September in Virginia: Rain & Covid

September 5-30, 2024                                                     Most Recent Posts:
Greenfield Mountain Farm                       Last Days of Summer in Vermont
Virginia                                                   Having a Wonderful Time and Then . . .

As I talked about in my previous post (link above), I left Vermont the day after Labor Day and arrived back in Virginia on September 5th. 
The next day, I took my friend Mary out for lunch as a thank you for all she had done for me while I was away.

We went to one of our favorite restaurants, Mellow Mushroom, where she got the veggie and I got the Holy Shitake (shown in the picture).  I bought us both the medium size which you can see is BIG.  But that was so we could have left overs for several days.  When you only have one person to cook for the motivation to bring back leftovers is high.

September in Virginia was like my summer in Vermont.  Over the summer my friends in Virginia were telling me to send the incessant rain to them.  They were in a months long drought.  Sure enough as soon as I got to Virginia the rains came and stayed into early October.   There was also Covid round 2.

The very next day after lunch with Mary, 2 days after returning to Virginia,  I had the now familiar high fever and total exhaustion.  It was Covid AGAIN for the second time in less than a month and exactly 2 weeks since I had tested negative twice.   Thankfully Mary did not get it from me.   And also thankfully my friend Pam drove all the way out to the farm to bring me N-95 masks and soups and comfort food.   Thank you Pam.

I had so many things planned including doctor appointments, car and RV maintenance and people I wanted to see. I had to reschedule everything.   Within 4 days the exhaustion was gone but a low fever (99 degrees) remained. I was still testing positive on Day 8.  On day 10 my fever went back to normal and stayed there.  On days 11 and 12 I tested negative.   AGAIN I’d lost nearly two weeks of my 8 weeks in Virginia.  To say I was irritated is an understatement.

I quickly remade all my appointments for Winnona, the car, to have my water tested, to have my washing machine, which will spin but not fill, looked at.  Went to my annual physical appointment, got a long over due hair cut and so on.   This smile is not how I was feeling for at least the first half of the month.

 

I celebrated the Autumnal Equinox with a foggy walk around the farm.  It definitely looked and felt like fall. 

Some leaves are turning others have just fallen off the trees with all the rain. 

We call this the landing.  The farm road comes back through the woods and curves around to this spot before dropping into the lower field.  Shannon, the man who helps with the farm, has game cameras here and has sent me some great bear pictures which I think I’ve posted before

Here’s probably a repeat of my favorite bear shot.  He must have had his nose in the camera.

On my walk, I found all kinds of fungi no doubt because of all the rain.  I’d shown so many mushroom pictures of my rainy days in Vermont that I’m only including this one from the field.  It’s a work of art.

Even seasonal streams had water which wouldn’t be the case at the end of a summer of drought like Virginia has had but they have made up for the water deficit in spades in the past 3 weeks.  Apparently I brought it back from Vermont since they have had almost none since I left in early June.  This is the little stream along the edge of the lower field that Colin and Celia like to wade in when they come.  If you’d like to hear its babble, here’s a short video.

So much moisture.  I woke up several mornings, looked west out off the master bedroom upstairs porch and saw no sign of the mountains or Humpback Rock on the Blue Ridge Parkway.  They were fogged out of view.

One Saturday, I headed in to town to do some grocery shopping and stop by
The McGuffey Art Center to see some human created works of art.  My friend Laurie was showing 4 of her works during the month of September..

The Art Center is housed in the wonderful early 20th Century building that was once the McGuffey Elementary School in downtown Charlottesville.

Can you even imagine a school today with the carvings above the tall windows and the half moon glass over the door?

The exhibits are shown in the main floor central gallery, along both sides of the main floor hallway, on the staircase to the second floor and on both sides of the second floor hallway.

In the main Gallery were two exhibits.

Collage Works by Charles W Peale

This one was unfortunately over my head and even standing back and zooming in didn’t help the angle or the reflection of the ceiling lights.

Arron Farrington does wet plate photographs with a 1910 camera. Wet-plate photography was invented by Frederick Scott Archer in 1851. It predates film and instead captures photographs on glass or aluminum plates.

Up the two flights of stairs there were works on the walls, on the landing and hanging from the ceiling.   McGuffey’s former classrooms are now studios for a variety of artists in every medium imaginable.

From the top of the 2nd set of stairs looking down to the first landing you can see two small child size chair exhibits.

The works on both sides of the upper hall were mostly from the class my friend took and with which she was exhibiting.

These were two of the instructor’s works that she exhibited.  They are done in oil.

This is the first of Laurie’s submissions.  All four of her works were monotypes.

Monotype is a unique, one-of-a-kind print making process, that involves applying ink or paint to a flat sheet or metal or glass  to create an image which is then transferred to paper either manually or by using a press.

Her other three works are on the right.

It is now the end of September and it has rained over half of its days.  Most recently the rain is remnants of Hurricane Helene which did bring flooding to the area but luckily not to the farm. 

On the very last day of September I went to lunch with my friend Pam.   We arrived at Guadalajara at 2:30 and didn’t leave until 5:30 and in all that time I took not one picture.   We had to leave big tips to compensate for taking up the waitress’s table for so long.

I’m hoping my October post will be the first in 4 months not to talk about constant rain.