^When the horses grow weary

I could have a Lamborghini if I wanted. I could. But I don’t want one, I’ve never wanted one. Even when we lived in Italy, and a shiny Black Diablo pulled up beside us at a light on Viale Unita D’Italia, there was no coveting. And I was not intimidated by its horsepower. Issac and Justine were in the backseat of our old blue Honda Accord urging me on, I looked over and gunned my motor while we sat at the light and the man in the Lamborghini turned his head like a bird does while looking for worms, Was that a noise? Was that my car making that noise? I don’t think he even knew we were racing because he was already about fifteen car lengths ahead of us by the time I had released the clutch from first. Lucky for him the street was narrow and went through a very busy port area. He turned onto the autostrada toward Naples, and we proceeded down Via Appia, his lucky day.

I don’t need fancy things. Though like a crow I like a shiny bauble. We’ve been putting together renovations for the house at long last. The tile and counters and cabinets in the kitchen, tile and fixtures in two bathrooms and finally getting rid of the old eye sore of a deck -- no more flat cat sanctuary. No more raccoon haven. We’ll have a small footprint patio and what I see as a future secret garden off the back. Two nights ago, as if to encourage us, the first firefly was spotted. And I did hear cicadas when I was in Belleville last week, but they haven’t emerged here yet, kind of disappointing.

School ended a few weeks ago and there wasn’t even time to go ah before I went with Jerry to Chicago, Fort Wayne Indiana and the on to Columbus to see the Bambina and her love. It was a wonderful little trip, lots of museum-ing and walking in Chicago, Fort Wayne has a surprising and gorgeous little museum and gallery and, well, Columbus has a part of my heart. And now we’re home. Time to really settle into clearing the kitchen. The Habitat for Humanity Restore will take our old kitchen cabinets and anything they can use or sell, but I need to find a home for everything that is in them now, those things that will return to the kitchen when it is finished.

Speaking of Indiana, while we drove through we passed by Warsaw, a place I wrote a poem about years ago based on name at a poetry forum. When the person joined they chose Death as their name and so the profile said, Death lives in Indiana. Who wouldn’t write a poem?

Death lives in Indiana

Down a dirt side road a few miles from Warsaw, a town he likes for the industry -
orthopedics and CoCo Wheats – and that its history doesn’t mirror
Poland, a place he hopes to never visit again, with such immense tasks.

He has a picket fence tangled with sweet peas, blossoms like prayer
flags shivering in the breeze, lilacs stout as bison, and a weeping
willow, fingers grazing the driveway, to hide his house.

He doesn’t have a TV, listens to the radio each morning: the local market,
hog prices down, feeders up; hospital report; Swap ‘n Shop; turns it off
before the funeral notices.

Nights he sits outside while the stars and the bats arrive, can’t believe
he’s waited this long to discover a porch swing. There’s the occasional
grange supper, casserole, and bingo, and a few kind people who invite him

to church but for the most part, he likes to keep to himself. If he feels lonely
he stops at Dig’s Diner or the Dairy Queen – the blond-haired girls
ignore him but it’s a connection.

