Busy Time

It's been a busy period with unusual events. The poetry reading was the first such evening I've attended in a great many years. It was an opportunity to meet many people from the school where Rachel works -- quit likable women. Possibly it will lead to being part of a poetry writing/reading group.

Last night we drove to Providence, Rhode Island. Rachel had a brief meeting to attend. We were especially glad Cory and Jason could come with us because the had never seen the Waterfire event that is a summer tourist draw to the renewed downtown area with it's landscaped and meandering river on which bonfires are lit for several blocks. The photograph above is somewhat digitally manipulated but gives some idea of the effect of the fire on the water. The gondola is a part of it as are a few other unlighted boats carrying passengers -- they are all silent.

However the event is not silent. There is piped music and there was also a jazz band with a woman singer a bit way from the river. There were street performers, mostly living statues and an origami artist. Of course there is a food tent and all along the river are may restaurants. We ate at in the near-by large mall and wandered the length of the lighted area. The night was very dark because of cloud cover but the weather was pleasant. Because it's early in the season and the day had been sprinkly, the crowd was not dense. Strolling along was very pleasant. Poor Rachel got the least enjoyable part which was driving home through patchy fog.

Today turned out to be very beautiful so Rachel and I went to Heritage Plantation in near-by Sandwich. The gardens are known especially for their rhododendruns and azeleas. The rhodies are in every possible color and many of them are large trees, not at all mere bushes. Wonderfully laid out paths lead through the garden which I supposed is a bit over 50 acres. It was a magical site today, wonderful vistas of color wherever we looked. In other seasons other flowers will bloom but none are a dramatically multitudinous as the rhodies. I have other photos of the flowers on my other blog also.

Reading Poetry

I'm not sure why this happened but I just read poetry in public at an event with which I have no real connection. It was poetry night for the charter high school where my daughter is a school secretary. She had agreed to read and she put forth my name as a reader also. Every other reader was a student, teacher or administrator of some sort. I did not belong. Well, what the hell? There I was with a poem of mine called "Marathon" about, of course, runners, and a poem of Symborska's because she is so wonderful. Everyone was most friendly and gracious beforehand.

I did not feel nervous, although I've read only once before in public. I knew the poem was all right, not personal but fairly strong as a statement, and easy to read. Symborska is also quite easy to read, her writing is so strong and immediate. But Rachel read first and she took her cue from some of the men who had been rather dramatic. She studied to be an actress and so read two poems, very humorously and with much charm and personality. That made me nervous. I have to follow that act with two okay poems? Well, one doesn't have a fit of second thoughts at the 11-9//10ths hour. So I read. I guess it was okay, that was enough. After all I didn't even belong there. But Symborska is strong and, though it could have been read bettter, it wasn't bad.

I remember former timss with stomach twisting, dry mouthed, knee knocking nervousness; that did not happen. I've spoken in front of much larger groups comfortably and have learned not to worry about embarrassing myself even if it's not perfect. So, okay.This is something we are lucky to know by the age of 70 -- alm9st 71. Life experience is wort something.

I met some nice and interesting people, that was the important part of the evening for me. What more can a new comer to a communiy want? To make some possible connections. Enough.

I didn't use to DO holidays

I don't DO holidays -- at least I didn't DO holidays in NYC. Ignoring them was a pleasure. Here I am in the land of men in aprons cooking hotdogs, hamburgers, chicken, women cutting watermelons into dozens of neat slices, chips and puffs and dips and salads. So much good clean fun -- these are seriously religious people who don't DO beer or wine let alone anything harder. But they are both good and nice people although a seriously competitive spirit erupts in croquet -- although no gloating by the winners.

The sun was high and hot in the late afternoon and by the time the cookies and coffee appeared the shadows were chilly and out came the hoodie sweatshirts. This was the essence of American "good life", everyone attractive, soft voiced and polite. For my taste it went a bit over twhen the minister whose home we were at, related that he ha only smoked a cigarette once in his life when he was six and his eight year old brother was afraid to try it so got the innocent babe to take a couple of puffs, which made him very sick and which his mother happened to witness and gave him a serious spanking. Likewise, he only once said a curse word -- "and that was the worst one" said he, but didn't say which. And again Mom heard him, told him what it meant and why he must never use it again -- and he hasn't. "If you hear anything more about me it's all untrue," said he. I don't remember the possibly ironic, possibly slightly insulting, apparently not humorous remark that escape my uncensored lips. Any man somewhere in the middle of life who has only those two "sins" to confess to is either lying or insufferably priggish and unimaginative as well. I suppose whatever I said - I honestly don't remember, it was relatively mild like "well, there's certainly a lot one could make up" -- got immediately repressed as all negativity seems to be.

