A SIMPLE SILLY DAY AT THE FARM...

The best things in life are silly.

-Scott Adams-

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend! We had a busy one that's for sure. You might remember from a recent post how Handy Hubby and I had a hard time relaxing at the farm. That wasn't quite the case on a recent trip up. We spent some time outside mostly just hanging around...Thought about pullin' some weeds...But it was too hot! So we took a que from the cows...And headed off to the old swimmin' hole! On the way over we passed the old West place and I had to do a double take...They had sold it to a mule!Like most country folks long about this time of day he was enjoyin' restin' in the shade of the porch. He was a friendly sort of fellow and came out to greet us...You don't get much traffic on this back road, so, if someone is neighborly enough to stop, you brave the heat as you and your buddy mosey up to the fence to shoot the breeze...His friend was a chatty sort, nickering and neighing his thanks for the sugar lumps I shared with him...We'd been sittin' in the sun for a bit and the call of the cool creek was starting to sound mighty good...Hot and parched we waded right into the icy spring fed water where little slivers of silver minnows tickled our toes...And crawdads hid in the creek bed stones...The lure of the deeper shaded pool where the leaf boats floated called for us to slide under its cool surface...Sitting up to our necks on the rock ledge, we watched an amazing amount of butterflies dance across the surface...We sunned ourselves dry on the warm stony banks then decided to head back as the shadows grew long and the cows began to return home to feed...After supper we sat on the porch and watched the Four O'clocks unfold while the Hummingbird Moths sipped their nectar...We watched in silence as the faint outline of the moon appeared and began to pull itself up from behind the mountain...Disentangling itself from the tree line in a matter of seconds...Floating freely... Where it hung itself high in the dusky evening sky...It hovered in the distance over the back pasture dotted with grazing cattle... As a nursery rhyme ran through my mind, " Hey diddle diddle, the cat and the fiddle, the cow jumped over the moon, the little dog laughed to see such a sport, and the dish ran away with the spoon." A simple silly rhyme, fitting for a simple silly day spent in simple silly ways. We continued to sit in one anothers quite company as the sun set before us and the moon rose behind us...Until the evening mountain air chilled us and the dark of the night blanketed us, waiting for the sound that signaled the end of the day. Not the Nightingale or the Red Winged Blackbird and their melodious trills at eventide but the hair raising howling that sends shivers up your spine and prickles across your skin, the call of the Coyotes bouncing off the mountains, echoing up through the hollows, being carried on the evening breeze. It begins with a yip that slowly builds into a howling yowl in the far distance. Then the call is answered to your right and your left until you are encircled in it sound not discerning if these creatures of the night are near or far.

Almost as suddenly as it starts it abruptly ends with a stony silence that is gradually being filled up with twinkling stars, bull frogs croaking on the pond banks out back, the cicadas begin to sing as the crickets and grasshoppers softly saw away at their twilight song. Sounds of comfort accompanied by the whispering leaves of the silver leaved maples and the swishing rustle of the pine boughs overhead. Mosquito's begin to nip and it is time to turn the page of the ending day and close the cover on a simple silly day spent at play at the farm.

Blessings,

Miss Sandy