windthread

for my Holiday.  Three things that give me such great pleasure,  such anticipation.

Beginning a new stenographers notebook.   it's what i write in,  almost daily,  to keep track of things i've read,  want to read,  things that come to mind and can be so easily lost.   Ordinarily,  the date of entry is on the left ….  thoughts in the column on the right,  some running all across the page.  Sometimes i use a sky blue highlighter.    When i began to find them with the plain brown back and cover,  like the new one on the right,  it was all that much more better.   Close to bliss.  For the last few months i'd looked for them online…couldn't find.  Then…Alyssia gifted for christmas.  They are not quite as thick,  ie not quite so many pages,  but maybe that will help me with the ever constant desire to be neater,  write smaller,  not sprawl.  We'll see.  So here…a virgin one.  Ready.  The anticipation of January l,  2019 is high.

The Calendar.  Hopefully a butterfly calendar.  If not flowers.  There's always one or the other.  At the Dollar Store.   The Calendar is the New Year's Eve ritual.  Going through each month of the past year,  entering things on the new year's page that would be well remembered.  Entering birthdays.  Marking them with the Sky Blue Highlighter.    For whatever reason,  i just LOVE,  like LOVE doing this.  I drink wine.  Go through the months.  Become Ready.

Crab legs.   Once a year.   an Expense,  but so what!,   and enough so that i am satiated.  Dripping in melted butter.  Ordinarily in the last several years i am alone.  Last year,  my first New Year here,  it was Alyssia and I.  Julian was not here.  Emrie was but was only some months old.  So,  Alyssia and I.  This time Julian will be here.  We will do this on New Years Day.   He thinks he might like crab legs,  but in case he doesn't,  he made the choice for Lemon Cake with Chocolate Mint Icecream. As much as he can eat.    This time we will have artichokes and i'll make Hollandaise Sauce  from Talkie's eggs.   A salad.  The ultimate extravagance.  YES!!!!!!

So,  these.  

Perfect and Elegant.  Excellent.   and all manner of words to tell of their Beauty.

Today,  Jenny and i worked.  She created a new gate for Nogal's yard.  I finished cleaning out the Doe Goats shelter house,  using a rake and a pitch fork.   piling the used straw bedding in a huge heap and then loading some,  maybe a quarter of it on to a tarp that we then pulled up and over and down to Campsite B.  Two more trips of it there and then 3 down to the Wall Garden at A.   RICH matter for decomposing into fecund soil for growing.   We have January,  part of February.   Instense Satisfaction.   Alyssia and kids showed up and they went off to see if they could see the cows that Emrie heard MOOOing in the distance.  I stayed back,  finishing.  Met them down at the gate on their return.  They had walked to look for the cows across the way and then on,  down the road along the canal/creek,  all the way to the end and back….to the gate,  and then UP the Hill road.  Emrie is one and a half.  She walked.  She did not want to take anyone's hand.  She wanted to Walk.  On Her Own.  it's at least a quarter mile.  I think more.  She didn't fall.

yes.  i think we are a little Crazy.  But as Mo pointed out,  the Herd name of us,  is Crazy Wisdom.  How these Goats are registered with the American Dairy Goat Association.   Not from Pink Floyd,  but from Trogyam Trungpa…Crazy Wisdom.  But the Pink Floyd can be our Sound Track

I forget a lot,  when i think things,  that i see all this in a finite kind of way.  I see all this as some kind of last chapter.  But that's just me.  For them,  all of them,  it can be ….      A   chapter.  If it doesn't work for them,  they can change it.  All of them.  Jenny being the eldest,  in her early 40's,  she can change it.  Alyssia,  just 30,  can change it.  The kids,  just beginning,  they can change it.  But for now,  for today and the tomorrow,  we go.  We go with Goats and Earth.  We love Goats and Earth.  Who knows?