We have yellow jackets living in the roof tiles at the house. We see them in the summer, especially in the afternoon when the sun is hot on the roof. They like hot weather. It makes them frisky. In the winter they are slow and dopey. They fall on the floor and walk around, they can't fly, and they clearly are waiting for warmer weather.
Unfortunately they don't die in the winter. They do like to crawl into tight spaces and ride the winter out in some sort of comfort. I always shake our my bicycle gear in the garage before putting on my shoes, or helmet. You never know...
So, you think I might have been just a little cautious when I put on the left handed glove I keep on the gas grill that I use to hold oysters to shuck them when I grill them. NO, I didn't. And last night when I pulled it on there was a moment when I didn't really understand why my middle finger was feeling odd - a sort of stinging, like maybe a blackberry thorn was inside. Then it got more acute, and I understood I was under ATTACK! I pulled my hand out, and a now-squished yellow jacket fell to the deck. The damage was done. I iced my finger and all seemed well. It was fine overnight, and didn't really bother me. Until the flight today from Seattle to Portland, Maine. My finger is now quite swollen and a bruise is apparent. The effect is limited to the joint that has the fingernail, and just a bit into the one behind it, but it is definitely affected. My typing seems to be OK, and it doesn't really hurt, but I notice it. OK, it hurts a bit.
On Saturday I played golf in Port Townsend. On the first hole my ball landed in the fairway (yes, it happens once in a while) but I could not tell how far I was from the green. Often they mark sprinklers with the distance, so I leaned over to have a look at one that was close by. It was covered in grass clippings, so I used my right hand to wipe away the grass, and YIKES! The sprinkler had been chopped by the lawn mower which had left a razor sharp shard sticking up! It sliced my middle finger and the blood shot out in profusion. It hurt like an SOB, but the leakage was the real problem. Fortunately I carry a red golf towel on my bag, so it didn't look like I was so badly injured as I played on (you didn't think I would stop, do you?). It stopped bleeding after a few holes anyway. And you can always wash a towel but you can't always play golf!
So, here I sit on Monday night. The middle fingers on both hands are messed up. One is swollen, and one is healing a scarred side.
I thought this shit was supposed to slow down as we aged...
Monday, March 25, 2013
Friday, February 15, 2013
The Brink
In the recent movie, Star Trek, a young James T. Kirk drives a stolen classic car across the wide open plains of what appears to be Iowa. There is not a thing in view in terms of a hill or mountain, only miles and miles of wide open space. He is having a great time, thrilled with the act of driving a fast car without any external limits, only wide open space and long straight roads. His is an act of rebellion, apparently against the situation he finds himself in - too young to legally drive, an absent mother who is currently "off planet", a step-father he doesn't respect, responsibilities to his family and school he doesn't accept, and a sense that he is above it all, smarter that everyone around him. He is complete within himself, confident of his abilities, sure of every action he takes and makes, respectful of nothing and plunging headlong into the future.
Eventually he is chased by a possibly robotic cop on a futuristic motorcycle without any actual wheels since it floats over the road. To escape this annoying reminder of his responsibilities Kirk turns off down a dirt road, at high speed, heading apparently nowhere. The cop is in hot pursuit, demanding that he pull over. The metaphor of the cop is clear: he represents the world that requires the young future Captain of Starfleet to acknowledge his place in things, that there are forces larger than himself to which he must submit, forces which he must acknowledge and to which he must conform. Kirk will have nothing to do them at the present, as he is all about himself and the present moment.
As an audience we are suddenly pulled back, and what is revealed is an enormous chasm, a crack in the earth where the road upon which the young Kirk is traveling abruptly ends. If he continues his current course he will plunge headlong into the abyss to his end. The depth of the chasm is not clear, but it is DEEP, really deep, and it is a one-way trip. It is the Brink of Existence for Kirk, if he doesn't change his ways. Sirens blaring, the cop is hot on his trail. Oblivious, Kirk plunges on.
What will happen here? What does the edge really represent to Kirk and to all of us? Is this an ending? Is this a beginning? It is a Brink, a forced epiphany where we must confront something fundamental about ourselves. We can't escape it, it bears down upon us relentlessly.
