Happy Birthday!

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Sorry for the link.  Google wouldn't load the image, after several attempts.


I hope that those of you who celebrate the anniversary of our becoming a sovereign nation will have a great time today.

Goodbye, Joe.

When I started my blog several years ago, I searched for others that had a crow theme.  Joe Hyam's blog wasn't about crows, not in the way I was searching, but he had taken a photo of a crow, and that's what came up in my search.  I liked what Joe wrote and added him to my list of blogs to follow.

 

Joe, through his blog, introduced me to many things - art, poetry, other bloggers, other places - that expanded my limited knowledge and added a lot of pleasure to my life.  He wrote about the artist Rothko, of whom I'd never heard, but whose works I find interesting. 

 

 

Abstract by Rothko

 

Joe also introduced me to another Brit with whom I've corresponded, his dear friend, Roderick Robinson.  When Joe posted a photo (below) he took of friends on a park bench near his home, I immediately thought of him and Robbie.  I swiped the photo, with Joe's permission, for my collection, and look at it often.  Never more so than today.

 

 

Photo of friendship, by Joe Hyam (c) 2009

 

 

If you visit Robbie's blog page today, you will find a beautiful tribute to his friend Joe, who has died.

 

I have no idea if there is anything for us once we die, but if there is, I hope Joe has found his Beloved and they are enjoying a skyscape together as beautiful as the one he captured in the photo below.

 

Goodbye, Joe.  Thank you for all that you gave to me. 

 

Golden clouds by Joe Hyam  (c) 2013

Beginning To See Trees

 

 

The familiar expression about not seeing the forest for the trees, meaning one can't see the big picture for being myopically focused on details, doesn't fit with my situation right now.  My problem is being overwhelmed by the enormity of the forest surrounding me, full of frightening sounds and shadows, no clear path (or paths) to follow out of the darkness, with frightening goblins jumping at me, ambushing my peace of mind.

 

However, I have a guide now, my former therapist, whom I last met with four years ago.  I tried counseling with a psychologist at the Veterans Outreach Clinic nearby, but it was not a good fit.  In fact, she made me feel worse than when I walked in.  She insinuated on my first visit that I was a malingerer, there for compensation.  I tried counseling with her through two visits, recognized it wasn't going to work and left.

 

I've been ill for a long time, more than 50 years.  Whatever happened at the end of December opened all the closet doors, behind which I've been stashing bogeymen -- instead of dealing with each issue as it popped up.  I do have PTSD, related to my time in service, triggered by my visits to the VA clinic, but it is mild and will settle down.  I can feel a space opening up around me, allowing a bit of light in.  That light will enable me to see into the rest of the darkness.

 

I have a long way to go before I'm out of the woods, the labyrinth of my mind.  There will be more clearings, I hope, where I can stop to rest, to gather my wits about me, before going down the next path.

 

For the time being (however long that might be), I will continue to lurk, to visit your blogs, but won't be back here for awhile.  Just wanted to pop in and let friends know I'm okay.

 

So, happy trails to you, until we meet again. 

 

 



 

 (*)

 

Sometimes, God-there-is-no-God, I just don’t see any purpose to anything (an exaggeration, but you get my drift, I’m sure).  Sometimes, I think we human beings were a terrible mistake; a curse upon this planet to ourselves and all the other creatures; also, to the land, the waters, the air.

We are a self-involved, self-serving, self-indulgent, self-congratulatory, self-important, Self-ish waste of evolutionary energy.  All that we create is for the attention, praise and adoration from others, unless it is for their subjugation or annihilation or enslavement.  What good are we?

Sometimes, I don’t want to be human.  Sometimes, I don’t want to be me.  Sometimes, I don’t want to be.

But, what else could I be?  What purpose could I serve?  What purpose does a life have, anyway?  Maybe (probably) there is no meaning or purpose to life and deep inside the darkest corner of our brains we know this – it is all moot.  Perhaps Life has no more significance than a flea’s fart, if even that much.  Yet we continue the struggle to give life a speck of significance, of meaning or purpose.  We search for joy, for laughter, for happiness, for bliss, for transcendence.  For Love, that other insignificant mystery, source of more pain than gladness; a thing more elusive than chasing a shadow or a sunbeam.

