Time

This time of the year there is never enough daylight time.  Or maybe there is and I am just wasting time.  Every morning I get on the computer to check the news, email and finally face book.  There is an hour wasted.  After coffee and breakfast it is clean up the kitchen and myself, make the bed and head outside for brush hogging, mowing, weed whacking, garden work, weed a few flower beds.  It doesn't matter what I do first it all needs to be done at one point in "time".  Lunch usually  involves computer (more wasted time) and then back to whatever was left out from the morning.  Supper is from 4:30 to 7:00 depending if one of us is in the middle of something.  This morning I made potato salad, plus a few loads of laundry before heading out. 

Back to that "time" thing.  What made me think of time?  My mom and a song today while I was in the back fields brush hogging.  The best time of my day, on the tractor and going back in "time".  I think of my mom and how she used her time wisely, she must have.  She sewed me beautiful dresses and fancy coats, crocheted doilies, knit sweaters and socks, cooked wonderful farm meals 3 times a day, baked delicious sweets and bread, kept a very clean house, milked cows morning and night and still found time to be a mom.  Her day never involved radio or tv.  If there would have been computers that would not have been in her day.  Shopping was once a week in Shinglehouse or maybe once a month in Olean.  One vacation in all my young years.  Thinking of all she did with a smile is amazing.  Consider our generation right on down.  We deserve all the good times.....right.....at least that is what we tell ourselves.  Working from dawn to dusk is not in our vocabulary now a days.  There are shopping trips, vacations, hair appointments, fingernails, toenails, facials, massages and lunch with the girls.  Because we deserve it.  Time......slips away.  The days turn into years and as I look back I wonder....was mom really happy doing all that work?  I think so, after all my happiest times are doing things around "Cook'n by the Creek".  It is like watching an old time movie playing my past, from the farm to my kids it is the best movie ever!

Now about the song.   Willie Nelson -  Funny How Time Slips Away.  Thinking of time brought back this old favorite.  It is not funny how time slips away but it is going to happen like it or not.  With out time slipping away how would we ever collect precious memories?  It is all part our life that keeps us going.

Today on the tractor was one of those.....how beautiful Clara Valley is.  The temperature was a cool 57 degrees, blue sky, warm sunshine and a brisk breeze that left my face wind burned by afternoon.  All worth it.  The leaves on the trees were fluttering and dancing around and the hay was blowing every which way looking like waves across the water.  Swallows were diving and dipping ahead of the tractor trying to catch bugs that were trying to get out of the way.  Usually a big Red Tail Hawk is hawking the field looking for mice or snakes once the hay is cut, not today.  There were two Turkey Vultures circling over head.   It made me laugh as I looked up at them and said, I may be old but not today.  They have never been a bird I enjoy seeing.  Another smile came when I caught a glimpse of our black dog Quincy running up to check on me.  He has a tough time keeping track of Dick and I if we are working in separate places.  He tends to run back and forth every so often just to make sure he knows where we are.  He hung around for a bit sniffing spot where the hay was crushed down, it was probably from a deer bedding down the night before.  Deer like to bed down in an open field,  they can see farther and get a scent from a predator that way.  From that tractor I can look up the valley, down the valley, to my right and left and all I see is high green hills and blue sky, my little heaven on Earth.  I wish everyone could feel the peace this play I call home has to offer.



At the end of the day there is always something
soothing to drink.

Breakfast is usually filling during the summer.  You never know if there
is time for lunch.  Dick had French Toast, I had an asparagus omelet and
we both had hominy and cantaloupe. 

If you have never heard of or had hominy give it a try.   Hominy can be for any meal in place of potatoes, noodles or rice.  We prefer the white hominy, drained and warmed in butter with salt and pepper.  My dad always poured warm milk and maple syrup over it for breakfast.

Take "time" to enjoy what you like to do.  Time slips away to fast.