Posted tagged ‘rain’
July 29, 2013
Last night it rained a bit, but today is sunny. The paper forecasts a chance of showers and temperatures in the 70’s. It seemed pretty warm when I went out for breakfast. I had the car air going but I had also opened a window. I wanted a bit of fresh air. When I got home, this part of the house felt cool. The sun hasn’t yet worked its way around.
My peace and quiet is gone. I can hear the new renters next door. They sit on their little deck, and their conversations are perfectly clear. Gracie isn’t used to strange sounds from next door so she gets up and checks every time a car moves or a door slams. One of the ladies next door was born in Maine, not in May, and she said it so loudly Gracie ran out back and barked. I am considering that an intruder alert.
My dance card has a few entries this week. On Wednesday is a play in Chatham and on Thursday friends are coming to dinner, my first entertaining gig of the summer. I should have fireworks!
I love most fish and shellfish. Salmon is an exception. Pink fish is unnatural. I also don’t like oysters, especially on the half shell. They can’t slide down fast enough. Steamed clams do have a bit of a resemblance to those oysters but steaming them then washing them in broth and dunking them in butter makes those clams quite tasty. My father, sister and I would sit at the kitchen table eating steamers. That always grossed out my mother who wouldn’t even eat fried clams with bellies. What in the heck kind of New Englander doesn’t eat clams with bellies? I only like fresh tuna; the stuff in cans is disgusting no matter what you add to it. Crabs are a lot of work. but I love crabmeat. We used to go down to the rocks and pull off the mussels just under the surface then we’d steam them and devour them. Nothing was as fresh as those mussels.
I haven’t been clamming in years, but I still vividly remember one Sunday. We were on the Brewster flats when the fog started to come in, and it came in quickly and scared the heck out of us. We grabbed our shovels and baskets and ran to the shoreline which, in only a short time, we could barely see. A few more minutes, and the shoreline would have disappeared, and we would have been stuck in the fog not knowing in which direction to walk. Yelling would have been useless. The fog distorts sound. When we got to the beach, we sat in the sand and watched the fog rolling in and covering everything. You couldn’t even see the water. We were lucky that day. We filled our baskets, got safely to shore and had steamers for dinner.
I love the fog, especially in the mornings coming off the water. That Sunday was the only time I have ever been afraid of fog.
Categories: Musings
Tags: clamming, clams, conversationsfish'shellfish, fog, mussels, noise, rain, renters, salmon, steamers, sun, tuna
Comments: 11 Comments
July 28, 2013
Last night it rained, not a lot as under the umbrellas is dry. I sat outside to read my first paper. Pandora was set to 60’s rock, the coffee was perfect and the newspaper wasn’t filled with dire events. I call that a great morning.
In the musical Camelot, King Arthur describes Camelot and says, “The rain may never fall till after sundown.” I always thought that a good idea.
I still have bits of the old Sunday in my head. It was a day to recharge for the week. We went to church, came home, got changed, and hung around until after Sunday dinner. Even then we didn’t go far. Sunday seemed to bring a quiet as if it were built in to the day. Even my neighborhood with a million kids was quiet. That’s a piece that hasn’t disappeared. I don’t hear anyone. I hear a bird or two but no people’s’ voices. Not a car has gone up my street. I know if I leave my neighborhood the stores will be open, and cars will have filled parking lots and lines of cars will sit barely moving on the roads, but for now, I’ll stay here and let it be my Sunday.
Each generation gives something to the next. Most times they probably don’t realize it. From my mother we have these wonderful sayings, and we use them all the time with each other. “It’s too cold to snow,” my mother always said. Mostly she was wrong. When it rained, it was a deluge, and my sister told me that the other day. Snow in spring is poor man’s fertilizer, and my father always noted it and so do I. My parents gave us big things, but we use the small ones the most, the every day observations of life. My mother learned them from her mother and passed them along to us without knowing we’d hold on to them so closely. They are precious and very time we use one, we bring my mother or father back with us for a little while.
No one ever told us how difficult it is and how long that feeling lasts when you lose your parents. I suppose we wouldn’t have believed them if they had.
