245. My Lawn

This one might sound weird, but if you think about it you’ll know it’s probably true of a lot of people: I love mowing and tending the grass of my lawn. I have never planted an entire lawn, but lately I’ve been working on the area of my lawn that was disrupted by the building of my garage. Naturally, the first thing to grow was weeds. I got some wheat straw and planted grass seed in the fall and then covered it in straw. The shaded part of the lawn had great grass. In the sunny part I got some great broad-leafed grass that ended up being wheat. So in that spot I had a great wheat crop that returned largely to weeds with a few spots of grass. I had heard from a friend that when you get a snowfall in late fall or early winter you should broadcast grass seed over the snow so that you know you have your area covered. In addition to that the seed will gradually get to the ground and germinate in the spring. So I tried that and it seemed to work fairly well, but I still have a lot of weeds mixed in. Now I’m working on that section with weed and feed and some weed spray. I prefer not to use a bunch of toxins on the grass, but I will do what I can to get good grass.

Another thing about the lawn is mowing it. I really enjoy that. In spring and early summer, it can be exacerbating because if I go anywhere I can’t keep up with it because it’s ready to mow every four or five days. The rain also interferes with keeping up because we can get spring and early summer rains for days on end. Sometimes I feel like I have to run out and mow at every break in the clouds.

And now it’s the season of watering. It’s really what I remember about summer at home: running through the sprinklers. While I don’t do that much these days, I do have my moments in the heat when I just take a step or two through the sprinkler and then laze around in a lawn chair letting the evaporation cool me. What can I say? I love taking care of my lawn.

244. Hiking

I love to hike. That was something I started loving at a very young age. I used to climb up the hills around my home as a kid. I’ve almost always lived in the mountains or very close to them, so going out to see what’s over the next hill has always been a thing I’ve loved to do.

I remember, when I was old enough to drive at fourteen, I would drive off into the woods and go for a hike. I was young and never thought that it could be dangerous, so I would go out often without telling anyone where I was going. I discovered all kinds of alpine lakes in the mountains—the Seven Devils and the Salmon River Mountains.

I also worked at the Priest River Experimental Forest and hiked into the Selkirks with friends past Upper Priest Lake toward the Canadian border. We found a little pond formed by a creek that we swam in. It’s these little discoveries that make the hikes worthwhile. I just relived part of that hike this past week, hiking to the far northern edge of Upper Priest. It was beautiful and I was able to take a quick swim in the lake and pick huckleberries on the way.

I have hiked all over places in Vermont, Maine, Oregon, Washington, Montana, California, Wyoming, Nevada, Utah, California, Arizona, Connecticut, and, of course, Idaho. I had never climbed Idaho’s highest peak until I turned fifty and had had a heart attack at 48 and bypass surgery at 49. At that point I figured I had been to the lowest point in the state and needed to see the highest at least once. I still haven’t done it again ten years later, but that’s all right because it’s quite a trip just to get there. Another great mountain top hike is Scotchman peak in the Cabinet Mountains near Clark Fork, Idaho.

All those hikes, whether alone or with friends, have given me time to see the world on foot. I’ve learned how to pack food, water, and all that I might need. It exposed me to the elements and made me think about what really matters in life and that’s important. It makes life bearable because the problems drift away and the air is clean and the world is beautiful. That’s why I love hiking.

 

243. Potlatch Days

I love Potlatch Days. That’s the community celebration of Potlatch, Idaho, the town where I have lived for the past thirty years. Little towns all over the country have their similar celebrations that welcome everyone to come celebrate their existence, but none are more fun than the towns where you live. And I live in Potlatch, Idaho. For me it’s like a big family reunion. I taught school high school English here for 27 years and I’ve been coaching here for all 30. I know nearly everyone and I have loved being here with all of them.

This year I started the celebration by running the beer mile relay. In years past I have done the beer mile, but that is just miserable. You chug a beer, run a quarter mile and repeat until you have run a mile. Chugging four beers in less than fifteen minutes (yes, it really slows you down) is sickening, but one beer and one lap is doable. I was able to talk three other people into joining me and we had a competitive team, even though we got second out of two teams…

On Saturday morning I ran the fun run where I met some new people. I actually won the 5K with a time of thirty-three minutes! I was slow because I took an uphill walk break. Clearly there was little competition, though I probably would have been beaten by the woman who was pushing her baby in a stroller if she hadn’t refused to run the last part of the hill. At ten I marched in the parade with the Latah County Democrats promoting our candidates and saying hi to all kinds of people I know and love. At lunch time the whole family ate German Sausages while listening to a concert of marimba players and then fiddlers. Later I had several plunges in a dunk tank to raise money for a skate park. For the rest of the afternoon I walked around the park perusing the various vendors and observing the logging sports such as the cross cut and axe throw. A former student bought my wife and I a couple of beers and we sat in the shade drinking beer and talking with former students and making further connections. That pretty much wrapped it up for me because I was beat, but the celebrations continued. I had a great time and I always do. I think Potlatch Days is one of the best celebrations of the year. 

242. Art

I like art. Our world has the capacity to be seen in a zillion different ways and I use that verb “seen” loosely because it’s more properly interpreted as experience. My forms of art that I like to employ are speaking, writing, and phone photography. So when I say I like art I’m not speaking strictly of visual arts, but for this entry that’s what I want to focus on.

This past month we went to Seattle for the Fourth of July and the days following. One day we went to the SAM Sculpture Gardens. There are several pieces of art there that are striking, foremost of which is Echo, a large statue of a face seemingly gender neutral, but it should be a woman since it’s based upon the Greek myth. There is no hair and the eyes and mouth are closed. It’s very tall and pillar shaped, or so it appears from the back. I just wanted to see it from every angle. I’m very familiar with the myth and I wanted to see the myth in the statue after having observed it already from several angles before I even knew what it was called.

That’s just one example of art that intrigued me. I also like to take photographs with my pone. I like to look at things that we see every day and show them from a different angle so that you stop and see things from a unique perspective. The best things are flowers, landscapes, insects, and architecture for me. I find it difficult to capture people so that they don’t look scattered or awkward or that I don’t make them feel that way. I don’t have much capacity to zoom in with my phone. I also use my phone because I always have it with me.

I also love paintings. I have absolutely no patience to get myself to paint, but I certainly enjoy the paintings of others. Some of my favorites are those by my mom and various friends as well as the classic American and international artists like Trumbull, Chagall, Van Gogh, Monet and a zillion others I don’t even know by name. I just love art.