The Final Days of Summer

Our wet spring and summer has turned dry. Dry enough, in fact, that we haven’t mowed in two weeks. It has also been hot. This, too, will change soon. And as we move into mid-September the last of the tobacco is being cut and farmers are turning their attention to harvesting corn. And in the cool of the evening we hear the popping of shotguns as dove season is now open. Fall is right around the corner!

COLLEGE GIRL
Jenna has had two weeks of classes and is loving it, even with an 18 hour course load! She bought a larger planner to keep up with all her assignments.

Jenna is also developing several close friendships. She and her roommate, Macy, have hit it off well, and they have become close friends with two girls who live directly across the hall. Incidentally, the neighbors across the hall are the two recipients of the McClurkan Scholarship that Jenna was in the running for back in the spring. We regularly see pictures of all four girls when Jenna texts pictures to us.

Someone asked the other day if we miss Jenna now that she is away. I had to honestly respond that we would if we had time to miss her. We’ve seen her all three weekends and been so busy all throughout the week that in a way it doesn’t feel any different from last year when she was a senior and had her own schedule as it was. I know Vicki feels differently since she and Jenna would often stay up late together. I’m ready for our schedule to settle down a bit, but at least all the activity has softened the blow to some degree.

CHURCH NEWS
I do want to note here that our pastor, who came on board at Mt. Carmel last August, resigned two weeks ago. The details are unimportant here, though I will say that prayers on behalf of our church family as well as our former pastor and his family as we all move forward would be appreciated.

Getting back to Jenna for a moment, she is planning to find a church in Nashville to attend while she is in college, but this development brought her home on the Sunday during her first weekend away. We ate lunch at Mom’s house after church. It was odd to watch her turn left out of Mom’s driveway and head to her new home.

SHAKESPEARE IN THE PARK
Last weekend we went back to Centennial Park for this season’s Nashville Shakespeare Festival production. Nate is required to attend this play by his theater teacher. We were originally planning to go last Sunday night, but Nate came home from school last Friday begging to go that night because some of his friends were going. So, we loaded up and went to see Macbeth. As it turned out, there were several kids from school there, but none of Nate’s friends.

As always, these productions are spectacular. The acting, set design, and costumes are phenomenal. And it is pleasant to enjoy the show outside at the bandshell. Once again, I felt like I watched a play delivered in a foreign language. I still don’t have any more clue about the story of Macbeth now than I did before I saw it. It was awfully bloody though.

Nashville Shakes is doing something new this year. Macbeth was actually performed by the apprentice company and featured a lot of young actors, one of whom is a senior at Davidson Academy. It was fun to see someone I know performing on stage. At the same time, their more seasoned actors are performing The Comedy of Errors. This is the play we had originally planned to see last Sunday, and since Jenna was going to meet us for the evening we decided to return.

It was a lot of fun to catch up with Jenna after her first week of classes, and since she did not come home even though it was Labor Day weekend we didn’t want to pass up the opportunity to see her. We picked her up at school, ate supper at Cook Out, and then went to the play. For the first time in my life I actually understood the dialogue of a Shakespeare play and could follow the story! I was so pleased with this I almost forgot to laugh at the funny parts.

Now our procrastinating son has to get himself in gear and finish up his assignment so that our brushes with culture won’t be in vain.

CROSS COUNTRY
Ben is moving on with Cross Country. He’s been to several meets and we finally got to one Thursday evening. For a beginner he pulled in a respectable time, finishing a 5k in 21:51, a little over a minute behind one of his friends who has been running cross country a while. He also did better than some of his friends from East Robertson who were competing as well. Of course, his height gives him a ground eating stride.

OTHER BUSYNESS
There are several other things that have kept us, Vicki in particular, busy of late. First of all, the Buick. My poor wife has exhausted everything she could think of to make herself comfortable in that Enclave. Her back would have none of it. Last week she admitted defeat and put the car up for sale at Rusty Graves’ car lot in Cross Plains. We are hoping it sells quickly and for a good price.

Next, our renters informed us that they would be moving at the end of the month. Vicki has been working feverishly to find new tenants. We have gotten a lot of nibbles, but no takers yet. Hopefully this will change in the next three weeks.

Finally, our washer died. The oil leaked out (with only a little appearing on the floor) and without lubrication the transmission chewed itself to pieces. For those of you who have seen our bathroom you know our washer and dryer fit in there like a puzzle. The dryer has to be removed to get the washer out. Thursday night, after Ben’s cross country meet, we bought a washer from the Sears Outlet store. After wrestling it into place we discovered we had neglected to measure the height of the cabinet door where we store the detergent. The washer was just tall enough to block the door. So, we got that back on the truck and Vicki exchanged it for one that fits the space. Hopefully this unit will give us years of service because it’s no fun moving these appliances around.

That’s what’s been going on with the Swann family as we head into the last few days of summer.

Joe