Perhaps a laugh

 

And changed a zillion diapers on your butt!

This didn't happen on my recent trips to Asheville through Swannanoa, but it is at the corner where everyone turns to get on I-40. Apparently the guy was at a gas pump and hit the accelerator rather than the brake pedal. No injuries reported...but you have to wonder how he got out!

Dry Falls, near Franklin NC. It's actually quite damp under the falls!

I was lucky enough to be alive when this happened, and lived within a hundred miles of it! Saw it on the news with the traffic problems.

A week ago Friday was March 13...and here's Mr Rogers (no relation) talking about King Friday the 13th.

“Laugh. We’re all going to be dead anyway some day. So while you should try your hardest to make the most of your life, when something funny happens, when you make a mistake, or even (and perhaps especially) when bad things happen, it’s easier if you can laugh about yourself and the world.”

Source: Life Is Short And So Is This Book: Brief Thoughts On Making The Most Of Your Life by Ex-Microsoft general manager and writer, Peter Atkins on how to live life.

If we fall in love with creation deeper and deeper, we will respond to its endangerment with passion.

Hildegard of Bingen Thanks to AC, must add this video! For all my fortunate Canadian friends! May you stay free of the (insert expletive here) threats from the Orange one, who we citizens of the USA deplore and wish to be rid of asap!

Miscellaneous week ending

 

From the internet

This is your brain!

researcher Alexander Shapson-Coe decided to focus their gaze—and the full power of electron microscopy—on just one cubic millimeter of the temporal cortex. 

The dent in my landlady's brand-new car. Mea culpa.

Before hiking the trail to High Falls.

Almost finished with the 1-1/2 mile hike...yes we were plumb tired out. Then had our picnic.

I'll share the wonderful High Falls soon!

Sunrise TN.NC by Jack Cathy Ollis, from FaceBook. Sharing with Skywatch Friday.

Throwback photo:

A gathering of pottery and plants 2015. 

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Today's quote:

The human skin is an artificial boundary: the world wanders into it, 

and the self wanders out of it, traffic is two-way and constant. 

 

—Bernard Wolfe

The old old roads...and what happens when two cars are in the same place at the same time

Just ran into a wonderful article which I'd shared a year ago on FB...Here's the whole thing. I'm grabbing the photos for this blog, and certainly recommend reading it.

Many of my ancestors moved about through the centuries...like most of us. And when there weren't yet roads, there were tracks...which later were worked on to be wide enough for wagons...and thus settlers could go to "frontiers." The quotes on that word is due to the fact that all of that land was occupied already by Native Americans, so it was just a frontier for the European settlers.

From whom I'm descended 

"Ramblin’ Man: From Wagon Trail to Interstate

"Getting from here to there in North Carolina has always depended on safe roads — for man and beast."

by T. Edward Nickens

.

And...

On Asheville's Urban Trail are statues of pigs (here) and turkeys (in background)...both of which were part of the drovers trade from Tennessee to at least Greenville SC, possibly as far as Charlotte.

Sharing  with Sepia Saturday this week!

And a Post Script....on Friday I tucked my little car into the side of a slightly bigger car, because a much bigger black car had blocked my view of the one I hit. Since my front bumper was riding on the tire, it was towed away.  Thus I am now without transportation, and have been calling around to find out how and if I can get the little 2004 Toyota fixed. Apparently it's also up to the insurance adjuster...who probably won't come right away.

Incidentally the other driver was also ok. She was Hispanic and speaking on a phone with an earbud constantly even when police and EMT's were there.  I felt really bad to have interrupted her life by running into her.

You have no idea how helpless I feel about car things...so I called who I usually had do my mechanical work...who referred me to a body place that doesn't have any openings till Dec...and I'd have to have it towed to them to just get an estimate...and on and on. Talking to mechanics, body shops, and my friends of male persuasion, well just one, who hasn't ever had an accident...I'm left sitting here feeling pretty darn helpless.

The air conditioning probably caused the fluid you see under the car.

Fortunately I have access to free transportation around my little town on Mountain Mobility, a small van which goes by my apartments 3 times a morning and 3 times an afternoon. 

And I have friends willing to help me out...either to get where I need to go, or to bring me things. The one thing they can't fix is my brain, which goes over and over the moment of impact and all the things said and done right afterwards.  I have called my Dr. office, but they are closed till Mon. and they only want to help with pain in my right arm, which was bruised as I was shifting gears. Sleep aids may be necessary tonight!

Today's quote:

No one else sees the world the way you do, so no one else can tell the stories that you have to tell. 

-Charles de Lint, writer (b. 22 Dec 1951)

 

O'Keeffe's paintings of Poppies and accidents happen

OK, by the time you see these on your computer/pad/phone screen, they have been photographed by my phone, from a printed post card which was photographed from the original in Santa Fe, NM. But they are closer to the original than lots of prints you/and I see. I do own the glare off the shiny surface.

And Wed. I had an event here (accidental) at the senior apartments... I had just come in from checking the plants on my porch, and decided at least one needed watering, so I filled half gallon jug and went back out on the porch. My next door neighbor (who seldom goes outside her apartment) was lying by her walker on the sidewalk, in her quiet voice calling "help, help." 

So I put down the water and walked over to her, where most of her was sprawled across the Hosta plant, and her feet and legs were entangled in the walker (the kind with wheels and brakes) but her head was on the cement. I untangled the walker, while she said, "Help me up." I said, "Just wait a minute, your daughter will be right back." There fortunately was no blood!

Daughter had gone to get the car, and said a minute later "I left her sitting there on the walker while I went to get the car. She must have fiddled with the brakes."

Daughter was very upset, and tried to dial "911" and someone else at the same time. Another resident had seen this happening and alerted the landlady who then also came over. Several of them dialed 911 and I kind of kept holding my neighbor's hand and talking calmly, while daughter slowly got herself calmed down too. I think it was probably 10 minutes before we heard the sirens that the EMS were coming. I went back to my porch to water my plant. The last thing I said to my neighbor was "There's a rule, you have to wait for a medical person to check you out before you can get up." 

She answered "I know, I was a nurse."

She's now 83, and has 3 daughters. The one who was picking her up today was not the usual one that visits their mom. I think they come and fix food for her and clean up her apartment at least once a day. They said their mom had tried living with them, but had previously liked it here, so moved back in (a couple of years ago.)

So the excitement was over for all of my efforts, while more people poured out of their apartments to see the EMS come treat my neighbor. Her daughter had brought out some pillows to make her more comfortable, and was able to give the EMT's her history (some back surgery). I'm glad we were able to help her.

And I watered the marigolds.

Today's quote:

Awareness of gratitude will allow you to savor and, above all, appreciate your life with renewed grace.