Bonaventure Cemetery, Savannah, Georgia, by abbey*christine (FCC)
“One
Green moves through the tops of trees and grows
lighter greens as it recedes, each of which includes a grey, and among the
greys, or beyond them, waning finely into white, there is one white spot,
absolute; it could be an egret or perhaps a crane at the edge of the water
where it meets a strip of sand.” ~ Cole Swensen, “Five Landscapes”
Thursday afternoon. Blue skies. Temperatures have dropped into low to mid 60’s, much more seasonal.
Today it is absolutely beautiful outside. I had thought last night that I might try to walk a bit when I got up, but alas, I had a dreadful night with intermittent sleep and lots of pain. Maybe tomorrow.
My voice is going in and out today, probably as a result of my sinuses, or maybe my annual fall cold is on its way. Corey got home around 7 this morning after going in at 3 yesterday afternoon. He had lost his shift on Monday, so this double shift made up for it, which means that he will actually be getting a decent paycheck for this week. Who knows what next week will bring.
I put on my rubber gloves today before I started the dishes, and apparently the gloves were wet on the inside as the nail polish that I was trying to protect stuck to the gloves and peeled off at least three of my fingers. I know that I haven’t mentioned my latest nervous tic: peeling off my nail polish. I suppose it’s better than chewing on my fingers, but it’s frustrating nonetheless as I spend my evenings trying to make my nails look nice, only to peel off the polish the next day.
Seems like more of that spitting into the wind—totally useless with no ground gained.
“Two
There is a single, almost dazzling white spot of a white house out loud
against the fields, and the forest in lines
receding, rises,
and then planes. Color,
in pieces or entire; its presence
veneers over want; in all its moving parts, it could be something else
half-hidden by trees. Conservatory, gloriette, gazebo, or bandshell,
a door ajar on the top floor.” ~ Cole Swensen, “Five Landscapes”
I came across this poem by Cole Swensen, which I think is pretty cool, but when I turned the sections into headers, the line spacing got funky, so if you are familiar with the poem and are wondering if I took it upon myself to change the spacing, I didn’t. I know that I can use the pre code to make things appear exactly as the original, but in Word Press, that doesn’t always result in the best looking copy.
I have forgotten most of what I learned in that absolutely awful computer infrastructure class, but I do remember bits and pieces of HTML, which I suppose means that it wasn’t a total loss, although I was really insulted by my final grade. Whatever . . . I’ll get over it.
The other night Eamonn came home and declared that he was going to buy a pair of goldfish as his room was lonely. Now this would not be problematic except that he assumed that he could have my fish bowl, which was an erroneous assumption as I have been saving that bowl for the time when I am finally able to get a red fancy-tailed Beta, something I have wanted for years.
It’s not an extravagant want; in fact, I would say that it’s downright reasonable, and I have been asking for a red fancy-tailed Beta for every occasion: Mother’s Day, Christmas, whatever, but no one seems to have taken me seriously, not until I had the mild tantrum over the fish bowl.
Why do I mention this? Because of the mild tantrum, which is what made me realize that I had forgotten to take my Cymbalta that day. In all fairness to everyone else, on days on which I forget this very important medication, I am, well, prickly, to say the least.
“Three
The trees are half air. They fissure the sky; you could count the leaves, pare
time
defined as that which,
no matter how barely, exceeds
what the eye could grasp in a glance;
intricate woods opening out before a body of water edged
with a swatch of meadow where someone has hung a bright white sheet
out in the sun to dry.” ~ Cole Swensen, “Five Landscapes”
Speaking of prickly . . . I am on day four of this week’s headache. I still have not heard from the nurse at the neurologist’s office, even though I contacted the place that was supposed to be shipping my Botox for my migraines. I don’t know what I’ve done to piss of this nurse, but it must have been something really big because she is really stretching out this entire process.
I just want to call the office and say, “PLEASE GIVE ME MY BOTOX SO MY MIGRAINES WILL GO AWAY!” but I know that such an action would not have the effect that I’m hoping to achieve, so I’m just sitting here, writing with my eyes squinting again.
