Hello everyone on this cloudy autumn day!  We had a lot of rain and wind over the weekend.  That knocked a lot of the nicely colored leaves off the trees.  Just when it was starting to look so beautiful with all those different colors.  Oh well, there will be more yet.  Yesterday was beautiful and sunny, more on that later.  Okay, on to adventures!

One warm autumn day dad and I went digging for old bottles.  Dad liked insulators better.  But occasionally we would go bottle digging.  Anyway, we were looking around this old abandoned place and came across what we figured was an old well.  Full of water.  Wonder if it is a well, I pondered.  Most likely, said dad.  He put his shovel in a little ways.  Looks deep, he said. You only put the shovel in a little, I said.  See if you can touch bottom.  It will be too deep, said dad.  I’ll try, I offered.  NO, said dad and he swung the shovel away before I had a chance to grab for it.  Unfortunately the shovel hit the side of the well.  And it slipped out of dad’s hand.

There was this kind of quiet ‘sploop’.  We both stood there watching the shovel disappear from sight down the well.  My new shovel, dad said quietly.  Looks deep, I said.  Bonehead! said dad.  That’s good.  At least he wasn’t upset about losing his shovel.  Oh well, he said, now I won’t be able to dig for bottles. Sure you can, you can use my shovel, I said.  I brought my extra folding shovel, so I will use that one.  I always liked to be prepared.  Especially knowing how accident prone dad was.  Dad just looked.  He used to do that a lot.

We were digging quite close together in this one spot and finding a few nice old bottles. But not usually a good idea to be so close.  Anyway, I was trying to pry something out of the ground.  Dad finally stopped digging to see what I was doing.  Right then my shovel broke free.  And dirt went flying.  Right in dad’s face.  Oddly, he had his mouth open at the time.  He was going to ask what I was doing.  Seems he got dirt in his mouth.  So now he was sputtering and spitting.  Bonehead!, he said.  Not sure how he could be enjoying a mouthful of dirt.

Dad decided to take a break and have some coffee.  I kept digging for a bit.  I found a really nice old bottle and took it over to show dad.  Look at this one, I said.  I held it right in front of him.  Then I brushed a bit more dirt off the bottle.  Oh.  We both looked down.  The dirt landed in dad’s cup of coffee.  Dad just looked.  And sighed.  He used to sigh a lot too.  You seem to be having problems today, I said.  Today?, he questioned.  Here, I’ll get you some more coffee.  I reached for the thermos.  NO, said dad as he also reached for the thermos.  It fell.  We both looked.

You should have put the lid on it, I said.  I should have stayed home, dad said.  Strange. And miss out on all this fun?  Oddly, dad didn’t think it was fun.  For some reason dad didn’t like digging for old bottles.

I will stop for now.  Yes, all these things really did happen.  I hope you all have a wonderful day and God bless!

Steve and Muffin.

© 2019 Steve McLeod.