Looking ahead to the next vacation

It's almost time for our trip on the rails to the Grand Canyon, and I'm already planning a trip beyond that to the Colorado Rocky Mountains.  Tentative planning, that is, without setting a date.

We know Colorado well, and it's only a day-long drive from here.  No motels will be reserved and nothing paid for ahead of time, because we will be ready to go at the drop of a hat.

The thing is, many times the little girl we babysit goes to spend a week with her grandparents in Iowa.  We'd like to go to Colorado during one of those weeks.  There is only one time we know for certain she will be gone, and that's during the first week in October, but there will likely be others.    

I've always wanted to see Colorado in autumn, and at first I was going to plan on going in October.  However, when I put out feelers to my Facebook friends, the idea didn't sound so great.  Among comments like "It can be nice then" and "It's my favorite season in Colorado", I heard disaster stories:  hailstorms, snowstorms, ice... yes, during the first week in October.  

Well, October is a lovely time to go to south Missouri and Arkansas and check out the fall colors.  So we'll just wait until the child's next unplanned trip to Iowa and pick up and go.  We can leave with little notice.

Speaking of the little girl, she isn't even three years old yet, but she thinks she knows everything and will argue her point.  Although Cliff still calls her "the baby",  she is anything but.  She's more like a miniature teenager.  She's a nature girl, a hillbilly whose shoes come off as soon as she's in the house (sometimes before).  She's a free spirit who has no problem with squatting outside when nature calls rather than going in to the bathroom.  She's a chatterbox in the true female tradition.  She still would rather do adult things (cooking, cleaning, gardening) than play with toys.  In fact, she usually only plays with toys if Cliff or I join her in playing.  Then she'll play for an hour at a time.  But we have to play by her rules.  She has a hard head and an unquenchable spirit.      

Being around the little girl as she grows has been so good for us, because we've had all the joys and few of the responsibilities and worries that go with raising one's own child.  She's truly a gift to us and to the world.  

I thank God for her.  She has given us more pleasure than ten vacations.

Something about that song

Early in the morning, I like everything quiet.  But since I've discovered Amazon Echo, I've found I can choose an Amazon Prime playlist that's "for relaxation" or "for meditation", turn the sound very low, and fully enjoy it.  I go to sleep by these types of list, and it turns out the same music also soothes me in the early morning hours.  Much of the music on those lists is instrumental, but as I sat at the computer this morning, a haunting voice singing some powerful words reached out and grabbed me.  I asked Alexa (because you can do that), "What is this song?"

She answered, "The song is 'God Bless the Grass' by Sara Thomsen."

I immediately built a Prime playlist of songs sung by Sara Thomsen, then hunted up the lyrics to that particular song.    

Malvina Reynolds: Song Lyrics and Poems   God Bless the GrassNotes: words and music by Malvina Reynolds; copyright 1964 Schroder Music Company, renewed 1992. People often think of this as an ecology song, but Malvina wrote it after reading Mark Lane’s comments about the John F. Kennedy assassination. God bless the grass that grows thru the crack. They roll the concrete over it to try and keep it back. The concrete gets tired of what it has to do, It breaks and it buckles and the grass grows thru, And God bless the grass. God bless the truth that fights toward the sun, They roll the lies over it and think that it is done. It moves through the ground and reaches for the air, And after a while it is growing everywhere, And God bless the grass. God bless the grass that grows through cement. It's green and it's tender and it's easily bent. But after a while it lifts up its head, For the grass is living and the stone is dead, And God bless the grass. God bless the grass that's gentle and low, Its roots they are deep and its will is to grow. And God bless the truth, the friend of the poor, And the wild grass growing at the poor man's door, And God bless the grass. Wow!  These words made me think of everybody I know who has fought against impossible odds, refusing to quit.  My parents, surviving through the depression.  My daughter, holding down a job while going through chemo and then putting up with all the side effects that cancer leaves behind it, still working at a steady job.  My husband, studying for and then acquiring his GED when he was in his 50's.   Once in awhile I see a song with words that make me say, "I wish I'd written that!" This is one of those.  I really like the way Sara Thomsen sings it, but I couldn't find it done by her on Youtube, so here it is by the lady who wrote it in 1964.