A Different Life II

[Lily&Me]

This was us, now me..

[Lily&Me]

I like this one, too...

[Lily&Me]

And, this one...

[Gearheart]

You picked a good time to get out of Dodge. It's c-c-c-cold and snowing pretty hard right now. We had a flash freeze on Sun night as the rain turned to snow in an instant and the wind just howled.

[switz]

You may need to hose the roof off as the duck "calling cards" can eat through the paint.

[Lily&Me]

I was concerned about exactly that.

It will have to wait til the weather breaks, tho. Cold enough here at night that there will be no hosing of anything,

Doug-the-driver took us south in snow, ice, and all manner of inclement weather....me, no thank you. Important to know ones limits.

Lily has had a good run, a batch of DO-bread-to-be-turned-into-pan-bread is mixed and rising, and oatmeal is for breakfast.

Now in the Eastern time zone, my body will stay on Central time while everything else just becomes an hour later.


Maggie

[ColoradoLady]

Originally Posted by Lily&Me

And, this one...

Maggie, this one is spot on! I agree 100%. If we stay within that comfort zone....we ARE NOT really living! Yes, at times, one needs to dig a little deeper to find that sense of bravado....especially as one grows older, (and older, and....)! But, once we do we experience LIFE...and the payoff is immeasurable. Travel on safely. Evelyn.

[Lily&Me]

Lily is always happy not to be driving...


Maggie

[Lily&Me]

We like water....

[nensihart]

Dear Maggie

Your posts are very inspiring... I came across them just now, I am a fairly new member and was doing some research on how to fix my Airstream Motorhome that I bought in Arizona and drove it back to Canada by myself, to the horror of my husband that kept telling me if I am going to get an RV, just get a small one, oh well, 36' was all that they had a the time and I fell in love with it.

I am so happy that you have kept on RV'ing and have not given up on your adventures,
it's better then sitting at home.

I am very new to this forum and hopefully I will try and get my husband out to a rally,
That is after I renovate the RV which is mostly in my living room right now waiting for new upholstery, mind you that is only the easy part, the difficult part is dealing with all the damage from the leaks.......

Happy Airstreaming.....




Nensi (Nancy)
Vancouver Island, British Columbia
Canada

[Lily&Me]

Hi, Nancy, and thank you.

A group of we (mostly) women are gathering the second weekend in September at Fort Stevens State Park in Astoria, Oregon, if you are interested in driving down to join us. ???

It is a women's gathering, but spouses are not prohibited and at least one is tagging along.

We will be in or near L Loop, where there are also cabins and yurts for rent....some will be sans trailer.

We're going to sit around and talk, perhaps do some hiking and exploring of the area.....we might cook a bit, will surely share some wine....whatever we feel like doing.

The link to that thread is here:

http://www.airforums.com/forums/f47/...-a-144837.html


Thanks for dropping in.


Maggie

[Lily&Me]

It always takes me several days, at the beginning of each long trip, to transition to living in the Interstate.....then, pretty much daily activities as they are at home, just in a more scenic location.

Sip my coffee while watching the morning news, walk Miss Lily (extra of that), crochet, cook a bit, read, crochet some more.

If I didn't crochet, I would have had to find some similar hobby to fill my retirement time.

Making scarves and ear warmers this trip, for whatever shelter or soup kitchen I come across......taking a break from prayer shawls. and hoping to use up all the partial skeins of yarn I brought along.

Then, I can buy more.

Water, like fire, has entertainment value in its own right.

Being by water, anywhere, for a landlocked person like me, is a privilege.

Add the sun shining on said water, and it is like nothing else.....


Maggie

[Lily&Me]

At the weekly needlework group I visit when I am home, people periodically drop off piles of yarn and crochet/knitting needles, unwanted from someone's estate....which are then free for the taking, for anyone present.

I picked this yarn up some time ago....one of those beautiful, expensive, variegated cottons I seldom indulge in...and made an ear warmer for my donation bag out of it yesterday.

Working the colors up, I decided I just had to have something for myself out of this, as well, so a couple of dishcloths should finish it off.

Some of these variegated colors are so beautiful, they make you you want to crawl inside them and wrap yourself up.


Maggie

[DIR1]

Oh!! I love those colors!!! be sure to check out the Wind River Valley when you're doing this coming western trip... kinda looks like that!!! I don't crochet or knit.. yet, maybe some day... but I bought yarn in those colors and paid a nice LOL to crochet an afghan for me years ago... I wonder where I have that packed??? Good morning Maggie, I'm sure enjoying your trip!!! Yes, water is the thing... I have a bay view from my window and the ocean just over the hill... a happy camper... hugs and love, Pats for Lily... gail

[Lily&Me]

Hi Gail!

The colors are softer, less vivid, than the photo shows, but remind me of desert flowers, the southwest....something. So gorgeous.

I tend to do dishcloths and pot holders in warmer weather, and to foist them off on those I gather with, so you will get a few somethings when I see you this year, I am sure.


Maggie

[ColoradoLady]

Good morning, Maggie.
The colors in that photo are a lovely combination...very cheery.
I agree, there is something about water.....serene, calming. I, too, am landlocked...and look for water to photograph.....lakes, streams, waterfalls, oceans. I enjoy painting them all and use my photos as subject material....all my paintings have water in them.

