Notes from the Flatlands...

It dawned on me the other day, I can't remember where, that for my family the summer months are a time of transition. This is especially true with July, which has two wonderful family birthdays that bookend our greatest tragedy as a group.

For several years, about this time of year, we gathered together at the ocean and participated in the ever-evolving family vacation. Lots of sun, mostly joy, but the usual amounts of elephants in the room. For the past two or three summers we have not gathered and while I speak with people individually, I greatly, miss the family meals. It was both a chance to celebrate the victories in our lives, and an opportunity to try and make meaning from the non-sensical parts of life. Without that time together I don't feel quite as well tethered. I miss the group.

We will have to get together and see what we can do about this. Everyone's life is spinning out in new and different orbits now. Kids have grown, marriages have blessed us, and the days at the beach may well be behind us in the warm recesses of fond memory.

If not the beach, then I need some other symposia of the great minds and spirits....

Yesterday, my neighbor and his father built the great fence you see in the back of this picture.  The old waist-high chain link was taken down and the six foot cedar fence replaced it.

I guess my neighbors value their privacy, which I don't blame them for a bit.  My only question is - "Dude, where are you going to blow the snow this winter now that you have the great cedar wall up?"

I guess we will wait and see on that one....

Yesterday was the tenth anniversary of Harriett's passing.  In some senses it sure seems like it has been longer than ten years - we often pause at this end and consider what would life be life if Harriett were here.

This weekend the last Harry Potter film comes out, which is also a fitting reminder of the influence and force of Harriett's life.  Thirteen wonderful years ago she introduced our children to the wonderful world of Harry Potter on the sun porch in Padanarum, Mass.  Her high squeaky voice for the character Dobbie first caught our attention to what was going on.

We miss you Who.  Now more than ever.

b.

Today's edition of MinnPost carries a thoughtful article on former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty's current strategy in Iowa.  Mr. Pawlenty hasn't being doing well in the polls or in raising funds for his candidacy, which led his staff to adopt a strategy used by Mike Huckabee in 2007 - i.e. shake every hand of the people who are most likely to go to Ames and vote in the straw poll.

It seems to me that if Pawlenty's best chance to win is to pretend he is Mike Huckabee, then he is in big trouble.  Pawlenty has the warmth and charm of door, and not a door of which you are fond.  This strategy seems like a last ditch effort on the part of a desperate man.

I was much more scared of the Pawlenty who was traveling to Iowa and saying we don't need to pay farmers to produce ethanol.  That is the candidate who I thought had a real chance to make it over the long haul. 

Here is where my analysis fails....Pawlenty needs money to keep running, and he is not going to gain enough votes in Iowa telling farmers that he is turning off the tap for the ethanol party.  As a result, Pawlenty needs to adopt a "win-in-Iowa" strategy that will allow him to keep going in the hopes that he can get back to the Pawlenty version of the "Straight Talk Express".

If the Pawlenty people are relying on charm, I am not sure it is going to work.  My call is that Pawlenty is done after a disappointing performance in Iowa.  There is not enough lipstick for that pig...

I just finished reading Stephen Ambrose's book about the E company from World War Two, called