Let's go for a bike ride!

I took this picture at the same place I took this picture of that real old tractor....as you can see if you enlarge this photo there is lots of old stuff at this place. But this bicycle is in a class by itself. I would not want to ride it...if you had a wreck and it fell on top of you, you would not soon forget.

But it makes me think of my brother, Robert. No, he never built anything like this but if he had wanted to he could have. When we were young, he was not one of those brothers that wanted his little sister to have to stay at home. He never minded if I tagged along with him and his friends; we would go to the dump and shoot bottles, light bulbs etc with BB guns, or we would head to the woods to find a grapevine swing. I know we did other things when his friends came but these are the highlights for me.

When it was just us, he was always busy with something. One summer we decided to build a tree house up in the thicket. The thicket was this patch of cedar and pine trees just across the road from our house. If you will enlarge the google image below, the thicket is within the circle...at the edge of the circle 'x' marks where our home was. Within the circle is an 'x' that marks the general area of where our treehouse was.
I know we got the wood from home...I don't know if mom and dad knew we were using it. But they had to because we had to pass right by the house with it. Seems like I remember being warned not to lose the hammer. Our tree house was built between 3 or 4 trees...I cannot remember if it was more or less a rectangle or if it was a triangle...but 2 x 4s were nailed to the trees. Plank flooring was laid on the 2 x 4s...and there was an area that had a second level....we more or less had a tree platform. I don't remember actually doing much with it after it was build, the joy was in the building.

Another summer we built a playhouse...there close to home and the barn. Neal was laughing about it the other day...about how no room was level. I agreed that nothing was level, but I still think it was something that we built it with nothing more than a saw and a hammer and nails. And whatever else we could scavenge.

It ended up with three rooms and had windows. One room did not have any windows, and where the other windows came from I do not know. I can't even remember what they actually looked like, just remember the light coming through them. You could stand up in the rooms. We got a seat from some old car and that was our couch.

When Robert started driving, at that time it seemed to me he was always working on cars. And always wanting me to help by holding something and that was the last thing I wanted to do...I can remember saying, "ah, do I have to?" One time he switched out the transmission on a car. I can remember having the feeling that his cars would just fly if he wanted....

Time slipping away

It feels like forever since I blogged any, when in fact it just now verging on a week. My older daughter's belongings are now here, she is now in Georgia and has done started her training. And I have been sick. Again. I am not going into details, but will just say there were a couple days that I was pretty miserable. I am pretty much back to normal, and I think a big part of that is due to our activities yesterday.

After breakfast, sometime up in the morn we headed out with camera and fishing equipment. We wanted to see Lorelei since we had not seen her since Tuesday so headed to Terre Haute first. We had not been there but a few minutes till she left and went in the other room, and here she came back dragging her jacket behind her! Roger was sitting in the floor, so she gave it to him and stuck her arm out for him to put it on.

He tried to distract her, but she was not having it. So, we put her jacket on and took her outside thinking that she just wanted to be outside...she went to our Rav4. We did distract her from that...not sure how she would have done had we brought her home. And I still was not totally back to normal, so didn't know how well I would keep up with her. But we really think she wanted us to bring her here. She is such a bright little girl!

We stayed and visited an hour or two, and headed out for a drive...taking roads we had never taken before with the ultimate destination Mansfield...in nearby Parke County. We first stopped at Bridgeton to fish below the dam...I only caught a couple there and Roger not many more than that.

We left there and headed to Mansfield, which is just a few minutes away. The picture above is of the dam...and that is where I really began to feel like myself again. We each caught fish--so many we didn't attempt to keep count. It was a catch and release day for us...neither one of us felt like cleaning fish at the end of the day.

But there is just something about fishing that does me a world of good. I think it is because I focus on fishing only, on what lure to try next, or where I want to cast. I can have the worst headache in the world and if I can go fishing for an hour or two it will be gone. I came home yesterday feeling like a new woman...well, almost new! I was plenty tired, but at least I had been doing something.

Otti Doddi

Otti Doddi=Otto in Lorelei speak. I am not quite sure when she switched to calling him Otti Doddi, because she used to say Otto. But now if you ask her if she has a dog, she says "Otti Doddi!" Anyway, here are a couple of videos Sarah just sent me. Enjoy!



As you can probably tell, she loves him and he loves her. When they are playing with sticks, he takes them so gently from her.