the country life

 But what do you do out there? That's what people ask when when they hear that I'm in the Ozarks.
Well, I caught a lightening bug for the first time in many years last night.
I went swimming in the river.
I refilled the hummingbird feeder, and have a taker.
Then there's the farmer's market, where the beans and tomatoes are coming in.
And yesterday the First Baptist Church had a fair.

I'm on what they used to call a repairing lease— after too much wine, women and song in the city, the dandies used to head for the country- side to restore their con- stitutions. "Rural sounds exhilarate the spirit and restore the tone of languid nature," William Cowper wrote. ("Though," groused one Georgette Heyer hero, "how you're supposed to get any sleep with a lot of damn cockerels crowing their heads off, I don't know.") Thus, in that great tradition—and yes, I endure the sounds of cockerels and woodpeckers and cows and logging trucks—I am ruralizing. After less than a week, my weight and blood pressure are coasting downward. Stay tuned.