August 3, 2006
About the rain. . . I think that once upon a time, had there been a “rainmaker” coming to Seward, I would have gone to the event, and added whatever was needed to pay the person because it would have been worth it. Or, if it were the thing being done, I would be joining the rain dancing to call up the clouds. When one is in the country, it is hard to ignore the weary courage of the plants and trees as they stand in the sun and hot wind day after day. The ground is as hard and unyielding as concrete and the growing things that started off the season with too much enthusiastic greenery above but too little root below have given up and died back. When I walked through Sanctuary this morning, I passed under the huge cottonwood tree that stands at the corner of the forty. It always rustles some leaves for me in greeting, and it remains serene in the heat and drought because its roots live below ground many feet where they remain connected to the water tables there. Most of the birds have given up their song since they no longer are defending territories, and the red wing blackbirds, grackles, and wrens have departed. Now we hear the occasional cardinal, the towhee, turtle doves and the elusive yellow warbler, with the blue jays always calling or scolding in the background.
This afternoon I had a ganglion cyst at the base of my thumb treated because it was growing quite painful to use the hand. Our general practitioner identified it quickly, (common but harmless) and drained it right there in the office. I had become so accustomed to greater complexity that I was astonished at such efficiency. He also told me that these lumps found on either the top of the wrist, or near the base of fingers, were called “Bible” cysts because it was the practice to lay out the hand and whack it with the heaviest book at hand, usually the family Bible, in order to flatten it out and disperse the liquid within. Ah the joys of modern medicine! A tiny needle and a bit of cortisone followed by a bright blue wrap are far more appealing.