Anyone who has lived in Dawson County for a while and has been involved in at least a few church and community activities knows that you will normally be busy.

If you drop out of your normal scene, you will surely miss some important, often pleasant, happenings.

So since I've been confined to a convalescent center for three months, I have missed a lot of happenings.

Events like campmeeting happen annually, so I can envision almost exactly what I missed at Lumpkin Campground: The services, prayer meetings, singing, delicious food and fellowship.

Actually, for the last several years my participation has been more limited. Last year, I attended mostly daytime services and parked myself where I could get a golf cart ride to and from the arbor service.

Now, however, I am not only unable to drive a car but, with this heavy brace, I'm not able to get in and out of one.

I'm hoping, however, that my visit on Aug. 6 to the Atlanta surgeon who did all the right knee and femur repair and manipulation will result in an order allowing me to move without the heavy brace and to get around well enough with a walker to live in an assisted living unit.

In fact, I have been arranging my affairs in that direction: Insurance, pieces of furniture, therapy sessions, etc.

The ability to get in and out of a car will greatly change my life. Then perhaps I won't miss every church service and the "Young at Heart" picnic.

In fact, if I had been able to accomplish that, I wouldn't have attended even if I had been at home: The gun-shooting competition, for example, or the humane society's casino night. Even before my latest "disaster," I was unable to climb hills, stairs or bleachers. That's the reason sports events are off my schedule. As much as I'd like to "root, root, root for the home (or a special) team," if it isn't on TV, I can't support it. And, by the way, the Braves are doing OK.

It still seems strange to me that schools are already up and running. But they are. And here I am still holding that check I had planned to send to fill a backpack and stuff the bus. Maybe they can still use it.

But I haven't completely missed the growing season. From my window I have watched the corner of a tiny garden as it was planted, cultivated, produced blooms and now fruit-- tomatoes, squash, cucumbers, etc.

Most of my friends declare that there would have been more if it had not been so rainy.

Oh well, the complaint is usually just the opposite.

Helen Taylor's column appears periodically in the Dawson Community News.