Jerry Apps's Blog, page 24

Garden Expo Feb. 9-11

So, has winter got you down? Are you suffering from Cabin Fever?

Here is an answer to what’s making you depressed. It’s time to think about gardening. Mark February 9-11 on your calendar and attend Wisconsin Public Television’s Garden Expo at the Alliant Energy Center in Madison.

As a promoter of the show wrote, “Now in its 25th year, this three-day event celebrates the latest trends in gardening, landscaping and edibles, and attracts more than 20,000 people from across the Midwest. Join other gardening enthusiasts to share ideas, gain inspiration and create something new. All proceeds support Wisconsin Public Television.”

Oh, lest I forget. I will be speaking there once more, along with my daughter, Susan Apps-Bodilly. To quote the program:

Old Farm Country Cookbook

Saturday, February 10, 2:15 p.m. Room Mendota 1-2

Jerry Apps and Susan Apps-Bodilly

Representing the Wisconsin Historical Society Press

Listen to rural storyteller Jerry Apps tell stories of farm life during the 1930s-1950s. Jerry talks about how farm families depended on their gardens for food. Jerry's daughter, Susan, will discuss recipes from the old, white, wooden recipe box that her grandmother followed when there was no electricity or indoor plumbing and all the cooking and baking was done using a wood-burning cook stove.

Also: Sunday at 1 p.m. in Room Mendota 4.
I hope to see you there.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: Time to think about digging in the dirt.

UPCOMING EVENTS:
Saturday, Feb 10, 2:15 p.m. Garden Expo, Alliant Center, Madison, with daughter Susan

Sunday, Feb. 11: 1:00 p.m. Garden Expo, Alliant Center, Madison, with daughter Susan

Wednesday, Feb 28, 6:00 p.m. Wild Rose H.S. Auditorium, Premier showing of Jerry’s new Public TV documentary on One-Room Country Schools.

Tuesday, March 6, 7:00 p.m. First state-wide airing on all Wisconsin Public TV stations of my hour-long documentary on One-Room Country Schools.

Purchase Jerry’s DVDS and his Books from the Library in Wild Rose, Wisconsin (a fundraiser for them):

Patterson Memorial Library
500 Division Street
Wild Rose, WI 54984
barnard@wildroselibrary.org
www.wildroselibrary.org
920-622-3835

The library now has available signed copies of Jerry’s DVDs:
Emmy Winner, A Farm Winter with Jerry Apps (based on The Quiet Season book.)
Jerry Apps a Farm Story (based on Rural Wit and Wisdom and Old Farm books.)
The Land with Jerry Apps, (based on the book Whispers and Shadows,) and Never Curse the Rain, Jerry’s newest DVD based on his book with the same title.
Also available are several of Jerry’s signed books including: Jerry’s newest nonfiction books, Never Curse the Rain and Old Farm Country Cookbook, and his newest novel, The Great Sand Fracas of Ames County. Also available are Wisconsin Agriculture: A History, Roshara Journal (with photos by Steve Apps) and Telling Your Story—a guidebook for those who want to write their own stories.

Contact the library for prices and special package deals.



.

Track Makers

The temperature had climbed above freezing. I pulled on my boots, grabbed my new Christmas winter cap, and put on my winter parka. The snow at Roshara, about three-four inches was puffy and light and relatively easy to walk in without snowshoes. I was headed toward the small field south of my cabin, not looking for much of anything, but just walking and listening, and enjoying the quiet of this beautiful sunny, winter morning.

I shuffled along, walking stick in one hand, watching where I was going because there was no trail to follow, no path. Just a strikingly white expanse of snow. I caught a glimpse of movement, a deer, a big doe, and then another, and another—four of them, bounding a few yards ahead of me, their white tails high and waving. And leaving tracks in the snow.

Animal tracks have always intrigued me, from the time when I was a little kid and hiked with my dad. He knew deer tracks—how a fawn track compared to a sizable buck. He showed me the difference between the tracks made by a running deer to one that was merely walking. Same for rabbits, foxes, and squirrels, the animals that braved winters in Wisconsin.

