My oh my, what a day. My cousin Art’s funeral was today at the Forest City Thresher’s site, north of Litchfield. Art was a founding father of the organization and I could tell, he will be hard to replace within the group.
Dennis and I left home before noon and the sun was brilliant. For two old farmers such as we are, it was interesting to see how tall the corn was and how much water was standing in the rows from the recent rains.
Just as several times before on the open highway, we met Kersten and Kevin heading south as we were heading north. We didn’t stop for a chat this time, we made due with me texting, followed by a phone call from Kevin.
The clouds above were turbulent the entire time. We stopped at a Casey’s store in Litchfield and before I could return to the car, the rains started. We didn’t think anything of it as Litchfield had just gotten four inches the night before. How much could be left to fall? The six miles out to the thresher’s site was driving at 40 mph as you couldn’t see for the rain coming down.
I enjoyed seeing many family members from my Mom’s side of the Riebe clan. Bitter sweet as we just had a Riebe reunion at the thresher’s site last year, hosted by Art himself. He was so proud to show off the dining hall adjacent to some of the warehouses full of goodies. Taken too soon at the age of 61, he was a memorable fellow.
We arrived home about 7:30 this evening, again often times driving through rain and very strong winds. With strong winds howling, the first thing we did was check out the yards to see if we had any wind damage. Dennis cleaned seed pods out of the Koi pond, but didn’t spend any extra time under the large trees. Older trees often have damage that is not detectable until it, or a part of it, hits the dirt.
After we got home, I offered a prayer of thanks for having a safe day of traveling. Then, standing on my driveway, clicking my heels together, the neighbors could very well have heard me say, “There’s no place like home, there’s no place like home.”