We’re beginning the end of July. It’s now the last full week of that month. Canada’s wildfire smoke is again drifting through our skies. The recent 24 hour, ten inch rain that fell in Nova Scotia would have been better placed on the wild fires. Lots of folks have it much worse than we do these days, despite our increasing drought which is about to be exacerbated by a dry week of temperatures at and above 90℉.
On a cheerier front, I seem to have convinced Son-In-Law that there’s something to this fly-fishing stuff. Reports are that he’s now adding tackle and gear (rods and flies) for his next go at the panfish and small bass we were playing with last Friday. I, on the other hand, am still nursing some aged legs that haven’t been in a boat for years and aren’t used to getting the exercise that maintaining balance while fly-casting from a floating platform requires. It’s probably more accurate to note that I’m obviously not getting enough exercise or the right kind if a few hours in a boat does this to me. After the heat wave I’ll literally stretch my legs more than I have been.
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| lazy, hazy, crazy days of Summer
Photo by J. Harrington
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St. Croix river flows are at 50% to 60% of long term median flows for July 23 but as we drove along the river last Friday, just north of Taylors Falls, water levels look much like bank full conditions. It’s hard to get a feel for what’s really happening. It’s not good, but it prompts the old question Ed McMahon used to ask Johnny Carson: “How bad is it?” Naturally, under these conditions, the tractor has developed some sort of very serious condition and won’t be back from the dealer’s service department for a week or more. Details may follow when we get some, but for now I may stretch my legs hauling a watering can up to help our spring plantings make it through the next week or so. We’ll see.
You’re correct. We’re not sharing much that’s really new and exciting and different. What can you expect during the slow, sultry, hot, humid summer days of the Anthropocene with an El Niño developed?
Travelling Storm
The sky, above us here, is open again.
The sun comes hotter, and the shingles steam.
The trees are done with dripping, and the hens
Bustle among bright pools to pick and drink. . . .
But east and south are black with speeding storm.
That thunder, low and far, remembering nothing,
Gathers a new world under it and growls,
Worries, strikes, and is gone. Children at windows
Cry at the rain, it pours so heavily down,
Drifting across the yard till the sheds are grey. . . .
A county father on, the wind is all—
A swift dark wind that turns the maples pale,
Ruffles the hay, and spreads the swallows’ wings.
Horses, suddenly restless, are unhitched,
And men, with glances upward, hurry in;
Their overalls blow full and cool; they shout;
Soon they will lie in barns and laugh at the lightning. . . .
Another county yet, and the sky is still;
The air is fainting; women sit with fans
And wonder when a rain will come that way.
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Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.
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