So today, for the first time since June of last year, I finally had income. Pretty amazing. I've always been pretty good at saving money, but this whole having a husband thing makes it a lot more challenging. After all, he has to eat. And he's a man. And a fairly young with high metabolism one at that. So after all the airline tickets, the wedding, and the food, it's great to finally get something back. Not that my part time job provided a whopper of a pay check, but at least enough to cover about a third of our most recent paperwork fee. At least it's all in now, so all we have to do is wait at the mercy of the government. We'll see how that goes.
In other news, it's sunny. It's been in the 70's several days this week, and I couldn't be happier about that. Now if the gas prices will just go down like some person on the radio said they should, life would definitely improve. Mark and I have been doing quite a bit of exploring over the past several weeks as the weather has gotten better, and it takes a toll on that gas bill for sure.
We're currently living in Moscow, ID. For those who don't know anything about Moscow, well, it's a far cry from Hong Kong or the Czech Republic. It's a little town with a fair sized state university, plopped down right in the middle of the Palouse. The Palouse is a region of Idaho and Washington characterized by it's rolling hills of farmland. It's surrounded by a large number of miniscule village like towns, tucked away in the hills at the end of winding dirt roads.
Since Mark and I are both fascinated by history, and the life stories revealed in cemeteries, we've been meandering about on these little byways in search of historical treasure. I think I wrote about one of the little cemeteries we went to a few weeks ago. Yesterday we were driving into Genessee after taking a long circuitous route along Lenville road. The sun broke through the scattered gray clouds to reveal a cemetery on a hill. It was a bit chilly, but we braved the cold and checked out the remnants of Pine Valley, a place that no longer even seems to exist except as recorded in the Cemetery. Someone had erected a stone there that talked about the family connections that could be witnessed when looking at the scattered graves.
Today, we went in a different direction. This time our search took us to Little Bear Ridge Cemetery, a very small plot that held maybe thirty or so stones. Again, this little place recounted the lives of early settlers, remembered only in this bit of ground set apart long ago. We then made our way to Burnt Ridge Cemetery. This one revealed a strong Swedish population. It was really quite fascinating. Of course, Mark had to harness his feelings regarding the fact that Sweden beat the Czech Republic in Hockey today (after the Czech's totally slaughtered the Americans a few days ago of course), but he managed to do so. It seemed that a large community had come there together to start a new life, probably during the famine that hit Sweden in the 1860s. Many of the stones were even written in Swedish. It made me think of my own maternal lineage, and how most of them settled out in Minnesota in that era.
As always, I was fascinated to think of the lives of the people, now nestled peacefully on these little hilltops. There was evidence of great loves and tragic losses sprinkled across the quiet green field. It reminds me of our frailty and the importance of living this life to the fullest while we have a chance.
So in honor of these thoughts we enjoyed half price frappucinos from Starbucks and later on buy one get one free frozen strawberry lemonades from McDonalds. So the weekend is on. I have three days off, so hopefully the nice weather will hold, although I've heard there are thunderstorms in the forecast. At least that could be interesting, and could mean the warm weather will continue as well. As always, here's to hope!
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