Day 14 of Summer Break

By Elizabeth Prata

Sometimes I get peckish. With food, that means you’re not hungry for a meal but just want to nibble, or peck at a few things, like a handful of almonds or blueberries. I get the same way with a jaunt. I like to stay home but sometimes I get peckish for a short ride, a hop skip and a jump to somewhere then come right back.

It’s a nice morning, and not too hot. I decided to jaunt over to the next town’s farm stand run by a nice family I know. I was looking for garden fresh tomatoes and flowers, two of Gods best growing things on earth. I’d take the back roads, see what I could see, enjoy the scenery, and return with plump tomatoes for a southern ‘mater sammie‘.

The farm stand is open 24 hours, because, you see, it has an honor box to pay. You put cash in, or click the code for Venmo if you have that app. Or a phone. I love that it’s on the honor system still. There remains in this word SOME nice and honest places, old world oases of a time gone by. I needed to support this.

Off I went.

A mere ten minutes later there I was looking at shelves devoid of the red gold I’d come there to purchase, leaving me bereft and unable to contemplate life. But there were flowers, and also yellow squash. So I semi-consoled myself, dropped my cash into the box, and placing my items in the car off I went. Taking back roads that meandered alongside pastures with a Ten Commandments sign or a rugged wooden cross outstanding in the field. Cows and horses and butterflies and gardens and flowers snaking up fences were my eye candy, along with blue skies and occasional cloud just for show.

I stopped at the pond that had the turtles on the log, and there were a BUNCH today! I knew that the moment I stepped out of the car they would plop into the water quicker than you can say Jack Turtle Robinson so I got the camera on and ready.

Nope. I only caught one turtle that hadn’t gotten the memo that a dangerous old lady was sneaking up; I managed one slightly blurry snap before he too, slid into the water.

While I stood there hoping the turtles would climb back on the log, but knowing they wouldn’t, I heard an unfamiliar noise. It was a hubbub of some kind. An outcry of frogs in the rushes? Geese on the bank? Birds in the trees? As I was looking in the direction from whence the sound came, I saw movement in the trees across the pond The cows has been let out of the barn! They were making for the pond, one after another.

Here is a video of it. You can hear the road noise which are vehicles passing at 55-60 mph and so close the backdraft rocks my car. It really isn’t a great place to stop.

Almost home I slowed enough to get a quick photo of this huge flowerpot in front of a historic home on the main drag. I liked how the sunlight lit it up.

10 flowers for $5, I made three vases out of them and arranged them in different spots.

May al your excursions be relaxing and all your journeys be wonderful!