John Swinburn

I wrote most of what follows much earlier today. But the day fractured into pieces and went in different directions. And so did I. I went to church to meet a man who refurbishes parking lots. I walked Bob. Friends came to retrieve a twin bed and chat a bit in the process (and they brought a sausage role and a piece of lemon cake). I had coffee with my sister-in-law. I spent much of my afternoon in a thought-coma, one of those unusual emotional states in which consciousness chooses to rest while thoughts choose to replay themselves in different iterations. And a little late-afternoon dreaming took place, including serious plans to ride from New York to California clinging to the top of a van that is much higher in the back than the front. There was beer in that dream, too, but the cans were empty. But here it is, 4:42 p.m. and my early morning blog has morphed into an older and decrepit version of its younger and more agile self. To be honest, though, the blog never was really agile. It willingly contorted itself into uncomfortable tangles of flesh, cartilage, and brittle bone fragments before springing itself into its original, inflexible shape.

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Lately, I have had several extremely short flashes of “memory” that I can’t quite place. These recollections are very brief but quite clear; but they arise from a hazy fog and they disappear into the same hazy fog. One of these incidents involved a friend who lives in Kansas now. The reminiscence included an image of her bright yellow car and a comment about her husband’s love of a fish dish. I remember having a conversation with someone else about making the fish for him, so that may have triggered the memory. But it wasn’t a memory. It must have been a snippet from a dream. Many other such snippets have been flooding my mind lately. The visions are so clear I would swear they are memories, but circumstances are such that they cannot be memories; they are dreamflashes. I will claim that word as mine, although I know for a fact that it has been used by an ink manufacturer to name one of its lines of inks. That’s too bad. Just when I think I have a neologism of my own, I discover someone else has stolen it from me, apparently in my sleep.

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Bob is going to Connecticut. Apparently, the Animal Welfare League here has a relationship with a rescue outfit in New England; that organization will take Bob up there for adoption. I am told the demand for larger dogs, like Bob, is much greater in that part of the country than around here. No idea why. At any rate, I take Bob to see a vet on Tuesday, then on Wednesday I will take him to the Animal Welfare League facility, where he will spend the night. They will bathe him and get him prepared for departure on Thursday morning about 3:30 a.m. to North Little Rock.; the transport rescue-outfitted RV will leave North Little Rock about 5:30 a.m. and will drive straight through to Connecticut. People tell me the organization taking Bob is extremely good to the animals under their care. So, there it is, the culmination of Life with Bob.

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Years ago, my wife and I became enamored with a Showtime series called Homeland.  Despite the fact that it seemed more than a little biased (downright bigoted from time to time) against Muslims and the Middle East in general, it was an interesting action thriller series, full of espionage and gratuitous violence, sex, and other audience magnets. We watched only as long as our free Showtime offer lasted.

I took advantage of a free Hulu offer so I could watch Nomadland. I was surprised to see that Homeland, from start to finish (I guess) was available. I tried to figure out how long we had watched it before, so I could enter the series at the appropriate time. Couldn’t do it. I finally started watching at Season 3. I had not seen (or did not remember seeing) what I saw, but I decided to stop looking and just watch. What I saw was not nearly as intriguing as I remember. I rather doubt I’ll continue watching. But one never knows, does one?

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This morning’s walk with Bob was very chilly, but productive. Bob enjoyed dragging me up the hill across the street. I assume his wiggling stump of a tail indicated enjoyment. The experience was not as wonderful for me. I have a sore throat that’s getting more sore as I type and a slight headache whose intensity seems to be gradually increasing. Walking Bob caused me to be out of breath much sooner than normal. And I have the sniffles. I am awash in niggling complaints that really do not merit mention, but my fingers are on the keyboard, so it’s like I hardly have a choice but to spill drivel over my little portion of the internet.

