The Worst Day Fishing Is Better Than the Best Day at Work

I recently overheard someone at an area coffee shop say, “The worst day of fishing is better than the best day at work.” I’m not sure I agree 100 percent, but any day with a baited hook tossed out, waiting for a nibble is a good day. You’re near water, catching sunrays, listening to birds twitter, and smelling that nose teasing scent of mud, water plants, and fish. If you happen to reel something in to put on the dinner table, it’s a bonus.

With the recent abundant rains, western Kansans are seeing water in long dry ponds and in city lakes like the one in Ellis. Anyone who’s lived in the area for a while remembers catching or seeing someone land a good size bass or catfish out of these pools. It was a blessing to spend an hour before or after dinner enjoying quiet time on the creek bank and maybe hooking a big one.

With the extended drought, hopes of snagging a trophy or even minnows turned into dusty dreams. Deep holes that once housed massive channel cat and huge carp made fine homes for ant lions as the water evaporated. Thoughts of netting those lunkers that survived in ever shrinking deep spots were for naught. There was nowhere to transfer the monsters. Any wannabe Tom Sawyers and Huck Finns who loved to fish had to wander the crick bottom examining big and little skeletons of creatures that were once the object of anglers’ tall tales.

Since big rains recently filled some of these water holes, you can see a sparkle in your favorite fisherman’s eyes. Some of these ponds in Ellis, Graham, and Rooks Counties are full to the brim and look like an angler’s paradise. Despite appearances, those of us who live around here know there hasn’t been time enough to re-establish aquatic populations. Even if the Department of Wildlife, Parks, and Tourism races to stock these, it’ll take a while to re-establish the numbers necessary for serious success. 

So what does a guy or gal say to a visitor that tosses a line in a creek that was dry only few short weeks before? This seems like a trivial question, but it’s warranted some philosophical thought. How do you know for sure no one has caught some big fish somewhere else and transferred them into this body of water? If folks enjoy spending time relaxing outdoors with a pole in hand, do you take their excuse away from them? Is it morally right to dash dreams? 

The individuals involved cussed and discussed the topic a considerable time before agreeing that a bad day of fishing was still better than a great day at work. So while we wait on restocking and regeneration of vibrant fish populations in these freshly filled water holes, it’s not a bad thing to claim a spot under a big old cottonwood and cast out a worm. The worst thing you can reel in is hope.

Fourth of July Fun

“Gramma, wuuuhms (worms), pops!” giggled my three-year-old granddaughter, calling from western Kansas. It’s July 3, so I realize her parents have taken her to buy childhood firecrackers such as black snakes and those little poppers that I, our daughters, and now our grand love to throw on hard ground. Sure enough, my little caller’s mother confirms that’s what happened. This is G’s first year to enjoy these holiday favorites, and she wanted to share her excitement.

This sweet, unexpected phone call sent me down memory lane to my own first visits to firecracker dealers. It’s been long enough since those shopping trips that the recollections count as antiques. I still remember the feel of silver coins, probably dimes and a nickel, in my hand and the sense of importance as my parents took my brother and me to select patriotic noisemakers.

Back then, folks didn’t have air conditioning the way they do now, so we were hot before we started shopping. It seems the stands were always under some kind of awning, perhaps old military tarps left over either from Korea or WW II. I recall stepping into the shade and appreciating cooler temperatures in the dim, gunpowder scented interior. The bad part was it made it harder to see kid- friendly fireworks displayed on homemade plywood and saw horse tables.

While I was older than our granddaughter when I picked out my first 4^th stash, I still needed to stand on my tippy toes to peer at the dazzling merchandise with pictures of black cats and Chinese letters and wrapped in crinkly cellophane. Our parents guided us to sparklers, snakes, poppers, and a string of tiny ladyfingers they would help us light. Miracle of miracles, when we handed the clerk our sweaty change, she gave us each a free punk.

Once we bought our treasures, our father selected some surprises of his own. He was partial to Roman candles and cherry bombs, which were legal then. As we climbed into the furnace-like car to go home, he made it clear that we were not to touch his fireworks. After I met a boy who’d had a Roman candle burn and scar his chest, I understood why Dad was so emphatic about this.

Back home, the oven-hot sidewalk became our launch pad. Our parents sat on the porch step, watching us arrange little black kernels that would become long, spiraling, snakes. We oohed and aahed watching them writhe and stain the cement black and grey. After those were ash, it was time for a popsicle and pockets full of poppers that we threw from distances and close up. We even stepped on them to make them explode. 

After our stash was shredded tissue, our dad helped us use our spicy smelling punks to light one ladyfinger at a time and throw it safely away from our bodies. He had us save one string so we could hear a bunch pop at one time. When we’d had our fun, he would light a cherry bomb or two far enough away from us that we were safe, but close enough the explosion vibrated our eardrums for a spell.

After dark, we slurped bowls of mom’s homemade ice cream and watched dad launch his Roman candle display. While these don’t compare to modern pyrotechnic displays, they were magical to late 50s and early 60s youngsters. To end the evening, my brother and I waved lit sparklers and danced wildly about the yard. 

We must have fallen asleep before our parents carried us inside. I’d be so surprised to wake up on July 5^th to a yard full up burned up snakes, exploded popper tissue, shredded firecracker paper, and torched sparkler skeletons. Cleaning up wasn’t nearly as much fun as lighting them.

I’m so glad Little Miss G called Gramma about her wuuuuhms and poppers. I enjoyed her excitement and my memory.

Labor of Love

Picking and shelling peas is a labor of love, not practicality. After three evenings bent over knee-high vines finding and shelling full pods, I conceded the payoff—healthy calories—doesn’t match effort expended. Some folks might wise up and start buying canned or frozen peas at the market, but they’d miss what some researchers call the intangibles.

A first value added of this pea crop was that day in January or February when too many gray days made me doubt the arrival of the first spring robin. Blue as an indigo crayon, I searched garden catalogues online (that’s how they come nowadays) and planned this summer’s garden. After looking at all the pea varieties, I decided which ones would perform best in our region and decided to add snow peas to our selection for something different.

Our next bonus was the day we decided we could till our now warm enough patch of soil and microbes. Anyone who loved playing in the dirt as a kid has to love that magic of turning hard packed earth into loamy particles that sift through fingers like fine flour. When you combine what you feel and see with the rich scent of fresh turned soil, that is a red-letter day on the calendar.