Since I have never been to the west coast....the ocean and the scenery of Oregon, Washington...have been a big draw for me for many years. This year, I finally get to fulfill that wish. Yeaaaah! See you in the fall. Evelyn.

[Lily&Me]

Hi Evelyn!

Yes, I believe the trip to the west coast will be grand, and we already have a good gathering planned at Fort Stevens.

Gail, I think the Wind River area is a boondocking destination for Ray Eklund's trip I am going on.....if not, will be sure to check it out.

Having an especially beautiful day here, and Lily has already had two long walks....she comes back, takes a nap, then starts asking for the next one.

At close to 60 degrees, going to open things up in a bit, shake the rugs out and do a bit of cleaning.

Tomorrow.....laundry, and the purchase of a new sewer hose.


Maggie

[Lily&Me]

Laundry done, propane filled....3.6 gal, @ "about" $3/gal, "how 'bout $10 for that?"....cash, no receipt. ....a few groceries, and new sewer hose , tanks emptied, fresh water tank filled.

It's fixin' to get cold, and prepared are I.

I bought a more expensive sewer hose, that expands to 15' and swivels, still had a devil of a time getting it connected. I remember Doug laying on the ground sometimes to attach that damn thing.

A full day in 4 1/2 hours, and it rained hard almost all of that time. I looked and felt like a drowned rat, warranting a second look by the grizzled man who filled my propane. I know, I said.

Lily is not interested in taking care of business in the rain.....she takes one look, and refuses to go out. If I insist she go out, she comes right back in. I can't make her pee.

Once the laundry was started, about 11am...15 hours since she had last been out ...I put her on her leash, walked her in the rain and told her she could go back inside when she went potty. And, she did. Booger dog.

We used to call these "town days"....choring in town, usually ended by a meal...and perhaps a drink...in a restaurant. The before days. Sigh.

I am acutely aware that the chores of travel that we did together, I now do alone, and it feels burdensome sometimes, but I remind myself 'tis the price one pays for being able to do this....and no self pity is allowed.

Would have liked to have found a liquor store, as I left the Jameson at home and a hot whiskey would taste really good, but I did not, and the grocery stores only sell wine and beer.

Wine will have to do.


Maggie

[Lily&Me]

I happened upon a PBS documentary this morning about the post-Civil War efforts, largely by organizations of women, to locate and properly bury the Confederate dead, who were scattered....buried or not....on and around the battlefields.....the Confederate dead who were overlooked by the Northern efforts to retrieve their own, and whose "own" didn't have the funds after the war for similar, organized efforts.

Ladies' Memorial Associations

It was very interesting, and very, very sad.

Several years ago, Doug and I visited the Antietam Battlefield, and also saw...only from the end of the lane....a home that was used as a hospital during that battle....the home still lived in and closed to visitors.

My CSA great-uncle was in the Washington Artillery, was wounded in some skirmishing the day before the main battle, and died at this home-turned-hospital the next day.

According to records held by the Battlefield, he was buried along a fence line near the home, if I recall correctly.....then dug up at some later point in time, along with thousands of Confederate others, and moved to unmarked graves elsewhere in the North.

Lots of ill feelings, and not a lot of compassion, toward Confederates after the War.

According to the NPS fellow I spoke with there, " he was known going into the ground, he was unknown coming out", so no way to identify which of several northern cemeteries his remains were taken to.

No one left at home to go looking for his body and bring him home after the battle, his only surviving sibling also serving in the CSA, and all other family members dead of disease in Germany or NOLA.....but for their pacifist father, who returned to Germany for the duration of the war, leaving his only surviving children......fighting and alone.

Unlike a cousin, who died at the Battle of Franklin, and whose slave...who had been with him throughout his life and accompanied him to war...buried him near the battlefield, marked the grave, then walked home to Southern Mississippi to get the father and uncle (my great-great grandfather) to bring his body home and bury him in the family cemetery....on the hill behind the house completed in 1818, which still stands and which I was able to go into for the first time about a year ago. Much of it still original, floorboards my ancestors walked on, porches where they laid out their dead, etc.

The more I read and learn of the Civil War, and I'm always learning something, the more felt is the incredible carnage and devastation.... a war fought on our own soil, between our own people.

Talking with the man at the hardware store in TN the other day, something got us onto the Civil War, and he said bodies and artifacts still turn up on a regular basis around there.

A local man not long ago had found a belt with buckle, still attached to the severed leg where it had been used as a tourniquet. The rest of the body was nearby, was eventually identified as a Union soldier and returned North to be buried with his comrades.

It breaks my heart, and gives me a knot in my stomach.

I am fortunate to have so much family history, and to have been able to be to so many ancestral areas, but they connect me so to all of it as to make it feel more present than past.

There's just something about the South....so much happened here, so many struggles and lives lost, regardless which side one was on.

It is everywhere, and like being surrounded by ghosts....I feel it, and understand more and more why it is so hard for native-born Southerners....whose very own fought and died on these grounds..to let go.

That's me, today....steeped in Civil War history.


Maggie

[mimiandrews]

You're right, Maggie. The civil war was and is about so much more than the issue of slavery. That issue might have been the trigger, but your ancestors and mine were very soon fighting to defend home and country--and often family who was on the property at the time. I have seen photocopies of a map my great grandfather drew of the battlefield at Shiloh. He was from Mississippi--can't spell the county, I'll have to look it up. All my dad's side of the family were surveyors and cartographers.