5/30/10:
A week ago Friday Jay and I spent the evening listening to 36 poets read their own works. The Skagit River Poetry Project holds a poetry festival in La Conner every other year to celebrate and highlight the group's work, which is to expose the area's students not only to poetry but to poets from around the world and from many generations. "This last year poets were in local schools grades K-14 for more than 75 days and worked with over 3,000 students and teachers." This project began in 1998— there are no graduating seniors at the local schools now who have not been exposed to poets from around the world. Cool beans.
Jay and I listened to poetry from 7PM until after 10PM. It was a great odyssey, listening to voices from many generations and countries, with many accents. We were able to once again hear Irish poet Tony Curtis, who spoke of his enjoyment visiting the area and interacting with students in their classrooms. He also spoke of experiencing things here he had not seen in Ireland— he read his poem Jazz (which I could not find on the web), citing his wonder at his first encounter with a hummingbird, "the largest bee I ever saw". Canadian Lorna Crozier read her amusing piece My Last Erotic Poem, about two old farts getting it on. It is worth the click on that there link...
I particularly enjoyed the reading by the first Poet Laureate for Washington state, Samuel Green. His poem resonated with my professional life, fooling me at first, making me think the poem was of the mundane, but it was not. I spoke with Mr. Green during the musical break. He gave me his email address to follow up with him about an NEA project on poetry for returning vets. I will write to him, it is in my plans. His poem, GRANDMOTHER, CLEANING RABBITS grabbed my attention. You can click on that name to see what the deal was.
Before we headed to Michigan in April Jay took some pics of the apricot-lings on his apricot tree— the first year for such a show. We await the results with bated breath, but in the meantime the picture up to the left is of those "lings", click to see another view... ciao.
When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less.— Lewis Carroll
5/28/10:
Back on October 24, 2009 I wrote about visiting the home and outbuildings that Jay's parents built many years ago. Before that, March 2008, I put an entry about the land next to the house on which Jay and his dad built trailer spaces and how everything there had been bulldozed, except for the wonderful, now large, black maple trees. The next time I went by the site after the Oct. 2009 pictures, the outbuildings were gone— we had been led to the thermometer just in time.
Since Oct. 2009 we have repeatedly passed Jay's old home and found it still up, boards over the holes that windows used to cover. It was depressing. Earlier this month the house also disappeared, via the magic of bulldozers. We stopped to take some photos, the small one there to the right catches part of one tree as you look across to the lovely older home across the road. If you click it you can see a nice pic of Jay's trees that I like.
Time still passes by, always the same and different, all at once. They say you cannot step into the same river twice. It is so.
Have a great weekend, ciao.
Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.— Charles Dickens, in David Copperfield
5/24/10:
I stayed home today, got an extra day off with my accumulated comp time and enjoyed it immensely. I slept in until 9:30 and later worked at reclaiming a flower bed area for 2 1/2 hours. It is amazing how insidious those grasses and weeds are. We will be taking at least one truck load of stuff to the compost place this weekend— we cannot keep up with it ourselves with only three compost bins!
In between weed pulling stints I sat on the back porch for a breather, looking over toward the rain barrel and admiring the mass of foxgloves, little spiky flowers coming up from succulents, ferns, hostas, and columbines. I thought about how bright the columbines photographed, the purple one especially looking like a "doctored" photo, however real life is quite dramatically colored. You can usually tell if photos have been messed with by checking out the greens, seeing if they look like greens you really see. Check out a really nice, cool close up of the spiky flowers by clicking my pic to the right.
Anyhow, I enjoyed my relaxing day. Hope your Monday was good too. Later man...
If birds had never existed, would man ever have thought to fly?— Cindy (she probably heard this somewhere else)
5/23/10:
I met my friend Barbara in Seattle yesterday and went to see a play at the Intiman Theatre, The Thin Place. As it turns out, there is a Celtic saying that heaven and earth are only three feet apart, and there are thin places where that distance is smaller, where the veil between this world and the other is thin. Barbara and I both enjoyed the play and were impressed with the acting of Gbenga Akinnagbe as he shifted from one character to the next. We were also able to catch a question and answer session with the director, Andrew Russell, after the show. The opening night was the evening before, the Saturday matinee we attended was not full but hopefully word will spread and this good work will get broad exposure— go check it out if you can, it is two thumbs up times two...
The play explored faith and its absence, ending up in Seattle— a "city without religion." This is based on national polls, with Seattlites choosing "none" for religious preference or affiliation more than any other city until recently, at least that is what they said. The series of characters played by Gbenga Akinnagbe were interesting, one using a description of God that I recently ran into, God is bipolar, that I had found very interestingly accurate.
Another character stated the obvious (not always so obvious) that God existed before Christianity— you can insert the name of any organized religion. Any idea of God is limited once parameters of religious "faith" are stated, changing what is experienced into a defined idea, one that all others must adhere to rather than know. God existed for the world since the beginning of man's time and every religion narrows God's availability, making God for only the home team, so to speak. Religion itself takes God's name in vain.
