July ends with a soft sigh, a trace of regret, and the slow hush of summer fading

Goodbye, July. Goodbye, summer. 

Sure, we’ll still have hot days-probably right up until Thanksgiving-but the kids are already heading back to school. 
That always signaled the true end of summer for me. 
School starts so terribly early these days; it used to be after Labor Day. 
They say we have air conditioning now, so there’s no need to wait anymore.

Yeah, well, some of the country kids in my area hop on a bus at 6:30 a.m. and don’t hop back off until nearly 5 p.m. 
Buses aren’t air-conditioned. 
Officials forget about country kids.

Anyway, today was spent in the artificial darkness of tinted windows and the chill of the air conditioning. 
Cowboy and I went up, got Badger’s antibiotic, came home, and that was that. 
I stayed in with Badger, who’s still wobbly and had a few heart-stopping, stumbling dizzy spells.

At one point, she yelped, “I feel funny!” 
I told her to suck it back up-if she faints here, I can’t grab her. 
She nearly knocked me down at the hospital. 
She clutched the gate that separates my hall and the living room, gave a shaky breath, and shuffled on to the kitchen.

Cowboy? 
Well, I’m not sure what he got into today, other than going to work. 
Gathering the eggs is a given. 
Those birds of his have to be fed, watered, and the eggs collected-sun, rain, snow, or tornado. 
Chickens have to be taken care of.

There isn’t anything else to be said of the day.

Tomorrow we’re going to attempt to go to town, get our groceries in. 
Badger will go with us. 
There are things she needs that we can’t buy for her-she’s very picky.

Then Saturday, she’ll go get that nose ring out, start the process of closing the hole up. 
Or at least, we hope it’ll close up.

Sunday will be church for Cowboy-rest day for me and Badger, because Monday she has to have an ER follow-up.

Badger is camped out in the living room on the couch. 
It’s rapidly approaching midnight, so I’ll finish up and head on to bed.