Tennessee Valley and more...

 

  This is the Clinch River on the Western face of the river, South of Tazewell, TN.  This is a place that has a lovely 4-lane highway that they insist you go 55 miles per hour on, for miles and miles and miles!  By the time you get to this place and wind your way up the hill and over the Clinch, it is an absolutely fabulous vista that you wish you had gotten there an hour and a half sooner!

  In my parents' generation, during and after World War Two, President Franklin Roosevelt put into play a series of dams and reconstructed waterways to produce hydroelectric power in Tennessee. Early in 1942, when the effort reached its peak, 12 hydroelectric projects and a steam plant were under construction.

  By the end of the war, TVA (Tennessee Valley Authority)  had completed a 650-mile (1,050-kilometer) navigation channel the length of the Tennessee River and had become the nation’s largest electricity supplier. (Thank you Wikipedia).  You can see by the pictures that I have included that it did change the face of the landscape but nearly 70 years later, it is still providing electric power, recreation and conservation, as well as beauty.

  I spent the weekend in the little town of Rogersville, TN which happened to be picked out from numerous points of interest on the map by my cousin's wife; who tired of the New York state tax base, researched all things considered for a good life and threw the dart at Rogersville, six years ago.

  She has integrated herself and heart into the local township and has acquired two business partners who opened a yarn shop (Sunny Side Yarns dot com) last April.  During the town's fall festival, I went down to sign up knitters, crocheters and people of tactile interest, and OK, tried to get a bowl of red beans and rice from a vendor but they were sold out.  No shortage of funnel cakes and LAW, LAW, LAW, such delectables as deep fried Snickers and Oreo confections.  OMG, how awful is it?  Please give me a green bean that is not deep fried!

  The crowning moment was while I was handing out business cards (Sunny Side yarns is for everyone, go in and visit!)  swagged in a flouncy knitted neck covering that I had actually knitted myself, a rather large woman, holding an even larger sandwich while on the street covered with food stuffs, asked me if I knew of a diet center in town that was rumored to be around.  "Not on this street" I said,  but she did not get the joke.

  Well, just let all that flow around you;  add in the noise of the uniform dance troops from age 3 to who knows what, and like a toddler arriving home from a birthday party, I was on total OverLoad of sensory input.

  Pullease let me slink home up I-75 and into my little cottage garden where today, it has begun to rain.  I seek peace!

  My friend whose husband got the job in Florida has packed up nearly all of her house.  I will miss her so much, and her little Sheltie, Rudy as well.  I never knew dogs knew people, before Rudy.

  All I know is that the River of Change keeps on flowing.  Sometimes it brings welcome change, sometimes, detritus of our pasts that we would rather have anchored to the bottom of the sea that should stay shipwrecked, sometimes new information and processes that we just don't quite want to tackle yet which bobble before us like a red and white fishing bobber on the pond, waiting to be overcome.

  However, it also brings hope, that river of change;  the thing not yet seen but believed for, that could happen, yes, it could.

  Cowboy called.  Son found a house, daughter is deciding what to do about college.

  I will yank some old stuff and buy some bulbs.  That always is a harbinger of hope.  In spite of the squirrels who eat them unless I cover them with pepper, in spite of rot that saturates them from the rain, I hold harmless the ways of the Universe and plant them anyway.

  We all want hope, until The Hope is accomplished here.



Following Fall in East Tennessee

  The fall non-toxic Sumac that is abundant in hillsides is identified by its red clusters of fruit called drupes (drupays).  The poisonous variety, which causes an allergic reaction like poison ivy to the skin, has white drupes.  There is both a Smooth and Staghorn variety.

  Always interesting to note what other cultures and peoples do with plants that are common to us.  The fruits can be soaked in cool water and then crushed to extract the nectar, mixed with water for a result like lemonade.  Native Americans used the dried fruits in smoking mixtures, so, here's my unprofessional advice:  just look at it and enjoy its beauty! I personally don't want to try drinking or smoking it!

  Tannins can also be extracted and when applied to leather, produces a light weight, light in color product; the more well-known, morocco leather.  It can also be used as burning fuel for beekeeper's smokers.  Who knew all that?

  I just like looking at it knowing it is a sure sign of fall and I have seen it in Arkansas, Missouri, Tennessee and West Virginia in the last 8 days.

 Now usually when I get home from a trip like this, I am so glad to lay my head on my own pillow in my own bed.  Nobody banging doors in a hotel at 4:30 a.m.; you would be surprised at how many people do that in "nice" hotels. 

   I walk through my yard to see what has happened, pick up the mail at the Post Office (hardly anyone has street delivery here, don't cha know?), catch up with friends to see what has been going on in their lives.  It keeps me connected, it keeps me grounded, it keeps me knowing I am loved and cared about.

  But this time, in my absence, I had a virtual bomb waiting in the mailbox for me.  I hardly slept a wink, already being without much sleep; the joys of Horse Camp already long behind me and THEN, there is this missive.

  It was one of those ominous legal-beagle looking letters and once opened, it is the proverbial can of worms that is going to spring Trouble into your life.  "How can this be?"  "What has happened here?"  "How can I fix this?"  "OH WOE IS ME"! 

   I hesitate to open it because in my mind, I can see all the dominoes going down in a very l-o-n-g trail.  You know, the map of the United States that somebody has spent three days setting up so that we all can marvel at how long it takes for Domino One, once set in motion up there where Washington State would be on a topographical map, all the way down to Florida.  That's what I'm talking about.  Prrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrript!  And on it went.