I enjoy my photos, the one above of a purple columbine in the back yard links to a larger, more easily viewable in detail, version. Good photos, poetry, writing, music, paintings, etc. reside in the thin place. Yes.
I searched for God and found only myself. I searched for myself and found only God— Sufi proverb
5/22/10:
The week went quickly and slowly at the same time, as usual.
I have had to work overtime rather regularly, getting "comp" time rather than extra pay. I am using eight hours to take Monday off, a welcome relief and an opportunity to run some needed errands and work on my flower beds— weather and energy permitting.
I did work on getting Michigan trip pictures together and today put the finishing touches on a page about what we often did, eating. Click on the nice picture of my mom and myself at the Mexican restaurant in Charlotte for a view of our eating adventures and enjoy!
The only man I know who behaves sensibly is my tailor; he takes my measurements anew each time he sees me. The rest go on with their old measurements and expect me to fit them.— George Bernard Shaw
5/17/10:
I lay about last weekend, whining and complaining of not being energetic even while the virus racing about my body began to wane. The weather was lovely, more than lovely enough to do some gardening, but the energy available to me was only enough to support a short venture into the yard to water newer plantings.
I did feel energized enough after that to get my camera and take some pictures. The columbines in the back flower bed are big, repaying prior spring efforts...
Ecclesiastes 11:1
We must cast our bread
Upon the waters, as the
Ancient preacher said,
Trusting that it may
Amply be restored to us
After many a day.
That old metaphor,
Drawn from rice farming on the
River’s flooded shore,
Helps us to believe
That it’s no great sin to give,
Hoping to receive.
Therefore I shall throw
Broken bread, this sullen day,
Out across the snow,
Betting crust and crumb
That birds will gather, and that
One more spring will come.
— Richard Wilbur, New Yorker, March 22, 2010
5/14/10:
Whew! I don't care for being sick, even though I did get to stay home from work Mon - Wed. Staying home loses its charm when you find yourself aching all over, unable to do anything for very long without laying down and snoring for a while, and otherwise being pitiful. I went in to work Thursday and still did not feel all that well, exhausted by the time I came home. Today I did better, with a bit more of a spark of energy. We are looking forward to a sedate weekend, and even the lovely weather won't tempt us to do yard work...
I left work a couple of hours early today for a dermatology appointment, to have stitches taken out of my butt. I had another biopsy done of a suspicious mole there two weeks ago and returned to the clinic with some trepidation, worrying that they would have to take a bigger bite... no worries! Yeah! The mole was mildly dysplastic and the margins were normal— they got it all in one try. Whew again.
I did get a second page of Michigan pictures together. Those pictures tell another quirky story, this time about murder and mystery near my parents' home— check it out by clicking to the right, on the picture the of Jay and another of the trees of interest to him. Enjoy the weekend.
...memories are not always what they seem and cannot be relied upon as factual. Some memories may be screens for others. And most crucially, people revise their memories at a later date. He called this Nachtraglichkeit; the word is very hard to translate in to English. James Strachey, Freud's translator, called it "deferred action" but it actually means something like "afterlyness." An early memory takes on new meanings and changes as a person matures.— Siri Hustvedt in The Shaking Woman
5/10/10:
There have been sick people at work since my return from Michigan and I successfully avoided getting ill from them by reciting my germ mantra under my breath: "back, step back from the sicko". Last week Jay started not feeling right and by Thursday evening was feeling somewhat sick, coming home from work mid-day on Friday. I had hoped to not catch Jay's virus since it looked unpleasant, but my efforts and mantra ended in failure Sunday afternoon. We both stayed home from work today, I mostly on the couch and Jay relaxing at his computer— he is going to work tomorrow, the jury remains out for me.
The picture to the left is of a tree (the larger one on the right) out back next to the creek behind my parents' home, taken in April. It is dead, but has not fallen. To learn more click on it... enjoy.
But he loved the flight of the hawk and could distinguish it from all others. He would stand rapt, gazing at the long pernings, the quivering poise, the wings lifted for the plummet drop, the wild reascent, fascinated by such extremes of need, of pride, of patience and solitude.— Samuel Beckett, Malone Dies
5/8/10:
We did not go to the lake a lot when I grew up but we did on occasion and a few times rented or stayed at a cottage on Duck Lake, not too far away, for a week at a time. It was always fun, playing in the water, having a change from the routine. I also remember seeing the rainbow glaze of gasoline on the top of the water, thinking how pretty it was when I was young and gradually realizing over the years that pretty did not always equal nice, or good.
The picture to the left is of the Gulf oil spill, lifted from the New York Times. It is pretty too, isn't it? That picture is from May 6th and links to a different pretty picture from April 30th. It is a shame that we need such concrete lessons to learn that pretty, easy, or plentiful do not equal good or safe, necessarily. It is as if humanity were only in its teens or twenties, its head and actions reeling with invincibility.