Plotting the garden’s layout is another joy for those of us who relished planning wars or building new worlds in our sandboxes. Arranging areas for barracks and battlefields in that square confine got creative juices flowing in childhood. Now planning where to put peas, tomatoes, onions, peppers, potatoes, strawberries, asparagus, and melons for maximum development stimulates dreary weather-dulled brain cells. You never really know if you made good decisions until you see the outcome in mid-July.

When you look at corn seeds in your palm, it’s hard to imagine that one shriveled yellow or white nugget will produce two ears with approximately 700 kernels each. That’s a return of about 1,399 times what you invested. I’d love to see my savings perform so well. Peas don’t pay off nearly so effectively, but still for the one you plant, you harvest 40 to 100. Who on Wall Street can claim better yields?

Gardening isn’t only about the end result. You have to factor in getting your daily dose of vitamin D while weeding. Time hoeing and repacking soil along rows or making wells around tomato plants doubles as meditation or prayer time. Some people pay for CDs with nature sounds to improve their relaxation practices. Soothing noises come free with gardening.

When you’re outside tugging invasive grass out by its deceptively long roots or picking potato bugs or tomato worms off your plants, you’re listening to at least a dozen different birdsongs and untold numbers of insects as they hum and buzz. Most gardeners meet s beneficial neighbors as well while they check dense rows of green to discover they host bees, praying mantises, ladybugs, a toad or two, a lizard, and maybe a garter snake hiding amidst the foliage. 

I like to maximize these bonuses so we set two metal lawn chairs near the garden. After I’m done picking, I can enjoy evening breezes and insect serenades whileI sit there shelling peas for supper or maybe just letting sweat dry from my hair and face.

Finally, canned and frozen peas don’t compare with the color and flavor of those fresh picked from the garden. No matter how much butter or spice you add, those little green orbs taste better when you grow and shell them yourself. Cheaper is not always better.  

Sci-Fi Flesh Dissolving Monster or Lawn Pest?

Nothing is more enjoyable than sitting outside on a cool Kansas evening listening to live music and watching the sun set. That is until a couple days later when you realize chiggers showed up at the same party you attended. Over 48 hours, music and breeze-induced peace and relaxation turns into itchy torture. The hungry, invisible insect larvae ruin family picnics, exciting baseball games, plum picking, and a thousand other pleasurable summer activities.

I always thought these miniscule red bugs were actual insects, but after researching them, I’ve discovered they’re larval stages of the harvest mite. In the egg stage and insect stages, these critters could care less about dining on human flesh. Unfortunately, in their in between condition, our bodies are a great choice for a tasty meal.

Another misconception I had was that these guys drink our blood. Nope, that’s a tick and mosquito activity. Chiggers inject enzymes that dissolve flesh. A couple of things go on after this point. Surrounding cells soup up, and nearby skin hardens, often forming a firm bump. This area contains the chigger’s stylostome  or feeding tube. Yep, we’re talking bug straw into your liquefied cells. Is that science fiction or what?

I’d also been led to believe that these unseen beings laid eggs in my skin so that painting the irritation with nail polish would suffocate the little devils. No, these are larva. They aren’t sexually mature, so there aren’t any reproductive activities occurring. That intense, sleep disturbing itch is the human body’s reaction to those enzymes turning tissue into consumable goop for these temporary occupants.

It takes about 24 to 48 hours for this chemical reaction to produce the telltale lesions around ankles, behind knees, near underwear and waistband lines, and armpits. (Making people itch in those areas is inspired cruelty, don’tcha think?) As a result, you have to be careful when making assumptions about where your bites originated. It’s best to consider where you were the day or two before when you want to cast aspersions on a specific lawn or park.

To avoid insane torment, you could stay inside. However, you’d miss good times. You could wait until outside conditions were either below 60 degrees F or above 99 degrees F. Temperatures at those extremes tend to dampen fun any way so that’s not a good option. You can liberally use bug spray containing DEET. If you don’t want to do that, you can soap yourself and shower extremely well after an outdoor adventure and hope for the best. Do the same for your clothing so you don’t put old clothes on the next day and reintroduce this problem.

If you are targeted, it’s two or three days of serious annoyance. Unlike ticks and other insect, chiggers don’t inject disease-causing bacteria as ticks do. Infections and complications occur because people scratch, break skin, and introduce infection. It’s best to ignore that particular itch.

Because nothing live is in the bump, it’s useless to coat it with nail polish or other lacquers. Calamine lotion and cortisone cream provide some relief. Benadryl may help, and it can aid people in falling asleep despite nagging reminders of the good time that was.

My great grandpa was sure chiggers had to be one of the greatest curses sharing our planet. I agree. It’s a sad day when you won’t trek through tall grasses because you might pick up invisible critters that make your life miserable for a week.

Barbed Wire and Torn Jeans Go Together Like Peanut Butter and Jelly

Some people like to buy jeans with holes already in the fabric. I, however, prefer my new britches with only traditional waist and leg openings. Unfortunately, because I’m not good at crossing barbwire fences, I’ve ripped some fashionable extra tears in my denims.

 One pair had a rent in the upper inseam that I was able to mend well enough to wear them in public. The other I managed to catch by the seater, and no matter how tiny my stitches were, I couldn’t piece that “L”shaped rip together without a visible patch. Regardless of how many young folks buy jeans with intentional rips, it just isn’t cool to be in public only to realize your needlecraft failed, leaving your undies on display.

Despite initial appearances, this article isn’t really about torn jeans. They’re simply a result of ineffective efforts to get from one side of barbed wire to the other. People who’ve lived long in this country know fence crossing is an art. It isn’t something you wake up one morning to discover is your area of expertise. If author Malcolm Gladwell is correct, you’d need to climb over about 9,999 such enclosures before you were an expert. While I’m not sure that number is necessary, I know it takes practice to perform this feat without damaging fence, flesh, or pants.

Before you think about your own well-being or that of your clothing when crossing these barriers, you have to be sure the fence doesn’t get messed up when you either lift a leg over or stretch the top and middle wires wide enough to allow an  adult to squeeze through. Fixing fence is no fun, so you don’t want to set yourself up for stapling line back on posts or having to splice it. If you’re responsible, you aren’t going to mess up a landowner’s hard work and then not repair it.

Once you’ve made sure you aren’t damaging that wire barricade, you need to decide whether you have long enough legs  or  superhuman leaping power to get yourself over the obstacle without jabbing yourself in some tender parts. It’s difficult to maintain composure among a group of friends and hunting buddies when you’ve hung your inner thigh up on a metal projectile. It’s more challenging to act like everything is fine with your nether regions attached to that fence, and you can’t find a place to grab the torturous cable without catching hand flesh and ripping it as well.