Categories: Musings
Tags: birds singing, deluge, mothers and fathers, quiet day, rain, sense of loss, Sunday, Sunday of old
Comments: 11 Comments
July 26, 2013
Last night the rain started, kept up all night and has just now stopped. This morning, during what my mother would have called a deluge, Gracie and I went out. Between the house and the car, a short distance, I got soaked. Now you’re probably thinking why didn’t this fool use an umbrella or at least a jacket. Well, the umbrella is in the car, and I didn’t even give the jacket a thought. Gracie and I just ran. She got in first. By the time I did, my shirt was soaked, and I was already cold. Why did I go out in the middle of a Noah rain you might be wondering? I needed a blood test, a fasting blood test, and I wanted it over as quickly as possible as my body was screaming for its morning coffee. I was dressed and on the road ten minutes after I woke up. I go to a lab that never seems to have any other people so I was in and out in five minutes, got even wetter running back to the car and right away headed to Dunkin’ Donuts. The line at the drive-up window was long, but it was fast. I got two cups of a coffee and a lemon donut, my treat to myself for getting the errand done and for being soaked. The first things I did when I got home were to change into dry clothes and take a towel to Gracie.
This is the first rain in weeks, and it was a good one. I even had to shut windows last night as it was so chilly and damp. The paper predicts today will be rainy on and off. I’m going nowhere!
I am on a rampage of late. Sometimes I wish I had a cow catcher on the front of my car. I’d use it to move the cars in front of me going around 20 or 25. The driver is usually a gawker who looks to the left and right, never behind. I let people out into traffic all the time, especially those crossing into the other lane. A few wave and thank me. Others just go as if the space I had made was a God-given right of passage. Common courtesy is becoming rarer and heading toward extinction. Because of my surgery, I had to give up 4 seats, two each to two different theaters: one theater’s two seats weren’t super expensive but the other two were, over $60.00 each. I didn’t ask for any money, After all, I had already paid for the season tickets, but a thank you would have been a nice gesture. Not one person bothered to do that. The other day I got cut off by a car coming out of a side street. Sometimes that’s the only way to get on the road here in the summer, but not this time. There wasn’t a single car behind me. A wait of about 5 seconds was all the driver would have needed. I guess that was way too long to wait.
The other day I told a person, “You’re welcome,” after I had held the door for him because his arms full of packages, and he was walking away. He muttered, “Thank you,” under his breath, a coerced response, but I’m hoping he’ll pass it along, this small bit of courtesy.
My mother taught me to be courteous when I was little. Please and thank you were the first lessons. I’m wishing for a resurgence.
Categories: Musings
Tags: blood test, coffee, courtesy, discourtesy, Dunkin' Donut, gawkers, getting cut off, getting soaked, lemon donut, please and thank you, rain, rampage, slow drivers, thankless people
Comments: 25 Comments
July 15, 2013
When I let Gracie out this morning, I couldn’t believe how hot and humid it already was at 7:15. When I went out for breakfast later, my glasses fogged as I was walking from the car to the restaurant, a matter of only a few feet. It was already 82˚ at 8:30, and I suspect it will get hotter. My plans for the day are to stay inside the cool house and look out the windows if I want to view the world.
Yesterday I heard squealing from my deck. I feared Miss Gracie had found herself another friend who was objecting to Miss Gracie’s attention. I went to go out to save the creature when I saw Gracie was asleep in her crate so I went to the window instead to see what was happening. I felt like a voyeur. The spawns of Satan were spawning right there on my deck. The Mrs. was doing the squealing whenever the Mr. was doing his business. It went on for a while as I could hear the squealing. When I looked again, I saw the Mrs. jump on a branch hotly followed by the Mr. I assume they went somewhere more private than my deck.
It must have rained a while last night as everything was still wet this morning. The flowers and herbs looked perky. They give the deck so much color. I still have to replace the third broken clay pot. I’m buying a larger one than I’ve had hoping it will be too heavy with potting soil and flowers for the spawn to break it again. I’ll do that tomorrow. I like having an errand or two each day now that I’m allowed to drive. I’ll go to the farm so I can pick up some fresh vegetables at the same time, and on the way home I’ll also stop and buy some fruits. I’m thinking cut watermelon, strawberries and maybe some honeydew. Sounds like a great lunch to me.
My friends Bill and Peg are leaving September 14th for Ghana. I am envious. We traveled together all the time in Ghana, and it seems strange not to be with them. Bill has a 1970 map of Accra so he is going to try and find the old Peace Corps hostel in Adabraka, one of the districts in Accra, and Talal’s, a Lebanese restaurant which we volunteers loved. It wasn’t far from the PC offices. Talal used to make a sandwich with pita bread, tomatoes and melted cheese. He used to call it the Peace Corps pizza. Talal’s was where I first tasted hummus, and I usually ordered it every time I was there. The first time I went back to Ghana in 2011 I tried to find the hostel but I just couldn’t remember where it was, and most of the landmarks have changed. I told Bill to take plenty of pictures when he found our old stomping grounds.