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Last night, after washing an especially large load of clothes, I discovered that the dryer was not producing heat. This morning, I’m running it again, on the off chance that the Universe gave the dryer a little time off for rest and recuperation. I decided to give it another thirty minutes to see how things stand. I checked again; no heat at all. So, either I’ll have to get the dryer repaired or buy another one. Sometime last year, before my wife got sick, she located the original receipt for the dryer; we bought it more than thirty years ago. Even if I have to replace it, it has been an utterly reliable workhorse until now. But I hope it can be repaired. I hate replacing equipment when the problem may be just an inexpensive part.

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Friends came to retrieve the twin bed from the master bedroom this morning, so I should be able to get the monstrously heavy queen size bed reconstructed in the not-too-distant future. First, I need to move all the “stuff” I’ve allowed to pile up on the big bed frame in the garage. Then, I’ll need to clean up the master bedroom. Finally, I’ll need to get some big, strong-like-bull people to help with the process. It’s a four-person endeavor. It will happen soon.

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Last night, I thawed ground pork, a pork loin, and a link of hot Italian sausage. I’ve not felt even remotely interested in cooking any of them today, so they languish in the refrigerator, wondering about their fate. I still have no interest in cooking them; or anything. But I am getting a little hungry. I suppose I could go pick up a burger, but that would involve working to get food in which I have no interest. I could order a pizza for delivery, but that would mean spending an enormous amount of money on food that’s worth a quarter as much. Or I could just fast for a while this evening and watch my excess pounds slide off like butter cascading from a hot butter-filled skillet turned sideways. There are other options, of course. But none of them hold much appeal. I’m in the mood for something else, but I don’t know what. Hell, it will come to me. Or I’ll go to it.

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I could have bought a dryer today. Or I could have attempted to figure out whether my dryer is repairable by someone with below average appliance repair skills. Or I could have taken a load of laundry to dry at some out-of-the-way washeteria. But where are they? I’ll look another day, maybe. I know of one place; it’s next to a bar. It’s about eleven miles from here. My sister-in-law has a dryer, though, and she has agreed to let me use it. Last night’s clothes, though, are dry now. More or less.

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I’ll probably never read this blog post again. And I won’t be alone.

People want to matter. They want to believe they have a purpose for being alive. Something beyond simply basking in enjoyable experiences and accumulating things of value and money. Most people want more than that. But for some, all that matters is wealth that gives them some sort of twisted sense of superiority.

And then there are others who are sure that mattering, having purpose, or believing their lives have some fundamental meaning are irrelevant and worthy of scorn. They are the nihilists, extreme skeptics who either deny all real existence or the possibility of an objective basis for truth. Is truth subjective? And are goodness and badness and meaning also subjective and impossible to actually know? I think nihilists must be deeply depressed; either that or textbook sociopaths whose conscience, if it exists, lies buried deep in the recesses of the brain from which escape is impossible. I think I once was nihilist; or thought I was. I now like to think that was simply a phase.

My psychological-theory-of-the-day is pointless. I do not have enough knowledge of the human condition or the way the brain functions to really know anything. Almost all of my so-called “knowledge” has been delivered to me as factual. And, in most cases, I have not questioned it. What if most of our understanding of the world was based on lies or bad information? What if we learned that “the rest of us” are the mutants, the crazy ones, the deviants…and that the people society tends to lock away exhibit the natural behaviors of our species?

There are so many “what if” questions that compel me to think about them at night. Sometimes they are personal questions about different directions my life might have taken, like living in a van and getting odd jobs around the country, just to survive. Or what if I had taken the advice of a contemptible man who fancied himself a human resources genius and gotten a job as a Radio Shack manager instead of looking for something more in line with my interests. Some “what if” questions are a bit broader. Like, “Is a question about “before and after” with regard to the existence of the universe relevant? Is it answerable?”