If you can’t make it over the obstacle, you need to squeeze your hunting-gear-encased torso between taut lines and then drag your legs through one at a time. For folks who don’t practice yoga regularly, this is difficult. You’re also depending on a fallible human to spread those lines wide. Sometimes the responsible party gets distracted. All the apologies in the world don’t make it feel better when you’ve been twanged between two strands of barbed wire—and that’s after you get your clothes and hair detached.

I’ve ripped enough almost-new jeans to wonder if some outdoors person who wasn’t very good at crossing barbed wire fences was responsible for making torn denims fashionable. I don’t have to pay extra for torn pants. A trip out of doors updates my wardrobe considerably.

Get Home When the Streetlights Go On

After pulling weeds, mowing lawns, playing, or swimming under hot summer sun, evening breezes provided welcome relief during games of softball and freeze tag played at dusk during my childhood. As a youngster, I loved being outside under lavender, apricot, and rose tinted  skies when cool winds blew  and tangled hair into Medusa-like snakes and tickled sunburnt skin. This was a such a positive part of my life that I still enjoy replaying mental videos of evenings my brother and I invented new games or enjoyed old standbys with neighborhood kids after supper.

These end of day activities also trained me to respond physically to streetlights flickering on just as Pavlov trained dogs to react to ringing dinner bells. No, I didn’t start salivating when those bulbs lit up, but I did know to hurry home for the night if I wanted to continue to stay outside with my pals until later  streetlights brightened future June, July, and August nights. Mom’s tone was clear about following this directive, and I knew she meant what she said. Decades later, seeing this golden glow silhouetted by twilight still triggers a need to hustle inside for an evening bath and a good read before bedtime. 

These days, as I enjoy cool evening breezes on the patio, I hear kids competing loudly for the next shot at the basketball goals a few blocks away. Just north of us is a community park where children swing, slide, struggle up the climbing wall, and toss sycamore balls and acorns in the air. Their laughter floats into my yard on cool evening zephyrs. Their voices and giggles transport me back to my own carefree childhood and the recollection of knowing a streetlight turning on meant it was time to halt my fun and skedaddle home.

Apparently, this signal still works because many nights when I’m working in the flowerbed or garden, twilight sounds shift from singing birds and laughing children to that faint electronic buzz emitted by towering lamps high overhead. It isn’t long before insect hums accompany that manmade sound. Chirping crickets and buzzing cicadas in nearby trees join distant frogs and Wodehouse toads to add a rhythmic backbeat sounding like quickly shaken maracas and a throbbing bass in the descending darkness. Most little kids and their noises are tucked inside lighted rooms or already in bed as beetles hum and pop when they fly too close to those yellow beams.

Despite these intriguing reverberations, I often don’t stay outside long enough to hear all the nigh t sounds. Due to my mother’s effective training during my early years, this body still responds to that cue drilled into me as a little girl. You’d better get home as soon as the street light goes on. Even though it’s been eons since I had to follow that command, every fiber in my carcass answers to that golden flicker. It’s a magnet that pulls me indoors.

Skunked Again

It’s been a while, and I let down my guard--the consequence, not one but two skunked dogs. In town, to add insult to injury.

When I lived along the banks of Big Creek, almost three miles west of Ellis, I expected dog/skunk encounters every year, and we had them. I kept a supply of ingredients to make my magic de-scenting potion and knew I’d use them every few months. A year and half of living in the small burg of Logan with no Pepe Le Pew encounters spoiled me. I never thought about the fact that skunks don’t read city limit signs.

After a Friday night cruise into the countryside to watch dusk descend over green pastures and wheat fields, we arrived home ready to settle in for the evening. It wasn’t three minutes before that acrid, eye-burning smell rode a gentle south breeze from behind our shed into windows open to welcome fresh spring air. That was a joke. About the time my nose hit high alert, my husband let me know what triggered the stink bomb.

 Yes, our beloved grand-pups had insulted a black and white kitty as it passed through their territory. Working in tandem to drive the invader away, they’d come close to that trespasser’s backside. The direct shot blasted both with enough stench to coat ten pooches. Their hangdog looks told me they knew it.

I hurriedly concocted a triple dose of hydrogen peroxide, baking soda, and dish soap before slipping into raggedy clothes I could toss if necessary. One at a time, I doused each pooch and scrubbed relentlessly. After the first bath, my insulted nostrils and eyes couldn’t tell if I’d succeeded or not in banishing the offending odor from dog one’s fur. Using shop towels, I rubbed him down and lugged him outside to shake remaining droplets from his coat.

Round two with pet number two began soon after. That chunky boy didn’t seem quite so odiferous, and he’d had a recent shearing at the groomers, so he was a little easier to de-scent. Due to his size, he was  harder to maneuver in the laundry room sink, but we got the job done and kept the water where it belonged. He, too, got a toweling before I transported him outside to join his partner in crime.

It didn’t take more than a sniff of dog one to realize it was good thing I’d made so much of the special elixir. That guy needed a second dose of my un-skunking solution. He must’ve read my mind because he tried to scurry out of reach, but it was too late. He was heading back to the washtub and the last of the skin tingling cleanser.

Both dogs had that unmanageable hair look caused by a recent bath. I’m not picking up much residual scent from the boys, but that skunk certainly laid a shot pattern over our yard. Every time I walk out back, I can tell it visited. I’m hoping good rain will  take care of that problem.

Memorial Day Memories—Learning Family Stories Around Headstones

Peonies blooming, flags flying from light posts, and alumni celebrations signal Memorial Day’s arrival. For some families it’s time to camp at the lake or picnic in the backyard. No matter what I do to celebrate this holiday, this last weekend in May is a reminder of trips to the family cemetery and lessons learned about long dead ancestors.

Just saying Memorial Day brings back memories of Grandma Lottie lugging her store of floral arrangements up from her basement. She’d lay them all over her back porch and examine them for wear and tear--no worn out arrangements for her deceased loved ones. Then she’d make certain each had appropriate metal clothes hangers clipped in two to anchor them into Southwest Kansas soil until it was time to retrieve them for another year.

After she’d inspected and repaired her wreathes and bouquets, she’d relegate them to boxes destined for particular cemeteries where deceased relatives rested. By the time she and grandpa finished, the trunk was full and the journey ready to begin.

I’d find my place in the backseat of their Mercury and we’d hit that asphalt ribbon guiding us toward Dodge, Jetmore, and Ford. I loved sitting behind them, listening to their reminiscences of people I never met. 