In Groundhog Day, Bill Murray and Phil, the groundhog, drive off the edge of the cliff to their demise, only to wake up at 6:00 a.m. the same day they departed as if nothing ever happened. This doesn't happen to the rest of us. We suffer the consequences of our actions in linear time, with day following day, consequences following acts, in a billiard ball universe where actions create reactions ad infinitum. Things done cannot be undone. Balls set into motion continue to move. There is no do-over. There is no control-Z on the keyboard of life. More's the pity.
We face more situations where brink-like conditions exist than we may realize. Every day we are faced with choices that, if taken one way, could lead to the precipice Kirk faced. Roads that appear fine and safe, and are, until they come abruptly to an end. Can we see the end coming? Maybe. Maybe friends can help us see the end. Maybe we can see them ourselves but choose not to see them. Either way, there are situations that are more than crossroads, they are the precipitous Brinks that mean everything. Fall over them and you are lost. Step back and you can save yourself. Lines that should not, cannot be, crossed. Brinks. The Brink.
Metaphors abound in this arena. How about the tightrope walker? Does that work for you? He walks the high wire where any misstep will mean disaster and death. Walk the straight and narrow and you are safe. How well does that represent life as we know it? Not so well, I think. Things are not as black and white as that. Or maybe they are even more stark, and we choose not to see it. Believing is seeing, as we learn. If we believe we are safe, we can't see how far gone we are.
I have a friend who is at a brink, and it is painful to see the process unfold. What will happen? What can I do to help? What action that I can take is too much, and what is too little?
How can I reach out and help?
Monday, January 14, 2013
My Saga Continues
For Christmas I bought Judy a Sony speaker that sits on the counter. She can sit her iPad on it, or her new iPhone, and it plays stations like Pandora or specific radio stations that have apps for them. She uses it all the time now, and it has replaced the temperamental and scratchy wireless system we have been using in the house for all these past years. I consider this a major step forward. It plays loud if you want it to, or quiet. The quality is excellent, and the ambience it creates is wonderful. The best thing is that the sound is exactly where you want it to be - in the kitchen.
Tonight I went to Costco and bought a pair of speakers that are the size of large eggs. They pop up and sit there, making a tremendous sound absolutely belying their size. They are amazing. They have internal batteries that power them, and they plug into the iPad (not Bluetooth) but expand the sound and the sound quality in an unbelievable manner. I'm listening to them now as I write this. Yikes, this is cool. Headphones are cool, but ambient sound is also cool. I'm listening to Pandora and the songs are exactly what I like. Technology is working for me tonight...
Tonight I went to Costco and bought a pair of speakers that are the size of large eggs. They pop up and sit there, making a tremendous sound absolutely belying their size. They are amazing. They have internal batteries that power them, and they plug into the iPad (not Bluetooth) but expand the sound and the sound quality in an unbelievable manner. I'm listening to them now as I write this. Yikes, this is cool. Headphones are cool, but ambient sound is also cool. I'm listening to Pandora and the songs are exactly what I like. Technology is working for me tonight...
Thursday, December 27, 2012
Holiday Letters
I wrote an introduction to a Holiday Letter that we did not end up using. As I was putting this down in writing I felt the spirit move in my fingers, and what I ended up with was not particularly what I started out to create. It went something like this:
If I am writing a letter that describes what my family and I have been doing for the past year and sending it to "family and friends" that have not been interested enough in me to try looking at my Facebook postings or reading my blog, then why am I bothering? If you want to know what is happening with people today you have multiple avenues to reach them, either actively with an email or phone call here and there to ask them how they are doing, or passively through participating in shared environments like Facebook, blogging, and many others. My Holiday Letter seems to disrupt this status quo by forcing you to read about me even if you have not been interested in doing so.
What should I write about? If you have been following me and my life you know about the big stuff, and likely about the little stuff, too. What's left to write about?