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Have I mentioned that I have friends who have gotten into tarot card reading? I put no stock in the practice, but that doesn’t stop me from being intensely curious about what a reading might “reveal” about me. While I really do put no stock in tarot card reading, I am edging just slightly away from my unshakeable disbelief in such hogwash as mind-reading. What?! Can I have written that? Yes, but it’s not as woo-woo as it sounds. When I consider that invisible radio waves can be transmitted and received, I have to acknowledge that invisible energy exists. And if we can transmit information through the air with the proper equipment, might we not also be able to transmit (or intercept) energy in the form of information as it is transmitted from the brain to the open air. I am not saying I believe it happens; only that I acknowledge it’s conceivable.

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Late Wednesday afternoon, after the corned beef and cabbage dinner with my wonderful neighbors, I walked Bob a bit, hoping he would relieve himself of intestinal congestion. He did. A little. In spite of more walking, though, he seemed disinterested. So, we went home. I watched Nomadland. Bob sat next to me on the loveseat, watching me watch Nomadland. While the film is slow to develop, I think choosing to film and edit it that way helped tell the story. It was never boring, as far as I was concerned. Some people who either chose or were forced to live the life of a nomad, including two very visible characters, Swankie and Linda May, were featured in the film, along with Bob Wells, a well-known advocate for the RV lifestyle. I would give the film a rating of 9 on a 10-point scale. Definitely worth watching.

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After the movie, during which I drank a little wine and otherwise sought an elevated mood, I turned off the television and sat on the loveseat, thinking. Mostly, I thought about how stressful living in a van or an RV probably would be, but also how liberating it could be. The freedom to just pick up and go when the mood struck you would be wonderful. Of course, when you’re scraping by to afford gas for the vehicle and food for the stomach, freedom might be an overrated state of being. However, I might be able to get used to the RV lifestyle with the right vehicle; one that would cost as much as my house, probably. I have such mixed feelings about RV “camping” though. It’s not really camping. It’s Nature-insertable small-capsule living. I’m convinced camping involves small tents, sleeping bags, small and portable cooking gear, maps, and a compass. And food and water, of course. Unless you really want to rough it. I wish I wanted to, but I don’t.

Suddenly, the time was 2:00 a.m. I wondered how three hours sitting on the love seat could have passed without me knowing it. I told myself I should get up and go to bed. And I did. But it was three hours later. Finally, at 5:00 a.m., I awoke and stayed awake long enough to undress and go to be. I set the alarm, though, not trusting myself to wake up of my own volition. At 7:30, the alarm went off for all of one second; I heard its “preparatory noise,” which prompted me to lunge at it in an attempt to silence it before it began. I almost made it.

The remainder of the following morning, Thursday, was uneventful. I vacuumed a little, ate the remainder of some sweet rolls for breakfast, blogged a little, made a “tuna salad on steroids” for my lunch, walked Bob thrice (finally, I no longer have concerns about his digestion, by the way), and otherwise frittered away my time.  Then, around 4, a new friend stopped by to return to me a folder on the old Camry and to show off her new car. We chatted. And chatted. And chatted. At some point, I got hungry and suggested Mexican food from El Jimador. We took her car to pick up the orders. We talked and chatted and talked some more. It was a nice evening. Judging from the kitchen sink, the nice evening involved a not insignificant amount of wine.

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And here it is, Friday morning. Later than usual Friday morning. As in, almost 8 o’clock late. It’s an embarrassment and a Sin against Nature and Humanity (capitalizing just seemed appropriate) that I would be in bed after light spreads across the land. That happens only in sickness, madness, and tiredness.

Yes, here I am on Friday morning and I feel more than a little dizzy at this moment. Even sitting at the computer, my head keeps bobbing up and down in response to sleep and sudden wakefulness. I hope this is temporary and meaningless.

Finally, after 9 a.m., I am able to sit—however briefly—at my computer. I sit here attempting to write something other than my usual drivel. But nothing comes. Not even the drivel. I wish I could write a poem; sometimes, writing poetry helps wash away the broken glass scattered around inside my skull. Not this morning, though. I can hear the shards of glass slam into one another, creating ever-smaller slivers and tiny cubes the size of grains of sand but with edges sharper than scalpels.