Behind his house cottonwoods and an old silo mark the entrance to a
meadow, a place full of thigh-high grass and alive with bird calls
a few acres that will allow grazing, *when the horses grow weary.

~~~

So we made it through May. It was hard. "And so we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past."

Here are a few pictures from various places:

 

Enter freely and of your own will

Classes were scheduled to start on Tuesday, January 16th, unfortunately, that first day saw the school closed due to cold and snow. So all classes started a day behind. Then the following Monday the school was closed due to freezing rain. This coming Monday I will finally be able to attend Film and Lit which meets once a week. For homework the Professor has us reading a section of a novel and watching clips of various film iterations. Because I have Fridays off I took the opportunity to donate platelets while listening to the audiobook of the novel. If you've got to sit quietly for an hour and a half at the Red Cross I highly recommend a good recording of Dracula. It really puts a unique perspective on the encounter.

And just for fun here are some hip vampires from What We Do in the Shadows.

Be kind

The neighbor’s cat is my new best friend, or I am hers depending on how generous I am with cat treats. Not that she isn’t gracious, she has plenty of kitty love and she does accompany me around the house on occasion. 

Last week we discovered the wire I had put on the deck to keep the flat cats from getting under has been torn down near the steps. And I appreciated how she went right under to check it out for me. It’s not flat cat time so that leaves a few other critters in this Disney backyard. I placed my yard-cam out that night and saw this creature coming out. 

The next night I rigged the camera under the deck and could see their glowing eyes way under it. My next step will be to make the deck an area they will not want to stay strobe lights and German Death Metal may fit the bill.

The town is small but spread out, the downtown is only a few blocks but then the suburbs and sprawl are along the freeway and a couple of state routes that intersect. We live on the side of town that is almost farmland. Today as Jerry and I were running errands we saw a fox cross State Street and go into the community garden where it paused and then made a beautiful leap straight up and over a fence into one of the raised beds and then posed like a model; lither than a cat (don’t tell my friend). And a good omen for the year I think. A local store has a sign out from that reads "Dear 2024, be kind. From all of us." If this was 2024's first effort, I'll take it.

A link to the best writing I did in 2023?

Maybe: No Spoilers 

Happy New Year!

I dreamt of journeys

There was a moment on the way to Charles de Gaulle airport Thursday morning when I looked up to see Jerry laughing with a young black man on the train. He too was headed toward the airport. When we arrived Jerry told me that the man had leaned over and said something, Jerry said to him “That’s not French” and that’s when they laughed because he was speaking an African dialect. Jerry speaks an international language which is kindness. He always has but I love to catch it to remind myself how fluent he is in so many ways. Later while we waited to check in at our airline he helped a woman get to a plug for her phone and then in Dublin, he paused and helped security reload trays on a conveyer system while I put my shoes on. It’s these small moments I’ve witnessed for the past forty years.

            And it is exactly forty years this month since we first met. It was 1983 in Naples Italy and he and Tommy D. Strickland came bursting through the computer space where I worked. Tom was part of the command I was stationed at, and he and Jerry had arrived on the same flight and had attended intercultural relations (ICR) class together. ICR gave you a review of Italian life and culture, some language, taught you how to ride the buses and trains, etc., I’d been in Italy since March and had a few acquaintances, but Jerry and Tom and I became good friends, and then another, Kathy, came to our command in February. That was our core, for a while and then Mary Jane arrived, and we had a nice group. One of our big events was when we drove North in two cars to the National Park of Abruzzo and camped.

I knew Jerry for a good while before we ever started dating. And Europe is always the backdrop to our life. Jerry likes to say, “What are the chances that someone from Joseph Oregon, and someone from Moundville Alabama will meet in Agnano Italy, and fall in love?” So, it is good to go back to Europe, had I been thinking more clearly when we decided to go away for Christmas I would have chosen Naples. But Paris is always a good idea.

On this trip, we stayed in a small apartment in the 7th arrondissement. We had ten days and no agenda aside from being. Being with one another and being in Paris. The 7th arrondissement includes the Eiffel Tower and the surrounding gardens. [Small note: On Wednesday the 27th, it was the 100th anniversary of Gustave Eiffel’s death; the workers at the tower went on strike.] There was a concentrated effort to visit places we had never been: the Rodin Museum, the Paris Flea Market, Place Bastille, the Pompidou Center, and Montparnasse, etc., I’ve been trying to get to Eugene Delacroix Museum for a while and we were blocks away and it is temporarily closed; c’mon! We found the oldest church in Paris, the Church of Saint-Germain-des-Prés; I took Jerry to the Luxembourg Gardens, the Shakespeare and Company Bookstore, and to a small park next to the bookstore. From there we went to the Pantheon and into the church of Saint Gertrude, the patron saint of Paris.

            We strolled the Seine, we looked at the now low profile of Notre Dame, we went to the Louvre and the Orsay on their late nights and we had dinner at one of our favorite restaurants. We walked a lot. We walked in the rain, we walked at night, we walked and walked and walked. We went to open-air markets. I found Jerry one of the best macaron places. We cooked in our little kitchen and slept hard and long. I dreamt of journeys but no arrivals. 

Is it over yet?

 

2023 ...

Sweet fairy wren

"We are shaped by the landscapes we are born to as inescapably as any other earthly creature born to any other ecosystem." Margaret Renkl

This is the last full week of classes for the semester. Today was the last day of Earth Science if (if!) you needed to take the final exam. I did not need to, so I didn’t go to class. I attended the lecture on Tuesday and turned in my lab, which just seemed respectful to the Professor.

Then I went to the last Mass Comm class today before our final next week. Tomorrow is the last regular class for Film Appreciation, we’ll watch one more film, Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure which was chosen by one of the students after a “quiz” victory. It was really fun actually, the quiz and the film will be fun to see again after all this time.

I’ve finished all my blogs for the class, and I have a little bit more to write on my final paper, I’m comparing True Grit 1969 & 2010. A good excuse to rewatch the movies and read the novel again. After watching and writing about the movie There Will Be Blood, it’s nice to think about a film where a female gets to tell a story (have more than ten lines). I’m all set up for the Spring semester but will enjoy about a month's break.

I went to get my haircut on Monday and as I walked into the salon I was asked if I had checked in online, “Yes.” I said.

“What name?”

“Mary”

“Okay, got you.”

And then this man walked over and sat down next to me and said, “Mary, your son will save us.”

What?

“Do you know that song? It’s about Jesus.”

                            

Yesterday I watched a Carolina Wren at my front door. It was patrolling all the bricks and stones looking for bugs. I think I got a good six- or seven-minute observation before it was spooked by a couple of sparrows, jerks. I want a wren for my best friend.

Here are some random pictures from the past few months.