During these drives over green prairies, I learned about a family branch that immigrated to northwest Kansas in the early 1870s. Once there, several families homesteaded and formed the little community of Devizes, named after their hometown in Canada. One of these great greats was a Methodist Circuit rider who served rural residents living in dugouts along Beaver and Sappa Creeks. After the Cheyenne Breakout in 1878, he buried some settlers killed in that incident.

I always wondered if his tiny wife, daughter of a ship captain on the Great Lakes, saw the similarity between waves on huge bodies of water and the ripples of wind moving prairie grasses in rolling surges. I know she saw the grass because she hid her children in it when she heard Indians traveled near their homestead.

Another side of the family moved first from Kentucky to Indiana and then to Kansas as their families expanded and they needed more resources to support them. We have photos of their homestead, livery stable, general merchandise store, and boarding house in Ford, where they settled. By the time I came along, I realized I’d only see that family name engraved on headstones at the cemetery. We descended from the female side, and that great grandma’s name changed when she married into the Canadian branch I mentioned earlier.

At each gravesite, Grandma and Grandpa continued sharing tales of those who rested beneath our feet. Though I’d hardly met a single soul resting in those hallowed plots, I thought I knew them personally. I learned what they drove, whether it was wagon or a Model T. I learned who their children were and what they served at family dinners.

Through these annual narratives, I understood what it took to survive and thrive in a land that nature designed to suit nomads. Looking back, I’m sure these pilgrimages with my grandparents triggered my love for this prairie that brought me home to Kansas.

Be the Hero of Your Own Journey

This time of year is more than budding flowers and nesting birds. It’s promotion time for scores of young across the country. Friends have posted photos of precious preschoolers wearing mortarboards to receive tiny diplomas. Others celebrate their own or their loved one’s high school and college graduations. Seeing these pictures on Facebook as families rejoice over this life event reminds me that all of us are on a journey, hopefully a hero’s journey to live a worthy life.

In literature, students read about heroes such as Odysseus, Beowulf, and Atticus Finch. They analyze the differences and similarities in those adventurous lives. Some classes examine scholar Joseph Campbell’s version of the hero’s journey and learn to recognize archetypal calls to adventure; thresholds to cross; tests, mentors,  helpers, and hinderers; ordeals; seizing rewards;  traveling the road back; and discovering freedom to live. Anyone interested enough to know more can find models of this ancient pattern if they wish to look it up.

It doesn’t take long before an attentive reader realizes this prototype is also the story of each of our lives. Adventure in some form or another calls every one of us multiple times throughout our existence.  For some, it’s a siren call to foreign lands as missionaries, travelers, employees, or soldiers. For others, it’s a summons to marry and unite lives. This choice often results in children, an undertaking which certainly requires mentors and helpers to overcome hinderers and problems. To be alive means to join this hero’s journey. To recognize the steps along the way makes it more fulfilling.

It’s obvious new graduates stand at a threshold. Everything that’s been predictable is about to change. In short time, these people on the cusp of a new existence go from parents’ support and home to their own households and jobs where they are responsible to maintain employment, pay bills, and handle challenges. They realize they make their own decisions and no longer depend on someone else to tell them what to do.

Suddenly, it’s clear the guidance they received from loved ones helped prepare them for this day. I recall those early months on my own when I dug deep to remember what loving adults had taught me about budgeting and making do. Fortunately, I came from a resourceful bunch who taught flexible problem solving so handling difficulties might have caused stress, but it didn’t throw me off my intended path.

That’s the value, I think, in knowing the predictability of the hero’s journey. You know you’ll face tests. You know you need to find and recognize your helpers as well as your hinderers, and sometimes the difficulty is differentiating between the two. You know there will be rewards. Once again, it’s important to look for them. Sometimes they’re small and easy to miss. However, those who seek will find those treasures and can offer gratitude for large and small boons in life.

I’ve decided recognition is the operative word. We must learn to see and value individuals and moments, which adds richness to life that some never enjoy. For me, that adds up to that final part of this journey-- freedom to live. Truly being alive means savoring an awareness of those who enrich our lives and those instances where we experience life in that instant; whether it be catching a big fish, reveling in  a splendid sunset, snuggling a baby close in the middle of the night, or comforting an elder passing on.   

This time of year and its graduates remind us that we, too, are on a journey. We might travel a different path than they, but we also share helpers, hinderers, and rewards. Acknowledging these along our way improves the quality of our own lives. Happy trails.

Forget the Time Machine--Time Travel via Old Newspapers

Time travel has been the focus of many a story over the years and recently was in the news with reports about American scientists investigating its possibility during WW II. Michael Crichton explored the concept in his novel Timeline, which required rearrangement of participants’ molecules. Both of these examples are too daring for me, but I’ve found a way to safely journey through time that’s safe for my students and me. All it requires is access to old newspapers, which are available at the local library.

My introduction to exploring the past via microfilm was my master’s project. I studied the history of Ellis schools and discovered the treasure trove of additional information available in those little canisters of film. I learned about the first library, fire department, and street bricking in Ellis. Spinning through those little reels introduced me to not only the first schools and teachers but also declamation societies and fancy dinners and dances. I discovered Teddy Roosevelt campaigned locally. Reports of murders and natural catastrophes as well as support for victims intrigued past readers just as they do today.

Once I found this resource, I had to share it with my students.  I created a research scavenger hunt tied to a personal interview or study of an individual’s diaries and letters so my kids could scour the past to help them better understand not only their lives but also their communities.

Depending on the year they studied, Ellis and Thunder Ridge pupils discovered dates their towns got electricity and indoor plumbing. They were surprised to learn that early phone numbers contained only two or three digits. Analyzing costs of living created culture shock. The idea you could buy four or five gallons of gas for a dollar was novel. Local groceries advertising rib-eye steaks for 53 cents a pound and a gallon of milk for less than 20 cents made them long for the past until they found out what the average annual salary was. Once they learned that people earned much less, they didn’t long so much for the good ol’ days.

In a day when fewer people traveled great distances to shop or seek entertainment, towns like ours offered movie theaters, skate rinks, and bowling alleys, as well as several grocery stores and hotels. Students were surprised to discover how many services were available locally just a few decades ago. In discussions generated by their research, they analyzed why rural communities can’t support as many businesses today. They also understand that modern transportation makes it easier to jaunt to a nearby city where they have more selection.

The interview component of their assignment personalized their research. These teens visited with elders to learn what life was like for them.  If their chosen individual had passed on, they could read diaries and letters to answer their questions. One student met her great-grandmother born in 1922 this way. As she poured through old documents, she found grade school autograph books and stories of dating pre-WW II style. During the war, her grandma recorded a night when her community pulled their black out curtains as a security measure.