So on this day I am thinking about tracks, and how tracks are one way of recording history. Tracks are a record of where the creature has been, and what it had been doing. We can learn a lot about a creature by looking at its tracks.

As we go about living our lives, we leave tracks as well, perhaps not as easily seen as the tracks of a deer in snow. But tracks nonetheless—of where we have been, and what we have been doing.

THE OLD TIMER ASKS: Why do so many people try to cover their tracks?

UPCOMING EVENTS:

Saturday, Feb 10, 2:15 p.m. Garden Expo, Alliant Center, Madison, with daughter Susan

Sunday, Feb. 11: 1:00 p.m. Garden Expo, Alliant Center, Madison, with daughter Susan

Wednesday, Feb 28, 6:00 p.m. Wild Rose H.S. Auditorium, Premier showing of Jerry’s new Public TV documentary on One-Room Country Schools.

Tuesday, March 6, 7:00 p.m. First state-wide airing on all Wisconsin Public TV stations of my hour-long documentary on One-Room Country Schools.

Purchase Jerry’s DVDS and his Books from the Library in Wild Rose, Wisconsin (a fundraiser for them):
Patterson Memorial Library
500 Division Street
Wild Rose, WI 54984
barnard@wildroselibrary.org
www.wildroselibrary.org
920-622-3835
The library now has available signed copies of Jerry’s DVDs:
Emmy Winner, A Farm Winter with Jerry Apps (based on The Quiet Season book.)
Jerry Apps a Farm Story (based on Rural Wit and Wisdom and Old Farm books.)
The Land with Jerry Apps, (based on the book Whispers and Shadows,) and Never Curse the Rain, Jerry’s newest DVD based on his book with the same title.
Also available are several of Jerry’s signed books including: Jerry’s newest nonfiction books, Never Curse the Rain and Old Farm Country Cookbook, and his newest novel, The Great Sand Fracas of Ames County. Also available are Wisconsin Agriculture: A History, Roshara Journal (with photos by Steve Apps) and Telling Your Story—a guide book for those who want to write their own stories.
Contact the library for prices and special package deals.



.

Mouse in a Box

It happened between Christmas and New Year’s. When two of my grandsons, Josh and Ben were home. I sent them to our attic and to our basement for the retrieval of boxes, many boxes, 57 boxes to be exact. A history of my years working at UW-Madison and a history of 50 years of writing. All stuffed into boxes. Letters, manuscripts, interview tapes, speech notes, edited book pages, research notes. Lots of research notes. And several book journals. I keep a journal for each book I write—a topic for another day.

Oh, and a bit of mischief on the part of my grandsons, who knew well the whims and fears of my daughter, Sue, their mother. As Josh hustled box after box down the rickety folding attic stairs, he spotted a dead mouse in the attic. And he put said mouse in one of the boxes before handing it to Ben who brought the box to my office where Sue and I worked. She and I inspected each box as it arrived from the attic and basement for its contents, so I could develop an inventory. The work was progressing carefully and quietly.

Then a hair raising scream from daughter, Sue. So loud it brought my wife running. So loud it nearly short-circuited my hearing aid. And then laughter. Belly laughter from Ben and Josh who had once more “put one over” on their mouse challenged mother, about the only wild creature she can’t tolerate. She had opened a box, and there she spotted the dead mouse. Very dead.

After son, Steve removed the mouse, the work continued. Eventually the 57 boxes filled half our living room—until Jonathon Nelson from the Wisconsin Historical Society Archives arrived and hauled them away.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: One way to keep a record of one’s history: Stuff it a box and pile it in the attic

UPCOMING EVENTS:

Saturday, Feb 10, 2:15 p.m. Garden Expo, Alliant Center, Madison, with daughter Susan

Sunday, Feb. 11: 1:00 p.m. Garden Expo, Alliant Center, Madison, with daughter Susan

Wednesday, Feb 28, 6:00 p.m. Wild Rose H.S. Auditorium, Premier showing of Jerry’s new Public TV documentary on One-Room Country Schools.

