Actually sat in the swing a few minutes this morning. Was hoping to see some male goldfinches but only cardinals and chickadees were feeding at the bird buffet. Got to fill up the feeders, too. Birds are such beautiful creatures. I get so much pleasure in watching them. When the feeders are full of song birds, I feel like Chief has sent them to me.

Got cold so I finished drinking my coffee in the kitchen and watched the birds on the deck feeders. Some critter has been in my pansies. Drug a whole plant out of the pot and left it on the deck’s bench. Probably a raccoon, mad cause I didn’t refill the suet feeders. If they are looking for somewhere warm to sleep tonight, it better not be my living room chimney. I’ll burn their butts with the gas logs.

My phone has a winter cast alert for snow at 1 AM tonight. No accumulation. I’m excited. Just a tiny flurry thrills me. One of my high school friends lives in Colorado. She gets great snows in Denver. When I was a child there was a phone number you could dial for a local weather forecast. She was in love with snow flurries, too. We wore that number out in the winter time.

Chief lived in Vermont as a young man teaching college prep English at Montpellier High School. Course the snow didn’t slow them down up there. Stayed on the ground till spring. He lived in a beautiful old colonial home next door to the state capital building. Rented the upstairs apartment from an elderly lady. His landlord, in her 80’s then, would brush the snow off Chiefs car and crank it every morning so it would be warm for him! We all picked on him about that but he said she wanted to do that for him.

Snow here in Alabama always depressed Chief. He always worried about family and friends that had to be out and about. He hated bringing in the wet wood for the fireplace. We’d roast marshmallows and cook hot dogs in the fireplace when we had a winter storm. I never could find the perfect place to sit and watch the flurries in Alex City. The lady den here at The Gran has 9 windows so I have a good place to perch!

Changing the subject, but ever noticed on a keyboard the only letters in correct order are j, k, l, and f, g, h. You might have, but I just noticed it this afternoon. Guess I need something to occupy my stupid self. Anyway, how on earth did someone come up with the order for the keys? Was curious enough to research that. Christopher Latham Sholes invented the typewriter in 1874. The first keys on the typewriter were in the alphabet order but the keys would type fast and jam. So commonly used letters were spread out and the QWERTY keyboard was born. QWERTY, named for the first 6 letters on the standard key pad. I think Qwerty would be a good raccoon name!

When I first went to work with Chief he was writing a history of the Ben Russell family and how it was woven in with Russell Corporation history. Thursdays he would visit Tom Russell and his wife, Julia, and read them a chapter of the history. I had previously worked at The Roanoke Leader (now the Randolph Leader) and was used to a compugraphic typing machine and used to an electric typewriter in college.

First day of work, Chief comes to my desk holding the book’s next chapter for me to type on a manual typewriter with two carbon copies! You can imagine how thrilled I was. Thank God for White-out! Thought I was going to have to quit the job the first week. I couldn’t even strike the keys on the manual typewriter hard enough at first to make the carbon copies.

Years pass, the book reading keeps going and Mrs. Russell asks Chief to bring me and the children to their Thursday reading. Chief was so proud. They loved him, had come to our wedding here at The Gran. And I thought, “ Oh, my God! How could I get a two-year and four-year old to behave during the reading?”

Anyway I’ll never forget that day. We made it through the chapter reading but while Chief read, Rosalyn and Thomas were devouring a large bowl of Hershey kisses. I moved it once and Mrs, Russell put it back! Then the sugar rush hit and Rosie started jumping on the sofa. Thomas was getting ready to jump, too. I was mortified and swatted her fanny and told her to get down. Mrs. Russell fussed at me for correcting her! “Leave her alone, Lane. She’s not hurting anything and she’s having a good time!”

I thought to myself, she’s going to have a good time when we get home!