. . . AND THE GRASS WAS SHOWING SOME GREEN

It’s far too early to open up the attic fan and celebrate spring. A week into March, warm days and sunny skies felt right but winter can spill over into April, even May without rhyme or reason. When summer does this into October we feel good about it. When winter hangs on we take it personally. The lawn was still a dull, dirty shade of brown and winter buds on the trees were still tightly wrapped, but the sun was shining. On Tuesday last, a friend was helping me frame up the last photographs for an upcoming art show. By the time he went home I knew there was something wrong with my throat, a little hack that wouldn’t go away. By bedtime my nose was running and I knew it would get worse before it got better; that was five days ago.  

I’ve known a few binge drinking alcoholics, go for long periods without drinking anything then fall off the cart and disappear for a few days. When they popped up again they looked terrible and couldn’t remember anything. If there is a lesson there for me it is in the parallel, coming out the other end. Trying to reconstruct the last four days is more guess work than memory. I knew I was sick on Wednesday, started drinking water, taking soup and sleeping. At first I thought it was allergies but painful joints and muscles let me know it was one flu or another. I took the flu shot this year but halfway into the flu season they announced they got it wrong. The bug they protected us from was not the flu we were getting. I forgave them at the time and suspected, if I ever get the flu, this will surely be the year. 

Over the next few days I remember going to sleep, waking up not sure where I was. When I couldn’t sleep, a hot shower was the only thing I could trust. Go to sleep in places like my bed or my car in a parking lot; waking up in unlikely places. It wasn’t confusing then, only now. I knew I had to keep taking fluids and nourishment. Getting up, all I noticed was daylight or dark and did I feel good enough to go back to sleep. If not, I would do something for a while and take a hot shower. I realize that all of my behavior was thought out and rational, slow and deliberate. I wasn’t taking any chances. But putting it together several days later, it just isn’t all there. This morning my radio came on at 6:00 and I woke up. It was a new day and I sensed I was off the hook. I didn’t need a hot shower.

In the meantime I had finished the last four photographs, helped my son with some dog-setting duties, kept myself well hydrated and fed. Everything in my kitchen was exactly where I put it down. It didn’t take long this morning to put things away and clean up, framed photos in crates and framing tools in their proper place. I can see the counter tops and both sides of the sink are empty. I looked out the kitchen widow and the grass was showing some green. This flu kept me very into the moment, very self conscious but the hindsight is blurred. Even asleep, the dream factory wouldn’t let me rest and those memories, shuffled in with reality create another disparity. Just how much this is like a binge drinker coming out of the zone, I don’t know. But I do know I’m feeling better and I'll take that.

DAYLIGHT SAVINGS

Getting up this a.m. was a task, and I knew it would be. When the clock falls back there is a short lived sense that you got an extra hour of sleep but the internal clock takes it all in stride. This morning the clock had fallen forward and my body thought it was 5:00 a.m. The radio doesn’t know the difference, it just does what it’s told. I had set it forward on Saturday but I sleep late on Sunday, missed the point altogether. This morning it took 11 minutes for me to bridge the consciousness gap and that put a kink in my schedule. I usually hit the parking lot at 6:25 and start my swim ten minutes later. I thought about my 11 minute penalty and the lethargic effort I was making. I didn’t have to do the math. Within 20 minutes after I finish my swim the guards are rolling up the lane dividers in preparation for the lady’s aquarobics class. I’ve got it timed so I can get my swim in before the ladies take over and only a few minutes to spare. So this time I dozed for a while, until my body was ready to get up. 

I hate to miss workout on Monday. Two days off is alright but three days without exercise sets me back. I arrived at 7:35, the time I usually crawl out of the pool. Sweats and tennis shoes were the uniform and I went up to walk with a bunch of strangers. The track is a balcony over the gym, 16 laps to a mile. This morning they were walking in groups of 2 or 3 or 4 and they were talking. I want to work at a heart rate of 120-130 beats/minute and talking is a struggle at that rate. So they’re talking and I’m passing. They are trained pretty well, sense you approaching and open a hole where you can slip through. You can’t help catching bits of their conversation each time you pass. I try to remember who’s who and connect the sound bites, figure out what the conversation is about. Two ladies were talking about men, someone they knew who had health problems. Two mixed groups were grumbling about the time change. I heard a couple of complaints yesterday at church and not a good word anywhere since. I don’t know if it’s coincidence but it seems daylight savings is unpopular everywhere. It doesn’t matter if we are falling forward or back, it’s an inconvenience. “Just leave the time alone.” That’s what I hear. 

