FIELD NOTES: Peeps

Have had trouble finding time to write, but...

here is inspiration found...

two birds in the bush are worth more than a bird in the hand...

FIELD NOTES: A day for watching...

(Super Bowl Sunday: Patriots v. Giants – not that I follow football - just making historical note for all TRUE New Englanders.)

...the CBS Sunday Morning show and wanting to find things to write about…A Typewriter Renaissance added a little ‘sweet’ to Sunday coffee and muffin making…and a little ‘bitter’ because my late father one day decided to get rid of the classic 1940’s Royal typewriter that had predominated his desk like a pipe organ since he had closed his furniture store…I had typed my school papers on a more ‘modern’ version of the manual - a Smith-Corona - out in the backyard…on the picnic table in the Mays and Junes of the 1970’s…then moved on to feeling quite elite when one of my first jobs landed me at the keyboard of an IBM Selectric with changeable type balls and white correcting tape on the ribbon…just in the brief shadow of the Wang on which I learned the magic of word processing…what a pain it had been to have to cover up ones mistakes on paper…who wants to see where our fingers and thoughts had gone off key?…funny thing, I want that Royal typewriter…and if I want another one, it will now cost me to acquire one from some stranger…maybe human beings need to leave dimensional marks and brush strokes on paper…at craft fairs, they make jewelry out of old industry…at a flea market in Seattle, I found myself pawing through boxes of keys…of question marks and exclamation points and capital letters… keys that had been pulled off their type-bars with needle-nose pliers…I found D…brought it home, fused it to a bezel, hung in on a chain and took a picture of it around my neck…like baby teeth in a tooth fairy jar…I seemed to feel some strange and innocent magic…

FIELD NOTES: These boots are made for walkin'?

...I figured I could take a couple of loops around Harrybrooke after tutoring today without having to stop home to change…I have “Saturday-wear” on …skinny jeans, cotton sweater, down vest, ponytail…I even have sunglasses and my Klean Kanteen of water…however,I forgot to throw my walking shoes into the car…but my gray suede boots are flat…they should be okay… we have been experiencing a Seattle-ish winter so I have a good amount of company in the park…quiet company, contented company, nature’s company…I start at the Sri Chinmoy sign as usual and breathe in the softened Februrary air…as incorrect as butter left out on the counter too long, yet somehow delicious …two-thirds in, I notice my thin dress socks are sliding around a bit in my boots…uh-oh…friction is not good on the sole…perhaps I should only do one mile today…but it’s like flossing my teeth…I won’t feel right if I don’t complete the routine, so I go again…at the point of no return, the bottoms of my feet are burning…as a proud walker, I am taken by surprise as I gain new appreciation for athletic socks and shoes…in hoping to avoid blisters, I think to walk off-road, as the words of Nancy Sinatra follow me from a long-ago 45 on my little record-player…”These boots are made for walkin’, and that’s just what they’ll do, and one of these days these boots are gonna’ walk all over you”…dum-dum-dum….back then, I had no relationship to that song other than payback for one of my three older brothers or the pre-teen pecking order of fifth grade girls…I give up trying to keep my standard pace of a fourteen minute mile and just try to tip-toe my way to the car, thinking about aloe…these boots aren’t made for walkin’...but they did make me think…

FIELD NOTES: Storm Alfred's haiku...

Found: red feather, while
collecting tree arms turned to
harpoons, arrows, rams.

My Top 10 Gifts From Storm Alfred - Java

FIELD NOTES: Trick or treat...

...has pretty much been the theme of the entire year, but it is especially true after this record-breaking weekend. Our class jack-o-lantern expresses my feelings accurately enough! Throughout the afternoon and night, continual cracking and thudding kept me on alert and indoors. It was nature's battle and all we humans could do was take cover. It sounded like a snowball fight on the roof...or ammo...trees fell like soldiers being hit...one after another. I appreciate my lessons from nature...this one demonstrated the power of small things in large numbers...think of each leaf catching wet, heavy snow and multiply that by hundreds...thousands...there aren't usually leaves on the trees when we get 15" of snow (needled trees have the better design for this)...it pressed me to think further...a penny, a pushup, an Occupier on Wall Street...none represent much by themselves...neither do votes...except when you add them all up, which may be the hardest part of all...

Lucky..

...not so lucky.

FIELD NOTES: Now that it is long past, I can write about it...

…the month of August that is. It is not the Ides of March the soothsayer warns to me, but the Ides of August!...and perhaps the Kalends and the Nones of August as well. I do not approach its advent with predictions of calamity like a horoscope, omen or phase of the moon…I am naturally optimistic and hopelessly hopeful…but yet it comes. What used to be a month full of weddings, births, a summer fling squeezed out before going back to school, is now pock-marked with deaths of friends, parents, emergencies and the destruction of property from hurricanes and floods. But I cannot stay angry long at nature. It is human nature that assigns to us our curses.