To A Child Love Is Spelled T-I-M-E

The following story is actually an excerpt from
"To A Child Love Is Spelled T-I-M-E" by Mac Anderson.

It touched me, and I think it is a great reminder to us who have children and grandchildren that things might not always be as we think. It is a great example of what we might think as unimportant may be very important to someone else. I hope you enjoy it.


In the faint light of the attic, an old man, tall and stooped, bent his great frame and made his way to a stack of boxes that sat near one of the little half-windows. Brushing aside a wisp of cobwebs, he tilted the top box toward the light and began to carefully lift out one old photograph album after another. Eyes once bright but now dim searched longingly for the source that had drawn him here.

It began with the fond recollection of the love of his life, long gone, and somewhere in these albums was a photo of her he hoped to rediscover. Silent as a mouse, he patiently opened the long buried treasures and soon was lost in a sea of memories. Although his world had not stopped spinning when his wife left it, the past was more alive in his heart than his present aloneness.

Setting aside one of the dusty albums, he pulled from the box what appeared to be a journal from his grown son's childhood. He could not recall ever having seen it before, or that his son had ever kept a journal. Why did Elizabeth always save the children's old junk? he wondered, shaking his white head.

Opening the yellowed pages, he glanced over a short reading, and his lips curved in an unconscious smile. Even his eyes brightened as he read the words that spoke clear and sweet to his soul. It was the voice of the little boy who had grown up far too fast in this very house, and whose voice had grown fainter and fainter over the years. In the utter silence of the attic, the words of a guileless six-year-old worked their magic and carried the old man back to a time almost totally forgotten.

Entry after entry stirred a sentimental hunger in his heart like the longing a gardener feels in the winter for the fragrance of spring flowers. But it was accompanied by the painful memory that his son's simple recollections of those days were far different from his own. But how different?

Reminded that he had kept a daily journal of his business activities over the years, he closed his son's journal and turned to leave, having forgotten the cherished photo that originally triggered his search. Hunched over to keep from bumping his head on the rafters, the old man stepped to the wooden stairway and made his descent, then headed down a carpeted stairway that led to the den.

Opening a glass cabinet door, he reached in and pulled out an old business journal. Turning, he sat down at his desk and placed the two journals beside each other. His was leather-bound and engraved neatly with his name in gold, while his son's was tattered and the name Jimmy had been nearly scuffed from its surface. He ran a long skinny finger over the letters, as though he could restore what had been worn away with time and use.

As he opened his journal, the old man's eyes fell upon an inscription that stood out because it was so brief in comparison to other days. In his own neat handwriting were these words:

Wasted the whole day fishing with Jimmy.
Didn't catch a thing.

With a deep sigh and a shaking hand, he took Jimmy's journal and found the boy's entry for the same day, June 4. Large scrawling letters, pressed deeply into the paper, read:

Went fishing with my Dad.
Best day of my life.

"Life Is Good If You Let It."

Roughing It

A post on my son's blog, http://morewordstoponder.blogspot.com/ , made me think of the times that I have "roughed it" out camping.

The first thought finds me and a couple of friends out elk hunting North of Buena Vista, CO. It was the first gun season which usually opens up around the first of October. At this time in the Rockies the weather can be anything from temps in the 80s to many feet of snow. This instance is about the later.


We had watched the weather report and knew that we could possible get a couple of feet of snow in the high country. We were sleeping in my wall tent that was several years old but in very good shape. Our worry was that it was all canvass and would not shed snow very well. We decided to make a rain/snow fly out of a tarp. Those of you who tent now days know what a rain fly is. While this ended up to be a great idea it still did not shed the snow very well. I woke up early in the morning, or late evening, and noticed that the roof was sagging in about a foot or so. I went outside to about a foot of snow everywhere. All this weight on the roof was minutes away from collapsing the tent. Using a pine bow I scraped as much snow from the roof as I could. The problem was that it was snowing so hard that by the time I was done there was about 3 more inches that had built up. For the remainder of the night, we took turns going outside and scraping the snow off the roof. At least the tarp protected the canvass and we stayed dry. At least we all had good sleeping bags. Mine was good to 10 below 0. By day light we had a little over 2 feet of snow. Getting down the mountain is another blog.