DST has been around for a long time. It came and went and came back again; east, west, Europe, Asia, North America. After the energy crisis of the 1970’s it was pitched as a way to save energy. Nobody wanted kids walking to school or waiting for a bus in the dark so in winter, they left the magic hour in the morning. But summer time, outdoor time was different. The sun comes up early in summer anyway. More daylight in the evening seemed like a good thing. I think people are just more fractious now than I remember, grumbling is more about the person than the object of their displeasure. I don’t like to grumble, it’s depressing. When I feel like complaining it comes quite natural to hit reset and do a second take. If I can’t change what I don’t like, grumbling is just a self inflicted wound. I know there must be people who take some satisfaction there but all I can do is avoid their penchant for pain and try to stay positive. By Thursday I’ll be acclimated and I’ll make the 6:35 swim time without any hangups. I did like the walk and the weight machines afterward. I may incorporate them into my schedule as the season unwinds. Sunrise and sunset, I like them both, regardless of the hour. One is a metaphor for hope and anticipation, the other is about reflection, bookends for a precious day. Even days we struggle through, we only get so many of them and to take any one of them for granted is more self inflicted punishment. The last year I worked at a job, I threw my watch away. There were clocks on the wall at school so we knew when the bell would ring and you could place yourself between meals. DST is one of many harbingers of spring. I really like it when trees start popping new leaves and you need a boat to go fishing out on the lake. When Standard Time comes back around the naysayers will be grumbling about snow and cold. 

NOSTALGIA

By definition, a wistful affection for the past; nostalgia. This may not be the best title but the perfect word escapes me right now. I noticed my high school and college year books on the bottom shelf of my book case this morning. I pulled out the high school book for my senior year and began thumbing through the yellowed pages and snap-shot quality photographs. I took Publications that year, was on the yearbook staff so the book pulls up more memories for me than for most of my classmates. There were only four boys in the class. We inherited sports, some of the clubs and whatever else the girls deemed fit. I did all of the free hand art and sketches. The crème de la crème assignment was the class section for our class, the seniors. The girls who got that plum were the power brokers of the class. They threw alphabetical order out the window. Individuals were paired and placed on succeeding pages, guided by the whims of those girls. You could judge your own status by how far back and who you were paired with. They also did interviews to confirm the honors and activities each senior had accumulated in the four years. Each entry closed with, in their own words, future plans and aspirations. 

As I read the summaries, going to college or joining the work force were most common. There were a few leaning toward the military and some simply stated that their plans were still in the making. Then there were a few with no expectations recorded at all. I remember that interview. Diane sat there waiting for me to speak, then asked, “What do you want me to write?” Hell, I didn’t know what I wanted to do. My plans wouldn’t get us into the next day. But I didn’t tell her that, just, “Leave it blank.” The guys who were going to be lawyers ended up being something else. Nobody wanted to be a teacher but many did just that. The military guys had a better grip on their direction than the rest of us. But ready or not, we jumped out in the fray and life took us for a ride.

Common sense, ( I don’t believe in common sense by the way, Albert Einstein said common sense is the list of prejudices we acquire in our youth, and I’ll side with AE) common sense would have us believe that the sum of our lives is determined by the decisions we make. I think we must live as if each decision is crucial and possibly life changing but my life has more finger prints on it than the decisions I made. Sometimes I think I know and sometimes I think I think. I look at those class pages from 1957 and see squeaky clean faces and best intentions. But once out the door we were more like leaves in the wind, blown from fence to fence, settling in heaps. The cottonwood leaf says to the sycamore leaf, “I have decided to wait here with you. If we choose, we can cross the yard and lean against a different fence.” 

