Food, wine, painting, travel.

Flower arranging, French Creole cooking, my husband, four children and our grandson, fund-raising for cancer research and nursing scholarships, historical preservation, photography and trying to master the digital camera while being technically challenged (read dumb), my chairmanship of the Live Oak Society and all it entails to promote and preserve live oaks, and most importantly, good friends. To name a few.

Dang ya'll, SOOOO politically correct! How about the truth?
Gossip, foods that are terrible for our health, requesting free samples of things we know we'll never buy, spraying a roach with a powerful insecticide. Life is good!

I enjoy photography, piano, kidding around, a great deal of music of many genres, philosophy, good food & wine, reading, some art, learning about other cultures, traveling, birds, lots of stuff, really.

--Ron

I enjoy reading, drinking wine, and sitting on the screened porch in nice weather. I really enjoy reading a book while drinking wine as I'm sitting on the screened porch in nice weather.

I like working on restoring our land, learning more about that process and taking long walks to see the progress of our restoration.

I love to cook when I have the time to do it as an act of pleasure. I enjoy listening to music, especially live performances of any kind, and I enjoy my feeble attempts to make music as a member of a handbell choir.

I love to run off at the mouth (or the fingertips) given half a chance...

V.

I am in those middle years of raising a family so I have no real interests of my own, but it's great.

I enjoy starting projects that i can never finish.

I enjoy pulling weeds and twisting their blighted little necks until their eyes bulge. immensely.

I enjoy heated discussions without animosity. I enjoy the light that goes on when someone sees my point of view. I enjoy the thoughts that follow when i see someone else's.

I enjoy long legged women who think and act on their own, who have a wit and sense of humor with eyes that can stun me.

I enjoy inserting comments into posts and see who takes notice. What'd you guys do to the "garden writer's aren't writing" forum while i was gone? It seems to have been weeded.

I enjoy painting watercolors, but don't have the time. It's too easy anyway.

I enjoyed learning the guitar but can't seem to get past John Denver. He is dead and i am stuck.

I enjoy working in the yard, because mother nature argues with me about all that i try to do. I learn a lot in those discussions.

Poppa

I'm not a writer, yet I write.
Does that count?
May I wet my toes here, now and again?

For me the garden writing is the 'besides'.

KJ:
Of course you may.

Loved your post Poppa. Long-legged women : now there's a vision, with eyes that stun me. I've had these same feelings. So when are you gonna publish something we can buy and read?

Catching up with my own life for one thing. The other is gardening. That's actually the same as garden writing, just the letters look different. My garden speaks my individual language, it points out what I think and feel. Strangely enough it often communicates better than words...

Poppa--have you written about long legged women with eyes that stun yet? Share.

I? Write something you can buy and read, or at least read? I am sorry to say my attention span barely rises to that of my golden retriever who, in a mid-air stick-grabbing leap, can change direction and tear off across the field in a butterfly feeding frenzy that would make a great white cringe.

I enjoy these forums where I can spit out a post as fast as I cough up when inhaling a fungus gnat. I don't have to think about form or tense, voice or punctuation. Writing something of substance is scary. Here, I can throw out something fairly witty and make some people smile and, as I was once told, make 'em pee in their pants. How could I compete with that sense of instant gratification? Still... there is something to be said for creating a quality persistent piece of writing artwork that could someday be offered on a infomercial as part the full set of best-loved works of Poppa.

OK. I'll sit down and throw something together about the long legged gal with eyes that can stun me. I'll even try to make it garden related. If I don't post by next Monday, you'll know I either chickened out, couldn't do it, or resorted to drink and am lost in Mexico.

Poppa

currently I spend any spare moments hiking the trails at a nearby park where I take the dog for exercise each day, every day at 7am and 7pm (I get a poop free yard in return). It takes about an hour to finish the main trail and I get lots of time for thinkin'.

Seems to me that I spend a lot of time scrutinizing why friendships are hard to have time for now that I am in my middle years and always busy. I recently moved here after spending almost a lifetime somewhere else - I'm still in that limbo-land of not knowing my way around, not knowing where "home" is, and not knowing that many people.

taking one step in front of the other, one day after the next, and trying to avoid the dog poop.

