It’s probably time to bring down the cat crates and blankets. Cool weather is beginning to feel like cold weather. Mind you, no one is complaining, but then again, the cats don’t really complain. They just sort of mill around and look at me.

In the beginning, I wrote about the little things. The feel of a breeze. A trail in the grass. A star in the sky. Then one day. I wrote about the big thing.

I set out for Houston yesterday morning with a nice covering of winter gray clouds and a north wind. I like that short light, when you know the sun barely has enough energy to get up over the horizon.

Grapes. I’ve always loved them. In my youth, you only got them when they came into season, and my mother bought green grapes. No idea what variety they were. They were just grapes.

I did it. Fixed my dryer. It took a $25 part, two weeks of waiting, and a YouTube video. I was all set to just buy another dryer. But as I checked out the prices, I thought what’s the worst that could happen.

This is probably getting old, but I have another gate story.

There is something like fall in the air. It is cool outside. It’s a nice way to be greeted in the morning. In addition, I woke up to find my collegiate football team pulled one out late last night after I went to sleep. Good for them.

Helped bury the mother of a friend yesterday. Sad business as always. She left behind a husband of seventy years and a home she’d lived in for fifty-six. An anomalous couple in this day and age of turnover marriages and turnover homes…

Big doings in and around town. Over at the headquarters of the Pedernales Electric Co-operative crews are dressing the trees with lights. Really. They’ll finish in time to turn them on the day after Thanksgiving. Meanwhile, down the road toward Fredericksburg, they’re strangling traffic.

Took a slow walk through time yesterday. Went back to the trail we hiked on Tuesday. This time, rather than turn left and hike along the Piedra River, we turned right and went up the mountain.

Big day yesterday. We took out the trash. Literally. A lot of it. Bulky trash day, which meant all the stuff that had littered the yard and around the house and behind the workroom for about the last five years is now gone.

Went to see a show last night at the Paramount Theater in downtown Austin. We parked in the garage they use and went off to meet friends for dinner.

A while back, oh, let’s be honest, several years ago, my little push mower that I used on my Tiffway yard stopped working. Just wouldn’t roll. I poked at it for a while then just set it aside. Another thing in my life that didn’t work.

Three friends. More than fifty years together. Lots of laughs. Lots of parties. Lots of dancing. Lots of football. Yesterday we sat there together on our metal seats, backs against the concourse wall. Comfortable.

Went for a drive in the hills south of town last night. A little bit of free floating anxiety had made its way into the house and settled on my shoulders. I needed to get out.

Made music last night. It was a spur of the moment thing. Last month my steel guitar playing son asked my bass playing daughter to sit in with him during a monthly music gathering a friend of his has started. This month they invited me.

Well, durn, I hike over half of creation this past week without a twinge from my feet or any other part of my body. I wake up yesterday with a left ankle so sore I can barely touch it after a really good night’s sleep.

Yesterday was a surprisingly dour day. I thought I was prepared. I wasn’t. The anniversary of my wife’s death took most of the air out of my sails. Luckily, a coterie of friends stood by with words of love, and words of encouragement.

Here we are. August 4. The second anniversary of my wife’s death. Last year I took off my wedding ring. It seemed as good a time as any to admit the obvious.

It’s Monday. I’m late in the writing, for no good reason, actually. I have started taking Sunday’s off, which is why I had no words to offer yesterday.