Icewind's Ramblings

One of my favorite books is Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry. It’s funny how a novel and later a movie have lasting impact on your life. Good writing is supposed to be that way as the book won a Pulitzer Prize in 1986 for fiction. Oddly the Lonesome Dove story came about in the 1960’s as a movie script for John Wayne, James Stewart, and Henry Fonda but was never developed after Wayne turned down the part. For me I’m glad that it was later developed with Robert Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones as the lead characters. Both were perfect in how they portrayed the lifestyle and complexities of the American West. When things get too busy or stressful for me I tend to make time to sit and watch it again to glean life lessons which I find useful. I seem to watch it several times a year since it first aired in 1989. “If you want only one thing too much, it’s likely to turn out a disappointment. The only healthy way to live, as I see it, is to learn to like all the...

This has been another busy week flying by with many things happening and it seems too little time. I have been surprised this summer with better weather in a few weeks than several past summers combined. It has been great . . . what have we done to deserve this? Yesterday it jumped up to 76 degrees and for a short while reminded me of past lives when I lived in Atlanta . The humidity was much less here but for a few fleeting moments it was awesome. I was making my way home driving the round about for the entrance ramp for the Seward Highway and as I made the circle I noticed two geese had taken refuge in the quiet space between the hustle and bustle of city around them. As I continued the turn I saw that they also had several goslings swimming in the small retention pond. They will stay there until the small ones learn to fly and can move on. Geese mate for life and it still amazes me to find different pairs here and there in places you...