She said; “So...?”

Yankton, 2001: view from our house

A lot of my pictures on the blog have water in it. I like water! We sailed Lewis and Clark lake, near Yankton SD, for twelve years. Whenever I was in the water, however; it was mainly by choice. I do remember an early sail, when I lost my sunglasses overboard and promptly dove in after them, leaving the boat under the command of two rookies... Fortunately there was very little wind and the boarding ladder was available for me to climb back on board. I must say, though, that I never did that again. (The plaque on the boat stated: “ I am the Captain of this boat and I have my Wife’s permission to say so.”) All kidding aside, she did make an excellent mate!

We also love visiting the ocean. In Hawaii on previous mission support trips we usually spent the weekends at a beach. Mostly every night we watched the sun set over the ocean whenever we were there. Vacations in Florida were very frequent as well, when we used available timeshare events. Again most of these times we got wet by choice, wearing appropriate attire.

On August 28 we were visiting with my bride’s relatives at the usual gathering place for this family reunion. There is a lake adjoining the back yard. The kids, grand-kids, and even great grand kids enjoyed the fun of playing in the water. As in previous years, there was some “horse-playing” by the adults; it is just great fun to dunk someone in the readily available lake. I thought that as an older person I would be safe, but when my daughter came to admire my watch and even asked me if she could hold it, I became “wiser.” I did say to her, “but I have my bill-fold in my back pocket.”

She said; “So...?” “I am also wearing my cell-phone,” I retorted. She said; “So...?” “But I am also carrying the camera on my belt.” She said; “So...?”

I did not take very long for me to dispense with these items, but I had one last hope: “But, I don’t have any dry clothes to change into.” She said; “So...?"

So! My brother-in-law, the one from Colorado, and his son carried me bodily to the lake and dunked me. They went down with me, I guess, it was to be sure that I would get really soaked. I’d like to think that I pulled them in with me, but they were wet already anyway. Next time I’ll bring a change of clothes, if I don’t forget in the meantime.

Iowa does not have many large bodies of water, at least not in our back yard. The rain tried hard this year, but we stayed dry. We do enjoy the weather when it is dry, so we can continue to enjoy riding our motor bike to local and distant sites.

We try to always find a winery and it is a lot of fun finding them and getting to know the vintners. There are many recent additions in Iowa, so we keep right on going.