This brings to mind the old Bert and I skit where Bert returns home after an absence and his friend tells him "There really is no news, except that I should tell you that your dog died." As the story unfolds, the dog died from eating the dead horse flesh, which died in the fire that destroyed the barn, which caught fire from sparks that flew from the house, that caught on fire from the candles that were burning around the casket, which held the beloved Aunt that died, who died when she heard the news about your Uncle, etc. A perfect Shaggy Dog story that never has to end. It does finally end when he says, "Other than that, there is no news!"
Well, my dog died, but all that other stuff didn't happen!
If I am writing a letter that describes what my family and I have been doing for the past year and sending it to "family and friends" that have not been interested enough in me to try looking at my Facebook postings or reading my blog, then why am I bothering? If you want to know what is happening with people today you have multiple avenues to reach them, either actively with an email or phone call here and there to ask them how they are doing, or passively through participating in shared environments like Facebook, blogging, and many others. My Holiday Letter seems to disrupt this status quo by forcing you to read about me even if you have not been interested in doing so.
What should I write about? If you have been following me and my life you know about the big stuff, and likely about the little stuff, too. What's left to write about?
This brings to mind the old Bert and I skit where Bert returns home after an absence and his friend tells him "There really is no news, except that I should tell you that your dog died." As the story unfolds, the dog died from eating the dead horse flesh, which died in the fire that destroyed the barn, which caught fire from sparks that flew from the house, that caught on fire from the candles that were burning around the casket, which held the beloved Aunt that died, who died when she heard the news about your Uncle, etc. A perfect Shaggy Dog story that never has to end. It does finally end when he says, "Other than that, there is no news!"
Well, my dog died, but all that other stuff didn't happen!
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
I feel like a modern poem is inside me...
I thought I would write a poem or two tonight...
I had my iPad out in front of me at the desk, with my leftover dinner heated up in the microwave downstairs in this Howard Johnson hotel in Salem, Oregon. My intent was to take this free time between 7 and 10 pm and do something useful with it.
But before I start, let me check my email. Several new ones, some that require responding. OK, that will only take a couple of minutes. There, done. Now I should check Facebook, because I haven't all day... Several new postings, but nothing important. What's this? An IM from my son about his interview at Microsoft today? Things went well, but no offer yet. Damn. We share several messages back and forth as though we were on the phone, but of course it is the new way to communicate, through the fingers instead of using the tongue. Whatever. OK, let's start..
Wait, a familiar "bling" and another email is in. Better check that, and it is from my salesman in Bangkok who is up and at it in the morning of tomorrow. My tonight is his tomorrow morning, of course, and he has questions about the messages I sent him from work today. Better answer them now so he can be productive with his day and I don't have to deal with them tomorrow, my time. He is obviously up and at his computer because as soon as I send one message he responds with 2 more, and here we are off in a conversation about his projects and my recent visit to Thailand. What should we tell this customer, and how can we move that project along, and what about the problem we are having with this installation down here, and so forth. Normal communications within companies all over the world, and in this case it really is global in scope. 14 hours difference in time zones is just about as bad as it gets. There is no common "good time" for us both.
What time is it? Time to call Judy and get caught up on the day. How about FaceTime, she on her iPad and me on my iPhone? It turns out she is just back from a dinner out and is ready to talk. We get things set up and we chat for about a half hour with the cats wandering through the camera's range from time to time. Both cats, which is unusual. I think Judy's voice and stationary pose draws them in. They don't respond to my voice even when I do the normal kitty, kitty stuff we all do. Apparently the ability to understand FaceTime takes some sort of higher brain function that cats don't have. Maybe the guys at Apple need to work on making the interface even more simplistic?
We end our conversation and I see that there are several new emails, including ones from Thailand. It takes only a few minutes to dispatch these. The wine is having an effect at this point and if nothing else, my will to be creative and write the poems I had in mind is fading. It is not gone, but it is fading.
"Bling", and new emails are in. Judy has taken my advice and checked my blogs which I updated earlier this evening. She has commented which generates an email for me. OK, now she is up to date not only on the things we talked about in our phone conversation but also with the things I put in the blog which are beyond normal topics of discussion. My "Inner Voice" which drives me to write the blog in the first place has been absorbed by her and she has processed it and responded. Good. Now she is really up to speed with where I am and what I am thinking. No response is necessary this time so I just read them and smile.
