REMINISCING

(From Facebook.)

Stairs are done -- even the casters. I took a look at what I had collected and I had three casters I could just mount. A little reflection and I decided that would do in a tripod arrangement -- one on the low front and two on the high back. It'll be propped against a bed anyway, so it will be quite stable. So, that project can be dispensed with.

I'll still buy casters if I come upon them just to have them handy when I might need them. When you buy cheap at sales, that system pays off more times than not. Saves a bundle when the need arises and I don't have to shell out retail prices. My collection of bolts, screws, etc. is almost endless and I make use of it frequently. Seldom do I have to go to the hardware store.

The weather is absolutely ideal right now. I had to take off my flannel shirt for a while as I was working, but it feels good most of the time. I pity those poor people up north and back east. Seems like something unseasonal keeps coming along and it horrified me to learn of all those ranchers losing so many cattle trapped on summer range in South Dakota when that surprise storm came along last month. I know from my Dad's experiences how that hurts. He lost much of his herd in 1952. Took a long time to recover. Weather is one of the most devastating variables farmers and ranchers have to deal with.

One of the things I'm thankful for is having gotten away from the agricultural life. It's not what it used to be. Not many truly small family farms exist anymore. Only the large holdings, mainly corporate entities now, have survived. I wouldn't like it. Running everything by computer calculation doesn't appeal to me.

Remembering the old days of gardens, milk cows, a diversity of production and using your own seed saved year to year gives me a nostalgic feeling. I fondly remember churning butter, cultivating the garden after a rain, etc. I'd love to see a mother hen come wandering in with her brood from a hidden nest again or watching the young lambs prancing around in their joyful play. It was a different world back then. Now, a lot of tumbledown farmsteads are nostalgic reminders of those times.

Just reminiscing. Old men and women have been doing it for millenia. It's what we have left.