Purchase Jerry’s DVDS and his Books from the Library in Wild Rose, Wisconsin (a fundraiser for them):

Patterson Memorial Library
500 Division Street
Wild Rose, WI 54984
barnard@wildroselibrary.org
www.wildroselibrary.org
920-622-3835

The library now has available signed copies of Jerry’s DVDs:
Emmy Winner, A Farm Winter with Jerry Apps (based on The Quiet Season book.)
Jerry Apps a Farm Story (based on Rural Wit and Wisdom and Old Farm books.)
The Land with Jerry Apps, (based on the book Whispers and Shadows,) and Never Curse the Rain, Jerry’s newest DVD based on his book with the same title.
Also available are several of Jerry’s signed books including: Jerry’s newest nonfiction books, Never Curse the Rain and Old Farm Country Cookbook, and his newest novel, The Great Sand Fracas of Ames County. Also available are Wisconsin Agriculture: A History, Roshara Journal (with photos by Steve Apps) and Telling Your Story—a guide book for those who want to write their own stories.
Contact the library for prices and special package deals.

New Reprints

During the early 2000s I wrote two books about farm life in central Wisconsin when I was a kid growing up on the home farm. Our farm was located four and one-half miles west of Wild Rose.

The first book, EVERY FARM TELLS A STORY was based on mother’s account books, which she diligently kept from the day they moved onto the farm in 1924 until they left the farm in 1973 to retire in Wild Rose. I found such items listed as: Fork handle--$.65, milk pail--$1.15, Horse collar and pad--$8.15 and gloves for Herm (my father)--$.52. These entries not only revealed something about the cost of farming in those days, but for me they triggered stories associated with the items. This book became the source of the stories that I shared in my first Public Television documentary, “Jerry Apps: A Farm Story.”

The second book, LIVING A COUNTRY YEAR, is also a story of my early farm life. But this time I’ve organized it around the months of the year on the farm, with a story for each month, some thoughts for that month, plus a recipe. For instance, for January I wrote: “January is for slowing down and reflecting, for considering the year that has passed and anticipating the year that is beginning.” The January recipe is for “Ma’s Homemade Chili.”
I am especially pleased that the Wisconsin Historical Society Press has reprinted both of these books, with new covers, and new introductions. Check at your local bookstore, order on line, or order from Patterson Memorial Library in Wild Rose. The Patterson will soon have copies for sale as a fund raiser for the library.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: Cold and snowy winter days are made for book reading.

UPCOMING EVENTS:

Saturday, Feb 10, 2:15 p.m. Garden Expo, Alliant Center, Madison, with daughter Susan

Sunday, Feb. 11: 1:00 p.m. Garden Expo, Alliant Center, Madison, with daughter Susan

Wednesday, Feb 28, 6:00 p.m. Wild Rose H.S. Auditorium, Premier showing of Jerry’s new Public TV documentary on One-Room Country Schools.

Purchase Jerry’s DVDS and his Books from the Patterson Memorial Library in Wild Rose, Wisconsin (a fundraiser for them):
Patterson Memorial Library
500 Division Street
Wild Rose, WI 54984
barnard@wildroselibrary.org
www.wildroselibrary.org
920-622-3835
The library now has available signed copies of Jerry’s DVDs:
Emmy Winner, A Farm Winter with Jerry Apps (based on The Quiet Season book.)
Jerry Apps a Farm Story (based on Rural Wit and Wisdom and Old Farm books.)
The Land with Jerry Apps, (based on the book Whispers and Shadows,) and Never Curse the Rain, Jerry’s newest DVD based on his book with the same title.
Also available are several of Jerry’s signed books including: Jerry’s newest nonfiction books, Never Curse the Rain and Old Farm Country Cookbook, and his newest novel, The Great Sand Fracas of Ames County. Also available are Wisconsin Agriculture: A History, Roshara Journal (with photos by Steve Apps) and Telling Your Story—a guide book for those who want to write their own stories.
Contact the library for prices and special package deals.