I have a hunger for something I can’t name, haven’t seen or tasted or held or heard or smelled; something that does not exist, not even in my imagination.  It is this yearning for the inexplicable, for the unsayable non-existent that led to humanity’s creation of gods and goddesses, of God-there-is-no-God, Allah, Buddha and all the other Masters of the Universe. 

Know what I think all the Masters of the Universe are?  A big black hole leading to Absolute Zero, that state wherein no Life can exist - no sun, no constellations, no thought, no pain, no gladness, no sadness, no pointless ruminations on a dreary, wet, cold Friday night of no light – or Light.  No yearnings, no words, no sight, no response, no reactions.  No being.

What’s it all about, Alfie? 

I'm going to fix a cup of coffee, go out on the back steps, sit in the almost-pitch dark and watch the steam rise from my cup to enjoin the rainful night air.  Going to listen to the plip-plip, plick-plop of raindrops onto the roof, the metal gutter, the sidewalk, the alley's blacktop.  Going to close my eyes and picture the sound of tires spraying water onto everything the cars pass.  Going to listen to birds snoring and fleas farting.  Going to feel every ache in every bone, in every muscle, in every cell of my body, and be grateful that I can.  When I finish that cup of coffee, I expect you to have an answer for me, God-there-is-no-God...okay?


(*)Photo:From Wikipedia article on black hole: Simulated view of a black hole in front of the Large Magellanic Cloud. The ratio between the black hole Schwarzschild radius and the observer distance to it is 1:9. Of note is the gravitational lensing effect known as an Einstein ring, which produces a set of two fairly bright and large but highly distorted images of the Cloud as compared to its actual angular size.

 

Rose-red and Pink

(C) 2013 M C McLemore

 

 

Anyone over the age of 6-years on this date in 1963 likely has some memory of where they were when JFK was shot.

 

I was in biology class, first class after lunch, at F. T. Nicholls Senior High in New Orleans, wondering where our teacher was.  She was almost ten minutes late, and the class was getting restless, loud and unruly.  When she came through the door, it was obvious she had been crying, was still crying.  The class fell immediately quiet, uneasy.

 

"It is my sad duty," she said, "to tell you that the President has been shot."

 

Stunned, confused silence greeted her announcement.

 

A boy sitting behind me asked "What president?"

 

Our President, she blubbered.  "John Fitzgerald Kennedy!"

 

Disbelief replaced confusion and several of us screamed out "NO!"  The boy behind me said she lied, that Kennedy wasn't shot, it wasn't true, it couldn't be true.

 

We were the same class that had lived through the Bay of Pigs and the Cuban Missile Crisis, practically at our front doors.  We didn't believe anything could be scary after that.

 

Mr. Garland, the principal, came on the intercom a few seconds later, telling the teachers to close the doors to their rooms.  He told everyone to remain calm, that he would speak again after the upcoming broadcast.

 

Somewhere in the front of the room a girl began to cry.  Then it became real.  Something was dreadfully wrong.  Mr. Garland was crying, too.

 

Like in a roomful of babies, where one after another begins to cry (not knowing why exactly, but if the other babies are bawling then there must be something to cry about), sniffling and low moaning spread through the classroom.  Even the most macho of the boys succumbed to the anxiety.

 

The next announcement came from the school secretary. 

 

"The President is dead.  Please remain in your seats."  Her voiced cracked.  The mike clicked off.

 

Fear, unnamed but near-palpable, raced its way from seat to seat, row to row.

 

Mr. Garland opened the mike.  He said he was reading a statement from the Orleans Parish Superintendent of Schools.

"President John F. Kennedy was shot today in Dallas, Texas, around 12:30 this afternoon. He was rushed to a nearby hospital where he was pronounced dead just a few minutes ago."

A great roar went up in our classroom and those around us.  Unbelievably, some were cheering.  Not in our room.

Mr. Garland told the teachers to take attendance and for the students to prepare to leave, but to stay in their seats until he released us.

When we were released, we walked out of school into a world changed forever.  We had left the cave, lost a measure of our innocence, and felt the heavy hand of adult responsibility touch our shoulders.

I didn't break down until later that evening, at home, while we were watching the arrival of Air Force One returning to Washington, DC.  When I saw the First Lady standing at the back of the open bay, her face puffy from crying, her hair in disarray, I said to my mother that there were rose petals still on her suit.

"Those aren't rose petals, Martha." 