I guess I'm hopelessly subversive for the only reasonably interesting conversation I had was with a woman who has done long mission stints in Southern China. I said I deeply dislike the Chinese government especially for their treatment of Tibet. She did not defend the Chinese government but also seemed unaware that they take a dim view of Christians, not quite on a par with the Falun Gong. Real politics seemed not to figure into life. I guess I forgot about the goody-two shoes life a long time ago. Yes, indeedy-di, we aren't in the gritty Big City among these well kept houses and the family-size vehicles.

Oh, I guess I was even a bit more subversive when I asked about a much advertised local event called Fugawi weekend, which includes a sailboat race and a gala -- all to rsise money for charity. I assumed others had heard how or why some group chose that name. A couple people said to me with perfectly straight faces that it was the name of an Indian tribe. "You haven't heard the joke?" I asked. Well, one guy had but he supposed there was a real Fugawi tribe. This level of innocent boggles my mind -- to the extent that I Googled the word and found that the only Fugawi Tribe is a motorcycle group -- which makes sense. At any rate there are apparently elsewhere in this almost lily-white community some people who know the joke and think it good fun to have a Fugawi weekend festival for a good cause. I hope someday to meeting someone who knows the origin or orignator of the local event.

Summer Season

Traffic has become a steady stream. Enough locals are in that stream to maintain the local kindness of stopping for pedestrians who want to cross the street. This is just the beginning, when the weather is really warm traffic will crawl. Suddenly the many outdoor tables of the Main Street restaurants are busy instead of being forlornly empty as they were a few days ago.

Walking Molly on the beach late Friday afternoon the air was sweatshirt cool and the wind came in inexhaustible gust so strong grains of sand struck bare body parts like tiny bullets. Molly's thick coat protected her, she loped down the sand with all her doggy enthusiasm for being off leash. The shell tree stood festooned as usual but winter's gales had covered the ground at its foot with shards of broken shells. The wiccans or elves or local ecology worshipers had replaced the broken ones. This tree is always numinous to come upon -- here in buttoned up preppy-dom it speaks to something shaggier and freer in the spirit of the place. Some white beach roses are blooming. They have red and pink cousins all along the dunes but only the white were out so far as we saw. They had that heartily delicate [a true oxymoron] scent. When I decided to photograph them, having just passed the shell tree and its magical aura, I said to the gusty wind -- not commandingly or even with any intent -- "stop. Be still. Stop a minute." And it did. Rachel was impressed.

Hereafter permit stickers will be needed for the parking lots and, except very, very early in the morning, Molly will have to be on leash. Gradually the water will get warmer and locals -- except for those under 16 -- will cede the beaches to the summer people from midmorning to evening. Sunrise is usually too early but 7:00 or 7:30 isn't, and sunset is a wonderful time. These are good times for my tiny patio too so I welcome the season and don't worry too much about trusting my life to strangers in murderous vehicles when I cross the street.

Vintage Reading

Memoirs of a Mountaineer, Helvellyn to Himalaya, by F. Spenser Chapman was discovered at a used book section of a thrift store for a couple of dollars. In fact, the named book is the shorter of two books it contained, the second, Lhasa: The Holy City, I read some time ago. Because I enjoyed Chapman's very simple and rather naive style I bought this book and am now rereading [which I very rarely do] the Lhasa part.


The book itself is a bit beat up, I think probably from age and neglect for only the cover is worn, the interior is pristine, with wonderful pictures like the ones seen above. The distinguished mustashed man is the 13th Dalai Lama. I can say like an old curmudgeon "They don't write books like this nowadays." It's true. Mountain climbing is a totally different undertaking these days. Chapman was first to climb Chumolari, a magnificent mountain on the Sikkim/Tibet border, 23,000 plus -- using no oxygen, wearing multiple layers of wool socks and sweaters, long before Gore-tex existed. He had no "expedition" really just one sherpa companion [not so different from Hillary on Everest twenty years later].