I went to a yearly plant sale at the county fair grounds today, picked up gold cherry and large tomato plants as well as several more perennials, most of which are already planted as I write... and I am damn proud of myself, you are right. The weather here has changed from winter-like drizzle and clouds (that made me want to hibernate) back to May. We like it.
The Burglary
They stole my mother’s silver,
melting it down, perhaps,
into pure mineral, worth
only its own weight.
We must eat with our hands now,
grab for food
in this new place of greed,
our table set
only with memories, tarnishing
even as we speak:
my mother holding a shining ladle
in her hand,
serving the broth
to children who will forget
to polish her silver, forget even
to lock the house.
While forks and spoons are divided
from all purpose,
patterns are lost like friezes
after centuries of rain,
and every knife is robbed
of its cutting edge.
— Linda Pastan, The New Yorker, November 16, 2009
5/7/10:
Yikes, still.
I have not gotten around to posting pictures from our recent trip to Michigan, and I know you are all waiting with bated breath... In lieu of a full posting I am offering this lovely picture to the left, a photo of Jay's lunch sandwich taken at the Subway shop in the Charlotte, Michigan Walmart. You like, eh? If so you can check out the full picture by clicking on this little one.
It was once again a busy week, with a couple of days of working overtime. It was also windy and stormy at the beginning of the week, but was lovely today. I picked up seven plants for $9 at a local gardening group sale and planted six this evening— an excellent example of almost unbounded energy on my part. I planted 2 bee balm plants, a money plant and 2 variegated Jacob's ladder plants. Cool beans.
More later, looking forward to being home this weekend. Ciao.
I envy paranoids; they actually feel people are paying attention to them.— Susan Sontag
5/4/10:
Well, the weather here has been wacky this week. We went to Bellingham to see a concert at Mount Baker Theatre Sunday evening and found ourselves driving home in a rainy windstorm. Since then it has been more than blustery, with intermittent downpours and even hail. Many neighboring communities have had power outages; we dodged that ourselves, thankfully. At the moment the skies have suddenly cleared to pleasantly cloudy with the sun peaking out, hopefully portending more pleasant weather in the offing.
As some of you have guessed, we went see Arlo Guthrie in concert Sunday. It was a great time, thanks to Jay who got the tickets for us.
Arlo was accompanied by members of his family, from his son and daughters and their spouses down to little ones fighting over the microphones. The pictures above demonstrate time passing, time Jay and I are familiar with. Young Arlo links to a video of Arlo and some of his family singing his father Woody's well-known American classic, This Land Is Your Land. The more current picture of Arlo links to his youngest daughter singing a song she sang Sunday, a song put out by her Folk Uke group called Shit Makes the Flowers Grow— a wonderful song.
Arlo has continued in his father's footsteps, not particularly happy with social injustice. One of Arlo's daughters told a story about a day after her father bought the old Trinity Church in Great Barrington, MA, the church where Alice's Restaurant was filmed. Arlo was inside cleaning and a local pastor came by, asking Arlo what he he was doing with the church— Arlo replied that he was cleaning it up. The pastor said no, what kind of church was Arlo going to have. This took Arlo a little aback because he had just thought he would have the church be a place of music and community gathering. After thinking a second Arlo replied it would be a church for people to "bring your own God". Today the church is the Guthrie Center
It was an evening of good songs, good lyrics, good stories and fun watching such a musical family play together. We had a good time, heading off into the work week. Hope you are having fun too, laughing at times even in the midst of hard work. Life is good, even if it sucks half the time. Ciao.
Plenty of rich folks wants to fight. Give them the guns.— from WOODY SEZ, a collection of articles written by Woody Guthrie for the PEOPLE'S WORLD
5/1/10:
Happy May Day 2010! It is cloudy and has spit rain a little bit today. I made it out to plant geraniums in a pot and in the bed next to the front porch to brighten things up, and also planted some basil and a plant called a curry plant but it just has a curry smell and does not impart curry flavor to food (shucks). I also pulled some weeds and dug up some sod for a front yard project that is now about 1/3 done. It always feels good to have some of the yard shaped up as far as my flowers go. I tend to be sick of gardening by fall and then in the spring I am ready to go...
Hope you got a chance to check out the last entry on my April page, with a nice Make a Wish Foundation story. Now May has begun.
The economy is perking up some, I think the unemployment rate has gone down about a percent in our county. The credit cards up above link to a site with foreclosure rates by state. Some of the homes were lost due to job loss, others were lost due to good old greed. Homes were way overvalued, people were able to take out loans beyond their financial means and so they did so with gusto. By now it is an old story, more than likely to be repeated again if the powers that be, the economic elite, have their way, fueled by "conservative" interests who preach that regulating corporations is un-American. It is interesting that placing the interests of the people, the populace, above economic entities has now garnered negative implications. You can't fool all the people all of the time...
American Excess, can't lose your home without it.— Jay Eckert, 5/1/10
Jardot's World: May Edition, 2010
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