During my brief attempt to write, or at least finish, poetry, I looked at my drafts folder and found eight poems…out of about 450 draft posts. I read all eight of them. Two of them seem very familiar and may be recent. I think I may have posted different versions of them here on my blog or on Facebook or read them for Wednesday Night Poetry, but I’m not sure. And not sufficiently motivated to take the time to look. Regardless, none of them could have been salvaged to fit my mood this morning. Said mood approximates a merger between Mary Poppins, Eeyore, Count Dracula, and Frankenstein’s Monster. There’s no particular reason for my odd sense of anger, anxiety, happiness, fear, innocence, and skepticism. I think I may have been infected with artificial intelligence; when I had the lobotomy, they extracted the intelligence and left the artificial.

Some emotions are wisp-thin at their fullest and invisible in their natural states. The problem with describing those emotions or demonstrating them is that they combine almost imperceptible movements of the facial muscles, nearly-invisible perspiration around the eyes and on the forehead, and a slight tightening of the skullcap, just enough to cause the hair to move just a “hair.” The best way to observe these emotions in the field is to watch close-up video images of television or film actors; when the actors respond to a surprise or a crisis or are caught in a lie, look at their faces. Watch that barely noticeable movements. Those are evidence of those wisp-thin emotions. What’s that you say? They are not emotions but, instead, visible expressions of some underlying emotion? Are you questioning me? Well, you may be right, I may be crazy, but it just might be a lunatic you’re looking for.

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See? Drivel. That’s one of the reasons I am no good in conversations. My mind sometimes works at the speed of a snail on downers. My fingers think much faster than my mind, but the fact that my fingers sometimes are drivel-driven contributes to the overabundance of drivel around these parts.  But I did have an idea a day or two ago for the plot of a novel. I hope someone writes it. I might write it myself, but I don’t recall the plot. I recall almost nothing about it, in fact. I may have told someone; if I told you, please let me know what I said.

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Okay. I’m back. It’s nearing ten o’clock now, that morning moment at which plans for the day should have been made, confirmed, and their execution begun. I’m running a little behind. I’m thinking of putting off until tomorrow the things I should do today. Making that conscious decision makes me more than complicit in the crime; it provides irrefutable evidence of my guilt. But I really should vacuum and dust and straighten up a bit because the housekeeper is coming tomorrow for her somewhat periodic now-and-again visit. I hope she enjoys working around a dog. No, I wouldn’t do that. I’ll take Bob in the car for a long, long drive. If I knew anyone nearby with a huge, dog-proof-fenced yard, I’d ask if I could impose by letting Bob run free. Then again, I might prefer to just keep Bob in the car, where he seems to be in ecstasy from the moment he jumps inside.

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Enough fun for now.

I learned of Bob’s fear of thunder and lightning when I felt his paws pulling at the sheet. He was trying to climb up into bed with me. I succeeded in preventing it, but moments later—when a bright flash of lightning, accompanied by a crack of thunder that violently shook the house, lit the room—he tried again, much harder, to leap up onto the bed. Once again, I succeeded in keeping him off, but this time I tried to comfort him by stroking his ears and talking to him. I had to say “No!” a few times, but eventually he got the message. He settled down on the floor next to the bed. A short while later, following a few more lightning flashes and rumbles of thunder, I heard his nails click-click-click on the floor as he padded off, seeking solace elsewhere.

When I woke up this morning, much later than usual, I was surprised that he was not in his bed. I assumed he had decided to spend the night on the loveseat in the office. My assumption was correct. He was there and there he remains as I type this post. I imagine he’ll soon decide it’s time for breakfast, which means he will interrupt my post and urge me to hurry, hurry, hurry to prepare his morning meal. No long after, he may insist on taking a walk, but the prospect of thunder and lightning may dissuade him from that routine. I’ll be interested to discover how he deals with two competing emotions: the joy of walking and terror thrust downward from the sky.

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Today is St. Patrick’s Day, the day my neighbors will feed me corned beef and cabbage for dinner. It’s hard to believe we’re already mid-way into the third month of the year. Time, that artificial construct about which I write far too often, has apparently ingested large quantities of methamphetamine, AKA speed. That’s the only explanation that can fully explain the “rapidity of moments,” as I am wont to call the quick passage of time.

