Keston learned to walk on Friday, October 3rd. We’re in trouble now!

On Saturday, we went to the Franklin County Historical Society’s Fall Festival, which was essentially a glorified reason to get your kid out of doors, coming face to face with animals, games, and fall harvest items, including pumpkins. It was not, however, quite as horrific as that sounds at first blush, as the weather was nice, there wasn’t a ton of people out there (although there were more than I would originally think), and Keston had a great time trying his new-found walking skills outside.



There was a jack-o-lantern contest for the youngin’s, although my son didn’t participate because he’d probably try to ingest the innards of a pumpkin rather than discard them and make something artistic. That and writing on the back, “Nathan, 30″ for my name and age seemed rather out of place in all of the, “Kayden, 5″ and “Elsie, 3″ ones that were already there.



Being Iowa, there was, of course, a lot of corn.



And what better to do with that corn than to teach the kiddos how to run an old-fashioned hand-cranked corn sheller.



A garden nearby sported these double D-cup beets. I suspect that they’re going to be a bit…uh…woody.



If you can imagine, there was a flatrack with shitloads of pumpkins there. Then again, about this time of year, there are any number of a billion flatracks sporting orange vine fruit, so this isn’t a unique occurrence.



Everyone got a hayride, either behind a tractor or behind a team of horses. My son, having been properly indoctrinated by his grandfather, was only truly interested in the tractor itself.



We met a lot of friendly animals, because that’s what you do with small children. Here a cow and Keston are eyeing each other, but not necessarily making friends.



The baby pigs were more successful — Keston actually tried to reach for them, but couldn’t actually hit them.



With the baby chicken, Kes tried to be extra friendly and would whap the poor bugger on the head like he was beating a drum till Daddy took hold and made him pet it nicely. I don’t think it was nearly as amusing to either Keston or Daddy, but the chicken certainly appreciated my intervention.



We hung out some, just sitting around on the grass and enjoying a nice Iowa fall day.



Keston decided that the big green carpet needed exploring and headed off for a good crawl.



He had actually tried walking everywhere, but the unevenness of the surface made him approximate a stone gathering no moss on more than one occasion, so for this outing, he did mostly an all-fours mode.



We met up at this activity with Yolanda’s mother’s group, which is a group of kids and parents around the area that were all born approximately in the same time frame. As per typical, we got them all together for a group photo and, per typical, they all acted up when we tried to do so. This was the best of the lot.



One of the little boys, Brody, worked with Keston to try to extract the pumpkinds from underneath the pram.



We did, of course, come home with a bunch of pumpkins, and let Keston pick out his own. Here he is concentrating heavily, trying to feel out for the best pumpkin. Either that or he is trying to fart, we’re not positive.



But once he claimed a pumpkin, it was HIS, by golly.



We got a few smaller pumpkins, too, which are both more suitable for little hands and his mother’s decorating style.



You have the world by the tail if you just have a bunch of fall fruit around you.



Endless entertainment opportunities await even the smallest of ye — as long as you have a green stem and are of the orangeish skin coloring.



I shall HAVE them! Yes, I shall!



Aw, a perfectly flawed family photo, but at least 2 of the 3 weren’t cut off.

What better way to negotiate the fact that you aren’t doing ANYTHING at all interesting for your vacation for the year than to take off for someplace for a day to forget the fact that you aren’t going anywhere truly interesting? So, on Saturday, that’s exactly what we did — we packed up the car, tossed the kid into the carseat, and headed northeast to the promised land of Decorah.

Our pilot, Captain Yolanda. Landa offered to drive there, which is terribly nice considering that at least half of route is exactly what I do every day for work and, contrary to local belief, it is BORING AS HELL.

Keston, as usual, had the best seat in the house, complete with front-view mirror, bottles of sustinence, and toys hanging from the ceiling. Unfortunately for him and us, he did not fall asleep until we were 5 minutes away from our destination. DOH!

Along the way, we stopped at the Charles City wind farm for a photo op. Aren’t they posing nicely?

Once we got to Decorah, we headed to Luther College’s campus, my alma mater, to explore a bit and try to meet up with my college roommate and his family. (Unfortunately for them, his youngest got stung by two bees and they had to take off early.) So, we wandered around for awhile and enjoyed the view.

We then headed to Dunning Springs, a local natural spring with some beautiful scenery.

You’d practically have to TRY to screw up a good photo at this location.

Yolanda and Keston looking happy that they are out, absorbing some good ol’ fashioned nature.

We stopped to pose a bit, too.

Keston was fascinated by the water and probably would have played in it had it not been the typical freezing temperature typical to springs.

Oh, for the want of an DSLR, but I tried my best to capture something interesting.

We then headed up to Phelps Park, a park and scenic overlook across the Oneota Valley and the lower part of Decorah. We stood for awhile, admiring the view, peoplewatching the couples making out in the niches and the artist drawing an incredibly detailed pencil sketch of the river.

We then got asked to take a picture of a couple girls, and they returned the favor for us.

Keston loved playing with the rocks that made up the walls, laid in a herringbone style.

What? I’m just playing!

We then headed downtown to check out some of the shops. We then tried to hit T-bock’s, a very popular local sports bar (where they serve the infamous peanut butter cheeseburger and Erma burger), but it was stuffed full, so we ended up at the 2nd best place, Mabe’s Pizza, where we had a large half-and-half chicken BBQ and Deluxe. It was lovely.

After finishing up with Mabe’s and hitting the Co-Op for some things for Kes (rice ice cream and rice cheese), we hit up the Whippy Dip, the best ice cream stand known to man, and had some sweets before heading home.