A New Year

Some things to do in the New Year:

Start a journal and write in it every day, or perhaps once a week, but regularly. Record the weather. Pen your thoughts. Write a story from your past. Remove an emotional ache from your system.

Vow to laugh out loud at least once each day, all year long. You’ll feel better. You’ll help others feel better.

Take time to see the whiteness of fresh fallen snow that sparkles and glimmers and covers the grime and dirt of an earlier day.

Watch the sun set when the temperature is below freezing and the sky is steel blue and turns black as the sun sinks away and the thermometer plummets.

Listen for the silence of winter, when snow buries the land and the cold tightens its grip. There is great beauty in silence, something that is in short supply these days.
Stand in a snowstorm and watch snowflakes accumulate on your sleeve. Each snowflake is different, each one special—a reminder of nature’s creative magnificence.

Sit by a fireplace or a wood stove doing nothing except listening to the occasional pop of the fire and smelling the hint of wood smoke that sneaks into the room.
Remember that doing nothing is sometimes the most important thing you can do.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: Happy New Year!

UPCOMING EVENTS:

Saturday, Feb 10, 2:15 p.m. Garden Expo, Alliant Center, Madison, with daughter Susan
Sunday, Feb. 11: 1:00 p.m. Garden Expo, Alliant Center, Madison, with daughter Susan
Wednesday, Feb 28, 6:00 p.m. Wild Rose H.S. Auditorium, Premier showing of Jerry’s new Public TV documentary on One-Room Country Schools.

Purchase Jerry’s DVDS and his Books from the Patterson Memorial Library in Wild Rose, Wisconsin (a fundraiser for them):
The library now has available signed copies of Jerry’s DVDs:
Emmy Winner, A Farm Winter with Jerry Apps (based on The Quiet Season book.)
Jerry Apps a Farm Story (based on Rural Wit and Wisdom and Old Farm books.)
The Land with Jerry Apps, (based on the book Whispers and Shadows,) and Never Curse the Rain, Jerry’s newest DVD based on his book with the same title.
Also available are several of Jerry’s signed books including: Jerry’s newest nonfiction books, Never Curse the Rain and Old Farm Country Cookbook, and his newest novel, The Great Sand Fracas of Ames County. Also available are Wisconsin Agriculture: A History, Roshara Journal (with photos by Steve Apps) and Telling Your Story—a guide book for those who want to write their own stories.
Contact the library for prices and special package deals.
Patterson Memorial Library
500 Division Street
Wild Rose, WI 54984
barnard@wildroselibrary.org
www.wildroselibrary.org
920-622-3835

A History Tree

Our Christmas tree is a history tree. Beginning with the tree itself, that we cut from our farm, and planted some ten years or so ago. Since 1961, when Ruth and I married, our Christmas tree has hanging on its branches the history of our family.

A little wedding bell was one of the first ornaments on our tree. In not many more years, three more little ornaments appeared, one for each of our three children. And this was followed with ornaments helping us remember family vacations, here and there around the country. Then little rolled up pieces of paper tied with a ribbon, depicting high school and college graduations. And ornaments showing jobs the children have held over the years. For Steve a camera. For Sue a teacher’s desk. For Jeff a tiny pair of skis (he once worked at Vale resorts).

Children, spouses, grandchildren, and now great grandchildren each has a special Christmas ball with his or her name on it hanging on our tree.

Ruth uses little matchboxes as containers, and fastens an image of a book cover for a book that Jerry wrote that year. Inside the matchbox, Ruth lists the important events of the year, those both joyful and those less so.

So if anyone, at some future time, wants to learn the history of our family, they do not turn to a book, but they check the ornaments on our Christmas Trees.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: A Most Merry Christmas to all.