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The National Weather Service has informed me that Hot Springs Village is under a Tornado Watch until 1:00 p.m. today. That fact makes me wonder about the wisdom of taking Bob for a walk, whether he wants to go or not. On the other hand, Bob’s morning walks lead to intestinal cleansing events, which if they were to take place in the house would be unfortunate and stress-inducing all the way around. One assumes one knows how to deal with such situations because, well, people have pets therefore they must know how to address such circumstances. But confusion can overcome obvious knowledge. And so it has. I will learn. Possibly.

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A year ago today I found the answer to a question that had been on my mind for several years. But I did not accept the answer. This morning, though, I have come to accept the answer. And the answer is: Clyde McPhatter. The question was “Whose version of I’m Not Going to Work Today was played on the Glenn Mitchell Show on Labor Day, 205?” A year ago, I believed the answer was Boot Hog Pefferly and the Loafers. No longer. No, it was definitely Clyde McPhatter.

That’s one of several benefits of maintaining a blog. It can jog one’s memory. It can serve as a repository of minutia so utterly meaningless that the chances that one’s brain will recall such minutia without assistance are very, very small. And it can remind the blogger of moods, emotions, ideas, thoughts, considerations, and other such stuff that once occupied the brain. In fact, it can resurrect such stuff, weaving it together so thoroughly that it seems real. Even when it’s not. For example, I could make up something today and write about it as if it were real. A year or five from now, I could read what I’d written and I might successfully deceive myself into believing what I’d written. I haven’t done that, but perhaps I will. But not just yet.

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Artificial humor is an ineffective shield against the blues. It’s about as practical as replacing bulletproof vests with cellophane.

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It’s after 8 and I’ve still been unable to convince myself to get up and moving. But I have to feed Bob, so now is the time to begin a new adventure.

I did not do a very good job of taking a picture, but this image should illustrate reasonably well what the urn I had made for Janine’s ashes looks like. Her favorite color was purple, so I had the urn made with three bands of purple heart. The other wood is ambrosia maple, any of various varieties of maple that have been stained when beetles bore into the maple and leave acidic trails. I think she would have been extremely impressed by the work of Craig Annen, who made the urn, and June Lamoureux, who painted the dragon fly. Dragon flies were Janine’s favorite insect creatures. She had t-shirts with dragon fly motifs, she had garden art depicting dragon flies, and she had wall art with multiple dragon flies shown in multiple “shadow box” type displays. And more. Craig is an incredibly talented wood-turner and June is an amazing, well-regarded and well-known artist. I haven’t thanked her yet for the dragon fly art, but I will.

I asked Craig to make something elegant, but simple. Janine like clean lines, simple presentations, and superior quality. That’s what Craig produced for us. He was Janine’s friend, too, and he was happy and honored to craft her urn. He spent many, many hours on the project. In an ideal world, I would have paid him $50 per hour for his work, but this world, I’m afraid, is not ideal.

In just a few days, it will be three months since Janine died. It is a tiny bit easier, but at this rate, I’ll be a very, very old man before I can accept that she’s gone and I am completely alone. Friends, as wonderful as they are, can never take the place of a spouse. I guess no one can. But maybe one day someone will find a way to me; someone who can accept and understand my perpetual love of my wife and someone for whom I can provide the same protective anchor. The likelihood, though, is slim. Very, very slim.

I do need to try to adjust. Not get over it, but adjust. I don’t know whether that will ever happen, either.

I want to make an appointment with a surgeon. I need to find one who will do a lobotomy, no questions asked. Cash only. No record of the patient’s name, address, gender, race, hair color, eye color. Nothing. Just a quick operation and, Presto! I’m a new man.