I hang out now and then, have lunch or picnic with some of those old classmates. Even though we sprang from the same hatch, life has taken us on different journeys and we trust what life has left us with. So we delight in the good fortune that brings us together and share memories that only we can share. Later in the day as the wind blows us across the yard, we can give credit where we think it’s due and judge, right or wrong, with the perception of confidence. But when we break bread we don’t press petty stuff, like politics, patriotism or religion. We don’t even ask questions that might take us there. Life is pretty good. Someday, not too soon, I’ll pull the book out and think about it again.

OSCAR NIGHT

         A friend invited me to an ‘Oscar’ party last week. Oscar night comes off like a cross between the NFL Draft and American Idol and it takes several hours. Everyone has a list of awards and nominees and they make their predictions. As the night unwinds, they keep score. On commercial breaks it’s just like sports junkies; food, drink, spirited conversation and anticipation. I was the odd one, hadn’t seen any of the movies and was too late to complete the bracket before the awards began. I really like movies but don’t go very often so the conversations went over my head. The bast movie was about a washed up super hero, with a Mexican director who had a great night, winning several other Oscars as well. My party crowd thoroughly dissected the results and presented a trophy to the best guesser. I nodded my approval, went back for more guacamole and arrived home just before midnight.

         I have a good DVD collection of old movies. Last night I indulged in an old flick that has never left me disappointed. National Velvet was released in 1944, set in England after WW1, the story of a school girl (Elizabeth Taylor), a young drifter (Mickey Rooney) and a horse named Pie. Over time I’ve come to realize the movie’s undercurrent is more compelling than the story. A young girl comes by a horse that runs and jumps its way to the Grand National Steeplechase, the greatest horse race ever. But it leaves you with the warmth and the power of nurture and family. Interestingly, maybe a sign of the times, Mickey Rooney and Donald Crisp (Husband/Father) got top billing, ahead of the young Liz Taylor (Velvet Brown) and Anne Revere who won the Oscar in ’45 for supporting actress, as Velvet’s mother. 

         Mr Brown is the classic, dominant male but no match for Mrs Brown. He obviously trusts and depends on her to be his spell check as it would be. She allows him to be the ‘Man’ then gently provides wise course corrections that move the family in a healthy direction. In her youth she had been the first woman to swim thee English Channel. She understood the need to pursue a dream, even if it was not fulfilled. Without being written into the script she conveys, the journey subordinates the destination and that you must live in the moment. Life will make new demands and you need to be ready to move on. Throughout the movie, Mr & Mrs Brown refer to each other as Mr & Mrs Brown. You never learn their first names. The formal protocol is offset by a singleness of purpose and their affection for each other. In the end, Michael (Mickey Rooney) changes from a shady, self serving bloke into a principled young man and moves on in his life. The Brown family choses the simple life over celebrity and you conclude what you sensed from the beginning, Mrs Brown was right all along. They could have named the movie, “Mrs Brown Kicks Ass.”

GUILT

It sneaks up on me, like paying the water bill and remembering birthdays. When it hits me, all I can do is throw myself out there at the mercy of my peers. I think I caught if from my friends, so many Catholics and former Catholics; I suffer from spontaneous, flashback, Catholic, guilt syndrome. I am not Catholic but I get to suffer as if I were. “Hail Mary full of grace. . . Angle of grace, my Guardian dear. . .” If confession is good for the soul, then I confess.

I go into Whole Foods stores with no intention of buying anything. I get a cart, one of the little ones and cruise around the outside isles, through the produce, the bulk foods and fresh sea food sections. Then I gawk at the exotic sausages and stuffed pork chops, check out the cheese offerings and the bakery. All along the way, if I’m lucky, they have put out samples for the stereotype customer who doesn’t need to know how much things cost. Whatever the bill rings up, they just swipe their debit card; it’s just a number. But then I’m not a Whole Foods stereotype, I need to know the number. But I graze there. On a good day I can make a meal of it, especially when smoked salmon dip and pungent cheese selections from Italy and Denmark are on the fare. Chips and guacamole go fast so you must time yourself, be there when they set out a fresh container, take two and come back for a 3rd sample before it runs out. 