Other students discovered marriage during Depression years often meant young couples honeymooned by visiting relatives and returned to share a home with parents. Pre-antibiotic and pre-vaccine eras meant death commonly visited families. They also discovered ways people pulled together to accomplish work and enjoy good times.

Reading their reflections completed following this assignment allowed me to see that old newspapers and diaries have a broad appeal. Several students commented they’d found a new love for history. Almost everyone acknowledged that they gained an appreciation for those who lived in our towns before we did.

Almost Empty Nest

I’ve observed a great-horned owl on her nest for the past three months. This triggered my reflections on similarities between human and critter parenting experiences. It also added questions to those already swirling about my busy brain. One of those is do birds experience a sense of unsettledness like the one humans have when their young first leave home? After surviving those aching months when our youngest moved from home, leaving an unnaturally quiet house behind, I recall a moment when my husband and I looked at one another, and said something along the lines of, “We’re going to have to relearn what a world without kids in it is like.”  

As humans, we spend more time rearing offspring than wild creatures do. As a result, the empty nest stage jars our senses at first. To make it through those first weeks, we review photos and videos of earlier times with our youngsters. These remind us how clever, inventive, and cute they were. Thankfully, human parents have late teen and early twenty years when kids are out more than they are in to prepare for a future where only adults occupy the house.   

Seeing that great-horned owl and her nest progress from egg -laying to ready-to-fledge time has triggered a flood of memories about raising our girls. To compound these emotional flashbacks is the fact our eldest and her husband are experiencing the infant and toddler years with their two little ones. Between my watching these escapades through grandmother eyes and snapping weekly photos of maturing owlets, reminiscences of early parenthood invade my mind every time it wanders.

In February and early March, that owl momma attended her incubating eggs obsessively. Once they’d hatched, she’d fluff her feathers and spread wings wide to keep her babies toasty on frosty mornings. As weeks passed, I observed two downy heads peeking over the edge of the nest under momma’s watchful golden eyes. Eventually, days grew warmer and growing babies’ feathers filled in.

 As the nestlings matured, they crowded their home. Eventually, Mom ventured out to forage. I’d spy her leaving her young, who now occupied the entire bowl of their treetop home, gazing after her as she swooped low over the prairie searching for rodents.

Lately, her babes are often alone when I drive by. If that mom is anything like a human mother, she enjoys this freedom. While she’s hunting, her children mind the boundaries of their world, but like their human counterparts, it seems they inch closer to the edge every time I pass. The other morning, one daredevil stood on the lip of its nest, stretching developing wings.

One day soon, momma owl will come home to find her nest empty. I wonder if she’ll be as surprised as I was to discover my young had left home. Do owls reconsider their time management since the need to feed and clean up after offspring has ended? Will she soon perch atop power poles as she did last fall?

Whether human or critter, parenting cycles follow predictable patterns. For a time, babies tie mommas close to home with barely a moment to go to the bathroom alone. Slowly but surely, little ones mature, freeing parents from total dependency. In what seems like a flash, those youngsters develop until they’re ready to live on their own, leaving behind parents to figure out what to do with that extra time and space.

I guess we know what I did with mine. I started owl watching and telling you what I saw.

Spotlight on School Plays

While folks in northern and western Kansas might be a long way from Broadway’s bright lights, we enjoy our fair share of drama on the boards. Our actors are youngsters in our communities, and our directors are often teachers by day and drama coaches by night and weekend. Local wizards of the sewing machine and serger, forensic coaches, carpenters, welders, and likewise talented people are costumers, set builders, and backstage help.

Seeing one of these productions can’t help but remind a person that it does take a village to raise a child or in this case a cast full of lots of families’ children. The thespians commit a slug of outside time to learning lines, coming to practice, and helping assemble costumes and props for their scenes. During the day, they’re diligent students keeping up with the demands of at least seven different classes. After school, many go out either for sports or work part-time in local businesses. Somehow, they fit in family time.

While the kids are in class, the director keeps up with planning, teaching, managing, and grading for the courses that occupy those kids’ days. Somewhere house and yard work as well as the mundane duties of life like bill paying require time. By evening, that individual has slapped on his or her director’s beret and begun turning these usually normal teens into fairy tale characters, imaginary rabbits, or other theatrical manifestations.

Hours are never long enough for important things like eating, so parents provide catered meals to keep their offsprings’ metabolism running at full speed. Between times, they run errands to gather hats, capes, suits, dresses, and other necessities to add finishing touches to their children’s productions. Often they serve as ad writers, photographers, and publicity teams who interest area residents to pay to see the show.

After weeks of repeated entries from stage left or right and struggles with muffed lines, it’s time to put the spectacle on the road. Depending on the community, first run audiences are either the grade school students and future hams or local residents and loved ones who hanker to see their darlings perform. No matter what, everyone expects to appreciate the show. No nasty big city critics in these crowds.

During an evening or matinee, locals kick back and let the performers whisk them into another world. While enjoying the production, it’s easy to forget how much effort went into such a show. That hour and half play required hundreds of hours to devotion and labor from scores of individuals. In return, ticket holders get grins and giggles. The actors and stage crew savor working together as a team to provide a great show. Besides a few gray hairs, the director enjoys the satisfaction of knowing he or she coached, nudged, and otherwise prompted youngsters to go outside their comfort zones to bring unfamiliar characters to life.

Everyone, audience included, will share memories and stories that turn into local legends.  After I watch one of these plays, I never see those kids the same way again. Always, when we meet, even if it decades afterward, the aura of the personalities they’ve brought to life shadow dance behind them as permanent fixtures in their life stories.

Four Letter Words

Most of us have heard about four letter words. The minute you mention them, many immediately think naughty words. But this time of year, hope is a four-letter word. As is soil, seed, rain, bird, root, stem and grow. Four letter words-- every one. As I roamed about my yard planting hollyhocks, bachelor buttons, sweet William, zinnias, and other butterfly attractors, I kept thinking, I hope for moisture and that the hard little hulls I tucked in the earth would sprout roots and stems to unfurl skyward under warm, spring sun.

With the advent of t-shirt and shorts weather, I see people walking about area towns with a spring in their steps. All of us are tired of winter’s leafless silhouettes. We’re weary of seeing only sere grass and stick-like bushes. Our senses ache for hues of green and brilliant blossoms.

Even birds agree. Those not yet on the nest warble noisy courting songs, perform antic dances, and ruffle feathers, hoping to attract mates. Who can help but smile while watching such crazy expenditures of energy, knowing it’s one of those four letter words—hope-- that drives each of us to do all we can to make the most of these few perfect days of spring.