The other time I think about was deer hunting in western ND. As you ND people know, this takes place in November where you again can expect any kind of weather Mother Nature wants to throw at you. This particular trip finds us camping out in a tent trailer equipped with a furnace. WOW, you might say, this isn't roughing it! Well let me finish. After a day of hunting and eating our dinner it was time to turn in. The temperature was somewhere South of the 0 mark and the wind was blowing as it can in ND. My hunting partner and I proceeded to get ready for bed. Both of us had sleeping bags that were good to about freezing and that was it. So,,,, with this in mind, we undressed, added another layer of underwear, a pair of jeans, T-shirt, long sleeve T-shirt, 2 sweatshirts, snowmobile suit, 2 pair of socks, stocking cap, and finally our hunting jackets. I now had on about twice as many clothes as I had hunted in that day. (In fact I didn't have many clothes left to put on.) Now some of you may think that it couldn't have been that bad with a furnace. Let me explain. On top of the furnace was a counter. On top of the counter we placed our dirty dishes in a pot with a bottle of dish soap and water. Keep in mind that this is the warmest place in the camper. The next morning the water was frozen along with the bottle of soap. We were so cold that we didn't even bother to cook breakfast. We just jumped in the truck, thanks to the Lord it started, and we proceeded to warm up. Needless to say, we did a little road hunting that day. Thinking about this one still makes me shiver.


Soooooo, say what you want about my RV now that comes with insulation, furnace, and TV. I paid my dues. Been there done that!


"Life Is Good If You Let It."

A Green Desert

I am very blessed to live on the edge of Tucson Mountain Park. Just at the end of my street is one of the many gates that allow access to the park. Tucson Mountain Park is part of the Sonoran Desert. I know when people come to visit us the first time they are usually amazed that a desert can actually be green. The Sonoran Desert is just that. While the soil is mostly rock and sand all of the plant life is green.

My battle of the bulge requires me to get out and do some physical exercise once in a while so come and join me as I take an early morning walk in the park in April of 2010. I usually make a loop that takes me behind the ridge you see in the above photo and then down through a wash and back on another trail that comes out just a couple of hundred yards from where I went in. The walk usually takes about 45 minutes. I walk to the end of the street and enter the park on the "John Krein Trail". This is named after a neighbor who used to walk these trails with my Dad.


While I am not an expert on plants I will do my best to explain what we see as we take this walk in one of God's amazing places on this earth. While there are a few plants blooming right now the desert is pretty much green like this all year around. The main trees you see are the Palo Verde. The leaves are so small that you need to be within a foot or so to see them. What is amazing about this tree is that the bark is green. This tree has the same ability to create chlorophyll through its bark like most trees do through their leaves. The leaves are small so that they don't need as much water to survive. This is true with a lot of the plants here as we get little rain. One of the next fairly large plants that we see is the Ocotillo. This is also known as the Hummingbird Bush as it always blooms in April when the majority of the hummingbirds are on their way up North.


The Ocotillo is the plant in the right side of the picture with all of the whip-like looking branches. During a year when it gets plenty of moisture it will sprout leaves plus the red blooms at the end of each branch. During dry years it will not grow leaves but will always have blossoms. The leaves again are small but larger than the Palo Verde tree. The Ocotillo branches are very thorny. Much care must be taken when getting close.


In this next picture you can see the leaves and blooms but you can't really see the thorns.

The next plant we see a lot of is the Prickly Pear Cactus. There are many varieties of the Prickly Pear. (Clock-face, Beavertail, Tuberous, Purple, and the list goes on.) These haven't started blooming yet but will have very pretty flowers when they do. The flowers are different colors depending on the variety of Prickly Pear.


You can see the buds of the flowers on the top edge of the petals. After the flowers are done blooming these buds fall off. They are red in color and almost look like a flower also. We have friends that boil these up and make the best prickly pear jelly that I have ever tasted. We are currently on our second pint of jelly. (Now you know why I need to exercise.) If you look close at this picture of a Prickly Pear you will see that it has a plant growing in the middle of it. It is a Fairy Duster and is currently blooming. It has light pink flowers that look like a duster. Its real name is Calliandra eriophylla and now you know why everyone calls it a Fairy Duster.



The next plant we see on our walk is the Creosote Bush. Where it got it's name, I don't know. When I think of creosote, I think of the black smelly stuff we used to treat fence posts with so they wouldn't rot off in the ground. As you can see this bush is a lot prettier than that description. It reminds me of a yellow daisy. These are in full bloom now and you can see lots of them from the trail, as you see in the next picture.


