's also wreaking havoc on my cell phone memory. The first video he sent was lovely--a sweet greeting to me as he enjoyed an evening boat ride after a long day's work. Then there was another one labeled "sunset." But things took a nasty turn as an incoming photo message of grandson August generated the "MEMORY FULL" prompt.

I admit, I push my phone memory to the absolute limits. I don't like to delete photos. It's a perpetual delicate balance of pushing the limits of technology and preserving a great photo of the cucumbers from the garden.

But I digress.

I caught him watching boat wake video in our bedroom. He has shown it to our children, grandchildren and {shudder} even his mother.

The man needs help.

Drifting

Sometimes it feels like we've drifted apart. Days of work, meals, chores and projects pass so quickly. Conversations are one and two word sentences early in the morning, cell phone calls and business communications in the middle and quiet exhaustion in the evening.

Unexpected--the realization that we are still in sync:

Sam came back from his errands and began washing the dishes. I was in my chair and excitedly told him, "I just started a blog. Guess what I'm calling it."

He paused for a moment, his hands in the soapy dishwater, and peeked at me from under the cupboards and said, "Above the waterline."

Yet another example of our complete marital mind-meld.

Above the Waterline

The boat is a 1962 28 ½ foot Chris Craft—a wood boat with an interesting history that continues on in the Iowa Great Lakes. Given to us by friend and business associate Rick Scrimgeour in the early 1990s, we have spent hundreds, probably more like thousands, hours restoring repairing and replacing virtually everything on the boat. Our goal is to have whatever the yearly project is wrapped up and the boat ready to put in our Okoboji slip by Memorial Day. Realistically it’s closer to Father’s Day and one year we didn’t get in until the Fourth of July.

A few years ago Sam was finishing up a huge project in which he replaced a large section of ribs and planking. He started the job thinking just a small area needed replacing but as he started tearing it apart, it became evident that the rotted area was much larger. After many weekends and long nights of tedious frustrating work he was putting in the last board. I came to check on his progress and was admiring his work, when I noticed a hole in the boat.

“Are you going to fix this?” I asked.

“Don’t worry, it’s above the water line dear,” he replied.

And thus was spoken the standard by which we determine restoration and repair priorities for the boat.

And many other things.

My world

This morning Sam and are in Okoboji at the Love Shack, or as Olivia calls it our "little house." I posted a photo on Facebook of last nights outing with George, Jan and Kent. One thing lead to another and here I am with my very own blog. My next post will be about why I chose the title.