I’m going to get changed from my outside to my inside clothes, and I’m going to read while lolling on the couch. I will have no productivity whatsoever today. I wish you the same!!
Categories: Musings
Tags: 1970 Accra, Accra, Adabraka, clay pots, fresh vegetables, Ghana, heat and humidity, Hummus, Mr. and Mrs. Squirrel, Peace Corps Ghana, rain, spawning, spawns of Satan
Comments: 11 Comments
July 13, 2013
Sometime during the early morning it must have rained. The sides of the street were wet when I went to get the papers. The day is still damp and cloudy, but I like it. Though humid, the air is cool. Tomorrow will also be cool but starting Monday it will be back to the closed windows and air conditioning. The prediction is for temperatures in the high 80’s.
My landscaper and I chatted today. He loves taking down trees and clearing yards. He said the side front lawn is being taken over. Just beyond it is an area left untouched and filled with trees though a row of day lilies separates it from the lawn. Sebastien pointed to branches hanging over the lawn. “Those need to go,” he said and smiled. I had to agree. Some are dead, and the rest drop leaves and pine needles on the lawn. Another branch from a side pine is also dead, and he’ll have that cut down as well. He gave me the bird’s nest, beautifully constructed and with branches hanging below it. There were pieces of plastic mixed into the construction, and I saw that frond I had left on the lawn intertwined with small branches. A few weeks back I thought I saw the parents and the baby so I checked later and the nest was empty. Now the forsythia can be trimmed.
I have one errand today then the rest of the day will be dedicated to reading and lolling about on the couch eating bon bons. I am not even going to make my bed. It will only get messed again tonight
Okay, I saw the worst science fiction movie ever the other night, one made by the syfy channel. It was Sharknado. Yup, sharks were swimming inside funnel clouds which had picked them out of the ocean and then dropped them into swimming pools, city aqua-ducts and on streets. No one was safe. The man scoffing our hero’s warning that sharks were in his pool got eaten. It served him right. I love watching the sharks swimming inside the funnel clouds, but my favorite part was at the end. Our heroine got swallowed, and our hero with a chain saw in hand got swallowed on purpose. The shark was lying on the sidewalk when all of a sudden you could hear the chain saw coming from the inside and then you could see the blade making a long slit in the side of the shark. Our hero cut a large enough hole to drag himself and our heroine out of the shark. All was well.
Categories: Musings
Tags: bad movies, catbird nest, coolness, dead trees, humidity, rain, Sharknado
Comments: 31 Comments
July 12, 2013
The day is actually in the 70’s, and there is a cooling north breeze, but it is still dark and cloudy with a bit of humidity when the breeze dies for a bit. This morning was my monthly breakfast with a fluctuating number of women whom I worked with for years and who are now all retired. Today there were ten of us. I have nothing else planned for the day. My friend is coming to take my trash to the dump, and I’m thinking of moving the laundry from the hall to the cellar with a simple toss down the stairs. The laundry is getting closer and closer to the washing machine every day.
My friend used to say that once July 4th is over so is the summer. I actually saw a back to school ad the other night. Now I’m waiting for a Halloween or Christmas ad. Summer Santa was on the cape yesterday doing a six month naughty or nice check. He was wearing summer Santa gear and Boston Red Sox socks. The paper showed a little girl on his lap who was mesmerized by being with Santa.
When I was little, I was filled with wonder and made new discoveries all the time. The world was still fresh and unfamiliar. I got older and the mysteries disappeared but not the wonder. I love to sit on my deck in the evening and watch the fireflies in the backyard flit among the trees like fairies taken to wing. The male gold finches are so bright and beautiful they take my breath away. I remember the hummingbird at my feeder. I couldn’t take my eyes off it. A starry night is another wonder, a night so bright you can read by the light from the heavens. The summer meteor showers in August are so amazing I say things like, “Wow,” out loud but never figure anyone hears me as all the other houses are usually dark. Thunder and lightning and a heavy rain are favorites of mine. I watch from the window and see the sides of the street flooded and filled with swirling rain. Sometimes the rain is light enough that I can sit outside under the umbrella and not get wet. The rain hits the umbrella and that is among the best of sounds.
