Twosday before Thanksgiving

Once again the people, the marriage, and the house, have survived the hanging of the outside Christmas lights. This year some gratuitous yard work was accomplished concurrently. In the process, we noted that at least one string of lights needs replacement for next year. Somehow there are a couple of dead spots along the string, in between sections nicely lit. I remember the strings where, if one bulb was burnt out, the whole string was dead, and others where only one bulb wouldn’t light but the rest of the string was fine, but never before extended sections that were dead while the rest of the string lit. For this year, what we have will do. Maybe we’ll watch for post-Christmas sales.

soon the house will look something like this

Photo by J. Harrington

Thanks to the Better Half going above and beyond, many of the dead branches brought down by this week’s winds are picked up, stacked and ready to be fed into the burn pit if the weather ever cooperates. Meanwhile, the birds (goldfinches, chickadees, nuthatches, and woodpeckers) and squirrels (gray and red) are pouring into the feeders as if it were time for free Thanksgiving dinner. This morning’s moon was still visible and high in the sky at 9’ish. We had to abandon leaf blowing because today’s wind was largely  blowing in a direction opposite where we were trying to blow the leaves. Maybe tomorrow prevailing winds will be more favorable.

post-Halloween pumpkins nibbled on by ....?

Photo by J. Harrington

The Halloween pumpkins have been hauled up the hill to the vicinity of the pear tree and left for deer and/or whoever else may be desperate enough to eat them. Every year the pumpkins do seem to disappear over the winter before the pear tree is in bloom the following spring. Some years the deer, or rabbits, or .... don’t wait for us to dispose of pumpkins before they start nibbling on them.

All told it’s been a mostly productive day, enough so that we will remember to be grateful on Thursday for the  fact that we live in beautiful country even if leaves fall from the oaks for six or seven months of the year. We still need to take a trip to say Hi! to the St. Croix river. We’ve not visited her enough this year, but  remain grateful we live in the watershed.

Thanksgiving

By Ella Wheeler Wilcox

We walk on starry fields of white
And do not see the daisies;
For blessings common in our sight
We rarely offer praises.
We sigh for some supreme delight
To crown our lives with splendor,
And quite ignore our daily store
Of pleasures sweet and tender.

Our cares are bold and push their way
Upon our thought and feeling.
They hang about us all the day,
Our time from pleasure stealing.
So unobtrusive many a joy
We pass by and forget it,
But worry strives to own our lives
And conquers if we let it.

There's not a day in all the year
But holds some hidden pleasure,
And looking back, joys oft appear
To brim the past's wide measure.
But blessings are like friends, I hold,
Who love and labor near us.
We ought to raise our notes of praise
While living hearts can hear us.

Full many a blessing wears the guise
Of worry or of trouble.
Farseeing is the soul and wise
Who knows the mask is double.
But he who has the faith and strength
To thank his God for sorrow
Has found a joy without alloy
To gladden every morrow.

We ought to make the moments notes
Of happy, glad Thanksgiving;
The hours and days a silent phrase
Of music we are living.
And so the theme should swell and grow
As weeks and months pass o'er us,
And rise sublime at this good time,
A grand Thanksgiving chorus. 

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