My mother's voice was soft, kindly, tearful.  I looked at her face, then knew.

There were many tears shed in our home over that mournful weekend and the week after, but none stung as bitterly as those shed for the blood rose-petals on Jackie's skirt.

Domesticity Afternoon

(c) 2013 Martha McLemore

In early September, on the warning advice of a neighbor that there was to be a killing frost that evening, I picked every tomato on the plants at the Neas House.  Our buildings and grounds maintenance man had told me to take as many tomatoes as I wanted from the four vines he put in.  He wasn't going to harvest anymore of them.

Don't know where my mind was that day, but as I left work that (very hot) afternoon, I remembered the neighbor's warning.  I stripped the vines bare.  No frost that evening, nor for any evening since.  Dumb move.

Must have picked close to a bushel of them, the majority of them still green.  Over the next few days, a few of the less green ones ripened, and were promptly eaten.  Very good flavor, juicy; a welcome treat from those cardboard things in the grocery stores.  Then, for some reason, the ripening slowed to a trickle...finally stopped. 

I left the tomatoes in my car, which gets warm during the day.  Thought the heat might spur the ripening again.  Well, it did - or, something did.  A fortnight ago, a half dozen ripened, seemingly overnight.  A couple of days later, had even more; then fifteen or so the next morning.  I brought the basket of fruit inside last Sunday, hoping the lack of sunlight might stop the process.  Didn't happen.  I knew I couldn't eat that many tomatoes before they went bad, and Daughter was tomatoed-out.  What shall I do?!

My favorite bakery/café/coffee-shop makes these delicious breakfast pastries they call egg soufflés.  Their newest one has roasted tomatoes with feta cheese filling.  Ever-ripening tomato quandary solved.  I roasted the suckers!  In the photo above are a few of the remaining tomatoes not destined for the oven (about three times that are sliced and roasting even as I'm typing this.)  The platter holds the first batches (boy, they cook down a lot!), what's left after I sampled them.  Oh, they are so good on toast with yogurt cream cheese, let me tell you! 

The green leafy stuff is Greek columnar basil.  I'll add that to some of the roasted tomatoes for a fresh marinara.  Minced Greek-style black olives might be a nice addition.

Tomorrow morning I'm going to try my hand at the tomato-feta soufflé for breakfast.  If it's any good, might have another for lunch; then supper, too.

But next year, I'll wait until late October to pick the green ones.

Nemesis

Still playing with blobs.  This one was on the same piece of paper as the blob that became Charlie Bird.  I couldn't imagine that it would become anything at the time, but I let it sit on my desk where I'd see it every day.  The idea was that my sub-conscious mind might chew on it and come up with something worth pursuing.

In the meantime, my nemesis, the Octopus, slithered up from the deep and grabbed me by the ankle.  I've been battling it ever since the last post.  I think I'm winning.  I hope I'm winning.  My therapist voiced concern the last time I slipped into serious depression that if I didn't do something to treat it, she was worried it might become a permanent state of mind.  She suggested medications.  I suggested she keep them. 

I've been fighting the Octopus for nearly 60 years.  In the last cycle of serious depression, almost two years ago, I thought Octopus was going to win.  I almost gave up, so strong was its siren call.  The winter of 2011-2012 was particularly hard financially.  I couldn't heat my home properly, couldn't pay for medications or food and my worklife was beyond dismal - bordering on abusive.

But I didn't give in.  I'm still here.  But I was scared.  That's when I remembered the Book of Five Rings, written by Japanese swordsman Miyamoto Musashi sometime in the mid-1600s.  I read it about 20-25 years ago and was fascinated with it.  I don't remember all the lessons, but enough of it stuck that I approached my battles with Octopus from the warrior's perspective.  I studied the Octopus, learning its tells when it is about to attack.   Having survived that winter, I paid attention to the survival lessons I'd learned.  Last winter, I was prepared for deprivation.  I was prepared for the Octopus and I defeated the rascal at every turn.  Not saying it was easy, but every time I turned Octopus back, I grew stronger emotionally; more confident.

Then illness struck and I was knocked off balance.  Octopus saw its opportunity and took advantage of my being distracted.  We've been in an ongoing tug-of-war for my soul since this Spring.  Thus far, it is a tie, but I am edging ahead.

My sub-conscious finally told be what to do with the blob above.  This is Octopus, my nemesis.