A Portuguese neurologist named Egas Moniz performed the first brain surgery to treat mental illness, in 1935. The surgical procedure, which Moniz called a “leucotomy,” involved drilling holes in the patient’s skull to get to the brain. Eleven years later, Walter Freeman, a psychiatrist, performed the first “ice pick” lobotomy in his office in Washington, DC.  But for hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years before that, humans have used trepans, tools that cut shallow circular holes, to drill holes in the skull to release evil spirits. I don’t know which process is most likely to give me the results I want: Serenity that’s unavailable to people overcome with evil spirits or who have tightly knotted balls of razor-sharp barbed wire in their heads. A lobotomy severs the connections between the frontal lobes and the rest of the brain; something so simple it could be performed by children on their stressed parents in the comfort of their own homes.

Why, you may ask, am I expressing a need to make an appointment for a lobotomy? A more appropriate question might be, “Why not?” What valid and persuasive reasons might I have for NOT arranging for the procedure? Sure, the results might not be as I wish. And I might not survive the process. And the aftermath could leave me incapable of managing my own daily life. There could be hundreds of reasons to skip the procedure, opting for something else, instead.

Something a little more adventurous, like replacing my legs with newer, stronger, more attractive models. The legs of a 25-year-old marathon runner might do, as long as his knees and ankles and so forth have not been permanently damaged by the repeated poundings they took during the man’s ten year career as a professional marathon runner. As I see it, the biggest stumbling block would not be the removal of my legs and their painstaking replacement. The key obstacle is likely getting the runner’s consent. Why would he be willing to have his legs severed and exchanged with mine? I have doubts he would go for it. Money could enter the equation, but how much are two marathon-quality legs worth? And would the man be willing to exchange a lifetime of sprint-worthy mobility for, at best, hobbling around on geezer feet, simply to accumulate money? Even if he were motivated by money, where would I get it?

Inasmuch as he almost certainly will refuse to accept checks, I’ll have to gather plenty of cash. The only places that keep that much within easy reach, I think, are banks. So, I’ll have to rob a bank. A big bank awash in super rich clients who eschew credit and debit cards in favor of pulling out rolls of hundred-dollar-bills to pay for packs of gum and toothpicks. Banks that cater to the cash-loving über rich will have to be my targets. Once I’ve identified them, I’ll case the places; camera locations, security guards, ease of ingress and egress, etc. And I’ll need a disguise; I’ll want to look much taller and thinner than I am. I’ll want to walk in with blue eyes, cherry red hair, with a beard and mustache covering most of my face. And a black fedora. And I’ll wear a sky-blue leisure suit. The reason for the leisure suit is that…oh, I’m not allowed to say.

The box into which I will instruct the tellers to place the stacks of bills will measure 22 inches by 32 inches by 38 inches tall. That box should accommodate roughly $16,800,000 in $100 bills, the only denomination I will accept. Half of that will go to the St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital and the rest will go into my bank accounts.

From the moment I walk in the bank to the instant the full box is in my possession, I will be deadly serious and threatening. But when the money is in my possession, I will transform from a dramatically pudgy lump of White shortness into a tall, gregarious Black man with six-pack abs and skin as smooth as a baby’s bottom.

Using my new identity, I will say to the tellers, “Thank you for your professionalism and grace in the face of severe stress. I will repay you soon for your efforts to make this engagement as flawless and possible.”

But things could go horribly awry. One of the tellers, a forty-four year old recently divorced childless woman named Michelle will have pushed the emergency call button immediately after I made my demands. Four police cars, their sirens blaring, will screech to a stop in front of the bank just as I will make my way to the front, carrying my box full of $100 bills.

When I see the police, I will shout out loud, “Oh, no! Someone called the police! You’ll be sorry. Half of my take was to go to the St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital. But you were more protective of the damn bank than you are of children in need! I will remember this!”

Michelle will look at me and mouth the words, “I’m sorry,” but it will be too late. I already will have decided she must have been the one to press the emergency button. So I turned toward her, pointed my gun, and pulled the trigger. Michelle went down in less than an instant. I had envisioned a life with her. But she ruined it with her finger and her admission of betrayal.