Getting older doesn’t ever mean losing our sense of wonder. The beauties of the world are still here. We just have to remember to look.
Categories: Musings
Tags: birds, breezy, cloudy, humid, meteors, mysteries, rain, thunder, wonder
Comments: 13 Comments
July 11, 2013
Last night I re-entered the world. I went to my first Wednesday play of the season. We always have dinner at a friend’s house first so I bought a few appies then drove, a new adventure for me, to Harwich, had dinner then went on to Chatham. Wouldn’t you know it but this play had three acts so I sat far too long. By the time I got home, at close to 11, I was exhausted and the house was stifling. I closed windows and put the air on. Gracie was panting, a barometer of sorts about the heat and humidity. It was close to 12 before it was cool enough to go to bed. I slept until 9:30 and am still tired. That first foray into the world has exhausted me.
We have a breeze and we have rain, not a lot of rain but rain nonetheless. The breeze is enough that the chimes hanging from the trees are making a sweet sound. I have all the windows and doors opened. Gracie loves it as she can come and go as she pleases. Even if I could muster the energy, l’d go nowhere today as the roads must be clogged with tourists looking for something to do. This is the summer of the tourist. Cars are everywhere. I’m guessing people have a bit more money to spend, and the cape is a great spot not too far away and one with all sorts of accommodations and restaurants and then there’s the ocean, the beautiful ocean which surrounds the cape.
I didn’t get my first job until the summer just after I’d graduated from high school. Back then none of us worked summers. Until I moved to the cape, I lived in a town which didn’t offer a lot of jobs for a teenager even if you wanted one. Parents never pushed. We just had to live on the paltry allowance they gave us. We managed.
The summer after high school I worked in Woolworth’s in down-town Hyannis which was a huge store. It had front and back entrances and a long counter for food. I remember the menu slots on the wall and the plastic menus with pictures of the food. I usually took my break at that counter. Working there was an okay job as I worked all sorts of places in the store and wasn’t bored. I worked the jewelry counter, the register, the pet corner and the souvenir section. The only problem was it didn’t pay a lot, but I could understand why as it didn’t take a whole of expertise or talent to work there. The pet section kept me the busiest as I had to change cages and feed the animals every day. There were fish, birds, hamsters and Guinea pigs. Little kids used to come to see the animals and watch the fish. The register was an okay spot to work. I could make change which made me a valuable employee. The souvenirs were mostly from China and included shells, fake driftwood, small boats and t-shorts. People bought a lot of souvenirs. I worked there until Labor Day which gave me a few weeks off before I had to go to college. All in all, it wasn’t a bad first job.
Categories: Musings
Tags: breeze, food counter, menus, pet section, play, rain, souvenirs, summer jobs, theater, Woolworth's
Comments: 24 Comments
July 9, 2013
Today is dark with a gray sky. The humidity is high but not unbearable as there is a slight breeze, and a breeze is welcomed however small. The paper says rain with thunder and lightning. I am already looking to it. I love storms, and we do need the rain. This morning I have a doctor’s appointment for a wound check and yesterday the physical therapist signed off on me. That means I can now drive. I can be part of the world again.
All the windows and doors are opened, but I don’t hear anything, a random bird now and then but that’s all. I wonder where everyone is. This small street has kids, lots of kids: eight of them under seven years old, and I don’t even hear them. Not even a dog is barking which is also unusual. Maybe my invitation to wherever everyone has gone got lost in the mail.
It seems strange not to be traveling this summer. The last two summers I went back to Ghana, and if I had the money, I’d go again. I plan on austerity being my life style for the next year so I can save enough to go to Ghana again. Even after 40 years away, it seemed like home, and that connection is even greater after having been back a second time. Most interesting of all was meeting my former students many of whom are now retired and in their early 60’s. They refused to call me anything but madam or Ms. Ryan. I was and still am their teacher.
In the summer of 1969, I trained in Ghana to be a Peace Corps volunteer from June until early September. We had no phones, no televisions and no computers so we knew nothing of what was happening in the world. Letters from home were newsy but only about the family. One place where I stayed during training had a radio, and we listened to Voice of America and the moon landing. That was it for the entire summer. I, who used to read the paper every day, didn’t even care. None of us did. At night, we played cards and drank a few beers (I had coke-hate beer) at the local spots and the wide world never intruded. We didn’t even notice. All of us were too busy learning a new language and learning to live in a culture so different from our own.
