As Summer Closes

Lying in the back of the truck late at night watching the Perseid Meteor Shower, riding bikes along the Cedar River trail, playing with the kitten in the backyard, buying school supplies and new clothes, sitting on the porch as the sun sets to the deafening song of the cicadas, putting up the wainscoting in the kitchen, learning a new instrument... August!

More Wedding Pictures

Abby and Justin's wedding photos were just posted and I wanted to put a few of them on the blog for safekeeping.

Yup, that's Abby:

Dave and Daphne:

The dudes:

Me and Cynthia walking the aisle:

Rose kept busy doing some photography of her own:

Everybody:

Running away from the bubbles... pfft. Our wedding took place during the biggest blizzard in years and we could barely escape from the church. Those Texas peeps don't know how easy they have it:

Fires in the Backyard

Grandpa and Grandma Brackin's House

Recently I ran across an old pen and ink drawing that I had rendered depicting my Grandma and Grandpa Brackin's house. I worked from a photograph and finished it right around the time of my high school graduation. The trees were the most difficult part to draw, so I decided to exclude most of them from the picture.

The house had been built in the 1850s and was part of the underground railroad before the American Civil War. There was a large old built-in cabinet that was designed so that the shelves could be removed and the very back of it would open to reveal a tiny hidden room. Two or three people could hide in their for a short time if needed and there was no other access to the room. The cupboard was torn out and the room was sealed off when the kitchen was remodeled, which was OK because that hidden room was creepy!

For generations, the house was passed down the line, remaining in the family. The original idea was that neither the house nor the land (22 acres) would ever be sold and it would always stay in the family. Unfortunately, that chain of ownership was broken in the late 90s when my grandma sold the house a few years after my grandpa died.

Now all of the land has been parceled off and the house has been completely remodeled and today it sits in the middle of a neighborhood. When I was growing up it was surrounded by woods and a small corn field. Even though it's changed a lot, I still remember it this way:

The Lights Out West

In my dream I was working in a grocery store stocking shelves when a very sharply-dressed corporate-looking woman stopped and asked me where to find some weird gluten-free something or other. Since I stocked the shelves I knew exactly where to find it, so I led her there. She was pleased that I was able to find the item so quickly and she told me that she had been there several times before and asked, but no one knew where to find it. Then she ran down a list of odd items and asked me if I could find any of them. I realized she wanted me to take her to each item and basically do her shopping for her, but I didn't really care. Once she had all the items she left and I went back to stocking the shelves.

An hour later she returned... with Kanye West. (Yup, this dream is about meeting Kanye West and being at Hy-Vee, the two things I despise most in this world.) Kanye wanted to know how I found all of those items so fast and I told him I worked there and knew where everything was. He told me that his assistant (the woman who was shopping on his behalf) had talked to the manager previously and had been told that the store didn't carry those items. I told him the manager was an idiot and didn't know anything (who cares if I get fired?). Then he asked me if I could find all of the items, plus some additional stuff that he gave me on a list. I looked the list over and told him I could do it. He glared at his assistant and dismissed her. "To remain above all and to create at this level of artistry, Kanye needs the best and nothing less," he said. (Yes, he referred to himself in the third person.) He went on at length about how his brilliant creative output and artistry required a higher quality of nourishment than the rest of the masses and he offered to pay me one million dollars if I would agree to do his grocery shopping. I agreed.

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My next dream was less interesting, but I wanted to write it down anyway. I woke up in the middle of the night and went into the bathroom and turned the light on. Or at least I flipped the switch – the light didn't come on. That's weird that all those bulbs could be burned out at once, maybe the power was out. None of the lights in the house worked, but everything else electrical worked fine. It became darker and darker in the house until I could not see anything and could only feel my way from room to room. Not a single light source anywhere, except the clock radio in the bedroom and the clock on the microwave. In the dark I began to realize that there were more rooms in my house than there were when I could see. Soon I was walking for what seemed like miles, stumbling from room to room looking for a light. Funny how watching something right before going to bed can mess with a person's head like that.

Into August

Uno Stacko!

On Saturday, we took Rose and Emily to stay with my parents for the week and met up in Newton. My parents just got an Impala, so it was good to see them driving a reliable car at last. After lunch and leaving the girls with my folks, we drove around and checked out all the places we used to go so long ago. Ah, memories! The arboretum was still there with the old gazebo and it's interesting to see how little the town has changed. I don't miss living there, though.

We came back home and went out to dinner before the Jim Gaffigan show. Our freedom was so weird and it took us some getting used to! The show was awesome and exceeded my expectations. Ted Alexandro opened the show and he could easily have been the headliner on his own tour, the dude was hilarious. We had never seen him before and I'd definitely like to see him again if he comes back through.

We made good use of our freedom on Sunday and got in a bicycle ride, church, picked up a load of wood so we can have some more fires in the backyard, and then we grilled out. It's been about a year since we last grilled bananas and I think I've almost got it down to a science. So good.

Then we went to our usual spot to watch the sunset:

There was a storm several miles south of town and the cloud formations were fascinating to watch:

I like the way the spectrum of the sunset is reflected in the clouds, even when the sun is no longer visible from the ground:

I'm excited for our week together!