Mtn Summer

A couple of days with Dad at his place in Pioneer, last hurrah before the students return. So much woodland you’d expect to find mostly hippies and Grizzly Adams types, but there are flags flying over every unpaved driveway. Deer and dogs dart in and out of yards. Neighbors stop to visit in the middle of dinner, make themselves comfy. Neighbor nails a sign to a tree: “Parking reserved for world’s best grandpa.” Another neighbor “invents” a mechanized, driveable rake from spare Jeep parts for scooping up pine needles. A rough-hewn, hand-carved bear holding a freshly caught fish… with a flag sticking out of its head. Smell of propane wafts from motor homes. Dad at 70 cutting down trees from his own proppity for firewood, splitting massive slices with a hydraulic log splitter (impressive power!). He had forced air installed but after a few weeks decided it was making him a nancy boy, and returned to the pot-belly stove for warmth. Bees are having a field day this summer, worse than flies. Sirloin injected with teriyaki sauce, hot summer corn, perfect watermelon. Miles collecting pine cones, thrilled to spy deer in the trees. Pictured: Jeep rake and Saddest. Yard ornament. Ever.