So, now it is 10:21 and I am finally ready to write a poem. What was it going to be about, I wonder?
How about, "How does technology today impact our free time?"
Yea, that sounds about right.
I had my iPad out in front of me at the desk, with my leftover dinner heated up in the microwave downstairs in this Howard Johnson hotel in Salem, Oregon. My intent was to take this free time between 7 and 10 pm and do something useful with it.
But before I start, let me check my email. Several new ones, some that require responding. OK, that will only take a couple of minutes. There, done. Now I should check Facebook, because I haven't all day... Several new postings, but nothing important. What's this? An IM from my son about his interview at Microsoft today? Things went well, but no offer yet. Damn. We share several messages back and forth as though we were on the phone, but of course it is the new way to communicate, through the fingers instead of using the tongue. Whatever. OK, let's start..
Wait, a familiar "bling" and another email is in. Better check that, and it is from my salesman in Bangkok who is up and at it in the morning of tomorrow. My tonight is his tomorrow morning, of course, and he has questions about the messages I sent him from work today. Better answer them now so he can be productive with his day and I don't have to deal with them tomorrow, my time. He is obviously up and at his computer because as soon as I send one message he responds with 2 more, and here we are off in a conversation about his projects and my recent visit to Thailand. What should we tell this customer, and how can we move that project along, and what about the problem we are having with this installation down here, and so forth. Normal communications within companies all over the world, and in this case it really is global in scope. 14 hours difference in time zones is just about as bad as it gets. There is no common "good time" for us both.
What time is it? Time to call Judy and get caught up on the day. How about FaceTime, she on her iPad and me on my iPhone? It turns out she is just back from a dinner out and is ready to talk. We get things set up and we chat for about a half hour with the cats wandering through the camera's range from time to time. Both cats, which is unusual. I think Judy's voice and stationary pose draws them in. They don't respond to my voice even when I do the normal kitty, kitty stuff we all do. Apparently the ability to understand FaceTime takes some sort of higher brain function that cats don't have. Maybe the guys at Apple need to work on making the interface even more simplistic?
We end our conversation and I see that there are several new emails, including ones from Thailand. It takes only a few minutes to dispatch these. The wine is having an effect at this point and if nothing else, my will to be creative and write the poems I had in mind is fading. It is not gone, but it is fading.
"Bling", and new emails are in. Judy has taken my advice and checked my blogs which I updated earlier this evening. She has commented which generates an email for me. OK, now she is up to date not only on the things we talked about in our phone conversation but also with the things I put in the blog which are beyond normal topics of discussion. My "Inner Voice" which drives me to write the blog in the first place has been absorbed by her and she has processed it and responded. Good. Now she is really up to speed with where I am and what I am thinking. No response is necessary this time so I just read them and smile.
So, now it is 10:21 and I am finally ready to write a poem. What was it going to be about, I wonder?
How about, "How does technology today impact our free time?"
Yea, that sounds about right.
Salem Reflections
With the beautiful summer weather now a fading memory, the fall rains have started to fall and I've even seen snow on Mt. Pilchuck down nearly to the bottom. Over the weekend the snow level fell to 2,500 feet, low enough to remind us all that winter is real, and is just around the corner. I need to get the Blizzak's out and ready for installation on the trusty Prius.
Here in Salem the rain is falling and the temperatures are cool. I'm wearing the pullover nylon tops I favor at home when the house is cool during the day. In the office the temperatures are OK and I take it off, but when I am out and about it is a comfort, and here in the room I leave the window open a bit to let in the cooler evening air. It helps me sleep. This week I am at the Howard Johnson's, selected on Hotwire.com for $35/nite, with an all-in price of $135 for 3 nights. The room is spartan but clean, the shower is hot, and they serve a breakfast that includes cereal and a banana which are my favorites. I tell Judy that I live like a monk when I am here, and that is almost literally true. A monk might have more to do in the evenings than I do.