Tuesday fare is nothing like they have on weekends but it was worth the walk. Before I could get through the produce section (looking for guacamole) the guilt thing closed in on me like thunder and rain on a parade. I went straight into my penance mode, in the bulk food section; measured out a pound of dry, calico beans and tagged them with the code #number. A couple of small bananas later my cart was sufficiently stocked, allowing me to pass as a customer. I am a ‘Grazer’ but I can’t help it. I can buy something after all and it eases my guilt. In the bakery they usually have little morsels of common varieties, bread and muffins but today they had all the broken bits from the pastry bin, yogurt dipped pretzels, cookies, fudge brownies. I got a sugar buzz going and took a second lap around the track. 

I keep telling myself that I have to quit doing this. I’m sure the guys in the security section, screening their video monitors, see me come in the door and call their associates over to watch me browse, make wagers on how many chips I’ll munch before I move on; and how long it will take me to come around again. But they keep putting samples out and they keep letting me graze. I spent almost $6 at Whole Foods today and I probably ate $10 worth. The 3rd time by the cheese plater was sinful but I recognized several others who were doing the same thing. Maybe they don’t have this guilt thing as it’s all part of the business model. I wish I could get my head around that. If I kept all the toothpicks from sampling at Whole Foods I could build a bonfire. I’ll be fine, walk out the door with some beans and bananas in my shopping bag. I get the nickel refund for bringing my own bag and my appetite is suppressed for at least a while. No smoked salmon today, or shrimp scampi but I don’t need much. I remember in the Kevin Costner movie, ‘Robin Hood’ the sheriff’s men chased a boy who had killed one of the king’s deer. Robin saved the kid, killed some soldiers and sent the rest off in retreat. Good movie but I don’t need Robin. The sheriff’s men leave me alone. They know I’ll be feeling guilty again and that’s good enough for Whole Foods.

WAITING FOR PAINT TO DRY

It’s a long story. You know, getting through winter, even a mild one requires ingenuity and persistence. When I had a real job I didn’t have time to think about it. It was up at 5:00, school at 6:00, kids at 7:30, lunch at 11:00; when I took care of personal business, kids go home at 2:30, take a 15 minute nap then lesson plans, check papers-enter grades, set up lab for the next day, telephone-talk to parents, update computerized progress reports, read ahead in text and screen outside reading assignments, organize my work station and turn out the lights between 6:00 and 7:00; never, ever take school work home. After a short ride home, grab a bite and decompress for a couple of hours. Next thing you know the alarm goes off and it’s second verse, same as the first. 

But I don’t have a real job; I have to improvise, fake it. I can’t do everything I used to do but then I wouldn’t if I could. Still, at the end of the day, I want to feel spent. Right now I’m putting together a show of my photographs. The show will hang from mid March through mid April in the gallery at All Souls Church in Kansas City, MO. I try not to take myself too seriously but I get very serious when it comes to my work. Now days I work at writing, telling story, creations in the wood shop and for certain, my photographs. 

I decided to make my picture frames, three different sizes, all 26 of them. It saves me a lot of dead presidents but more important it gives me work to do. I can only make two or three at a time so when I’m sanding the finished frame, getting ready to paint, I start thinking about what I’ll do while the paint is drying, three coats. I don’t want to saw or sand while paint is drying, Duh! So this morning I decided to journal. If it doesn’t turn ugly and I stay positive I can post it on the blog. I have ten photographs matted, framed and crated with six frames ready, two more still drying, waiting on a 3rd coat. The prints themselves are safe in big envelopes, separated by dividers and handled with white gloves. My living room has cases of mat board, foam core board and three crates for finished work that are starting to fill up. The dining room table is stacked full of conservation museum glass and I can barely get to the window to open and close the blinds. 

To be honest, I do miss the kids (students) but I like this job more. It takes probably five years, maybe a decade to learn how a particular kid turns out. When you finish winding the hanger wire and turn the frame over, you know immediately. It’s not perfect, nothing’s ever perfect but it works. It’s a great motivator, I want to go back downstairs and start sawing again, or throw my camera bag over my shoulder and go out the door. I don’t need to know where to look for good lines and edges, strong shapes and vibrant color but I know it when I see them. I think the paint is dry by now. I can get that 3rd coat on and then go find a very small brush roller for touch up work. I haven’t touched the guitar in over a month and that’s not good but we’ll go there again after the show is hung. 

