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Home Ground #30
Bozeman, Montana
2024

An evening view of my workshop building and our garden shed.

Home Ground #29
Bozeman, Montana
2024

This peaceful looking gargoyle has been watching over our pond for too many years. The harsh winters have him slowing disintegrating back into the crushed rock he was made out of. Dust to dust, so to speak.

Bare Tree #135
Bozeman, Montana
2024

I should have posted this one on Halloween. It looks like the skull of some scary many-horned prehistoric beast.

Lectio #85
Chicago, Illinois
2024

It’s been a while since I’ve added to this series on reading. What’s a young woman reading early on a Sunday morning? It wasn’t anything I’d have guess: the novel Blösch by the Swedish author Beat Sterchi who writes in standard German and also the Bernese dialect. The title translates into English as Cow and is about the psychological impact of working in a slaughterhouse. Pretty heavy reading for any day of the week I imagine.

Cat in the Stack
Bozeman, Montana
2024

A special guest post today with a photo by the Fashion Queen a.k.a. Connie Blackwood. I couldn’t have done the subject any better than she did.

Grow Old Along With Me (Home Ground #28)
Bozeman, Montana
2024

The full quote on this sundial is the familiar saying “Grow old along with me, the best is yet to be.” We bought this sundial 40 years ago or so. At that much more tender age, it was really beyond my ability to seriously consider the implications of that phrase. But now, in hindsight I can see that it’s been mostly true for us and I expect that to continue to be the case for a while. Like this sundial and the stand it’s sitting on, the Fashion Queen and I have seen and continue to experience our share of physical deterioration. But unlike the sundial we are fortunate to be able to have experienced–and continue to experience–many increasingly positive non-physical aspects of existence. That will all end someday as is inevitably so, but in the meantime we will carry on the sundial’s command to the greatest extent we can.

Home Ground #27
Bozeman, Montana
2024

Another bench, another place for relaxation and contemplation. This spot, by our lower pond is perhaps better situated for pure relaxation because it’s screened from the house and outbuildings by brush and trees growing around the pond, keeping my mind from quickly wandering to what I should be doing rather than just sitting there watching the goldfish, birds and whatever else is going on right around me.

A Place for Contemplation
Bozeman, Montana
2024

This bench sits on the slope above our pet graveyard. It overlooks not only the graveyard but also our entire “homestead,” so it’s a good place to take a break from time to time and just look out over our domain. It’s a relaxing place but also one of motivation because I’ll be sitting there looking at our house, outbuildings, lawn and ponds and while I’m enjoying what we’ve done I will also notice two or three upkeep projects I really ought to get to, and that gets me up and moving again.

Home Ground #25
Bozeman, Montana
2024

A selection of the random statuary we place from time to time around our pet graveyard. Hard to see in this photo are the collars and dog tags of two of our dogs buried there.

Home Ground #24
Bozeman, Montana
2024

Strong evening light and dark shadows on this round ball of rock makes for an interesting nearly pure abstract composition.