We are now at the highest point of our journey and we have walked to the back side of the ridge in the first picture. This picture was taken from the trail looking across a wash. A wash for you non-desert people is a dry river bed. We have lots of these that are usually dry but during the summer monsoons they can fill with water. That's right, monsoons. During July and August we get the majority of our yearly rain. The rain storms usually will only last 10-15 minutes or so but we can get close to an inch of rain in that time.


The next plant/tree we will talk about is the Saguaro. Pronounced "saw war o". It is probably the most famous cactus and one of the most filmed. We all remember this cactus in a lot of the old westerns. They grow very slowly and can live to be over a 100 years old. They are protected and only grow in two areas of North America. From Tucson South into Mexico and there is also another area outside of Phoenix. No one really knows why some of them have arms and some don't. Supposedly they have to be over 70 years old to grow arms. They are a true example of a desert plant that stores water. If you look close you can see the the skin on the outside looks like an accordion bellow. This is so when the cactus fill up with water it can stretch out and as it uses the water it shrinks back again. Under the skin are actual wooden ribs with a pulpy type center.


The above picture is of a Saguaro that has died. You can see the ribs that are left. the Saguaro has white flowers when it blooms. While they are not blooming now I did take a picture of one that has buds on it that will become flowers when they open. These are the little wart like looking things on the top of the Saguaro in the picture below. These will be blooming in a couple of weeks.


Just so you can see what the flowers look like, the picture below is one Brenda took last year of one of the Saguaros in our front yard. It was the first year that they had flowered so we were kind of excited about it.


They have to be several years old before they flower. While the Saguaros are protected, developers can acquire a permit to move them and then replant them. The two that we planted in front of our house were two of those. They were about 3 foot and 4 foot tall when we planted them in 2001 and are now about 8 foot and 9 foot. Everything I have read says they don't grow this fast but our growth rate is probably due to the fact that they are getting water from other plants around them that are on my irrigation system. They say that if a Saguaro is over 5 feet tall the chance of surviving a transplant is slim. Their root system usually expands from the base a distance twice the height of the cactus. This means that when they get transplanted you lose most of this root system. If the cactus is large it will not survive. This fact is also why you should not water them by hand. If you water just the base of the plant only certain parts of it will get the water. that part of the plant will then think that it has plenty of water and the parts that don't get the water will die off.


The next couple of pictures are just scenery as we start to walk towards home. Those of you who like the outdoors should understand why I love this area so much. The more I read and learn about the plants and animals that live here the more amazed I am.

While I wasn't able to get any good pictures of the wildlife in this park there are many. Mammals consist of: Havelina, bobcat, mountain lion, mule deer, desert hare, and coyote. Reptiles are of course the diamondback rattlesnake and many various lizards. Other than the mountain lion it is not uncommon to see most of these on a walk. I have gone early in the morning and counted up to 25 mule deer on one walk.

The next plant we come upon is the Strawberry Hedgehog. This is a small cactus where many tubes grows out of one base. This one is blooming and has has some pretty cool flowers. It is amazing to me how something so full of stickers can be this pretty. Don't get your nose too close when trying to smell the flowers!

This next picture shows a Teddy Bear Cholla. Its real name is "Opuntia bigelovii". (I know, who ever came up with these real names, what were they thinking?) Don't let the name on this one fool you either. It is also called the jumping cholla because you can walk by it and it seems to jump out and latch on to you.

Once impaled to your arm, back, or what ever it is almost impossible to get rid of because it will then stick to what ever you grab it with. What really happens is that when you walk by one, the wind or breeze you create when walking by can be enough to knock one of the small branches off. This is why it is said that it jumps on you. I always take a metal dog comb with me when walking. This works really well when dislodging one of these cactus from your arm, leg, or whatever. You will see a few of these laying on the trail and you want to make sure you don't make the same mistake most people make, including yours truly, and kick it out of the way. It will impale itself into your boot. If you have sneakers on or some other light shoe you are really in trouble as it will go right through and find your toes, guaranteed.

This picture doesn't really show what I hoped probably because the photographer wasn't that good. When the Octillo's leaves start to turn they become a light orange/red. When the morning sun hits them they just glow. Anyway you can kind of see the color but the glow does not show up in this picture.


Well if you look close in the middle of this picture you will see the roof tops of houses. Yes, that means our walk is coming to it's end. I don't think I got as much exercise as normal stopping to take all of these pictures, but it was sure more fun. I hope you enjoyed yourself as much as I did. Thanks for coming with!


I will leave you with one last picture. To me, this Saguaro seems to be giving us the Peace sign. So from me to you.... God's Peace and Blessings......

"Life Is Good If You Let It".