Bad news and good news from old Lou. My wife has had Parkinson�s disease for a while, and it is really beginning to limit her. I can no longer in conscience ask her to stay out here in heaven with me. Thursday, we will sign a contract for a condominium in town, and we can't keep both places. So we will sell all 145 acres of wooded mountainside and bottomland, all 13 and a half acres of pond, the tractor, 4-wheeler, and everything else which has been so much fun for the past 15 years.
I am not sad, though. It was my dream as a boy to have my own pond, any pond, any size, anywhere. God granted that dream in spades, and I have honestly loved and been thankful for every minute of it. However many years I have left, I can close my eyes and be back on the pond. I had named every hole and point in my mind, recalling when and what I caught or bits of nature I had never expected to see, everything from the huge alligator snappers churning to the surface in a mating dance, 10 feet from the boat, to the deer who came down to drink right in front of me, all unaware. Those names and those memories will keep me company when I am only a pondmeister in spirit.
I want to thank all of you, not only for all the things you have taught me, but also for the sheer fun of swapping antics. I don�t think my city friends will be especially anxious to meet Mudcat Joe, but I am glad to have told some of his tales to you and to have heard yours in turn.
So, let�s don�t get all mushy about it. Now that I have told y�all, that�s enough. It will take about 9 months to complete the condo, and I am going to try to keep the pond just the way I would like it until whoever the new meister may be gets his turn. I will be reading Pond Boss just as if I still had a ten year plan, and I will be reading and writing in this forum until the day the moving van pulls up. After that, I will just think about the dyslexic chara if I feel cooped up.
Lou
