Got a bit behind

12/2/07 Sunday
Good morning Y’all. I’m a little slow this morning, running a five on the bob scale. I’ll probably clear up some by the time we get to church. At least I hope so. Now, to fill in the last two days as best I can.

Friday, after I recovered some from the slowdown I went into Midland to fill the tank on the truck as I usually do on the first of the month when my check comes. HEB had gas for $2.92 a gallon, a lot better than the $3.10 it was in Stanton. Still it was $86.00 to fill up the truck. One tenth of my monthly income for one tank of gas, give or take a couple of bucks. Ouch.

After filling up I went to get Cherie for our once a month go out for dinner we try to do when the check comes. She had been cleaning at Steve and Janie’s but had the impression she was supposed to wait because Janie wanted to talk with her. That blew the plans to beat the Friday crowd to the restaurants. So we waited with some confusion about if we needed to or when Janie would come home. Steve was there and asked if I wanted a beer. I accepted. Steve went into the TV room and turning it on sat down with Zoie, their new puppy. There is no question that Zoie brings a lot of joy into their lives. Kind of like a new born baby.

My insecurity and uncertainty is usually increased following a slowdown but I seem to have been more unsure of where I stand anyway. This is unfortunate and probably has no basis for truth but it is the kind of thing I must constantly deal with anyway. You can go back to the earlier parts of this journal and see that insecurity showing up often. But in many cases it had foundation as we were rejected by the Cedar Creek church and those in it whom we had grown close to. Then our experience at first church of Stanton didn’t help either. So it is hard for me to feel safe even when there is no reason not to.

So I took a seat out in the living room so as not to intrude on Steve and his time with Zoie. Steve called out “Bob, you can come in if you want”. That helped a lot so with the invitation I went in and sat down. Cherie, as insecure as I am, came in to talk but had to be convinced to sit on the couch. We are such a pair.

Eventually Janie made it home. The two of them have so much on their plate it consumes even their “free” time. That is a misnomer. I don’t think they have much of what you would call free time. Come to find out I don’t think Janie had wanted Cherie to wait so they could talk. Perhaps she did but it didn’t come out. They invited us out for dinner and it was decided to go to KD barbecue. I haven’t been to the regular restaurant before though I did stop at their other building to get a sandwich to go.

It was a confusing place to me as the set up is not at all like a regular restaurant. They don’t have plates, just hand you a tray. Then there is an array of meats from brisket to sausage prepared several different ways. It is hard for me to make choices when I am not real sharp so I kept it simple. I wasn’t sure what to do with the barbecue sauce and there wasn’t anyone getting any that I could watch and learn so I just slathered it on the meat really self conscious I was doing it wrong. Steve followed me and put his in a cup. He assured me I was ok.

The food was really good. There was a lot going on and of course Janie knows people who are there dining. Then a lady recognizes me and comes up to say “Hi”. She knows Cherie as well but neither one of us can figure out where we know her from. And we didn’t ask, not wanting to be embarrassed about not remembering someone who knew us so well. So I guess that’s a sign we are becoming a part of this small town as we run into people who know us more often.

I was drained from the earlier slowdown and Steve was definitely working on being exhausted. Janie should have been but if so hid it well. Besides that, I don’t think my social skills were up to par so had to work to be conversational. Hate it when that happens, which is fairly often. So after a while I pretty much announced I was tired, needed to go home, and that it was the end of the evening. And it was. It was a good time and I thanked them for dinner but I don’t think any of us were really up to par. It would be nice just to spend a quiet evening with them, perhaps playing on the guitars or talking about spiritual things or something. I think they need some time like that but time is a rare commodity nowadays.

That was Friday. Yesterday I worked on raking the rye seed in. I think I did that Friday as well. I got everything done except the border of the five acre plot. I might get to that today. Friday night we were blessed with a nice light rain. It wet everything down so should help germinate the rye. The areas I first planted and watered are starting to come up now. I love to see the green starting to grow. It also shows how sporadic my seeding efforts have been.

There are lots of blank spots and areas where the seed has been concentrated. My original method of raking by dragging the rake behind me with a sack filled with twenty pounds of dirt worked but not that well. Seeing that I decided to rake in the remainder acre or so by hand. This is much more physically demanding but I think will be rewarded by a larger percentage of the seed sprouting and a more even coverage. But even that won’t totally compensate for the sporadic way the spreader scattered out seed. I figure that by next Thursday or Friday we will begin seeing a sea of green.


Yesterday we visited the homebound old couple we agreed to spend time with for the homebound ministry for the first time. We took them a poinsettia and gift bag that had been prepared ahead of time by those in the ministry. I feel good about getting involved but was pretty awkward when it came to sitting down and having a conversation. I’m glad Cherie was there. The guy asked if I was a Cowboy fan wanting to talk about football. Nuts. I don’t follow football at all. Fortunately I had just caught a portion of a TV show dedicated to the Cowboys so heard their record was 11-1. All in all I had a hard time contributing to the conversation. They noticed how I had to get up and walk every now and then along with the difficulty I had standing up. I explained that I had broken my neck three times and back once along with being partially paralyzed from the accident. Anyway they invited us back though Grace, the woman, seemed to direct that to Cherie.