Thankfully, Keston fell asleep not 5 minutes after starting to drive and slept all the way home, so that was a big blessing. Yolanda and I spent the rest of the trip talking about religion and philosophy (have I said before that I love the dickens out of this woman?) and we got home without incident. All in all, not a bad day! Now on to the rest of vacation, which involves….WORK! More of that later!

Since losing my religion, I’ve noticed that my extreme emotions, especially on the joy/elation/happiness side of things have mostly gone away, or at least really hard to replicate, unlike when I was masked by that rigidity in my mind.   I’ve been musing about why that is and whether or not the feelings I felt back then were really true or not.

Let’s be clear here; when I say something about “losing my religion”, I am speaking specifically of that dogmatic, biased, conservative film that was placed over my life and mind for so many years of my life.    I speak not of belief, which is unconnected with this (and which I’ve retained, just in a different form.)   Until I entered my college years, I was as much of your typical Bible-banger as the next and if I was still in that state I’d probably think that the sun shines out of McCain and Palin’s ass as much as the next Republican fundamentalist whacko.  Fortunately, that’s not the case.

Losing all that was a long process that I’m not entirely sure I am finished with.   The first formative years were very hard; like a harsh solvent contacting an old portrait, logic, critical thinking, doubt, and speculation cut through the years of the caked-on paint of religious indoctrination, something supplied by my parents, my church, and many of my activities, including summer church camp.   Finding myself dropped into a vat of searing new ideas, I screamed.    The removal process was painful, confusing, and incredibly depressing.    But as the old grime came away, I discovered that the restoration process was, in fact, a good thing.

I emerged from the living hell as a better person, both mentally and emotionally.   Now I am left mostly with whatever is left — a more truer me, a justifyable credo, and a newfound appreciation for everything outside of myself.    I am significantly less in substance due to eliminating a large amount of my history, but I’m more real.    However, somewhere along the way, I lost my profound emotions.

I do not know if you, dear reader, have ever been involved in the extreme psychological experiences that the various acts and rituals of religions can impose upon a person, but most of my highest highs derived directly from my experience with the church.     Singing just the right hymn in the right context used to bring me to tears; hearing trumpets on Easter morning had me leaping for joy; the slam of the book at the end of Good Friday service sent chills down my spine; Christmas Eve was full of warmth and happiness;  joining arms with fellow church campers and singing praises to a song played by guitar while staring at a mirror-encrusted cross in spotlights made me weep uncontrollably with joy.

I sincerely doubt you’d get me to react that way anymore in the same situation.   But I think I’m ok with that.

I muse at these reactions that I used to have and their place in my life at that time, but then I also think of them in the context of what I know and believe now, and how they are so misplaced and misguided, they almost make me sick to think about it.    How could I have let myself get carried away like that?   It’s not only illogical, but is fully within the corruptive, rapturous behaviors that let groups of people whip themselves into a religious frenzy and do all sorts of crazy things devoid of thinking.

I think one of the greatest dangers of organized religion (amongst many others) is its ability to tap directly into that part of our brains which controls our unhindered emotional states and to trigger those extremes through use of a directed fantasy painted ontop of a base of suspended logic and glued together with dogmatic rituals and rites.   As we well know, emotional rollercoasters end up being very addicting, even those not enhanced by drugs or alcohol.   Some people live for the rushes, even if they come naturally.   Get enough religion under your belt and you have a constant source of high that doesn’t involve tying off and slapping your forearm or rolling up a roach.   How convenient.

Don’t get me wrong — I still have moments of extreme feelings in one direction or another, so it’s not like I’ve become a completely vapid creature.   Rather, many of the things that wind people up simply don’t affect me because I’m rationalizing my reaction.   Certain things still get me, however; particular performances of music, my wife, my son, specific writings, certain songs, some movies, the occasional commercial, etc.   I don’t know if these are illogical throwbacks and/or failings of my ability to intellectually handle all aspects of my life, or if they are expressions of my desire to, on ocassion, suspend my own reality in favor of another.   And on a moderate basis, I think that’s perfectly natural.

The question is, am I alone in my experiences?   Do the people who have religion automatically have a greater emotional range within them due to those extremes, or do they exist outside of the realm of belief?   Have I, by insisting that my life be directed by intelligent, rational, and calculated thought and conclusions, automatically excluded myself from ever truly achieving such profound emotional experiences?    It seems that the only way to truly reach those states is to suspend or deny reality so that they can be reached without the hindrances of thinking.

What of joy, oh heart?  Oh death, where is thy elation?

For many years, my father’s side of the family have been farming the same piece of land, and finally this year we attained the 100 year mark, earning us a “Century Farm” distinction. To accept the award, the entire family of Pralles trucked down to the Iowa State Fair and went up on stage with our grandfather, decked out in matching “Pralle Century Farm” blue t-shirts. I think my grandpa was pretty happy to get the award, but even happier to have his entire family there for the event.

Being a very nice day (cool and only slightly rainy), we opted to stay for awhile and walk around the fair to enjoy it a bit.

My cousin’s daughter, Kennedy, is either trying to get my son to laugh or is amazed by how much he had grown. Either one may be applicable here.

We went to see a bunch of animals, including the pregnant-and-giving-birth-live display, which featured a cow complete with afterbirth still hanging out of her back end. Keston found the pen gates to be the most fascinating part of the entire experience, and quickly ‘climbed’ up one as I was holding him near. Monkey genes!

I don’t think Keston’s grandpa minded having him around, either.

Yours truly and Keston take a break from watching our relatives go on giant slings to smile at the camera.

The Pralles all lined up at the top of the Giant Slide and the girl at the top was nice enough to line us all up and let us go down like a Smurfs convention. Wheeeeeee!

All in all, a good day at the fair, and not bad for being 100 years old!