Last night was Monday, the day of the last Presidential Debate. I watched it. The pundits on NPR today confided that Obama supporters thought he did well, and Romney supporters felt their candidate also did well. If that is true then all it really showed was people's ignorance about the Middle East in terms of the geo-political and geographic relationships there, and how impotent the USA is in affecting lasting change there. Obama was the better of the two, and seemed Presidential in his command of the facts and actions taking place there. But he would. I have been in this position before: a Republican candidate scares me with his conservatism and naivete, but when elected the mantles of the office are so constraining that he is actually rather limited in his ability to make changes. It is true on both sides - Democratic Presidents have the same problem. It is devilishly hard to make anything happen in DC.
Dinner tonight is leftovers from home. Same as last night. I went to Trader Joe's last night and picked up some spicy hummus and crackers for an appetizer, which is good, and some sushi in a plastic box. I ate half of the sushi last night, and about 1/3rd of the hummus. Tonite I finish off the sushi and dive into the Moosewood Cookbook noddles with a small pork chop on top. I'm looking forward to it.
I just checked on the posting from my fellow bloggers, at least those that I follow. It is good to see that there are some that are as remiss as I. Together we make a readable blog but individually we are too infrequent to keep a reader's interest. I have the ideas in my head, I just don't get them out the way I like.
BTW, I signed up for a free trial of SalesForce.com today. As a key part of the software they acknowledge the Facebook and Twitter-ish nature of the way people connect and they integrate that into the way the software works. And Google. When you want to find something you need you call on your contacts to share their experiences, to make recommendations, etc. Knowing this, why not mine the social networking sites and turn them to your advantage, or at least that what they are trying to do. I signed up and logged in, but I immediately saw that this is something my kids understand far better than I do. As usual I am behind the curve.
Here in Salem the rain is falling and the temperatures are cool. I'm wearing the pullover nylon tops I favor at home when the house is cool during the day. In the office the temperatures are OK and I take it off, but when I am out and about it is a comfort, and here in the room I leave the window open a bit to let in the cooler evening air. It helps me sleep. This week I am at the Howard Johnson's, selected on Hotwire.com for $35/nite, with an all-in price of $135 for 3 nights. The room is spartan but clean, the shower is hot, and they serve a breakfast that includes cereal and a banana which are my favorites. I tell Judy that I live like a monk when I am here, and that is almost literally true. A monk might have more to do in the evenings than I do.
Last night was Monday, the day of the last Presidential Debate. I watched it. The pundits on NPR today confided that Obama supporters thought he did well, and Romney supporters felt their candidate also did well. If that is true then all it really showed was people's ignorance about the Middle East in terms of the geo-political and geographic relationships there, and how impotent the USA is in affecting lasting change there. Obama was the better of the two, and seemed Presidential in his command of the facts and actions taking place there. But he would. I have been in this position before: a Republican candidate scares me with his conservatism and naivete, but when elected the mantles of the office are so constraining that he is actually rather limited in his ability to make changes. It is true on both sides - Democratic Presidents have the same problem. It is devilishly hard to make anything happen in DC.
Dinner tonight is leftovers from home. Same as last night. I went to Trader Joe's last night and picked up some spicy hummus and crackers for an appetizer, which is good, and some sushi in a plastic box. I ate half of the sushi last night, and about 1/3rd of the hummus. Tonite I finish off the sushi and dive into the Moosewood Cookbook noddles with a small pork chop on top. I'm looking forward to it.
I just checked on the posting from my fellow bloggers, at least those that I follow. It is good to see that there are some that are as remiss as I. Together we make a readable blog but individually we are too infrequent to keep a reader's interest. I have the ideas in my head, I just don't get them out the way I like.
BTW, I signed up for a free trial of SalesForce.com today. As a key part of the software they acknowledge the Facebook and Twitter-ish nature of the way people connect and they integrate that into the way the software works. And Google. When you want to find something you need you call on your contacts to share their experiences, to make recommendations, etc. Knowing this, why not mine the social networking sites and turn them to your advantage, or at least that what they are trying to do. I signed up and logged in, but I immediately saw that this is something my kids understand far better than I do. As usual I am behind the curve.
