So WordPress decided it knows better than me how I should write a post. They’ve been pushing their “BLOCK” mode on us for a long time, but there’s always been the option of continuing with “Classic.”
Until today. Apparently.
So I’m trying to figure it out. Let’s see if I can post a picture here.
So here’s a picture, but how do you make it NOT SO BIG? I’m already in trouble with storage space. What if I don’t want it this big???
Of course it’s a picture of you know who. She wouldn’t stand for anything else to be included in this experiment. I wonder if I can put a link in somehow. We’ll see how that looks….one moment please…well, that works…so I’m making progress.
Maybe I’m irritated because I’ve never liked being told what to do. Part of retirement is mostly freedom from being told how to spend my days. Mostly. There’s still Katie giving orders, but she’s cute so she gets away with it.
Anyway….I’ll post this rambling thing, I wonder if I can schedule it to post tomorrow.
(This was written in January 2012. It was sitting in my draft folder, never posted, probably because I was afraid of offending someone. Now, nine years later, the same issues are still being studied by the DOT. Other than mandating unboard recorders nothing has been accomplished there.)
Warning – this is probably not going to be politically correct. And I remind myself that what’s put out on the internet stays on the internet. Good or bad. But I’m working on truck safety stuff again, which makes me relive some of the initial moments and days after Dad’s crash. And some things just need to be said. Out loud. Emphatically.
I’m heading to Washington again, for more meetings with the DOT; Secretary LaHood, FMSCA Administrator Anne Ferro and then members of Congress, to talk about things that can be done to improve safety. Sometimes it all feels pointlessly repetitive, like we’re just wasting time, ours and theirs.
But then I remember.
I remember getting the call at work. I remember signing papers to have Dad cremated and faxing them to the funeral home from a retail UPS store the night before Christmas Eve. I remember suffering through the holiday cheer of the employees as I waited for my confirmation while trying not to cry. I remember sitting in my brother’s Alabama living room the night of Christmas Eve listening to the county coroner explain what happened. I remember not understanding.
And this is what I can tell you now that I know more, understand more.
I know that though Dad was the kind of guy that would fix things and make them better, dead is forever and dead can’t be fixed. And as much as I want to I can never make my family whole. I told my sister, a couple of years into this journey, that if we could save one life through our efforts with the Truck Safety Coalition we’d be even. She said “No we won’t.” And she’s right. We will never be even, not ever again.
So we can’t fix the fact that Dad is dead. But we can fix fatigued driving. And though common sense says that the easiest way to fix fatigued driving is to lower the number of hours a person can consecutively drive, well, maybe I’m just a naive civilian.
I received an emailed response from Administrator Ferro to my own emotional email expressing my displeasure with the new Hours of Service rule. She says, and rightly so, that reducing truck crashes will take a complicated combination of rules, a push toward safety from many fronts – and that reducing the number of allowed hours would continue to be studied. She assures me a reduction in consecutive hours of driving could still be on the table. OK. So let’s study this for another year or more. Apparently the people that will be killed by fatigued drivers during this period of study are expendable…collateral damage if you will.
Or maybe they’re just the cost of doing business. After all, the trucking industry is the backbone of our economy, don’t you know. So what’s good for the ATA (American Trucking Association) is good for all of us. Right? Well maybe good for everyone except those of us who get calls in the middle of the day, those of us signing our family member away to a funeral home, those of us left with a hole that can never be filled. Those of us angry in our grief.
I’m not apologizing for this rant. It’s your choice to read or not read. Comment or not. It wasn’t written for you. It was written for me. Because I have to go back to Washington and talk to these people again about common sense safety issues. And I shouldn’t have to. I shouldn’t have to explain simple concepts to people that are in power and are supposed to be experts in their fields. I shouldn’t have to exploit Dad’s death to get something done. I shouldn’t have to relive the whole thing over and over and over so that they can justify ‘studying’ things some more.
Give it up people. The time for studying and discussion is over. We need some action. People are dying.
Katie here, of course. It’s Saturday, March 13 and tonight mama and daddy do something called ‘spring forward.’ Huh. I don’t believe I’ve seen either one of them spring before. I’m pretty sure they’re way too old to be springing at all.
Anyway, I heard them talking about how they figured this was a great way to feed me later in the day. I start begging for my dinner about 2:30 in the afternoon and I usually wear them down between 3:30 and 4. Used to be, when mama worked a real job that I didn’t get supper till she got home, maybe 7 at night, and apparently they thought I was fine with that.
