My title is a line from a Ted Kooser poem "Abandoned Farmhouse". The poem is one of my favorites. When I saw our back yard on Sunday after Irene had passed through, the first thing I thought of was this particular line.
Relatively, we are unscathed and quite lucky. We never lost power, although most around us did on Saturday. Many, including our daughter, will not have power restored until Friday at the earliest as residences are 'down the list' after government agencies and schools. So she and our grand daughter are staying with us. On Sunday she and her neighbors had an impromptu block party. Melissa pulled out her grill and she and her friends cooked everything in their refrigerators and freezers as food was defrosting quickly. Someone must have seen the smoke and called the fire department, who were good-natured and let all the little ones sit up on the truck and ran the lights and sirens.
After my having a colon re-section and fistula repair, complications, a 5.8 earthquake, daughter Robyn's barn being hit by lightning, her suffering an allergic re-action to sulphur's being released into their well (due to the earthquake), and then Hurricane Irene, I think I can say it's been an interesting summer. C'mon fall!