Best of all is Chapman, the writer. An orphan raised by pastors and apparently with enough money to go to private [what they call public] school and then to Cambridge where he learned roof climbing. A bit of a loner, like so many English writers of the past he wandered fields and England's small mountains and learned names of flowers and birds -- which no modern day writer seems able to throw into observations with the casual assurance of many former British writers -- we've lost touch with the natural world except those writers who take an ecological stance.

Chapman is proud of his mountain climbing but never brags or shows off, gives the local men their due -- in words, although they were paid very badly. He observes both the mountains and then life in Lhasa with a fresh and largely unprejudiced eye, though always taking British superiority for granted. He has not done a lot of research to make himself an expert, rather he simply relates what he did and saw and what happened around him. There is no gee-whiz, and no ponderousness. In short this is a very refreshing read. He had an ease with language and unpretentiousness that is a joy to read. I have no idea what kind of career or life he had after these Himalayan adventures in the mid-1930s. I sincerely hope it was a good life. He was a very likable individual.

Unique Place to Life

Many things about this little arm of land sticking out into the Atlantic like an arm reaching up toward Boston are unique. Right now I'm looking at a feature I've found unique -- the light in the sky in the late afternoon; it has a watery softness.

But that's chocolate in the photo. There's chocolate most places and this may be cornucopia shaped with various chocolate goodies spilling out but even that is not very remarkable. No, what's remarkable is that people like my daughter who has no political involvements and no "social" standing in what is probably the old establishment of the town of Hyannis, can carry to her grandson's graduation luncheon a chocolate centerpiece courtesy of "the Senator". Well, sort of. She did enjoy saying that and in a way it's true. A friend of hers works at the Kennedy compound and occasionally, after various social events, has to dispose of overages such as too many chocolate cornucopias. So, in this case the friend asked Rachel if she could find a use for it. We indulged in the only okay chocolate [standards get higher in such circumstances] and muttered "Our tax dollars at work." Which may not have been fair, it may have been paid for out of Kennedy deep pockets.

When I walked to the post office yesterday morning, this still being pre-vacation time, the only place in the center of town that showed a bustle of people and activity was the small museum to JFK. Ourside is a nice bronze statue that is a bit smaller than life size. I don't understand why it wasn't made life size. It wouldn't have required much more bronze. Certainly he was a bit taller than approximately five foot. tall.]

Brandeis Graduation

For a variety of reasons I've never been to a college graduation ceremony until today when I went with my daughter and her husband to see their son, Joel, graduate from Brandeis. I expected familial pride and a lot of sitting listening to boring reading of names and honors. That was part of it but also fascinating people watching -- it was a BIG event in a big gym. Happily, a wonderfully varied and lengthy musical background accompanied marching in and settling down before the event -- everything from Handel to ethnic to rock, arranged both tastefully and amusingly.

It's a given that the speaker will say the equivalent of seize the day and take a responsible role in the world and that this will be forgotten along with all else except maybe who the speaker was if prominent enough a personage. In this case the speaker was Newark, New Jersey's relatively young mayor, Cory Booker. He was a wonderful speaker, he told personal stories that will not soon be forgotten, he recited an entire Langston Hughes poem apparently from memory -- he seemed to not be using notes at all. It was, in fact, a beautifully crafted and delivered speech. I was afraid early on he was going to lift the Obama "Hope" slogan and batter it to death but he did not -- one mention and he moved on to responsibility and, indeed, the seize the day theme, and ended with love -- of self and others. I totally enjoyed it.

Grandson, Joel, seemed very mature and confident -- he leaves for Washington tomorrow to take up a government job -- and to at least minimally furnish an apartment from Ikea and with kitchen and bathroom necessities we took with us for him. On the few occasions we've had a chance to talk in the last couple of years he's clearly got an education in world events, Arabic, Middle Eastern studies, philosophy, history his majors and minors. He's won many honors as a debater which has given him a self-confident air that is mature. I've always been attracted to smart, articulate people, so he makes me very happy and proud.