Purchase Jerry’s DVDS and his Books from the Patterson Memorial Library in Wild Rose, Wisconsin (a fundraiser for them):
The library now has available signed copies of Jerry’s DVDs:

Emmy Winner, A Farm Winter with Jerry Apps (based on The Quiet Season book.)
Jerry Apps a Farm Story (based on Rural Wit and Wisdom and Old Farm books.)
The Land with Jerry Apps, (based on the book Whispers and Shadows,) and Never Curse the Rain, Jerry’s newest DVD based on his book with the same title.
Also available are several of Jerry’s signed books including: Jerry’s newest nonfiction books, Never Curse the Rain and Old Farm Country Cookbook, and his newest novel, The Great Sand Fracas of Ames County. Also available are Wisconsin Agriculture: A History, Roshara Journal (with photos by Steve Apps) and Telling Your Story—a guide book for those who want to write their own stories.
Contact the library for prices and special package deals.
Patterson Memorial Library
500 Division Street
Wild Rose, WI 54984
barnard@wildroselibrary.org
www.wildroselibrary.org
920-622-3835

Radio Broadcast and Book Signing.

Photo: Sue, Jerry and Rauel LaBreche at McFarlanes in Sauk City.

It had snowed enough to remind us that winter was just around the corner. And if the snow wasn’t enough, a cold northwest wind put an exclamation point on that reality. Sue and I were on or way to Sauk City, to McFarlanes. To a hardware store that sells more than nuts and bolts, and paint and wrenches. McFarlanes also sells books— books written by Wisconsin authors.

Starting at ten a.m., Sue and I were a part of an hour long, live radio broadcast originating at the hardware store and aired on Baraboo’s 99.7 FM and 740 AM radio stations. Rauel LaBeche, animated and with never a dull word, hosted the show, asking us questions: What makes Old Farm Country Cookbook different from other cookbooks, why did Sue refuse to try the fried squirrel recipe, why did I write the Never Curse the Rain book, and more.

Some 40 plus people were seated in the little studio, carved out of a corner of the hardware store, listening, laughing—having a good time.

Sandwiched in between the questions and answers, Curt Meine and his Prairie Spies musical group offered live Christmas music. Curt, beyond his musical skills, is also a well know author and Aldo Leopold’s biographer.

Sue and I had a fun time.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: Want to get in the Christmas mood? Plan a stop at McFarlanes in Sauk City. You won’t be disappointed.


UPCOMING EVENTS:

Sunday, Dec. 17 –Readers Realm Bookstore, Montello 1 p.m. Old Farm Country Cookbook. Jerry and Susie

Purchase Jerry’s DVDS and his Books from the Patterson Memorial Library in Wild Rose, Wisconsin (a fundraiser for them):
The library now has available signed copies of Jerry’s DVDs:

Emmy Winner, A Farm Winter with Jerry Apps (based on The Quiet Season book.)
Jerry Apps a Farm Story (based on Rural Wit and Wisdom and Old Farm books.)
The Land with Jerry Apps, (based on the book Whispers and Shadows,) and Never Curse the Rain, Jerry’s newest DVD based on his book with the same title.
Also available are several of Jerry’s signed books including: Jerry’s newest nonfiction books, Never Curse the Rain and Old Farm Country Cookbook, and his newest novel, The Great Sand Fracas of Ames County. Also available are Wisconsin Agriculture: A History, Roshara Journal (with photos by Steve Apps) and Telling Your Story—a guide book for those who want to write their own stories.
Contact the library for prices and special package deals.
Patterson Memorial Library
500 Division Street
Wild Rose, WI 54984
barnard@wildroselibrary.org
www.wildroselibrary.org
920-622-3835

Dregne's in Westby

It’s called the driftless area. That part of southwestern Wisconsin where the last great glacier failed to reach. A place of steep hills and long valleys. A place where a goodly number of Norwegians settled back in the mid 1800s.

On Saturday, Sue and I signed books at Dregne’s Scandinavian Gift shop in Westby, south of LaCrosse and deep in the driftless area. As an aside, it is here where I found my wife, Ruth, with a last name of what else, Olson.