I was not fine, and since mama’s home all the time now I figure I should get my supper when I want my supper. Them thinking that they can fool me by an hour tomorrow is a hoot. Obviously they have forgotten my intelligence.
That would be a mistake.
So today mama took me to two parks! It was a beautiful day, 49 degrees (9.44C) with blue skies and no wind! We had so much fun! You aren’t seeing pictures cause mama is frustrated with her LightRoom processing stuff.
She’s filled up her alloted memory, so her cloud is full. She says she doesn’t even need to store stuff in a cloud, she stores it all on her laptop. So she has to figure out how to empty her cloud library without deleting all her stuff on her laptop before she can work on any more pictures.
Mama hates technical stuff like this.
I think this is obvious proof that mama takes too many pictures. She should learn from this and back off, especially pictures of me. Of course i like the treats involved in a photo shoot…so maybe I should reconsider that.
And mama is filling up her WordPress alloted space too. Proof, obviously, that she talks too much. Maybe she should just take a break. I’d vote for that as long as she uses all the extra time she’d have taking me to parks and on adventures.
What do you think, should she focus entirely on me and let the rest of the stuff go? Inquiring doggies want to know…and while you’re at it, who thinks they’ll be able to feed me an hour later than normal tomorrow?
Yea. I don’t think so either.
A picture from last week. I pretty much look the same today.
It’s been a crazy winter, right? Some parts of our country have seen snow where no snow is expected. Other parts are flooding, or fighting wildfires. I think we’ll all be glad to say goodbye to this winter, and for me, the first true sign that spring is right around the corner is the sound of the red-winged blackbird.
Hmmmmm…this peanut looks good.
It’s a distinctive cry that I haven’t heard around my house yet this year. Other people, not so far away from me, are hearing them already and have for awhile. My Facebook memories say that it was on this date when I heard them first last year.
I’ll just fluff myself up and let out my best territory protection scream. I’m sure the girls will be flocking to me in no time.
Today it’s too windy to hear much of anything here, but yesterday was a beautiful morning and I headed out to Kensington where I almost always find something beautiful or exciting or just fun.
I’ve picked out the perfect patch of cattails to build our home. Now I just need to find the perfect sweetie.
I found all of that in the massive flocks of red-winged blackbirds all screeching for a mate, while flocking to food, hanging on to swaying cattails, or flying up into trees to sing even louder. Their combined sound was almost overwhelming.
I can’t find the ladies anywhere! And trust me, I’ve looked!
On my drive north from Alabama last week I took a quick (or not so quick) detour 50 miles east of my route home to see Burgess Falls. Husband and I had been to see it several years ago in the middle of a summer when there was significantly less water flowing than this time of year.
A little waterfall on the hike back to the big one.
It rained hard the evening and night before I drove over to the falls, and it has been raining for months in the Southeast. There was a squishy walk of about a mile back to the falls. I didn’t mind, there were plenty of pretty things to see along the way. Plus I knew I had hours of driving ahead of me. A little walk would be just the thing.
Everything was damp and green and muddy.
The river was roaring, over it’s banks and moving fast. Just like all the other rivers I’d crossed the day before and would cross on my trek north.
My first clue that the waterfall would be ferocious.
I remembered, as I walked, our last visit to this park where we had trekked down a steep metal staircase, and then climbed over boulders to sit at the base of the falls. I was pretty sure that wouldn’t be possible, judging from the volume of water rushing down the river.
And I was right. See those boulders and trees down there in the river? That’s an island and we sat on those rocks and watched people swimming in the pool below the waterfall.
So much water. And the noise!
You wouldn’t want to be out there now. Still, some steps led down ‘to the falls’ so I went down to see what was what.
Wonder what’s down there?
Personally I think those stairs should be closed. It leads you right to the top of the falls where it would be so easy to slip and fall into the raging river.
Teenagers throwing sticks into the water. I couldn’t watch.
I scurried right back up, and told the family at the top who were contemplating the trip down not to do it, it wasn’t worth the climb, and it was too dangerous for their kids.
Other than that I enjoyed my brief time at the falls, and I’d go back again when some of the water dries up. I’m sure there will be plenty of repair work to do before it’s safe to go down to the bottom again.
It was worth getting a little muddy.
Regardless of the water flow this is one stunning waterfall and worth a detour to see it! And I got to see a few barns on the way over there.
Couldn’t resist stopping for this one.
And some more cows.
Cows and their barn.
So even though it added a few hours to my trip home I think it was all worth it. That’s the best part about a road trip –turning left instead of right once in awhile.