  I tried knocking myself out for a good night's sleep with some over the counter sleep "aids".  Sheesh.  Two hours later, I'm wide awake. 

  OK, nothing for it but to get up at 3:30 and start my research of why this Horrible Thing is a mistake of someone, not me, who is meticulous about records and things but now is impacting my life with a sledge hammer, immediately and with great consequence if I don't pull some documentation out of somewhere.

  I worked on that until 5:30 a.m., slept a bit on an unacknowledged (I sent it and hope my boss who I called last night will approve it) Paid Time Off request, then hit the Court House (no, not this one, the one down the street and over 6 blocks), oh and by the way...does your town have the money-free meters installed? 

  OMG, what a nightmare.  They are not free, you have to go to a central meter, read the configuration (no change given) of how to make it work,  hope to heck you have some negotiable tender shoved down in the wallet, feed this thing that spits out a date-stamped receipt which you lay on your dashboard.

  Yikes, it is exhausting to just read about it!

  I am so g-l-a-d to get home, pull out my pictures and write about the peace that has so alluded me all day, until...until I get focused and centered about what I do have, instead of what I do not.  Until I get focused on what did not happen and could have, that the provision was present, I just had to take care of it, that I could choose to quit feeling like a victim.  Trust me, I spent most of the day feeling like it.  I had no control of the financial mess that occurred, but, I had to fix it. 

  Good thing that I am good at fixing things and that I learned one big thing today.

  It takes a while to metabolize sometimes.  It takes us awhile to absorb, accept, take stock of, then work on Bad News. 

  Do what it takes to take care of you.  Look in the mirror and say "Behold, the glory of the Lord", or, whatever works for you.  Take that dry erase marker I talked about in the blog history and write up some good reminders of who the real you is in this situation.

  Eat, rest, pray, live.  Somebody made a fortune off those simple processes.  We just have to remember to do that.

  For me, the beauty of the land that we live in helps establish and reconnect me with my Maker, with my Rescuer and Provider. 

  Stop, take a stroll, write down some blessings instead of doing all that cursing.  You use up a lot of your life's energy going down the drain on things you cannot control.

  You can control your thoughts, one thought at a time.

  Here is some more of Tennessee to enjoy.  Pictures help!  Try it!

  I will be gone for a few more days so I hope that you are having peaceful seas, until I see you again!

Emminence, MO for mo fun~

  Now this idyllic picture is a real photograph that I took just Thursday in a hidden little area near Eminence, Missouri, named Alley Springs.  The site of an old mill (see insert, right) dating back to the mid-1800's it is a testimony to "Things you cannot figure out" but "must enjoy".  Just look at the colors of the water, for Pete's sake (Who is Pete, by the way?)!  Blues and greens that are normally found only in seawater are the deepest and richest of blue and green hues.  The upper pond is so deep and clear it is truly unbelievable. 

  Surrounded by lichen covered rocks, periwinkle blue wildflowers and the sunlight that danced liked diamonds off the water, my two trail mates I stood stupefied at this natural wonder.  I would give you all the particulars, but the park pamphlet is stuffed in the belly of my car which has seen Arkansas, Missouri, now Tennessee and tomorrow, West Virginia; all since last Tuesday.

  Now this trail ride is an area that a dear friend and a few married acquaintances of mine have met at for 13 years running.  It started 50 years ago on private property is for true horse enthusiasts.  They bring their own horses in trailers and camp in the grounds for about 10 days until they pull out and then look forward to meeting again next year.

  I do not ride well, do not have my own horse but was content to soak up the atmosphere in the two days that I was there.  One day, we canoed down the Jack River which starts in that pool of water above.  No one is quite sure (even the park officials) of why the anomaly in nature has occurred but, there it is, as clear and beautiful as can be.  Locals in the 1800's harnessed it for milling flour and you can visit all the work stations on display, for free.

  The second day, while everyone else was riding, I held down the camp chair and snoozed while listening to the cacophony of Horse Camp.  When I closed my eyes, I could hear the leaves falling like rain to the ground, an occasional mule bray, the rumble of diesel trucks everywhere, the smell of woodsmoke; which smells good only until your head hits the pillow, and then I was awakened to a horse snorting just above my head.

  The perpetrator was one of the ten or so people who has met with the group for those 13 years.  Everyone was married but this fellow and me so as you can imagine, there were not too subtle seating arrangements at the table or bus from the river to get us next to each other.

  In my every day life, I have a lot of stress and am a fixer-upper of a lot of other people's trouble and derailment and while most of the time, I handle it with aplomb, there are times, like it has been in the last two weeks, that I find myself not handling the stress very well.  It was such a welcome r-e-l-i-e-f to talk to an interesting adult male just about things, about the camaraderie around the table and in the canoes floating languidly down-river, that I really enjoyed it.

  Well here's the kicker:  we live several states a part. So there was that 'bittersweet thing' in life again; I was happy to have met a very Nice Man. Two days later though, I saddled up my real life and left.

  I copied off the photographs that I had taken and sent them off to Nice Man with confidence knowing that he too, enjoyed a Nice Woman's visit and perspective in his life.

  Today, at cousin's in Tennessee, I have been taking a lot of photographs of her local scenery and indigenous plants.  I will share those with you in a few days when I finally get to rest my head upon my own bed in Kentucky.

  Until then, soak up whatever is around and in front of you.  Store up the sunshine like the squirrels who are gathering nuts so in the cold of winter, you can draw them out and be warmed all over by just the thought of the fall days.