Friday, October 12, 2012
Crossing to Safety
I got home again just fine and don't really have much to say about it. I have had "sinking spells" where I just want to close my eyes for a few minutes a couple of times, especially on Wednesday when I traveled and returned to Seattle to face the complete day still to come, but other than that the jet lag thing doesn't seem to affect me much. I am fine today and things seem to be back to normal.
I wanted to blog today about a book I read on this trip called Crossing to Safety by Wallace Stegner. This is the guy who wrote Angle of Repose, his first novel I read, and both Judy and I were blown away with his writing style and command of story development. Angle of Repose was a wonderful book, and I didn't really know what to expect from this other one. Would it be the same?
The story revolves around the friendship that formed between 2 couples, and the many ways in which people interact. It takes place in many places, but the central theme is the annual summer pilgrimage to the Lang Families' summer home on a lake in Vermont. The way the couples meet as new PhD's recruited into the Univ. of Wisconsin - Madison's English Department as instructors, the pressure to be accepted into the department and get started on a tenure track in 1937, the year that they arrive, and the many ways the story unfolds. Different characters have obvious and hidden traits, the relationship between the men and women is hugely important, and the interplay within the married couples.
I could see parallels in my own life with the stories and friendships that were portrayed here, and it brought to mind old friends I have not seen in years, and old friends I see all the time. I have often said that for Judy and I there was a critical time between ages 17 and 24 where we made friends with people where the friendships lasted a lifetime. It is true - we still see certain people we met at UNH and Mizzou, travel to see their kids get married, go out of our way to see them when we are on vacation, keep current on FB (the modern equivalent of writing letters), and call them on their birthdays (Happy Birthday, Anne!). In Crossing to Safety there are seminal events recounted in painstaking detail at times, with the benefit of hindsight to identify the critical elements and interactions that will carry the story into the future.
Stegner's writing in this book is as good as it was in Angle of Repose. The story is not as hard to read, and the characters are both familiar and engaging. You feel the losses, celebrate the triumphs, and cheer for them at every turn since they are so easy to identify with and make your own. But it is the writing that keeps me from putting the book down.
Judy purchased a copy at the Upper Case Bookstore in Snohomish for $6.50. I'm sure you can find it elsewhere, even at the library. I haven't checked on the Kindle Store, but some of Stegner's works must be there.
I wanted to blog today about a book I read on this trip called Crossing to Safety by Wallace Stegner. This is the guy who wrote Angle of Repose, his first novel I read, and both Judy and I were blown away with his writing style and command of story development. Angle of Repose was a wonderful book, and I didn't really know what to expect from this other one. Would it be the same?
The story revolves around the friendship that formed between 2 couples, and the many ways in which people interact. It takes place in many places, but the central theme is the annual summer pilgrimage to the Lang Families' summer home on a lake in Vermont. The way the couples meet as new PhD's recruited into the Univ. of Wisconsin - Madison's English Department as instructors, the pressure to be accepted into the department and get started on a tenure track in 1937, the year that they arrive, and the many ways the story unfolds. Different characters have obvious and hidden traits, the relationship between the men and women is hugely important, and the interplay within the married couples.
I could see parallels in my own life with the stories and friendships that were portrayed here, and it brought to mind old friends I have not seen in years, and old friends I see all the time. I have often said that for Judy and I there was a critical time between ages 17 and 24 where we made friends with people where the friendships lasted a lifetime. It is true - we still see certain people we met at UNH and Mizzou, travel to see their kids get married, go out of our way to see them when we are on vacation, keep current on FB (the modern equivalent of writing letters), and call them on their birthdays (Happy Birthday, Anne!). In Crossing to Safety there are seminal events recounted in painstaking detail at times, with the benefit of hindsight to identify the critical elements and interactions that will carry the story into the future.
Stegner's writing in this book is as good as it was in Angle of Repose. The story is not as hard to read, and the characters are both familiar and engaging. You feel the losses, celebrate the triumphs, and cheer for them at every turn since they are so easy to identify with and make your own. But it is the writing that keeps me from putting the book down.
Judy purchased a copy at the Upper Case Bookstore in Snohomish for $6.50. I'm sure you can find it elsewhere, even at the library. I haven't checked on the Kindle Store, but some of Stegner's works must be there.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)