Dregne’s is celebrating their forty-second anniversary as one of the region’s premier gift shops for all things Scandinavian. Want to know how to make lefse? They have the books and equipment that will get you started. Want some Swedish herring with dill, this is the place. A gnome? Sure, lots of gnomes. Norwegian Christmas ornaments? Many choices. A sweet tooth? How about some Swedish milk chocolate with caramel?

But there’s more. I quietly asked Jana Dregne, she and her husband Dave, own the place, if she had anything German. “Sure,” she said, and was soon showing me some beautiful wooden ornaments made in Germany. “We’ve got some Irish stuff, too,” she offered showing Sue and me some “Inis,” a unisex cologne that “makes you feel close to the ocean no matter where you are.”

And books, lots of books at Dregne’s. Books about Scandinavia. Books about Wisconsin. Kids books. How-to books. Gift books. Many books.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: Plan a stop at Dregne’s in Westby. Something for everyone, especially if you are Scandinavian, or married to one.

UPCOMING EVENTS:

Thursday, Dec. 7, 6:00 p.m. Waupaca Historical Society, Trinity Lutheran Church, 206 E. Badger Strreet, Waupaca. Christmas on the Farm

Saturday, Dec. 9 McFarlane’s, Sauk City. Old Farm Country Cookbook. Jerry and Susie

Sunday, Dec. 17 –Readers Realm Bookstore, Montello 1 p.m. Old Farm Country Cookbook. Jerry and Susie

Purchase Jerry’s DVDS and his Books from the Patterson Memorial Library in Wild Rose, Wisconsin (a fundraiser for them):
The library now has available signed copies of Jerry’s DVDs:

Emmy Winner, A Farm Winter with Jerry Apps (based on The Quiet Season book.)
Jerry Apps a Farm Story (based on Rural Wit and Wisdom and Old Farm books.)
The Land with Jerry Apps, (based on the book Whispers and Shadows,) and Never Curse the Rain, Jerry’s newest DVD based on his book with the same title.
Also available are several of Jerry’s signed books including: Jerry’s newest nonfiction books, Never Curse the Rain and Old Farm Country Cookbook, and his newest novel, The Great Sand Fracas of Ames County. Also available are Wisconsin Agriculture: A History, Roshara Journal (with photos by Steve Apps) and Telling Your Story—a guide book for those who want to write their own stories.
Contact the library for prices and special package deals.
Patterson Memorial Library
500 Division Street
Wild Rose, WI 54984
barnard@wildroselibrary.org
www.wildroselibrary.org
920-622-3835

Christmas Tree Search

A warm day in late November. A clear blue sky with a slight breeze. We are at Roshara, our Waushara County farm in search of Christmas trees. Three generations in search of three trees. Not an easy task—but it is a family tradition, one of many that our family enjoys each year.

The challenge is not locating a tree—Roshara is a tree farm with thousands of them, most of which we have planted over the 51 years that we have owned the place. We have mostly red pine from two years old to 50, white pine of various sizes and shapes, all self-seeded, Scotch pine, also self-seeded, a few jack pine, a handful of spruce, and even smaller handful of Frasier fir. Christmas tree farms, Roshara is not one of them, feature Frasier Fir, which is a beautiful tree.

We shear (prune) none of our trees to make them look more perfect. Our trees are what they are, each natural and perfect in its own way. After considerable hiking, inspecting, comparing, discussing, dismissing, and finally accepting, we have three trees. One Scotch pine, one red pine, and one white pine. It was great day in the woods. The only thing missing was a little snow.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: Traditions can help tie the generations together.

Photo: Grandson Ben, and daughter, Sue.

UPCOMING EVENTS:

Tuesday, November 28, Aldo Leopold Nature Center, Madison. Stories from the Land. 7:00 p.m.

Saturday, December 2, (10:00 to 2:00) Dregni’s, Westby. Old Farm Country Cookbook, Susie and Jerry.

