@rwinney Great to hear from you, Rachel. You're pretty amazing. What internal energy you have to keep going with all kinds of obstacles. Thanks for the link.

Yesterday... I always have a hard time remembering what I did the day before, which is why I write notes every night about the day. We went to the first church service in the morning, had lunch at Shari's, bought groceries and drove home. I tidied up the mess I'd made on the patio, getting plants ready to donate. The manager asked me to bring 20 pots, so I tried to put together an assortment. I found that I had 60 pots that need to go away. Hens and chicks, aloe "pepe", some sedum, jade plants and gasteria.

I was inspired by @sueinmn and @gingerw ,so I puttered around with rocks. I discovered some neat rocks around the house and barn that I had forgotten about, and since they served no purpose where they were, I loaded them into my wheelbarrow. I've been working on a rock pathway past the herb bed for way too long. I'm using limestone pavers I found on Craigslist for too much money, some 12" plain concrete pavers, rocks I've dug up in the pasture and a pile of rocks that I saw advertised as free. I drove way out in the boonies and found that a previous homeowner had made a pyramid of a mixture of rock. It was huge! I didn't measure it, but it was an 8 or 10' square base,going up to 6'. The woman really wanted to see them gone. I think I made 3 trips in my full size pickup, and my focus was to take ones that had a flat surface. A lot of them are of significant size and weight, and to work them into the path involves a lot of digging so the flat surface ends up in just the right place to be level.

I cleaned up the herb bed last week and pulled out a bunch of rocks that were visible when I planted the herbs, but had long since vanished as the herbs filled in the space (and went beyond its space, encroaching on the less vigorous ones). I found a large disc of granite that I think I picked up next to a river somewhere along 395 in California. Please don't report me to the Sierra Club. But everywhere we went, we picked up interesting rocks. I have a huge oblong black slab that I had to recruit my wife's family to lift it into the car. It's now in its 6th home, and (maybe) is in its final resting place, under a peony and daylillies, getting covered by succulents. That granite slab is now a stepping stone from the pathway to the back lawn. I don't know if my wife has seen it yet.

We used to take a spring drive in our old Suburban across the desert to enjoy the wildflowers - and to dig up rocks- I learned to take a hand truck along - through Lake county and Harney county. As our kids got into the teens, they opted out of the drive. But everywhere we go, there are bound to be some cool rocks, from the Oregon coast through the Willamette Valley, over the Cascade mountains, across the high desert in central Oregon and to the Idaho border where you can see the remnants of the Oregon trail.

I lived through the Beatles rock era, oblivious to the music because my family was the core of the church choir and orchestra everywhere we lived, and in choruses and bands and orchestra in school. If we listened to music at home, it was the music each of us made as we practiced a range of instruments. So maybe I'm compensating for missing that rock era by collecting rocks that might speak more to me than even a yellow brick road.

I've done what I seem to do too often - going on and on and on. But I do eventually come to the conclusion. And that's where I am right now.

Y'all enjoy your week and stay safe.

Jim

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