Waiting For The Rains

5:31

5:33

I was up at 6:30, after hearing the roar of bass boats.  Evie was up at 5:30, walked out on the dock to take some pictures of the sky before all the clouds took over and blotted out the colors.  It's now 7:00, the lake wrinkled from a southerly wind and it's yet to start raining but it will come, at least according to the weather man.

Yesterday morning was taken over by the grinding of the tree stump in our yard. The grinder is an amazingly powerful tool, whipping through the huge stump in less than a half hour.  The guys also trimmed a few branches, and spent the rest of the time, shoveling the wood chips into their truck and smoothing out the area.  Now we have to figure out what kind of a tree we want. For now, we are thinking of a tulip tree but will have to see what's available in this area.  Maybe we will go tree shopping when it rains.

Stumpless In Woodlawn

After the early morning excitement, the lake lay waiting, just starting to catch some wind, so we kayaked down to Whitney Bay and back, fairly easy going and coming for once.  We paddled as far as the three humongous McMansions built in the last three years on one of the last open patches of land on the lake.  They seem out of place, especially in contrast to the modest cottages of their neighbors on both the north and south side.  I would take one if given!

The Newest McMansion

After kayaking, Evie made a batch of chocolate chip cookies for our grandson, Tyler, who turns twenty on July 2.  She packed them along with some other goodies, getting them ready to mail later in the day.  I am not sure what I did the rest of the day, mostly looking for small things to do I guess.  Like making another lunch of baloney, not fried but with mayo, and some soup, as I watched Sports Center debate Thursday night's NBA draft choices.  And, because our Sonos radio system is on most of the day, we were inundated with the news that the Supreme Court made Same Sex Marriage legal in all fifty states, the twenty second country to do so, a landmark decision in the US, and the reason articulately put by Justice Anthony Kennedy. Both Evie and I liked his words enough to quote it below:

"No union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice, and family. In forming a marital union, two people become something greater than once they were. As some of the petitioners in these cases demonstrate, marriage embodies a love that may endure even past death. It would misunderstand these men and women to say they disrespect the idea of marriage. Their plea is that they do respect it, respect it so deeply that they seek to find its fulfillment for themselves. Their hope is not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization’s oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right. The judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit is reversed.
It is so ordered." - Justice Kennedy

Early afternoon,  Evie reluctantly left the lake to drive to Lakewood, to get her hair trimmed, not something she wanted to do on a lovely afternoon on the lake.  I read, napped, then went out and worked some in the yard, filling in the tracks left by the tree guys, with dirt and grass seed.  I will probably have to do it again when we get a tree.  I then went out on the dock to enjoy the sun and, unfortunately, the wind, relentless for much of the day, so much so that we did not go out cruising in our boat.

Evie returned and we spent the late afternoon on the dock, before swimming, to wake us up and get us ready to put together dinner, roasting brussels sprouts and cauliflower. We then enjoyed a good hour on our front porch, sipping wine and enjoying chips and pretzels.  We never tire of this time of day, of sitting on our porch, lake watching, ever changing and interesting, with birds, boats, skiers, changing sky, multi colors of lake and sky.

We had more chicken and spaghetti for dinner, along with the veggies and corn on the cob, surprisingly tasty, and watched another Real Time with Bill Maher before going up to bed early, at 10:00, as Evie was tired.