(Photo by my late father, James David Row, probably. Circa 1966.)

See how happy I am there, age 2, with my dog, Peaches? I’m wearing slippers that my granny knitted for me. Cuz she loved me. The dolly? The doll cradle that we will later sand and paint and turn into a doll cradle for our daughter, and oh, my Lord. The sweetness of our daughter, age 2, climbing into the cradle with her dolly and her blankie and smiling up at us. Best.

(Photo by us.)

Steve + Nancy on a date, Los Lobos concert, 8/12/12, Tualatin Valley Parks & Rec summer show, Beaverton, Ore. How do I remember the date and the details? Because we blogged our whole lives. Then it blew up. Then next thing you know…

Yeah. I’ll spare you the gory details.

So what does this tell you, other than dog people should marry dog people and cat people should marry cat people? (“War of the Roses.” War of the Rawleys.)

Don’t marry someone who tells you what you can and cannot plant in your garden.

He doesn’t like roses; I do.

I’m a June baby, they’re my birth month flower, I’m from the City of Roses. But the way he whined about them — the black spot! The aphids! The thorns and the hassle and what is the point of roses, exactly? NO ROSES FOR YOU. (Except a bouquet if you demand them, for Valentine’s Day or your birthday or something.)

My new place? So many roses. (All of these photos by moi, Nancy Ellen Row Rawley.)

These are the first ones to bloom. They came out today. They’re hanging over a trellis in my garden. Note the black spot? I do not give care about the black spot. It’s only May, how can there already be black spot, aiiiiiii, etc. Come on. You can cut off those leaves and little branches, try not to water at night (it makes it worse), but end of the day? Who cares? The old lady who lived here before me, Boots, was Welsh, and her whole goal in life was to recreate the Welsh countryside. I’m Irish. I appreciate everything she did around here, it’s gorgeous.

(Rhodies galore, mostly light and dark pinks, very girly.)

Nice yellow.

I can’t tell yet what color these are going to be, but I’ll tell you one thing — they’re already covered with aphids and I do not care. I hosed them off, they’re beautiful. They’re big, and they’re climbing all over the place. Next to them is the big, overgrown forsythia, and I’m not pruning it back much, because the chickens need a place to hide and stay cool this summer.

Iris, more iris, and life, always sweeter over the other side of the septic tank. (That’s what you want to plant in your septic field, by the way. Something with low-growing roots, not deep roots, with lots of space to let the clean, run-off water evaporate. (My garden is uphill from the septic tank and field, thank you.)

Lots of big oaks around here. That’s actually a maple, sorry. There are oaks up and down the road, they’re majestic. I kinda love Corvallis, and all the trees. It’s good here.

Here’s all I have to say: I loved my old man. I did my best, we have these two great kids, and I finally have my roses. (I’ve counted nine or ten bushes so far, including some wild roses that are going nuts from having a little attention. The garden hadn’t received enough loving the past few years. It happens.)

xoxoxoxox and bon appetit!

WM

(“Historia, Historia,” pic by Nancy Ellen Row Rawley)

When Gardenburgers ™ were first invented, by a Portland guy who owned a really superfine supercool house in Southeast Portland, btw, one of the other tasty tidbits they invented was a Gardentaco.

They did a funny ad, black & white as I recall, and it had a line drawing of the Gardentaco in a shell.

“Looks funny, but fits!”

But the best line? “The average person, in their lifetime, eats 700 chickens! Let your 700 live!” I thought that was cute.

Did you know you can toast Gardenburgers in the toaster? You can. So when my vegetarian sis and I were in college, and broke, we toasted a *lot* of Gardenburgers.

My cousin, visiting and heading straight to the kitchen, used to say, “Something about walking into your house makes me want to toast a Gardenburger.” lol.

Oh, Historia, Historia… She was our chicken. She was egg-bound (the eggs couldn’t come out. She was a big girl who laid big, gorgeous eggs.) There were two stuck in there. So I took her to the vet and they told me that for a grown chicken to be egg-bound like that was generally a “secondary symptom,” or something, meaning she had another problem and the eggs not coming out was just a sign that something else was wrong. Tumors. She hadn’t been grooming herself, was listless and in pain. She had a lame foot and it hurt her to walk.

So I had her euthanized and now I’m just sad because, dammit, chickens. And also? I don’t really want to eat chicken anymore, it depresses me. Do you know how much chicken is always on the menu? A lot. My friend Gigi says, kindly, “Chickens are disposable.”

(huge sigh.)

Let your 700 live.

Sorry this post is sad but life in the country is sometimes sad. PS the gardener said next time he’ll take care of it, if one of the chickens gets old and sick (which they will. That’s life). Also? Can I deal with the poison oak out back cuz he’s hugely allergic to it?

I’m hoping I’m not.