I’m back in Michigan, and it’s lovely here, with sun and blue sky, a bit of white snow left on the ground. It might get to 50F this afternoon.
My last night at the lake the sky finally cooperated and provided a worthy sunset.
Still.
The fact that it was a foggy morning made it somewhat easier to leave.
In Alabama it was beginning to warm up too, daffodils were blooming, and when the sun broke through the rain clouds we enjoyed temperatures in the 70s.
For weeks, this trip, I passed this field and remembered one year when cows where there and how photogenic the spot was. But I never saw any cows there until the day I was leaving town.
My last day in Alabama I sat on the deck and enjoyed listening to the birds singing. The brown thrush were chasing each other around the yard. Blue birds were flitting everywhere. Robins sang in the morning and ducks and geese gathered in the lake.
I took tiny little two lane roads that curled through the mountains as I headed north. The better to find interesting things to photograph.
It would have been wonderful, after almost a full month of rain, to sit there for a few more days.
There were a lot of interesting places along the way.
Still.
You don’t always have to have a structure to make an image interesting. Especially with fog.
My husband and my Katie-girl were in Michigan and I’d been gone a long time. I felt somewhat guilty lounging around in the South while my husband dog-sat the demanding princess.
So many old, abandoned homesteads tucked in the hills.
Still.
I think about all the families whose dreams moved on to somewhere else.
My sister and brother are in the South and I hadn’t seen either of them in more than two years, so it was great to spend weekends with them, painting with my sister, going on a boat ride with my brother. It would have been nice to stick around and spend more time with them.
So many barns hanging on.
Still.
So many decisions to make.
My girl, who lives in the moment, had spent enough moments without her mama. She must have felt like she’d never see me again.
A high point in Alabama. Plus the sun started to break through the fog.
Still.
Lots of barns still in use.
There were more adventures to be had in the south.
I turned around to get this, because of the car.
Still.
A cozy barn nestled in the hills.
There are adventures to be had in the north too.
Solidly facing a new day.
So here I am, enjoying sunshine while wearing a coat, tickling the princess tummy, feeding my birds, watching the squirrels. And it’s good.
Some grey barns are by design, not by age.
Still….
Photos in this post are from my last evening at the lake, and my drive north.
Hey people! Katie here, and boy do I have a story to tell you. After I’m finished I’m sure you’ll agree with me – mama should be in a very long timeout.
So as you may know, cause I told you a long time ago, mama’s been missing. I have spent hours of my precious time looking for her. Even though I had daddy with me, and he was feeding me and all, I still felt it was my responsibility to find mama.
You’re going to make my breakfast, right mama?
Shelties are super vigilent, as you know.
So I’ve been looking and looking, in all her favoite spots, which to be honest aren’t that many. There’s her bed. And her sofa. Hmmmm….I think that pretty much covers her favorite places. But just to be sure I even checked in the closets and the bathrooms and in the backyard and the garage and I couldn’t find her. Daddy says she wasn’t at any of my parks either.
So I mostly gave up, though I’e been sleeping with one eye open just in case.
What do you mean I have to wait a minute?
Then yesterday, daddy and I were making the rounds in the yard while I made a decision as to the perfect pee spot when a car drove up and stopped! Daddy picked me up right away and the car drove into my driveway! Then daddy put me back down and told me to go check it out.
It might be a maurader! Someone to steal my supper! I ran up the driveway and saw somebody get out of the car! But the sun was in my eyes and I couldn’t be sure….so I kept running toward that person the better to tell them off about parking in my driveway without my special sheltie permit.
You have apprently forgotten I AM A PRINCESS!
And when I got close enough to see, I was soo excited cause it was MY MAMA!!!!!
I barked and barked and wriggled all over and mama picked me up and held me tight and kissed my head and I wriggled some more and then she put me down and I ran around her feet and barked and barked.
Mama barely got in the door when I started barking at her again. I had a lot to tell her.
So she sat down on a chair in the foyer and told me she would listen to me for as long as I felt necessary to tell her off. I think she was being perfectly fair, so I only barked at her for a few more minutes and then I went over and asked dad if I could please have my supper. Dad told me to go ask mama, but I told him she was pretty useless and unreliable and I was counting on him for sustenance.
Get your priorities straight, woman!
Daddy sighed and went and started my dinner. This morning I had to bark at mama some more in order to get breakfast. The pictures on this post are from my morning performance. I think you will agree it’s Oscar worthy.
I also think you should agree that mama should be put in a very long timeout considering she got herself lost for about a gazillion million years and she hasn’t sufficiently explained herself yet.
Change Is Hard 