What Famous Leader Am I?

What Famous Leader Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

Darned tests anyhow!! Headless - where do you find these??

Construction Chronicles Part 22

Hmmm...I didn't realize when I started the Chronicles that I would have so many chapters.

Well, today was like most every other Saturday - sand, fill, sand, sand. I didn't get to stain today, but I'll finish that tomorrow afternoon. I chemical stripped my door jambs, and attempted to strip the archway in the bedroom - I'll need the heat gun for that.

Back to sanding. It's amazing to me how I can begin with a piece of old trim that looks more like shredded wheat than wood, and actually get down to the grain. This is what I was dealing with today:



















Hard to believe, but after runs of 60, 100, and 150 grade sandpaper, the grain God put in that wood 100+ years ago actually comes back to life.

Kirby has survived day two in his new home. He started out hissing again this morning, but he's settled down this evening. He held still long enough this morning for me to get a picture of him:
















Yeah, now that I look at the picture he looks as frightened as when he first arrived. But, he's had lots of attention, and hopefully has gained in strength and character since his arrival.

Babbette is fine, but hanging close to me whenever possible. "Possible" meaning when Kirby isn't hanging on my heels. She's still the queen.

Construction and Company

I have a frightened newcomer to my humble construction zone hiding in the foyer beneath a stool that Dick made. When I call his name - Kirby - he gets all wide eyed and vulnerable and walks toward me, assumes the petting posture, then hisses as I pet him. Poor boy. Change sucks. It's okay to hiss.

Babette is doing fine, but I'm watching her. It's my intention to keep her queen of the Paris house until she abdicates by death. So far, Kirby is a distant subject in Foyerstershire - not yet a threat, and perhaps a benign subject open to her benevolence.

In the mean time, I've finished my homework for the night, and I'm thinking about tomorrow. I'll be stripping my door jambs and my window openings, and sanding my last (yes!) door and all those funky little square blocks that go underneath the trim and butt up against the baseboard. Yeah - those.

I went to Menards today to find mullions for my bedroom windows and eight-inch baseboard for my bedroom and hallway. Mistake. Poor guy - he sort of tried. It was apparent 45 seconds into our encounter that he is a slave to moderation. Oh no, we can't special order any mullion but that one on the shelf (which was 1/4 inch too small). No ma'am, we don't carry any eight inch base board. Hmmmph. I can't blame him really. I went to Menards when I know full well I should have gone to Terry Lieffers. What was I thinking?

I've picked out my carpet for the second floor. Moss green twist. I almost hate going with it because I have so much green in my house already, but I think it will work well. I'm so excited that I CAN EVEN THINK ABOUT CARPET FOR FLOOR TWO!!

So now it's off to bed, alone but curious if Kirby will jump up on the bed, rub my leg and hiss at me.

Acorns

I've been walking to work the last several days, now that the weather is getting cooler and yes, now that the price of gas is up.

On the way home I kicked an acorn. It skittered in front of me, hit a big crack in the sidewalk and sailed off across the grass into the street. When I was little, probably eight or nine, I was fascinated with acorns. I would look at them for hours, lying in the grass and examining the bumpy caps, gazing into the grain of the shell. I thought they were nuggets of beautiful wood. I would steam them with my breath and polish them on my shirt, trying to get them to look as shiny as possible. Acorns.

I decided I wanted to collect acorns, and that if I had enough acorns I could make, well, I didn't know what I could make but I wanted to collect them. So, I took a box and began to fill it with acorns. I went to the yard two doors down where an oak tree stood over the home of the first old person I was ever afraid of. I don't remember her name, but I thought she was mean because she yelled at kids when they rode their bikes up her sidewalk. I started picking acorns out of her yard, and sure enough, the door creaked open and her crackly voice asked accusingly what I was doing in her yard. "Picking up acorns," I managed. For some reason I'll never know, this answer was acceptable to the mean old lady, and I collected my treasure without fear.

I had a cherry lug full of acorns by the time I was done. I was so proud! I brought them in the house, took them to our fruit cellar in the basement, and then dreamed of what I would do with all those acorns. I dreamed, and planned, and...

Before I knew it, spring had sprung and I had a lug of acorns that were sprouting roots. I was so disappointed, not just that my acorns were spoiled, but that I hadn't found a project worthy of their beauty. Now they had gone the way of all acorns. Except in a fruit cellar.

I still think acorns are beautiful. As I continued on my way home, I crunched one under my shoe. And then one came flying in front of me, bounced on the sidewalk and landed in the flatbed of a truck. I swear, that oak tree threw it at me.

Is it just me?

It's like the world ran into a fallen log in the road, and until the debris is cleared nothing is right.

It sounds so dramatic coming out of me, but I feel this way. Katrina hit hundreds of miles from my home, far enough away it seems surreal. But the air isn't right, and my soul isn't still.

We have a few folks who have made it to my town on their own, and we may get many more. Maybe not. Everything is uncertain.

All I can do is obsess or pray. When I catch myself obsessing, I pray.

And I'm assessing. Yet another prudent reminder that my surroundings are ephemeral against the backdrop of eternity, and that my sentiments tend to be deeply rooted in them.

So, I pray.

It's not so much a darkness I feel as it is an ache. I don't pray to lose the ache; I pray that the source of the ache will heal. I don't think it's my ache. I think it belongs to all of us. I don't want to stop feeling it until we're healed. But, maybe it's just that I need to hold it, control it somehow. But it's not about me.

So I pray.