I have a terrible time blogging in the summer... mostly because, well, it's busy!



Our chickens just started laying this week!  We are getting 4 eggs a day.  It seems we have a few roosters, which will be dispatched hopefully this weekend.



Benny and Adam, and an errant basket of socks.  They are healthy and happy, and growing like weeds.



Jeruselum Artichokes have taken over the side of my house.  Isn't that a lovely sunset in the background?



Happy doggy :)

And it is so much more than the title says.  He was so much to me, and so much to his family.

He and I dated for a long time in our 20's.  On and off for 10 years.  And it's not that that hurts.  We have been best friends that whole time.  I'm married now, and I know that that hurt my friend.  Not so much that I loved another man, but that he felt that I left him behind.

We tried hard to be friends through my marriage and his.  But between the two marriages, the friendship got pushed to the side.

Last year, he and his wife split up, and he started spiraling downward.  We had moved far away by then, but I tried so hard to keep him close.  We talked frequently and I tried to be there for him.

I came to visit over the summer and I saw how lost he was.  I tried to comfort him, but I just couldn't seem to strengthen him the way I used to be able to.

In March he tried to kill himself. 

I called.  I doted on him.  I called him every day after it happened and did my best to pull him out of his depression. I felt like he was doing well.

On April 14th my friend died.  It appears to be an accidental overdose.

He was 34 years old.  He leaves behind a beloved wife, and 6 children.

And a brokenhearted friend.  One of many, many, people who loved him.

Peace be with you, Thomas Edward Fleming.

Until we meet again.