Unearthing a life.....

No. It is not the Coalminer's Daughter. It's the once and future Bookworm, PhD. I think friends and clients alike might be surprised at the gusto with which she once wielded a pick at the Fossil Boys' dig site out there in the Columbia Basin. The long shadow stretching west and the jacket-vest suggest to me that I took this shot about 8:00 AM on a brisk May morning (1990 per the date on the back of the pix). Ahhhh .... those were the days! Days of sunrise at the digs with a thermos of coffee and giant cinnamon rolls from a QuikStop gas station. Listening to the coyotes yipping their 'good mornings' to each other. Flights of Canada Geese and Sandhill Cranes and Airforce Cargo Planes overhead. Wondering what exciting bone might sneak to the surface on this particular day.

As I've mentioned, granddaughter Rachel is here ... or was here ... yesterday. She went to Seattle last evening to have dinner with an old friend. But then was apparently telephonically besieged by one parent and/or another about her plans for her 22nd birthday (today) and has subsequently evaporated into the geographical mists. It would be safe to speculate that she's still in Washington State. I hope.

There are issues bobbing on the surface of this section of the River of Descendants. Control issues. Parental grips that refuse to relax and let the young lady get on with making her own way. Rachel is fine. Bright. Articulate. Funny. Conversational. Helpful. Tidy. Generous. And employed. That may be a trait or two more than I had going for me when I turned twenty-two. That was the year (1956) that I got married the first time, drove a '53 Chevy Bel-Air, and became the father of a baby-in-waiting. If my parents had any surviving control issues or bon mots of advice that late in the game, they had the good grace to keep them to themselves.

I'm into my week two recovery period.