Notes From The Canyon

"Always ride the horse in the direction it's going."

~ Chuck Pyle, 'The Zen Cowboy'

After a difficult summer, things are calming down here in our world. My husband's treatments are working for now, so we are getting the time I so prayed for. He is still in pain, something that I am not sure he should be, but other than that, he's beginning to feel better. 

This crazy man up on the sign post is his friend Tom, who flew in from Colorado to cheer my hubby up. I wasn't sure at first, the house was a mess, we were two messes, so very, very tired. But we spent two days cleaning, no time resting, but once Tom arrived, I knew it was the very best thing for my husband. And for me also, as I discovered a fellow spiritual seeker, and even a train lover. I have always admired Tom for the way he raised his beautiful daughter, Leilani, through her Cabbage Patch dolls stage to her golf scholarship to UCLA, but we had never before sat down alone to talk.

When hubby got tired one day, Tom and I went for a drive around town. At the Tehachapi Loop we were fortunate to see a very, very long train travel around the loop, through the tunnel, and off into the distance. We really didn't see it go on top of itself from our vantage point.

But I got some good shots and hope to dedicate a post in the near future to someone I don't know, who is going through some difficult times with a major illness. Oh, the wonderful thing about blogging, you really open up your heart to people you have never met. As has happened to us with all of you praying for us and sending good thoughts our way. 

Blue Oak, the most common oaks in our area are beginning to look tired from the drought. While still alive, they really don't look healthy and many have died. 

Driving a winding country road back to town, we had a good talk about life, love, disappointments, and moving on. Sort of unusual for a guy and for me, I know I found a friend. Before he left, Tom said to call him if we needed him and he would be on the next plane out. 

On our way back home, we stopped by The Mountain Spirit Center, the Korean Buddhist retreat in our canyon.

This time one of the monks came out and spoke to us and told us we could ring the magnificent Peace Bell. Which we did and chills went down our backs, as its sound reverberated through the mountains. 

At the bottom of the bell, children from all countries in the world dance together, holding hands. 

 Oh, Samson and Faith are doing great. Faith was four months on the 28th of August. I've been busy taking her to the vet for all her shots. She now weighs 30.1 pounds and knows how to both bark and growl. With all the dogs we've had, we never had a growling dog before. Soldier would, of course, growl/bite at the same time if you were a man and didn't get out of the way, but no one ever growled like she does. Four months old, where's this going to end?

Peace, my dear friends, and thank you for caring.

Notes From The Canyon

We take our trash to the dump in Old Betsy, our 1989 Ford Ranger truck, that just keeps going and going. However, during my husband's illness she developed a slow leak and got a flat tire. So trash piled up, both of us too tired to deal with it. 

A mama black bear with two cubs is roaming around our hills. When food is hard to come by, toppling trash cans, eating leftovers, and making a general huge mess is always an option. It has never happened to us before, but Saturday morning that's what I found. A huge mess! I wasn't even mad, as I feel so bad for the wild critters in this horrible drought. 

We cleaned it up,  hubby put air in Betsy's front tire, we loaded her up and drove over to the dump. There we learned that the biannual hazardous material collection would begin at nine a.m. When we got home, I quickly collected all the sharps related to my insulin pump and glucose meter, forgot all about the batteries I have collected for a long time, and drove back to the dump, gave them the old and got a new container. So the bears weren't all bad news. We got a lot accomplished that would have lingered.

Mama bear's timing was good for us as it began to rain Saturday night. A slow steady rain continued all day Sunday. Just what we needed here, a break in the weather, cooler for about five days. Fortunately, we didn't experience any flash floods like those in the mountains to the south of us.

About half of our garden is doing well, the other half, not so good. Looks like we will have plenty of peas and beans, some corn, beets, radishes, onions, greens and mixed salad leaves. 

Everything in our container garden is doing great, we are picking tomatoes and various kinds of peppers.  

We have more mint than we know what to do with. Bees like it, so that's good. 

I stopped by our friends' place to get some fresh eggs. While there, I saw their baby turkeys and baby goats, and got a kiss on my cheek from this gorgeous llama. Isn't she a beauty? Her eyes are incredible, long lashes, and dark markings for a smoky eye effect.  

Someone around here is getting bigger and bigger. And Samson is fine too, except he needs a good brushing. I used to brush him almost every day, now it's been a very long time. He loves his sister and gets plenty of exercise playing with her. She wraps herself in his tail when its time to go to sleep.

We have two rather difficult weeks ahead of us with every other day appointments both at UCLA and in Pasadena. I don't think I will be able to post anything during this time. The long distances are doing me in, messing with my diabetes care, and making me more tired than ever before. 

Samson Says: Thanks for asking about me, all you nice people. I'm fine, but as you can see, I need to take a rest after all the exercise my little sister puts me through. I should send her off to that TV show, The Biggest Loser, I know all those people's weight would come off in no time.

As for me, I see the vet next month sometime, but mommy said she can feel ribs and my collar needs to be tightened by a hole. Personally, I never understood why my weight was an issue. 

Love you my Gracie girl, I hope you are taking good care of yourself and your family.

From all of us here in the canyon:

Have a great day everyone!