During a painting class I recently attended, students explained to our waterlogged Wyoming teacher that we need rain. Unlike us, she’s seen an excess of moisture recently, so she struggled to relate to our craving for wet stuff. While we enjoyed the mild temperatures and balmy days with her, she treasured 24-hour sequences that didn’t require use of snow shovels. She  wasn’t looking forward to the predicted rains and snow on her homeward journey. Despite her dismay at the weather reports, we were giddy, hoping precipitation might move our way.  

Without moisture, we look forward to more blowing dust, bare fields, dirty cars, as well as stunted vegetables and blossoms if we can garden in our communities. Rain brings optimism for green yards, wheat, and a harvest. Those clouds building on the horizon have no idea when they pass us by and sprinkle on another town what they do to those thirsting for water-laden droplets.

We’re so dry here that folks normally indignant when rain ruins their plans behave gleefully when they have to move track practice or outdoor picnics inside. Those of us wearing spectacles relish coming indoors from the sprinkles to wipe our glasses dry.

Not only have the few little dribbles we’ve received perked up spirits, they’ve also jolted dormant perennials into production. Bushes that were tawny canes days earlier have sprouted hordes of pale green buds. A wheat field behind my house turned lush blue-green and grew at least two inches in nothing flat. I should have set up a stop action camera on it. I’d have captured amazing footage of high-speed growth.

Yep, this time of year, four letter words rule. Dirt, bird, seed, rain, and hope are important elements of spring. I’m all for saying as many of those words as I can in mixed and unmixed company.

Sticker Magnet

If you saw our fuzzy white dog, you’d swear he was good for nothing but keeping the end of the couch warm and watching his food bowl. In reality, he’s a sticker patch super hero who aides Mother Nature in her efforts to make sure prickly seed producing plants of all kinds never die out.

Dudley looks and feels like a chenille teddy bear. His mom is a shih tzu and his dad is a mystery who created a much bigger son than one might expect from such a dainty mother. While our pooch carries his father’s oversize frame, Duds has his mom’s silky coat with a few curls and kinks added for effect. He also has hairy soles that would make a hobbit proud. This combination makes him perfect to collect any kind of burr or sticker nature produces.

Even though we keep our pooch groomed, any seed with a sharp projectile point that can tangle in his hair latches on. He comes in from a romp in the woods with burrs woven into his facial hair.  Every now and then one manages to migrate to his eyebrows where it twists and turns itself into a tight little horn-like knot. Yesterday, our wily pup came home from a frolic with a big ol’ porcupine egg of a sticker snarled in his ear hairs. His usually soft, floppy ears turned into a finger-ripping weapon when I ran my hand over them. After catching and confining him, we snipped those torture devices loose and sealed them in the trash so effectively they will never have a chance to take root and produce more sticker plants.

Not only does Dudley collect these objects on his face and ears, his body attracts them as well. During the summer, his hair is short enough that he doesn’t gather as many as usual. However, I have to perform a full body pat down regularly to make sure he isn’t packing spiky armor that ends up pulling hair and creating red welts. Every now and then, I find a nettle tucked into his doggy armpit, and he knows it’s scissor time again.

The one area of Dudley’s body   allow hair to grow its full length is his tail. That fine, silky mane he inherited from his mom forms a plume waving happy circles  behind him as he’s adventuring through bushes and weeds. It’s one of this pup’s charms, but unfortunately, when it’s loaded with burrs, it turns into a weapon as harmful as a medieval mace.  When he’s had an abundance of prickly attachments that need to be snipped, that once lovely furry flag looks moth-eaten.

Our pet is lucky to live with folks who regularly check him for tangles and knots caused by hitchhiking seedpods in the form of stickers, burrs, and nettles. Knowing how irritating these can be during the short time our pet suffers, I wonder how beasts in the wild that don’t have anyone to perform the necessary snips and trims keep healthy.

Witches Britches or Ghosts of Dinosaurs?

I wish I’d paid closer attention to my high school chemistry teacher. If I had, molecules and their pairings might confuse me less so I could better understand polyethylene and other carbon polymer products. Despite my lack of comprehension, the intricacies of molecular interactions interest the poet in me. Niggling thoughts waken me in the middle of the night and leave me wondering about the origin of the end product—plastic bags that punctuate my landscape.

. Every household has scores of these mostly white but sometimes clear or blue or other-colored sacks stuffed in funky cloth tubes purchased at a craft fair. Those without handmade containers cram theirs in a bigger plastic bag in the pantry. Though I have far too many of these objects, I find they’re great fillers when I want to mail fragile items or grab an easy lunch container in the morning.

Despite their practical uses, gazillions of them end up in treetops, caught on barbwire fences, or blow across acres of prairie like some wannabe tumbleweed. I don’t know if I can count how many of these ethylene polymer creations I see as I drive 35 miles to work each day. Thank goodness, I don’t live in a heavily populated region. Imagine the totals if I lived in an urban area.

Recently, I saw a bird nest constructed with shredded bits of someone’s old grocery bag. Its tatters fluttered in the breeze like celebratory pennants at a ball game. Another bag trapped by the branches of a prickly red cedar inflated and deflated with the wind like an artificial lung. It looked like some kid’s science fair project gone awry.

An English friend of mine tells me they call these objects witches britches in her hometown. That made my inner bard smile. The white bags caught on a fence or branch do look like a fluttering pair of old-fashioned bloomers. I had to mull a bit to think why someone would associate these with pointy hats and broom sticks. The only thing that made sense to me was that you never find these flapping on a real clothesline. They’re always in the wild, where one might hope to find a perfect storybook hag.

In reality, these containers are refined petroleum products. According to one source, it requires approximately 430,000 gallons of oil to manufacture 100 million bags. The source also stated that Americans alone use more than 380 billion of these products a year.

According to my calculations, that’s a lot of ancient dinosaurs, sea life, palm trees and other carbon sources that Mother Nature compressed into the energy that makes my car run and my house warm. Instead of seeing plastic sacks on the fence or blowing across a pasture, I now envision ghostly tyrannosaurus rexes, stegosauruses, triceratops, and a pterodactyl or two returning to haunt former homelands. Turning such a resource into common litter is a waste. I’d rather drive those drops of ancient reptile juice or use them to keep me toasty than to clutter my landscape. 

Knowing more about where these bags come from makes me appreciate the reusable bags my grocery store recently handed out to customers. Thinking about specters the size of dinosaurs helps me remember my cloth-like sacks when I go shopping.