Yesterday, I made the mistake of mentioning to my mother that I want to find a different neurologist, and you would have thought that I had said that I was running away to become a Sherpa on Mt. Everest. “No, you can’t do that. What will they say? What will they think?” My mother is big on the school of what will they (whoever they is) think. Her continual references to this ubiquitous they when I was a teenager used to drive me crazy until I finally broke and said, “Who is THEY? Exactly where do THEY live? What do THEY look like?
She wasn’t too happy. But THEY have existed all of my life. One day I will meet THEM, and THEY will probably have three heads and look like a Dr. Who Monster, which, frankly, I would find very comforting as it would confirm my suspicions.
“Four
A white bird in a green forest is a danger to itself. Stands out. Shines. Builds
up inside. Like it’s dangerous to cry while driving or to talk to strangers or to
stare at the sun and a thousand other things
we’ve always heard
people who wear white see better at night, though they gradually lose this
trait as they age.” ~ Cole Swensen, “Five Landscapes”
So today’s image theme is Spanish moss and state parks and historic landmarks. I love Spanish moss, love the way it drapes and cloaks and creates an air of mystery about anything on which it hangs, and it grows like wild at False Cape (which used to be Seashore State Park back when I used to skip school and go walking there). Unfortunately, the stuff is riddled with critters, mostly chiggers, or berry bugs, red bugs, or Trombiculidae for the purists. For those of you who are unfamiliar with these things, they are a type of mite prevalent in the South.
After these little buggers crawl onto their host (including humans, they form a microscopic hole in the skin and chew up parts of the inner skin. The result is severe itching and red bumps or hives, sometimes a skin rash. Why do I know this? Because I used to skip school and hike through Seashore State Park.
Actually, a former neighbor brought home a big pile of Spanish moss and put it in his glass coffee table. Result? Infestation.
I read somewhere that Henry Ford used Spanish moss as the cushioning for his automobile seats until it was revealed that the stuff harbored chiggers. Result? The first Ford recall. I wonder if that’s an urban myth or truth . . .
Thank you Ms. Science for today’s lesson.
“Five
The air across the valley is slightly hazy though thinning though patches
remain between the groves of trees that edge a clearing in which stands a
single house. A child in a white t-shirt has just walked out of the house and
is turning to walk down to the lake.” ~ Cole Swensen, “Five Landscapes” from Goest
Okay. I’m not saying that my skipping school was a good thing, but high school was so tedious and boring, and I was able to skip 17 days of French and still get an A without breaking a sweat. Those were different times, though, and if I had been able to go to a school that specialized in college prep or something like that, I’m sure that I would have been more interested.
Or maybe not.
Thankfully, the days when skipping was easy have long since passed, and now parents get telephone calls when their children don’t show up at school, which is how I kept track of Alexis and Eamonn. Brett was never a concern as far as skipping school. Some of that old-fashioned do as I say and not as I do in action.
Last night I had one of those really intense dreams in which huge chunks of my life were blended into one time sequence. My boss from the steakhouse in which I worked as a teen was the manager of Dillard’s, and while I was working full-time at Dillard’s, I was also teaching a full load at ODU, only it was the first day of classes, and I hadn’t prepared my lessons, and Mari was there, and she wanted to use some of my colored sheet protectors, and I decided that my office with the window (which was the office I had in northern Virginia) was better than another office that had a better refrigerator . . . Get all that?
And you wonder why I wake up tired and in pain. I mean, I live lifetimes in hours. So I awoke around four and texted Corey to see when he’d be home, and he said that the ship was scheduled to depart at 6 a.m. So being the kind person that I am, I went ahead and proofed his paper that was due today. I don’t know if I was being noisy, but at some point, Brett looked in and asked me what I was doing. I told him homework. He went back to bed.
The dogs were really confused. I finished and collapsed back into bed, and all was right with the world again.
More later. Peace.
Music from The Wellspring, “The Ballad of El Goodo”
Final Autumn
~ Annie Finch, from Calendars
Lola's Curmudgeonly Musings 