Long Ago & Not Far Away

I cannot believe how many years have passed by...on days like this, beautiful June sunny days I think of riding out under the sun and then I remember no, those days are gone, but boy I wish they weren't. 

I can still smell my horse's sweat and the leather of the saddle. 

Sarina, knee deep in clover, alfalfa, and timothy.

Summer 1973, it was her first day at our place in the new pasture that Dad & Ed Falk helped put up corner posts on. The tiny barn that was once my grandparents' garage up here then down at their uptown home, now brought back to where it started...but this time on the old barn's foundation - with a fresh coat of oil-based paint courtesy of my Dad.

Dad was my right-hand man in getting everything ready for my dream-come-true that I had worked so hard to save money for ...

a HORSE!

Running Away from Home

I was about 6 years old, and I was really mad at my mother.  I don't remember why I was mad, but I was so upset that I wanted her to be very worried about me.

I ran out of the house, grabbed my red tricycle, and started madly peddling down the gravel road towards Grandma's house. Halfway there, I realized that Mom would likely check for me there first thing.  So I thought I'd really outfox her, and went into the big ditch and hid in some trees.  It seemed like it took her a long time, but soon she walked past me on her way up town. 

I waited as she inevitably came back. As she walked past the area I hid within, I could hear her say, "I am so sad.  I hope Patricia comes home soon..."  I almost spoke up, but I was a very stubborn little girl,and held onto my anger.  After she left for home, I waited to make sure she was really gone.

I struggled to drag my trike back to the road, but I did it.  On to Grandma's house!  When I got there a couple of minutes later, I ran into the front porch, letting the wooden screen door slam behind me. Inside, Grandma was in the kitchen.  I don't really remember a lot after that, except that once there, I felt home-free.  I had accomplished my goals:  I ran away, and I worried my Mom.  I was satisfied.  I obviously got picked up at some point and brought home.  But in the meantime, I may have managed to wrangle an overnight at Grandma's house with homemade hot cocoa and brown sugar toast in the morning...

Idyllic Summers

This song got me through one of my first periods of depression when I was attending NDSU in the fall of 1977. My dorm room mate was my best friend Kathy. I listened to this song over and over again, because it spoke to me with it's melancholy melody, and lyrics that reminded me so much of parts of my life at that time. "...riding on the roadside..." was to me, the idyllic summers my friend and I had riding our horses day after day, with no cares at all. We knew at the time it wouldn't last, so we drank it in and treasured it, even as it was happening. Days and days of sunshine, wind, and open prairie, cantering and galloping across the fields and dirt roads. This song brings it all back to me...

Old Homes are Old Friends

The house I grew up in.  The section far to the right was all that was originally built by
my grandparents in 1906.  The rest has been added on over the years.  Every time I go
by and visit the house, I almost think my parents are going to come up to hug me...

I grew up in a very old house that leaned and creaked and had strange smells, but I wouldn't trade it for the world. I loved it.

I am once again in an old "home with character".  I sometimes have little plants struggling through the cracks in the basement concrete by the washing machine, and herds of Daddy Long-legs living in the bathroom, as well as a colony of ladybugs hanging out pretty much everywhere they want to.  Many things don't work quite right, and it takes a lot of love and care, but that's alright.  I can relate.