Back from my bucolic past!


We just got back from a quick trip to Indiana for a graduation party for my cousin's son, Scott. It was a family kind of thing, and on the way over, Greg and I took state route 224 across central Ohio instead of taking the turnpike. We did this partly to avoid the tolls and partly because we needed to go to Markle, Indiana, to visit the cemetery where a good number of my family on my dad's side are buried. As part of the bargain, we drove through a lot of the farming communities where I grew up; and at this time of the year, they were busy getting crops in and making sure tender seedlings were ready to grow.


The theme of the day on this beautiful Saturday morning in early June seemed to be "John Deere Rules." Instead of the SUV's and BMW's of suburbia, the 2-lane road will filled with pickup trucks and farm machinery of every type and size. Besides the tractors on the road, the farm yards were filled with horses and cows and chickens and an amazing number of clotheslines full of blue jeans and overalls and towels. This made me laugh at the memory of drying laundry outside. It is the true test of a person tough enough to live in the country! If you have ever dried off with a towel that is dried outside on the clothesline, you know that it is an invigorating experience. :-)



I really enjoyed driving through the small towns with big churches on the main street and all the stores closed up by 9 o'clock on a Saturday night. I had forgotten that the 24-hour convenience store is pretty useless in a town where you can just go next door and borrow whatever you need after the stores are closed. And the store owners go home to their families and let you worry about your midnight craving for pizza rolls.


Here are a few photos to further explain the nostalgia. First, doesn't everybody want to know that your grandparents are resting under a tree in a cemetery near their parents and the rest of their family?

When you get in your car to go to church or to hop over to the next town to pick up something at the hardware or the Tractor Supply Company, people don't get too upset about waiting a few minutes for a train to pass. Counting and cars and wondering what's in them is entertainment enough, and it isn't inconvenient or stressful because the sun won't go down for hours anyway.

In the country, even the people who don't work on the farm anymore but have jobs where they wear business casual clothes and stay in the air conditioning and worry about the computers that keep track of your medical records can find time to be with the family on a Saturday afternoon.

Congratulations to Scott, our newest high school graduate, who will be headed off to Indiana University in the fall to study history. It was really great to see all the cousins and aunts and uncles and parents and brothers and . . . well, everybody. Even though we don't see you often, you are always and forever our family. And there is still a lot of the country in us---thank goodness!

Until next time . . . .