Thursday Again...

It is again Thursday. I'm starting this entry off with a link to Wikipedia for John. We discussed Hutchinson, KS the other day and I think the link will be of interest to him. If you all go take a look there you may find it of interest as well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hutchinson,_Kansas

I was born and raised in Hutchinson for the first six years of my life and then moved back again when I was 14. My sister, Jeanny and her family still live there and I visit whenever I can. It is the best big city in the state of Kansas if you ask me.

I don't have any art to show you all today cause the deskroom is still in disarray. I was all gung-ho this morning to get it back together again but the vaccuum sweeper and the electrical outlet in the deskroom refused to get along and kept blowing the breaker so I gave up on that endeavor before I got so fustrated I wanted to throw the vaccuum out the front door. I didn't throw the vaccuum out the front door though, it's sitting over there in the closet waiting patiently to be put to good use. That is on my agenda for later. I have to go with plan B though cause I'm not fighting with that stupid machine tonight. I refuse! Wish me luck with plan B cause I haven't formulated a plan C yet. Plan A sure didn't work out!

I made the 'bones' of three more paper bowls. One this morning. I still have four more to go. I gotta get busy on that endeavor cause Christmas is going to be here before we know it and I want to have them all done long before that day arrives!

Nothing new on the home front so this is going to be a short entry. I'll leave you with a poem for now and wish you all a happy Friday!


The Old Man Next Door

The house had been in need of
a coat of paint for many years,
the man inside in need of a
woman's touch for many more.

An old man living alone in the confines
of an old house with weathering boards and
his heart weathering more rapidly then his house.
He went away one summer's dawn.

The house now sits lonely on the side of the road,
filled to the brim with things he collected
to fill up the emptiness he felt in his soul.
He looked all around and love was not found.

Honeysuckle vines climb the façade
where the front door is hidden from view.
There inside you'll find lonely old walls
adorned with lonely old photos of those he once knew.

His children, grown now, came to collect his
personal belongings the other afternoon.
They loaded up furniture, boxes and things
into the back of an old Chevy truck and drove away.

The house seems abandoned just like that old man.
And the weathered old house sits aging day after day
with no one tending the honeysuckle vine,
no one even taking notice of the life once lived inside.

The yard is over grown with wild catnip and
weeds of all kinds, reminding me of what once belonged.
I drive by there every single day and I wonder
what kind of people would abandon an old man.

He had grown quite deaf in his aging life and
he hollered when he talked, if he talked at all.
He was an auctioneer in his younger days and
all those things came about from the way he made his living.

Like the house itself, the things inside are of ancient times gone by.
When his children had taken what they deemed to be the best,
the old auctioneer's things
were put on the block to see what they would fetch.

Seems quite terrible to me that the things he held dear,
to his children, were a means to farther their riches,
to enlighten their senses and make light of
what the old man stood for in his life.

He lived in that old house with the leaky roof,
the seven out buildings and not a soul to share it all with
for as many years as I can remember.
He simply lived all alone.

His children appeared only after he'd died.
I didn't know he even had anyone in his life.
They buried him in the cemetery on the hill and
now he's gone to meet his wife in the afterlife.

I am in hopes she met him at the gates
and the reunion they shared was so full of grace,
it didn't really matter he lived all alone and
the years gone by were of the waiting kind.

Surely he smiles more everyday
with his love beside him on the hills where they can play.
His children haven't been seen for weeks
and that old house will someday fall in a heap.
2006

I'm uncertain of the date this one was actually written, but sometime in 2006 nonetheless. This old man really did exsist in my world, though I've embellished the facts in this poem. I hope you like.

Be good to one another! Smile at a stanger, lend a helping hand and love yourself as well as your neighbor! I shall yak at you all another day!
Peace
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