Dry

One of the pieces of advice that I once read was this:  when you are writing, NEVER write everything that it in your head.  Save something for tomorrow, for when you start again, because otherwise you might run into the dreaded "writers' block."  It's a paralysis of thought to the extent that absolutely nothing comes to mind.  It probably has scared more writers into NOT writing than anything else.  It has probably been the cause of many, many books to sit idle for years or maybe forever.

That's what I feel like tonight -- like I'm all dried out in the head.

The storm this afternoon does come to mind just now, however.  The skies over Canal Fulton were absolutely black at around 5:00 p.m. when I returned from watching two of the grandchildren today.  So dark that I decided not to go to Subway and get dinner after all.  As soon as I got home, the winds started and dead leaves blew past the front door, and the howling began.  We went down the basement as a precaution, but the worst of it went quickly, and soon it was just rain and an occasional rumble in the distance. 

The strength and the power of the wind, of rain, and of lightning is awe inspiring, and so beyond our control.  It comes; it goes as it pleases.  The first summer we lived in our house, there was a drought.  By August, I was certainly depressed, oftentimes looking out the window for any hint of a rain cloud, of a storm.  When the rains finally came that August, the smell of that rain was one of the most welcome things I've ever experienced.  We had gotten through it and I vowed at that moment to never complain about the rain again -- and I haven't.  It wasn't until years later that the true damage could be assessed.  We lost many, many trees to the drought because the damage was already done and they were failing.  Many dogwoods, all of the hedge apples, all of the wild crabapples, and all of the edible wild berries were gone.  You look at a stretch of woods and you think -- yes, it looks the same -- but I learned that summer that no stretch of land is ever really the same for long.  One of the dogwoods that died had branches spanning at least 20 feet across, a true umbrella tree. 

Just when my husband had cleared much of the dead trees and had gotten the property in the best shape it had ever been, a terrible storm came and knocked down about 50 trees about 10 years ago.  Most of them caught in other trees, and many of them remain so to this day, still alive.  One tree with a huge trunk was literally spun around and left in a twisted mess.  Two trees hit the house; one fell into the house on the side and the other grazed the house on the other side.  When the tree guys came to get it cleared up, the one man looked about and said, "You were very, very lucky."  Of course, I believe that God spared us that day. 

The American Indians have a saying that is very true, "No one owns the land.  We borrow it."  I believe that.  We are caretakers of whatever we have been given, and we will leave it to someone else when our time comes.  This homestead of ours has taught me so much.  How we basically share the land with the animals that roam about it, whether we appreciate the smell of skunk in the early evening hours or not.  How we might hate the briars that grew more abundantly with the loss of the trees, but to think of managing to eradicate them -- too big of a job.  How we might tire of the greenish tint that the roof gets after a while on one side, so that we have to bleach it.  But it is such a blessing being in the woods.  Time to read Thoreau again maybe.

Well, enough now -- I've got to save something for tomorrow!!!