When I forget, I plan to keep those laboratory-made bags corralled where they can’t catch a Kansas gust and haunt the countryside. I see no reason to invite nightmares into my life.

A Bucketful of Sweet Possibilities

You don’t have to travel far to learn something new. During Spring Break, my husband and I jaunted to Courtland, Kansas, to explore Jamestown Marsh and other area sites. I expected to see migratory birds, including eagles, ducks, and geese. I hoped to visit the Pawnee Indian Village Museum to study more about early residents of my region. My to-do list also included antiquing and photography. One thing I never expected to discover was a maple tapping/syrup making operation. In fact, I thought of this as a New England only activity, never considering that Kansans could produce local maple products.

Along Highway 36, it was clear the trees realized spring’s official arrival was only days away. Tiny buds turned toward the sun. Robins hopped about farm and small town yards looking for a satisfying meal. Upon arrival at our destination, we noticed additional seasonal scenery. Scores of maple trees sported not only tiny reddish bud clusters, but also blue and silver buckets adorned their trunks, adding color to the landscape.

After cruising each street to confirm what we saw, we agreed someone was tapping local maples. Upon arriving at Snow Goose Lodge, the mystery deepened. We spied a sugar shack—a small hut containing a wood-burning evaporation unit—with a wood maple leaf cutout labeled, “Republic County Maple Guys.”

Fortunately, our curiosity was soon satisfied. Jim Elliott, lodge host and one of the participants in this colorful spring ritual, was simmering maple syrup as we drove in. He informed us that you could only tap the trees under certain conditions: day temperatures must be above freezing and night temps below. He said the operation typically has a two to three week sap collection window. Our timing was perfect to experience this activity in progress.

Jim and his business partners-- two young men, tap trees, collect sap, reduce it on a wood burning contraption designed for this, and then condense it further on the stovetop to golden brown, thick syrup they bottle to sell at local farm markets. Smelling the kitchen aroma as the well-tended stockpot simmered told me I want to return as soon as summer operations open.

Wanting to know more about maple syrup production in Kansas, I researched and found an article online about these entrepreneurs and their efforts. According to the Republic County Economic Development site, this is their third year of production. Each year, with the aid of local maple tree owners, the team has increased efforts enough to garner approximately 600 gallons of sap this season, which should render around 12 gallons of syrup. The article focused on value-added agricultural products.

Even more than goods to sell, I think about the value-added human product Mr. Elliott offers his business partners. The lessons these young men learn about identifying and carefully tapping trees, collecting sap, converting raw material to consumable syrup, and about marketing have to be a wonderful education for everyone involved. Those lads will have real life math, cooking, food safety, writing, reading, creative thinking, entrepreneurial, and people skills that surpass anything textbooks provide.

Maybe this is what value added is really about. Maybe it’s seeing opportunities to go beyond expanding markets and services. Maybe it’s finding ways to connect rural youngsters to local resources and using those contact points to teach expertise to make successful business people and employees who stay in Kansas and grow our state.

What began as a restful getaway turned into a bucket full of possibilities. Seeing three Kansans turn the  natural resources in their front yards into not only an agricultural venture but also  a skill and character building effort offers hope that anyone utilizing such assets can create sweet deals as well.

Who Decided to Switch the Clock?

I don’t know about you, but my system is still re-calibrating to Daylight Saving Time. You’d think with more than a half century to get used to my internal clock resetting two times a year that this semi-annual switch would go smoothly. Nope, the older I get, the more my carcass resents folks in high places not understanding that you can’t cut off one end of a blanket, sew it to the top, and say it’s longer. Not only do those in power mess with where you put this amputated hour, they all too frequently legislate change regarding when that reattachment takes place. It’s no wonder heart attack statistics increase in the days following this time shift.

Once I began researching DST I am more traumatized. I discovered I’ve been saying it incorrectly.  I thought it was called Daylight Savings Time, but, no—it’s Daylight Saving Time.  No second S. Some countries simply call it Summer Time.

Several informational sites credit Ben Franklin with DSTs existence, making participation seem patriotic. In reality, he was long in the grave before anyone actually adjusted a clock. This business began in England prior to WWI. Once hostilities occurred, Parliament enacted British Summer Time in 1916. Hoping to save energy here as well, America followed suit for seven months in 1918 and 1919. Due to lack of support for the time shift, lawmakers retracted it.

Time-pieces and humans ticked along satisfactorily until America once again went to war in 1942. Congress determined that this change would save energy to support the war effort so it was reenacted from February 9^th of ‘42 to September 30^th  of ‘45. After this date, states and localities adjusted clocks as they wished. If I’m cranky now, I can’t imagine what that did to people dependent on train and bus schedules. How would you be sure to arrive at a meeting on time?

I guess it was okay for individuals to miss schedules, but once TV and radio stations mainstreamed into American life, federal legislation regarding a consistent time change followed. The Uniform Time Act of 1966 ended confusion by starting DST on the last Sunday of April and ending it the last Sunday in October.  Except for Hawaii and Arizona, the rest of the nation jumped on that bandwagon.

Until the energy crisis of the 70s, those dates remained stable. Some of us remember the burble called the Arab Energy Embargo where we experienced eight months of Daylight Saving Time in ‘74 and ten in ‘75. While many believe agricultural interests support DST, lobbying by farm states and others returned it to End-of-April/End-of-October status.

Americans enjoyed predictability until 1986 when President Reagan signed into law PL 99-359. This act changed the beginning of DST to the first Sunday in April. It’s ending date remained the same. Nearly twenty years later, Congress passed the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which, starting in 2007,altered the beginning date to the current second Sunday in March and extended its run to the first Sunday in November.

Interestingly, medical studies reveal a number of concerns regarding this cha-cha with the clock. With each change, heart attacks and accidents increase. Classroom and work productivity decrease. Humorist Dave Barry gets cranky. And so do I.

I’m for punchin’ the same clock that Arizona and Hawaii do. I want time out of Congress’s hands.

Sore Hands No More

Frigid temperatures do more than raise the gas bill. Cold, frosty days redden and roughen flesh, leading to splitting skin on fingers and hands that hurts as bad as or worse than a paper cut. No matter how much girly girl lotion and cream I applied in January and early February, I couldn’t smooth out either the hangnails that snagged on bulky sweaters and hoodies or soothe away those painful, weather-induced wounds that formed at the edges of my finger and thumbnails and over the tops of knuckles.

I suspect that even if I never left my house during frigid temperatures, the effects of the furnace on my skin would lead to some discomfort. However, I was going outside and coming in several times each day while washing up at least once an hour to discourage flu and cold germs. This combination is a prescription for hamburger hands.