Now I read two papers, am on my computer every day, carry my cell phone everywhere and watch news on TV. Sometimes I am very sorry I am so connected. The world at large intrudes on my life. Every bad thing that happens is blasted everywhere all the time, often the whole day on TV. I watch and am saddened by so much tragedy. Sometimes I long for that summer when I knew so little of what was happening in the world. I was blissful and ignorant.
Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: austerity, Ghana, humidity, lightning, money, new language, news, Peace Corps, quiet day, rain, teacher, thunder, training
Comments: 10 Comments
July 2, 2013
The day is thick with an intermittent breeze. Rain is again predicted, maybe even thunder showers. The sun won’t be making an appearance until tomorrow when the weather report predicts partly cloudy. I think they could have thrown us a bone and said partly sunny instead.
I used to like to miniature golf. I admit, though, that the windmill sometimes gave me trouble even with its three openings to the hole. My ball usually hit the wall between the openings and bounced right back at me. I’d keep count, one stroke, then try again, two strokes, and hope the ball would go through and maybe even into the hole. Nope, that never happened. It usually went through but to a corner, and I’d have to move the ball a club head length away from the side so I could putt. Par was like a magic number to me. The best thing about the miniature golf course in my town was it took just a minute or two to walk to the Chinese restaurant after a strenuous 18 holes.
We used to spend the whole day at the beach, usually Sunday because Saturday was my dad’s errand and chore day. We swam, walked the beach, collected shells, ate sandy food and were never bored, not the whole day. My mother wasn’t a swimmer. She had never learned how. She used to sit on the blanket and read and keep an eye on my two sisters who never strayed far. She wasn’t worried about my brother or me as we could swim, and she could see us walking along the shore or throwing rocks into the water. I remember she’d go crazy if we stepped on the blanket with sandy feet. That meant taking everything off and shaking out the blanket. The picnic basket was always on one side to anchor the blanket and keep it from blowing. We’d eat lunch and then periodically comb the basket for a snack as the day lengthened. Usually we’d find cookies or fruit. In the late afternoon, it was time to pack everything up and trudge to the car. My dad always put a towel on the seat to keep the seat dry and the sand out of his car. He’d then have us sit on the edge of the seat while he dunked our feet in a bucket of water to get the sand off and then we’d inside the car so the next sandy feet could be cleaned. The ride home was usually a blur as I slept most of the way.
I remember lying on my pillow as I was falling asleep and feeling warm water drip out of my ear. It was the weirdest sensation.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Beach, Clouds, Miniature golf, rain, rocks, sand, shells, swiming, thick day
Comments: 11 Comments
June 29, 2013
I don’t think I have ever heard such thunder in my whole life. It roared overhead as if a jet were flying low to the ground and passing over my house. Gracie and I were both jolted from sleep, no waking up and stretching to the morning. We sat up and looked at the ceiling as if we could see the sound. When the thunder finally faded away, we both went back to sleep only to be jolted again by as loud a clap as the first. The ceiling gave us no hint this time either. Gracie and I admitted defeat and got out of bed. I showered. She laid down and waited.
Last night’s heavy rain left a damp, dark day, the same sort of day as yesterday’s when we never did see the sun though Fenway Park had sun for the Sox game last night. Maybe it was sun or just maybe it was the god of baseball shining on the home team.
My Peapod order is due sometime between now and 3 o’clock. I took the wide window to save a couple of dollars. That made me chuckle. I am not generally the save a few bucks sort of shopper. I never check weight against price or buy something simply because it’s on sale. I don’t know what prompted me to choose the crazy time, but I did feel a bit proud and certainly quite parsimonious.
I started going through the recipes I’ve torn or cut out from newspapers and magazines. I made several piles like appies, dessert, chicken, beef, pasta, foreign, potatoes, salads and on and on and on. My piles got out of hand, I ran out of space and I got bored. I decided to redo the piles so I went to appies, sides, meats and desserts. I got about a third of the way through my cuttings and decided I’d had enough. I put everything together in one pile and put it away. I’m just about back where I started. I don’t care because when I’m old and bed-ridden, this will give me something to do.
Categories: Musings
Tags: coupon saving, damp, grocery order, humid, rain, recipes cutting out recipes, Shopping, thunder
Comments: 14 Comments
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