Alone, Almost

Friday morning Grant and Blair drove away, headed back to law school in Tucson. They were delightful, helpful house guests who even left some nice fish fillets in the freezer. Grant caught a whiting; Blair caught a speckled trout.

While their last load of laundry finished drying, 
Blair and Grant relaxed in the swing by the canal.

The next morning Dennis drove away in a rental car, headed to cold, snowy Kansas and his job, his chickens, and Annie. Suddenly my companions were gone and I was on my own. 

This seemed a good time to check out Galveston's new bakery, Patty Cakes. Every winter I come here I search for a good loaf of bread. I've tried every grocery store and bakery, but could never find a loaf of real bread. Finally, I found it here.

 Patty Cakes makes a wonderful whole wheat loaf made 
with blackstrap molasses. They call it Squaw bread.

The good bread was a boost, but I still face the challenge of having only myself for company on this mostly uninhabited end of the island. Oh, there are people and small businesses, but the hundreds if not thousands of big, uninhabited houses loom large.

The houses have owners, but most of the owners don't live in them except for an occasional weekend. Developments have eaten up acres and acres of the West End, destroying much of the sandhill crane's winter habitat. I grieve for those big, elegant birds, but also for a society in which so many people have too much and many, many more have too little, not even a roof over their heads.

Now it's time to turn my mind to creative projects. I started with chickens.

It's time, also, to watch real birds, like this egret in the bay down my street.

And the beach is always calling me to see the latest ephemeral sand sculptures created by water, wind, and submerged creatures.

The flame still burns.