by Kathy Brasby | Mar 8, 2013 | Personal
The photo came via a text on my phone along with a message:. “Tell Mom the daffodils have finally pushed through.”
Our mother loves to garden. She ordered the bulbs for her yard last summer, before her stroke felled her. The bulb package showed up the week after Mom’s stroke.
My sister and her family managed to get 75 bulbs in the ground before the temperatures plummeted.
You plant bulbs with hope. The bulbs look too dead to endure a harsh winter. But the vision of the spring’s new life and colors spurred the family on.
Here in Colorado, we’ve been hammered by the lack of snow this winter. The ground is so dry that many farmers are considering parking their planters this year. The cost of buying seed and fuel may be greater than the potential harvest.
Our family has been hammered, too, this winter. Not by lack of snow but by loss and disappointment. As I’ve mentioned before, my father died in September and my mother suffered a major stroke in October. Our winter has been consumed with therapy and fear.
For a time, we wondered if we’d lose both parents back to back. Then we wondered if Mom would regain anything stolen by the stroke.
Mom has learned to sit up again, lift herself with one arm and a grab bar, and swallow again. The therapists have her walking – stiffly, awkwardly, but one foot in front of the other.
“She’s doing great,” they tell us.
My sister’s photo of the emerging daffodils made Mom happy. “We’ll have to go see those one of these days,” she said.
When those bulbs went in the ground, we all wondered about Mom. Would we be able to show her the new plants? Would the bulbs even grow in this drought? Would she survive the winter?
Yes, yes, and yes.
And I think those daffodils mirror our hearts as well. It’s been a long dry winter but spring’s coming.
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by Kathy Brasby | Mar 6, 2013 | Hope
Participating in social media means pictures. Photos. Readers are very visual and a post with a picture is better.
I ran across this cheat sheet for social media photos and thought I would share with you. I have a lot of work to do on my social media. Maybe you, too?
Check it out:
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by Kathy Brasby | Mar 4, 2013 | Hope
My roots are in rural America. I revel at the whippoorwill’s cry in the early morning mist.
A combine harvesting corn. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Seasons for me are planting, growing, harvest, and rest. Translation: spring, summer, fall, winter.
My neighbors are people of the soil with an uncanny understanding of corn hybrids, marketing tools, and diesel mechanics.
They know how to read the clouds and how to signal an auctioneer. They embrace technology when it saves them time but reserve their evenings for homemade ice cream and warm apple pie.
My neighbors know who plants the straightest furrows and whose wife/daughter/uncle is fighting an ailment. They will band together to plant or harvest crops for a downed farmer and contribute generously to fundraisers for kid, accident victims, and others in need.
They also know how to laugh.
There was, for example, a farmer who called the service manager of the local tractor supply company. A pump had failed on his tractor during harvest.
Harvest in the Valley (Photo credit: Quiltsalad)
The service manager checked the parts book and found two different pumps for that model, one on each side of the tractor. “Which side of the tractor is the pump that failed?’
The farmer hesitated. “The one on the west side.”
Harvest mania does that to you. In a controlled panic, farmers try to get the crop collected before the hail or wind seizes its share.
Another farmer was harvesting corn. He turned his combine toward the road one morning only to see the sheriff’s car, lights flashing, at the end of his field. He finished that pass in the field and stopped his machine near the deputy, who stood with hands on hips but revolver still in its holster.
“Hey, James,” the farmer dusted off his hands, straightened his cap, and extended a dusty palm to the deputy. “What’s up?”
“I’m here to arrest you,” the deputy said.
“What?” The farmer glanced around him for some clue.
“You’re supposed to be at jury duty this morning. Want to just drive in now? Because if you don’t, I have an arrest warrant in my car.”
The farmer missed the morning’s harvest that day.
Then there were the two Jones brothers (names changed) who had missed a couple of rounds when God was handing out wits. The neighbors noticed one morning that they suddenly had a new combine, perfectly timed for wheat harvest.
And the sheriff was notified that morning that a farmer several miles away had reported the disappearance of a new combine.
When the neighbors heard about the missing combine, they called the sheriff who headed out to talk to the Jones brothers.
It had been an exciting morning for the brothers because a guy had stopped by to offer them the deal of the day. For that morning only, they could buy a new combine for $1000. A new combine at that time sold for about $100,000.
In some places, the Jones brothers might have spent years in jail. But the sheriff took the keys and returned the combine.
No charges were filed against the Jones brothers. They groused a little about the $1000 but the sheriff told them to consider it a payment in the college of hard knocks.
Rural people know all about that.
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by Kathy Brasby | Feb 27, 2013 | writing
Last week we discussed using voice dictation on your iPad or iMac. This week we’ll look at the Windows version of dictation.
In the Windows environment, dictation is available as an accessibility feature. That makes it a little more challenging to activate than the Mac’s function key access. But not impossible.
Both Windows 7 and 8 use a similar system for turning on dictation. Once dictation is available, it works in any application that accepts text.
The simplest way to turn on dictation is to press the Start button, type Speech and wait for it to show up in the search. A small window will appear. You click on the microphone button to turn listening on and off. You can also configure Speech Recognition by right-clicking the Speech Recognition button in the notification area of your task bar.
Another route to Speech Recognition is to press the Start button and selecting All Programs>Accessories>Ease of Access.
Microsoft offers a tutorial for using dictation.
If you don’t like Microsoft’s free dictation program, consider other add-on programs. The best-known is Dragon Naturally Speaking. Dragon not only can turn talk into text, but can follow commands. You can launch programs, open files, and much more by speaking to Dragon.
Dragon packages range from $75 to $180 so it’s pricey but highly regarded.
Whether you don’t type well or you’re plagued with a problem such as carpal tunnel or, dictation options in either the Windows or Apple environment might make your writing times a whole lot easier.
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by Kathy Brasby | Feb 25, 2013 | Hope
Very early in my writing career, I learned to dread Thursdays.
In those days, I worked as the editor of a small weekly newspaper in a rural community that knew not only everyone’s name, but how they were related to one another and who had dated in high school. Our entire circulation was under 1,000 subscribers and our office smaller than some living rooms. A secretary went through the mail and handled the financial side of things. The reporting staff consisted of me.
The newspaper hit most people’s mailboxes by Thursday morning each week. Shortly after lunch on a particular Thursday, a white-haired woman with a bright polyester dress and heavy jewelry pushed her way through the front door and leaned over the front counter. My desk sat furthest from the front but the secretary ducked her head, leaving me exposed to our readers.
“I want to talk to you,” Mrs. White-hair said. Tone of voice was everything in how quickly I moved from my desk. When she spoke, I bolted.
“How may I help you?” Maybe politeness would stem the flood.
“I just got my paper,” she said. “And our club news wasn’t in the social section. I am very disappointed.” How could the word very drip like icicles?
“We were short on room but it will be in next week.”
Her eyes narrowed and she leaned in. “You had room for the sports section. Who do you think wants to read about the football game? You had two pictures of that game. Two big pictures. We are very disappointed. This is a sorry state for our newspaper.”
And she shook her shoulders, gathered her bulging purse, and stomped out the door.
An hour later, the door opened to welcome a man in a polo shirt and sweat pants who leaned over the front counter. “I have a complaint,” he said.
My feet were like lead as I walked to the front of our office. “How may I help you?”
“I just got my paper,” he said. “And there are no pictures of the junior high football game. No pictures. How are these boys supposed to feel like we support them if you can’t even cover their games?”
“We were short on room–”
“You have room for all that club news. Who cares about the clubs? Nobody. We need better stories of our sports. Got that?”
Yep. On that Thursday, I got it.
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