COTTONWOOD

Of our senses, we know that smell is most powerful when it comes to evoking memories and emotions. Regardless of when it was or where you might have been, a particular smell can transport you back through time and space. Whatever it was that you were doing that you associate with that smell, you get to go there again. I remember melon patches, cantaloupes and water melons; I was old enough to help in the garden. When I got down to turn a melon, to check it out, see if it was ready; there was a smell that I will forever associate with melons. 

‘Hemiptra’ is the scientific name for an order of insects, true bugs. They include aphids, assassin bugs, cicadas, stink bugs, box elder bugs; there are over 50,000 different species of true bugs. Stink bugs are a family within the order that feed on plants and carry an unmistakable odor. When I was a boy the only time I encountered it was in the garden, close to melon vines. I remember seeing fingernail size bugs, crawling on stems and leaves, on the melons themselves. The smell is potent and pungent but not particularly offensive. Curious as little boys are, I let those bugs crawl on my hands and up my fingers like lady bugs, which are actually beetles, not bugs at all. Then the stink was on me and had I known, I might have come away, turning up my nose and not liking it. But I loved the melons and by association, loved the smell. Sometimes when I go to the farmer’s market, where local growers bring in their fresh produce, straight out of the patch, I catch the scent and it takes me in a heart beat, back to childhood and the melon patch. 

Deer hunting for the first time was a great adventure. It was late October, on BLM land south of Montrose, Colorado. With a borrowed .257 Roberts rifle, two of my friends took me with them on opening day of deer season in 1970. It was important that we be in place at sunrise. They dropped me off on the road and went ahead. Separated by a quarter mile each, we would work our way up the mountain side and meet at the tree line. If one of us got a deer, we would field dress it and drag it back down. The others at the top would be able to see us on the road below. A cool, early morning mist would burn off as soon as the sun came up and I began my assent. The morning would lead me through several open meadows and aspen groves. As the air cleared and daylight prevailed I was climbing, immersed in the power of simply ‘Being there.’ You climb a while then stop, look, listen for a while but truth be known, you need a rest and breathing deep is both a joy and a need. I was having a very real deja vu moment when I became aware of a woodsy smell that I hadn’t noticed before. It was more subtle than stink bugs but evoked a powerful sense of the moment. If I never saw a deer, my day would be fixed in memory forever. 

Poplars are a genus of trees with about 30 different species. In the Rocky Mountains, cottonwoods thrive at lower elevations and aspen flourish as you gain altitude. Young trees have white bark and leaves that shimmer in the light, rustle in even the slightest breeze. Those leaves have a straight, flat edge at the base that is perpendicular to the petiole. The two remaining edges are serrate, converging in a point at the tip. Cottonwoods grow larger, have bigger leaves; but the general shape makes them ‘kissing cousins’.

The next year we moved to a house on the other side of town, with big cottonwood trees up and down the street on both sides. By September the trees had already begun shedding leaves. One morning after a rain, I walked out the door and was blown away by the smell of deer hunting on the mountain side. It didn't take much to figure out the source. When aspen or cottonwood leaves drop in the fall, they still contain wax and oils. All they need is a light rain or heavy dew to bring out a magical, natural, potpourri aroma. Forty five years later I have a 90 ft. cottonwood in my back yard that I can count on, all through late summer and fall to release that awesome combination of chemicals. All it takes is some moisture in the air and the wind to be right. Last night, mid winter, I dreamed about the family of screech owls that lived in the big cottonwood, in front of our house in Montrose. They would line up in the evening, four of them, on a low limb and make noise until the wee hours. I even dreamed the smell of cottonwoods and it woke me up. If you love your smart phone and your hybrid car, but you know not smells and odors that are naturally resplendent, putting technology to shame, changing your life without a battery, then you are incomplete: you have been short changed.