There’s open water up close and black ice afar in this picture taken from the east end of Lk.Charlevoix, near Boyne City.
These were blooming yesterday, 04/07/08, but I didn’t have my camera with me. As far as I know, it’s the first blooms of the year in this neighborhood.
At 1130am I heard the Spring Peepers for the first time. Now, family legend has it that there will be two more heavy frosts between now and the third time I’ll hear them sing. After that, it’s safe to plant crops. The source of this information originated on Mackinac Island so it may not pretain to the lower latitudes and the family isn’t prone to “unmitigated truth” either. We’ll see.
Just inside the back door to my grandparents home, a calendar was mounted, and on several dates in April, were several initials. Each initial represented the authoratative opinions of several generations, and each knowing for sure, the others’ were full of shit. It also represented a hundred dollar payoff.
Grandma and Grandpa Griffin lived on Union Lake, in Oakland Co., and George and Helen had many friends. They used to have just several, but not long after their move to Union Lake, the numbers grew expotentialy. Anyway, on any given Sunday there would be from 5 to 35 people who’d stop by and talk to Grandpa. They were all fishermen, smoked some of the most God-awful shit I’ve ever inhaled and drank Pabst Blue ribbon, or Carlings Black label, by the kegfulls. These guys were from all forms of trade and manor and they all adored Grandpa. He’d sit there in his recliner, chewing handfulls of Bugler, and smoking his corn cob pipe holding court to these men.
I was 11 years old then and I didn’t give a rip what Grandpa had to say, I wanted to win the “Ice out” contest. Uncle Ted, who lived there too, had an 8′ sheetmetel pram, with the bow covered, 2′ back. As soon as the water had melted away from the shore to get that boat in it, I was in it. I could easely walk about the boat, and using an oar, I’d slide up on the ice. Once there, I’d chop the ice all the way around the boat and then back off and cut the cube into pieces and stowing them under the ice. I would do this all day. We’d get there in the morning around 8am and I’d come off the boat around 5 for dinner.
I never won the contest but I was always thanked by the winner.
I remember the first and only time that I said those words and I remembered thinking at the time how profound they felt. I was from that point on; giving up my youth, my freedoms, and the possibility of my very life. There were several instances in the next 2 years, 1 month, and 19 days, of my reminders to GOD that I had asked for some assistance. Every single time I was answered, and I’m here to prove it.
I had walked into that room as the last activity I would preform, as a private citizen of the United States. All of the branches of the military were present, both by its leaders as well as the followers. At the time I was but a follower, but I had the opportunity to become one of it’s leaders in the future. There were another hundred guys in that room, just the same as me, and we all walked out of that room changed. We were all still citizens of our country, but now we could put our money where are mouth was. It’s one thing to talk about being a patriot, it’s quite another to prove it. No matter what a civilian may say about how patriotic they may be, they’re not even close to what we’ve proved after praying; So help me GOD.
On 02 April 2008, Ralph Lemieur II, recited that oath in Lansing Michigan, and has become one of us. Congratulations Ralphie. I’m very proud of you and I’d like to be the first to say thank you.
I drove up to Charlevoix yesterday morning to have coffee with Don and I saw a bobcat sitting in the middle of “Bullfrog Candles” driveway. It looked exactly like your ordinary, run-of-the-mill house cat ‘cept it weighed about 25lbs and had the tufts at the end of it’s ears.
If anyone in Charlevoix does own a house cat that looks like this, then I may be wrong but until then I’d stand out there while your puppy takes a leak in the morning.
