Month: July 2013

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Down to Earth

I’m looking out my window at the front lawn. The grass is cut low, but not because I cut it. My wife deals with the lawn maintenance because, honestly, she does a better job at it than I do. I don’t feel upset at that because I admit to it, but when she lets me I try my best to mimic her lawn care techniques. When I did mow regularly I used the push mower, even though the yard is not small. It’s how I got my workout back in the day. But I doubt the grass was this low back then.

Beyond the lawn is the sidewalk, which was freshly poured approximately three years ago, separated into blocks of concrete straight and true. It leads in a direct line toward the north of the village, where it dead-ends in a thick patch of woods. Odd, that a thick patch of woods would impinge upon an otherwise civilized place, but nevertheless it is the case. When I go for a walk, I can follow the path only so far until I have to take to the street to avoid the atrocity. Continue reading “Down to Earth”

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The DJ Must Die

Block-rockin’ beats, yeh

Us “old folks” have an unrealistic view of what a DJ ought to be. We think he/she needs to play every single song we want to hear when we want to hear it so we can dance our booties off. We think he/she needs to mix up fast songs with slow songs (for all the lovers out there to have a change of pace in their favor). We think he/she needs to play all the “happening” songs from our youth, like Love Shack, Thriller, and Walkin’ on Sunshine. If a DJ played (I Just Died) In Your Arms Tonight we would probably faint from the excitement. To us “old folks” that would be the perfect DJ. Continue reading “The DJ Must Die”

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Going Underground

Today, I got to teach about one of the most interesting occurrences that ever happened more than once: the treacherous trip slaves took on their way to possible freedom via the underground railroad. While it was prompted by necessity and the unending need of each slave to gain a freedom that was supposedly guaranteed to … Continue reading Going Underground

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Exhale

I didn’t swear until I was fourteen More a statement of the world than of me Not a conscious rendering of faith or fear But of a young child’s ignorance instead The power of words is dynamic Focused and determined in its force Like a preacher imparting divine knowledge Or like a swan poised for … Continue reading Exhale

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Old Woman Fishing

There was an old woman fishing on the edge of the creek today. I saw her there in the mid-morning hours, camped out there, as if she had been at it for hours. She was sporting a wide-brimmed fisher’s cap, or maybe it was even a gardening hat — they all look the same to … Continue reading Old Woman Fishing

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Personal Library, R.I.P.

“The room was full of bookshelves, from front to back, from wall to wall.”

I haven’t seen a room like that outside the confines of a library in about a month of Sundays, maybe even longer. It seemed like in another era it was common to have rooms such as the one described by a colleague of mine yesterday. And the house that contained such a room didn’t even have to be a mansion, even though those bastions of civility also had large insular libraries. A regular, standard house in the olden days would have perhaps a converted closet as a book repository, but it was still there. What happened? Continue reading “Personal Library, R.I.P.”