What started out as a gray day with light rain, ended up being another sunny, hot and extremely windy afternoon and evening. Just while I was out driving from point A to B, I noticed several trees which had big limbs snapped off and blocking a parking lot and public street. As we all know, our trees can only take so much stress until there’s a breaking point.
The first thing on today’s list, was to take a very early morning drive out to one of our cemeteries and pay my soulful respects to a handful of relatives that’ve gone before me. While standing at several markers, I couldn’t help wondering how they’d react if they were suddenly brought back to life and living it today’s world. I could see in my mind what their reactions would be. It wouldn’t surprise me if all of them after being alive for one day would say, “I can’t deal with this anymore, so take me back to my resting place.” Yes, the world has changed more than we even want to realize because we’ve unknowingly been acclimating and adapting to it on a near-daily basis.
I decided to call one of my colleagues and stop over for a short visit since I’d not seen her in weeks, and since she was free, I headed over. I didn’t realize our chat session was so long until I left and looked at the time which was forty-five minutes from when I walked in her door. She’s coming down off of a nasty summer cold which seems to be going around, and likely because of these broad temperature swings we’ve been dealing with for weeks.
After getting changed into my work clothes, I went out and pulled volunteer trees and weeds, trimmed hedges, and finished up on some mowing that was left from yesterday. For some reason I’ve been noticing more Deadly Nightshade growing, so I figured it time to take a trip out to Hardware Hank and pick up some heavy-duty weed killer.
Another hour or more was killed with the spraying around foundations and cracks in sidewalks where the weeds had started growing. The spray that I purchased is supposed to last for four months which should take it up to right before the first frost. Unfortunately I didn’t get the back of my office sprayed because the wind was growing too strong and I didn’t want something getting killed from an over-spray. I’m about ready to spray an entire bed of those old-fashioned Day Lillies which spread about as bad as quack grass because they send out countless numbers of rhizomes which have to be completely dug out, and if you miss even one, they’re back at it again. I’ll never forget how many months it took me to get rid of a bed of them growing on the side of my grandmother’s house. I really like the newer varieties which don’t spread like that, but of course it’s always a job keeping the deer from eating their leaves.
When I returned to office nearly drenched in sweat, I changed my clothes and went over to St. Paul Lutheran and practiced the pieces of music I was given to play this coming Sunday. It was a good thing I stopped there today because someone left the switch turned on for their sound system which is always to be turned off by whomever is up there last. I know I didn’t leave it on because I always check it before heading down, but the real confirmation someone else was there after me, was seeing the stops on the organ having been changed from where I’d left them.
Since I was the only one there, I spent a good hour running thru not only what I was given to play, but also randomly picking songs out of their book of hymns until my fingers were telling me it was time to quit. Before leaving, I took a photo of one of their stained-glass windows which I’ve posted for tonight which I considered most appropriate for our Memorial Day of 2022. St. Paul Lutheran has some of the most beautiful stained-glass windows. You really get a good “feel” for them when the sun is out and the lights are off.
Before heading home, I stopped to get a few groceries, and while there, I ran into a past customer, so we had a short aisle-side visit about her home and family. Once again, she also mentioned several members of her family dealing with lingering cold-like symptoms. With this storm that’s moving into our area later tonight, we’ll likely have another swing in temps. When looking at the sky, I’m a bit concerned it’ll be a nasty thunderstorm.
I took a little break to see what’s been happening around the world, and was happy to read where the Ukrainian Orthodox Church which used to be tied to Moscow and headed by Patriarch Kirill who’s in lock-step with Putin, decided to break from it and likely embrace the other Ukrainian Orthodox Church. That was a good punch-in-the-gut to Kirill and Putin because they’re attempting to make everyone believe that Kirill and his followers are the chosen ones. Go figure. Any person of the “cloth” who foments the killing, torturing and destruction of another’s country, is nothing less that a devil in disguise. I hope he takes a bag of ice cubes with him when he finds himself seated on his golden throne that’s tied to the gates of Hell. It’s no wonder more of our younger people are no longer aligning themselves with any form or organized religion.
A big mistake I made, was to click on a video with a warning on it regarding the graphic images contained. I was nearly in tears when seeing the body of a sixty-something farmer who’d been taken by the Russians and brutally tortured and then killed. His frantic wife kept saying over and over, “He was a kind man who’d hurt no one.” Unfortunately, the image of his body will forever be burned into my memory. Those Russian soldiers are worse than animals.
Tonight’s One-liner is: Other lands have their vitality in a few, a class, but we have it in the bulk of our people.
