November!

November has arrived, which hardly seems possible. We have been staying too busy, but are grateful for many friends and much work. Specifically, we are glad that we are still able to do work.

We had a road trip to Perryville, Missouri last week, for Harry to present a sculpture concept. It was a nice, cloudy day, and not too hot, so the dogs were delighted to accompany us. The meeting location was the American Tractor Museum, and I expected to wait in the car with the dogs. As it happened, Harry told me to come into the building, because the collection was impressive. He was right. There were scores of antique tractors, beautifully restored and all of them worked. I cannot do justice to the extraordinary exhibits, including a thresher made in Cape Girardeau, Missouri in 1898. Perryville is a remarkable town of fewer than 9,000 people, but with many interesting tourist attractions. Not least of which is Missouri’s National Veterans’ Memorial, with a full size replica of the Vietnam Memorial Wall.

On the way home, we stopped off in Ozora, Missouri, where my friend Ann Miller Roth is buried with her husband, Jerry (Jack). They died in a car crash on November 13, 1988. They were living in Florida at the time, both of them veterinarians at The University in Gainesville, but they had lived in Ste. Genevieve, and they are resting near there, in a beautiful churchyard now.

The General departed to become bronze last week. Vlad came to get him with Daniel and Ryan as helpers. They enjoyed seeing the horses, while Vlad did much of the work. The first thing he did was to decapitate the general, but we know he will put him back together again.

The Sisyphean fencing work continues around here, but the pleasant autumn weather makes working outside quite pleasant. Work around the farm and social obligations have interfered with our riding recently, but the horses are quite happy and are now on daytime turnout.

The dogs and cats are well. Eddy keeps us laughing and never runs out of energy. Weedy is very Zen, and dreads the camera.

The leaves were remarkably pretty this year, despite the drought. We had a couple of days of wind, and then, at last, some rain, and now most of the leaves are down.

My good friend, Cherie, turned 70 on October 30 and we were lucky to have birthday lunch with her. She is a few weeks older than I am, and looks half my age! We have been friends for six and a half decades.

Today, Nathaniel and I finally replaced the signs at the mailbox.

This afternoon, we had a short visit from nephews Scott and Bob. They enjoyed seeing the new grouping taking place in the studio.

A spider has set up residence in the door of the tack room. I love the orb weavers.

Be safe, be well, be grateful. Stay strong and hang on tight. Slava Ukraini! Peace.

8 thoughts on “November!”

  1. What an interesting road trip. A lovely collection of photos. I always love seeing the dogs/cats/horses and whoever else shows up! But I am fascinated by the plant (?) in the foreground of the pic of Eddy looking out the window for deer. I can’t work out of it is a plant or sculpture or combination?

  2. Love your golden Raintree. I really get into the fall foliage. Thanks for sharing some photos of beautiful trees. I bet you all miss the general plus, I bet it was hard to see him decapitated. I hope he makes it safely to his future home. I’m glad you got to go to Saint Genevieve. I used to go there a lot with Mike Roberts. It’s a darling little town.

  3. Lots of goodies, my favorites being photos of the sunset, with the trees silhouetted; but especially that marvelous photo of fuchsia. I could almost reach out and touch her. I say “her”, because it looks like a ballet dancer.

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published.