Today was the warmest day we’ve had in six months, and I’m horribly out of shape, so I took an afternoon walk around the old farm. I grew up here, but most of what I remember is gone. I’ve recreated it in my mind and on the pages of my books. Zoe lives in the house of my youth although the actual structure was razed after decades of being vacant. Check out the post I wrote about it a couple of years ago. So my walk involved a lot of ghosts.   Memories of my childhood, standing on ground that was once the farmhouse or a tractor shed, wandering through fields and valleys where my childhood best friend and I used to play, making up big adventures, cowboys and indians, acting out our favorite books. I walk over this ground every spring until it gets too grown over with brambles and the ticks come out. But with all the snow and cold we’ve had, the new growth is late this year. As a result, I was able to find the red-dog gravel base of what used to be the old tractor ...

One afternoon, very early in our trip out west, I received a text from my friend Sara, who was checking on Skye and Kensi back at home. Just receiving a text from her sent me into a panic. The opening lines of it did little to calm my nerves. I don’t know if you can receive texts or if they cost extra, but I figured it was the fastest and easiest way to reach you… Oh, my God. The kitties are fine… Phew! But what do I do about the woodpecker??? To which I texted back, “WHAT WOODPECKER?” I was picturing Woody loose in my house with the cats trashing the place trying to catch the laughing little fool. http://youtu.be/5Xan2dkMouM Sara assured me the woodpecker was on the OUTSIDE of the house, so I didn’t think much more about it. We’ve had them drum on our log house before from time to time. I put the whole woodpecker issue out of my mind. Until the morning after we returned home. Then I took a stroll around the house…and nearly fainted. We’ve b...