A "search" which made me go back in time..

I am "waiting" right now and have some time to do the famous "search" on the internet and
found this picture which was originally in an issue of "Country Living" magazine.

I was born and raised on a dairy farm. Most people are in complete surprise when they are told that. Just a few people in my life today understand what a farm kids life was or is like. This picture made me think of being 10 years old again. I love the miniature barn.. I actually have the original "show box" that was used when my dad and I showed dairy cattle at fairs in the summertime. I plan on using this showbox in my studio as a storage unit because it will hold a lot of "stuff". Inside the box, it is just like it was in 1963 , my dad passed away that summer at the age of 42, I was 13, the summer before I entered high school. Every item from that day, still remains in that show box from show halters, to clippers, brushes, combs, ribbons, exhibitor numbers, every item is still there. When I have opened the lid to it, I can see him , smell him and even at times have felt that my dad's hand holding mine. Now, at the age of 58, I miss him very, very much. For some unknown reason, I have so much I want and wanted to tell him, share with him, show him, funny, I still need his approval - even at my age - I miss and need my dad more than I ever knew. I also have often wonder, the men in my life, past and present - were and are they now in my life because I found in them - him? My son.. I look at him and understand that my dad lives within him, and I smile - and cherish the life of my son.

I think of my dad and wonder what he would have thought of my life, how my life would have been so different if he had lived and the paths of life that I would have journeyed. I wonder too of what his words about life would have been to me - how he would have influenced me in so many of my life's decisions. Some decisions, he would have approved , others he would have frowned upon and made me change the path I had chosen. Every now and then , I know he thinks of me as a very strange sense comes over me, I do believe those we have loved and left us, in some fashion still speak to us.

I guess my thoughts today, match this fall day - leaving one season to enter a new one. Much like life..

by the way- the paint by number pictures, the ones of barns, I collect those too. I have a great plan for using them but that will be a late winter project! Too many projects - too little time. Isn't that a saying of us miniaturists!