Poppa must be lost in Mexico. He hasn't posted his story about long legged women that he promised.

with eyes than stun, yeah! that's what I checked in for too...poor Poppa...he must be a sensitive guy...too shy to post about that lady...or maybe Mexico, right...I can just see him now...sitting there with that Tequila...ah well...we can only dream..maybe someday we'll find out the truth...!

From his previous posts I don't think Poppa is shy. All is conjecture but he probably is at this moment forming a basis of a story in his mind and the reason it is taking a while is he wants it to be good." Long-legged women with eyes that stun" struck a chord with me but then again short legged women that can't run fast are equally attractive. Of course all this should be in some sort of garden setting:
She bolted through the lavendar like a young deer and the fragrance swirled all about. I chased her as fast as I could but with her long legs she easily outdistanced me. This was not a bad thing as the further she ran the farther we were from anyone and I knew sooner or later I would catch this mysterious female who came to pick flowers by moonlight. Not that I minded , there were plenty of flowers, it was just an excuse to find out who she was. I topped the ridge and there she stood beneath a small tree. I slowed to a walk as I breathed in the cool night air. I could see the moonlight glowing through the thin dress that clung to her lithe body. I couldn't make out her face but there was just enough light where I could make out a sparkle in her eyes - Piercing eyes that followed my every move as I slowly circled her wary that she might bolt and run again. Closer I came as I pondered just the right thing to say that would not frighten her away. Darting in on impulse I grabbed her arm as she tried to pull away causing us both to fall....

And...............? Don't stop there, Eddie.

Life has a way of intervening on the best of intensions... A daughter has turned seriously ill and i am stunned that my own eyes were blinded to it. Stunned when i look into her eyes and see a mirror of the one she trusted who would protect her from this and could not, did not. A vile seed has taken hold within her, and grows. The gardener within me screams to reach in and pluck this noxious weed of life from her, but i haven't the tools. I do not know if anyone does, and I pray that Mother Nature has had the wisdom to build this garden of life that is my child, to defeat that which doesn't belong. I look for answers and hold my daughter and stare deeply into her eyes that stun me.

Peace and strength,
Poppa

You women, You're always telling me "don't stop."
I could have gone on but I am afraid my writing has too many sexual allusions in it.
By the way, I finally figured out why my eyes burn during sex - it's the mace. Okay, let me get back to talking about gardening (next time)

Poppa, I am so sorry.

Sorry Poppa, to hear the sad news, but how could you have possibly known....I wish you strength to deal with this...and comfort for the daughter you obviously adore.

Thank you.
Mine is the easier job.

Poppa

Eddie, "and caused us to fall" into a bed of poison ivy.

She gasped as she felt something hard jolting up between her thighs  it was a bullrush. She jumped up and grabbed it and cried "ThatÂs just what I was looking for in my dried flower arrangement"ÂÂ

Poppa, how are things going? Keep a journal for yourself--it helps to write your feelings down at times like this.

Coleen

Thanks for asking. The answer is that i am not sure. The worst fears have been put to rest, and that is a relief, but there is depression now that can be more scary than the illness itself. It seems to her as a monster under the bed - stealthy, stalking, waiting for when poppa isn't around. I can look under the bed and declare, "Look! Your room is bright and full of sunshine, there's nothing there!". But when the door closes in the night, she believes there is and doesn't sleep. She hears its breathing. It feeds upon itself, feeds upon her fear. The danger for me is this monster is invisible to me. If i forget for a moment that it may be real, if i get complacent, it may devour us all.

Gee, that sounds depressing, but i wrote it and i'll post it. It's not as black as all that, but it is. Is that a contradiction? Is that possible to live in two worlds so opposite at the same instance of time? I think i am begining to know what it must be to go through StarTrek's teleporter. Molecules being whirled around and tossed from one place and back again, almost without existing in either. Not a ride you'd want at Disney.

Poppa
Peace and a good garden!

No, it is not a contradiction. And, I have been there, with a son. Courage to you.

Poppa: What exactly is the diagnosis and is there something that will help or cure? Sharon