I miss Steve all the time, not just some of the time. That sucks. Twenty years is a long time to be married, and then have your partner go missing on you.

xo

WM

(Photo by Steve Rawley)

I “won” a gift certificate at a school auction, the masseuse won’t return calls to sked my appointment, and when she does? This is how the computer translates it. kinda funny… But I don’t think i’m going to get that massage any time soon.

— wm

“Hi this is Rosie. so(?) I hung up. We’re disconnected my phone disconnected us or something but I’m hey I was trying to come up with it the day that you could gimme a buzz but I don’t work Saturday. So I’m at work so we can been work Monday through Friday. And for this summer I’m trying to take two days off for the most part I might be able to bring something if I have day care but otherwise I have that deed designated as a mommy day. So just you know I guess I need you to call me back and let me know if you can do it anytime during the day or I have a couple evenings a week I work late. So I’m not to be ugly-to-her-thursday-than(?) Friday. So I do need a call back and we’ll schedule that. Okay thanks bye.”

(Photo by Steve Rawley)

love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love love

peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace peace

I think about what it’s maybe like in Heaven. My cousin, who shot himself in the head; my uncle (his father), who wrapped his car around a tree; my Dad (my uncle’s friend, and the man my cousin loved most next to his own father), who jumped off a bridge; my Grandpa (who loved my cousin, my uncle, my Dad, so much) who kept threatening to shoot himself, until my uncles took away his guns. So he went off dialysis and stopped eating and was gone in a week.

Yeah, I bet that’s a real g.d. interesting conversation they’re all having, about their rights and how much easier everything is, now that they’re gone.

Now, how about you tell me that suicide is painless, while I’m sitting here alone, with their pain and mine, on a Saturday night. When people kill themselves, that pain doesn’t go away; it just gets transferred to someone else is all.

That’s all. Someone else carries it.

This is all getting stirred up for me in a kind of huge, ugly way, because of Newtown (Clackamas Town Center, Columbine, Springfield, Jonesboro, on and on). All the Yosemite Sams are jumping around, shooting themselves down both legs at once, no gun control bs, “gotta stay safe!”, loading up on new guns and ammo, going to gun shows, taking shooting classes, taking out concealed weapon permits, NRA bs, 2nd Amendment bs, on and on until I want to scream from it, really.

You know what people like to shoot with guns? Themselves. And children. And their wives. Women, in general. Wait. And men. People like to shoot men, too.

No more guns. They’re not worth the cost.

This song always makes me feel a little better. I’ll just play it twelve more times and try to get some sleep.

Peace, love, peace, love, always.

nancy

…first you’ll have to pry my gun from my cold, dead fingers… if those kids had been armed they wouldn’t have been shot… it’s all the mother’s fault, she was single… guns don’t kill people, single mothers kill people… 2nd amendment guar-an-damn-tees me my right to AK47s and lots of ammo… and… cue Ted Nugent, celebrity spokemodel. Finis.

Betsy Hammond asks, Is the children learning? Maybe she and Tom Hallman can give lessons — pretty soon they’ll all be writing like m@th!rf&*ers smh ;)

From Thee O’s comments section:

hermtownhomy
“The irony flag was up in my head before I even started reading, and I knew it wouldn’t take long. I made it to the third paragraph. ‘But with class sizes swelling and teens more prone to text and tweet than string paragraphs together, schools and teachers face a tall order.’ And I could go no further.”

Dear Some of My Former Co-Workers,

As you are drinking yourselves silly at the wake tomorrow for our late co-worker… let’s just call him DUI Guy, for his sake… plz you will remember that alcohol isn’t the best temporary solution. But it’s a pretty good permanent one.

Love,

nancy

ps yes i know this graf needed an editor.

Here’s a related story for you.

And another one. Happy Friday, y’all. RIP, RIP, RIP to those who need it.

also, Peter Bhatia? kind of a wussy-boy. He’s all, You?! You! Are a Troll! and a… a… blogger.

oh my heck. This from the man who after he did yet another slice n dice on the newsroom, gathered us all around in an all-hands meeting, gave a big ol’ smirk and said, “The only person who likes change is a baby.” (Actually, he said that a lot. That was just the first time we ever heard it.) I told my co-workers, “This is a man who obviously has never changed a diaper.” oy.

Fed up with Lewis & Clark and Thomas Jefferson — it’s all my kids have learned about American history at school so far (grades 4 and 7). So we’re watching Roots.

all power to the people,

wm

But her dad is. #blesshisheart. She’s just stressed out and slowly going broke. I have never read such a painfully funny article in my life.

Ouch.

And no, I’m not saying that in an “elderschadenfreude” way, ‘k? ‘K.

Yeah, try covering those behinds with all four of your hands, how ’bout?