Thursday, Dec. 7, 6:00 p.m. Waupaca Historical Society, Christmas on the Farm

Saturday, Dec. 9 McFarlane’s, Prairie du Sac. Old Farm Country Cookbook. Jerry and Susie

Sunday, Dec. 17 –Readers Realm Bookstore, Montello 1 p.m. Old Farm Country Cookbook. Jerry and Susie

Purchase Jerry’s DVDS and his Books from the Patterson Memorial Library in Wild Rose, Wisconsin (a fundraiser for them):
The library now has available signed copies of Jerry’s DVDs:

Emmy Winner, A Farm Winter with Jerry Apps (based on The Quiet Season book.)
Jerry Apps a Farm Story (based on Rural Wit and Wisdom and Old Farm books.)
The Land with Jerry Apps, (based on the book Whispers and Shadows,) and Never Curse the Rain, Jerry’s newest DVD based on his book with the same title.
Also available are several of Jerry’s signed books including: Jerry’s newest nonfiction books, Never Curse the Rain and Old Farm Country Cookbook, and his newest novel, The Great Sand Fracas of Ames County. Also available are Wisconsin Agriculture: A History, Roshara Journal (with photos by Steve Apps) and Telling Your Story—a guide book for those who want to write their own stories.
Contact the library for prices and special package deals.
Patterson Memorial Library
500 Division Street
Wild Rose, WI 54984
barnard@wildroselibrary.org
www.wildroselibrary.org
920-622-3835

Savoring Silence

Silence. Not a lot of that around anymore. Loud noises coming at us from every direction. Shouting political pundits. Angry people raising their voices about one thing and another. Blaring TV sets. Sirens. Traffic noise everywhere, surrounding us to the point that we are numb to its very existence.

Yesterday, opening day of the gun season. I’m setting near my pond. It is chilly, an invigorating chill, not the bone shaking kind that we’ve sometimes experienced during deer season.

As the sun struggles to send a bit of light though a heavy bank of gray crowds, I listen to the silence. And I savor it. Not realizing how much I enjoy it. Occasionally a slight breeze hurries through the tops of the now bare cottonwood trees that grow near the pond offering the subtle sound of fall.

No birds or animals are calling. They too must be enjoying the silence of the morning. A rifle shot from the west jars me a bit. Then silence once more.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: There are times when we humans need silence, whether we know it or not.

UPCOMING EVENTS:

Tuesday, November 28, Aldo Leopold Nature Center, Madison. Stories from the Land. 7:00 p.m.

Saturday, December 2, (10:00 to 2:00) Dregni’s, Westby. Old Farm Country Cookbook, Susie and Jerry.

Thursday, Dec. 7, 6:00 p.m. Waupaca Historical Society, Christmas on the Farm

Saturday, Dec. 9 McFarlane’s, Prairie du Sac. Old Farm Country Cookbook. Jerry and Susie

Sunday, Dec. 17 –Readers Realm Bookstore, Montello 1 p.m. Old Farm Country Cookbook. Jerry and Susie

Purchase Jerry’s DVDS and his Books from the Patterson Memorial Library in Wild Rose, Wisconsin (a fundraiser for them):
The library now has available signed copies of Jerry’s DVDs:

Emmy Winner, A Farm Winter with Jerry Apps (based on The Quiet Season book.)
Jerry Apps a Farm Story (based on Rural Wit and Wisdom and Old Farm books.)
The Land with Jerry Apps, (based on the book Whispers and Shadows,) and Never Curse the Rain, Jerry’s newest DVD based on his book with the same title.
Also available are several of Jerry’s signed books including: Jerry’s newest nonfiction books, Never Curse the Rain and Old Farm Country Cookbook, and his newest novel, The Great Sand Fracas of Ames County. Also available are Wisconsin Agriculture: A History, Roshara Journal (with photos by Steve Apps) and Telling Your Story—a guide book for those who want to write their own stories.
Contact the library for prices and special package deals.
Patterson Memorial Library
500 Division Street
Wild Rose, WI 54984
barnard@wildroselibrary.org
www.wildroselibrary.org
920-622-3835