In desperation to ease the increasing pain, I used tried and true remedies that had worked in the past—even sleeping with cotton socks over grease-coated hands and buying dish soap guaranteed to heal raw skin. None of the products worked, and they depleted my bank account as I attempted to halt this attack on my body.

A fellow employee saw me gently massaging lotion into my irritated flesh and told me to avoid products containing petroleum products. She explained those unguents felt soothing when first applied, but they actually dried out skin. That explained why even though I’d just bought a brand new tube of something in that merchandise line a few days before, my hands were now bleeding. No wonder my almost raw digits weren’t improving.

I hadn’t found a cure, and the splits in my hands and fingers grew more painful by the minute. Unexpectedly, during a trip to get my mom some cold medicine, I spied a new product at a local drugstore. The sign above the display case promoted that it healed working hands that crack and split. Just what I needed. As a teacher, I hadn’t considered myself as a person with working hands since most of my labor takes place inside cozy buildings. However, my hands sure acted as if they were an outdoor laborer’s appendages.

When I asked the clerk about this ointment, she said farmers and road crew workers were coming in droves to buy it. After hearing this testimonial, I was sure I’d found the cure to my dry, cracked, bleeding hands. 

Sure enough, the ingredient list didn’t contain petroleum. Glycerin, water, and a whole bunch of words I can’t pronounce but didn’t have to do with the banned item filled up the component list. It didn’t smell, it wasn’t gooey, and it most importantly, it worked. Within a couple of days, craters that kept widening and growing tender to the point they awakened me from sleep began to disappear. Within five days, I could barely remember why I’d whined so much.

The lesson here is don’t go to the beauty product aisle when you’re dealing with outdoor hands. Hit the feed store or the place local farmers shop. These folks know what cures winter-roughened hands.

Secrets Leafless Trees Share

One of my favorite features of winter is being able to see bird nests in leafless trees. I like to figure out what species lives in a particular area so I can look for it when days lengthen, temps warm, and foliage hides those cobbled together nurseries.

Last winter, I spied a huge nest in a lone tree tucked off Highway 9. It was so large, I thought it might belong to an eagle, but my husband quickly let me know our national birds build more ambitious nurseries for their young—maybe big enough to contain a small human. I later saw an actual eagle nest with its family occupying it in Colorado and realized he was right. That still left me wondering what creature hatched its young in this particular locale.

Patience pays off.  I kept my eye on this haphazard collection of branches and twigs throughout the winter. Finally, I spied an occupant—or at least the top of an occupant.

I love to watch the sunrise as I drive to school and pay particular attention to anything silhouetted by that rosy morning glow. Imagine my surprise last week when I spotted two backlit pointed protrusions on either side of a rounded head peeking over the edge of that raggedy, round collection of sticks. I don’t know what creature originally assembled this contraption, but this year, a great horned owl is incubating her clutch of eggs.

Seeing this sight reminded me of a pair of great horned owls that spent much of late January and early February whispering sweet nothings to one another outside the bedroom window of our previous home. Once they’d mated, silence reigned until their eggs hatched in March. Then noise levels increased astronomically as hungry babies competed loudly for the first serving of regurgitated bunnies or other prairie delicacies. After they’d eaten, I’d often fall asleep listening to mom murmuring whooty nursery rhymes to soothe her offspring.

Happy to spot this new owl incubating eggs, I’m hoping the latest cold spell hasn’t put a damper on her nesting inclinations. I’m eager to observe mom and her offspring as days get warmer and the owlets grow big enough to fledge. If I’m lucky, that tree won’t leaf out before I drive by of a morning to see young birds perched on the edge of the nest, flapping wings as they mature.

Considering its location, I wonder if this is the owl or its mate that I saw last fall atop power poles that line that section of road. Usually, the big bird was just a black outline against the sky, but every now and then, I’d see it framed in my headlights as it dove after a rodent racing across the asphalt. 

Who knows how much longer I’ll be able to watch this new family in the making. Until either they fly away or unfurling leaves hide their home, I’ll appreciate this view twice a day, Monday through Friday. Those who say Kansas is boring haven’t discovered the treasures tucked into our landscape.

Gatherin’ Place

Some people like cities. They like the anonymity of blending into a crowd. They like choosing where to shop, dine, and have fun. Being unknown to a server is a relief rather than a blessing. For these folks, the intimacy of living in a small town where everyone knows your name and your business is too personal. On the other hand, there are people like me who love going into a local eatery where the wait staff knows my name and what I’m going to order. These establishments are the heartbeat of tiny towns.

In the same way that local schools weave together the warp and weft of a community , the local gatherin’ place—coffee shop—hometown restaurant-- links people’s lives like a quilter stitching one block to another or tying the top to the lining. It creates beauty and stability. Comings and goings at the local java stop establish a rhythm that outsiders soon learn so they too can join the club.

Area residents gather before hitting the office, their fields, or pastures. It’s good to down a cup or two of coffee while checking in with neighbors. It’s site for a mid-morning Bible study to gather.  It’s a place the Lions, Rotary, and Kiwanis meet, share a meal, and settle business in the middle of the day. It’s a interlude in a long afternoon.

In a world overtaken by impersonal connections these informal assemblies warm the belly and the heart as individuals look one another in the eye and ask, “What’s going on?” Then they listen. It’s sometimes the first place a person hears that someone needs help and arranges to offer aid. Somehow, it’s more powerful than reading a post on a phone or computer screen.

It’s a good place to hear who’s getting married or who had a baby, even before the preacher announces it from the pulpit or the local paper runs the article. You might find out whose heart is breaking so you can offer a meal or a kind word. People long out of the classroom and off the sporting field keep up with area youngsters’ successes. Some might say it’s gossip. I like to think it's connectedness.

Since I work, I forget how pleasant it is to join a kaffee klatch. This weekend I got  reminded how this daily ritual makes a person feel like he or she belongs. I returned to Ellis to meet a couple of friends for breakfast and a quick catch up. In Hays, we would have been anonymous. In that little town where I lived for thirty-six years, I knew everyone in the café.

A former student came to our table to introduce his little brother and girlfriend, telling them we were his former teachers. A past school board member dropped by to say hey, a neighbor from our newly wed year updated me on her life. It had been decades since we shared the same block, but we cared about what was going on in one another’s lives. It was wonderful to connect with folks who enrich my life.

It was a blessing the way that little visit reminded me that I still belonged even though I have a new address and new place to lift a cup. These little establishments are a hidden pleasure of small town living. Put this stop on your bucket list.