Daughter Summer

It has been such a pleasure to have twelve-year-old daughter here all summer. It's a pleasure that twinged with concern as one reason for the extended stay is because her mother is suffering from serious medical problems - she was eight weeks in the hospital - and still faces many months of recovery. And now that part of summer is over as Southern Man took her back to her mother today and will be lucky to see her once a month between now and Christmas.

On the bright side (Southern Man does make an effort to see silver linings) weekends are now free to tackle the many summer projects out at The Land that haven't happened because he's devoted his weekends to his daughter. His enthusiasm is a bit damped as we are still in an extended drought and heat wave - weeks and weeks of no rain and 100-plus afternoons with no sign of relief anytime soon - but early mornings and late evenings are still quite bearable and Southern Man plans to spend as much time as he can out there with a mix of activites both useful and idle. A good friend's birthday party was tonight. Southern Man's gift was a new rod, reel, and tackle box and a promise that the fish are waiting for us.