It can't be August already

Do you remember the old movies, like the ones where Jeannette McDonald sang into the face of Nelson Eddy? These movies tried to let the audience know that time had passed by changing the blossoms on the apple tree into the apples themselves. If that did not tell how much time had passed in the plot, perhaps the apple tree would be covered with snow in another shot and possibly back to blossoms again, if Nelson Eddy had gone to war.

As a child I first did not realize what all this attention to a tree meant. I kept waiting for something dramatic to happen to the tree, but it never did. It just calmly went through its own life cycles. This confusion might have reached MGM or whatever studio they were working for at that time, so they took on a new technique. They had a calendar on the wall and the months tore off and blew away to signify that it was now September and no longer June.

I was thinking about that technique this morning as I was resisting getting out of bed. We have a calendar hanging right above Lester's clock on his side of the bed. As the room became lighter when the sun was rising, I realized that the calendar was open to April. There was a pretty picture above the dates of April, but that wasn't why the calendar had stayed on that month. No, the real reason is I do not have a systematic routine for changing the dates on our many calendars.

I always wonder at the efficiency of the women in the drive-through window of First National Bank. They have an ancient turn over calendar that changes each day with a short Bible verse along with the day's date. It has been used for years because it doesn't have the year and they can turn over the correct number of days to make it correct for their public to see. It must be one of the first things the women do when they open the window for customers in the morning. Probably right there with counting out their money. Someday I will try to go very early and see if it is showing the correct day. I'm sure it will be.

But I don't have that routine in our home. I did a tour to check on dates just now. I already told you it was April in our bedroom. The one in the bathroom is still set at March. I know I have changed it since then, but it is a rather big, good quality paper and with only a single hole to hang it from, the ends begin to curl inward and then the weight of the month pulls the whole sheet down. Then the same process happens to the month before that. I notice this mistake often as I relax at one end of the room. By the time I come across the room I have forgotten what I was going to do and instead of fixing the calendar I rearrange the liquid soap bottles and take a quick look at my hair in the mirror. Once again it reminds me how much I now look like Moe in the three stooges and experiment with different ways to comb it. But not many people see me anymore so the important thing is to keep it simple.

Now, back to the calendars. The ones from the bank are easy to change, because you can just tear off the old month and be ready for tomorrow. So what does the bank calendar in the dining room have open today? June.

Our Missouri Conservation calendar is another one so large that it is hard to keep it open to the correct date. But we do look at it often to see what season is beginning. I just found out that next Tuesday copperheads are beginning to be born. Isn't that sweet? Some more little baby copperheads. We don't have that species in our lawn, but the big black snake that seems to live under the house is enough.

I think you get the idea that the Thornton household is not up to date on months. In fact I found one in Lester's "study" that wasn't even for this decade. But it had an interesting picture on it.

I have figured out how a studio could indicate passage of time if they wanted to dramatize our life, since our calendars are not correct and our apple trees aren't doing so well. They can picture the wrinkles and brown spots on our faces. When they can no longer determine our race, it's time to get some stand-ins for the movie.