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I’ve fallen asleep at the computer half a dozen times. I think I’ve contracted narcolepsy, perhaps from Bob, the dog. I’ve been sleeping quite lightly of late, trying to listen for Bob’s paw-steps while dozing. That act keeps me tired most of the time. The other time I’m tired for other reasons.

I’ve noticed that I twitch when I sleep upright in a desk chair. The twitch is not constant; in fact, it’s rare, but when I twitch the movement awakens me. It’s the same twitch I notice in Bob, the dog. But his twitches are followed by whimpering howls and legs moving as if he is running. I do not run, though I used to. Now, I tend to hobble. That is, I walk lamely, with a limp. Of sorts. Maybe it’s not a limp. It could be that I shuffle or stagger or stumble. Whatever it is, it does not resemble a run in any way, shape, manner, or form.  Why am I writing about twitching in desk chairs? Could I not find something more engaging? More interesting? More relevant to something…anything? Is it sloth-induced boredom? Do I need something to change my mind the way I change my shirts?

I’m in the mood for something completely different. Taking powerful mood altering drugs or special hallucination-inducing fungus or engaging in intimate relationships with married or divorced or single women. Actually, I might not take the drugs or eat the mushrooms; not without competent medical experts at the ready by my side. How strange would it be to hallucinate that a large tabby cat was morphing into an ambulance while doctors that looked like enormous crows stood by patiently, blood-drenched scalpels in hand? That would scare me. I am terrified of being scared. I get nervous and frightened and deeply apprehensive whenever I am scared. For that reason, alone, I probably would avoid the powerful mood-altering or hallucination-inducing options.

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All I’ve had for sustenance thus far today was a six- or eight-ounce glass of tomato juice, flavored with Worchestershire Sauce and Tabasco Sauce. I should have added some lemon juice from a fresh lemon, but lacking a fresh lemon I did not add lemon juice. So I made something like an incomplete Virgin Mary. The Incomplete Virgin sounds like a book title, doesn’t it? Sometimes the title can spawn a book. Other times, it takes a completed book to spawn a title. Life is like that, isn’t it? Sometimes a person has to die for his life to have meaning. Other times, a person has to live for his death to have meaning. The philosophy in those statements is crawling with fleas, courtesy of Bob, the dog. I sincerely hope Bob does not have fleas; because, if he has fleas, I have fleas. He likes to rest his head in my lap while I watch television. Bob and his sleeping habits and possible flea infestation has nothing whatsoever to do with an Incomplete Virgin Mary. For that reason, I recommend un-reading the part of this paragraph that has anything to do with Bob. That’s the only way you’ll be able to leave this post, untainted.

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If I weren’t so damn introverted in the public arena, I might get into acting. No one who has not spent time as my wife would know that I am an actor from the time I wake up until the time I go to bed at night. But especially early in the day. The “real” me is evident during the entire period, but the characters I portray are in full form when no one who has not spent time as my wife is present. I sing, I attempt to dance, I alter my voice and my facial appearance…at least to the extent I can with my face muscles and tendons that come to my aid. I’m relatively sure a candid early-morning video of me would reveal enough doubt about my stability to justify an attempt to have me committed to a mental hospital. On the other hand, an actors’ agent with sufficient wherewithal to “sniff out” hidden talent might look at the video and insist on signing me on as a client

He would say, “Either this man is a genius or an imbecile. If the former, he can make us both rich. If the latter, he can make me rich.  Either way, it’s a win.”

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As I sit here, nodding off occasionally, the clock reads 12:38 pm. I have spent the morning whiling away the hours by taking Bob for a walk, having a conversation with my sister-in-law, and speaking to the woman from the Animal Welfare League. They’re going to try send Bob to Connecticut if the agency in Connecticut will take him. Apparently, bigger dogs have an easier time of getting adopted in Connecticut. We’ll see.

I’ve felt enormous highs and deep lows during the past week. While is beyond my comprehension. What I feel like now is a meal. Something to eat. There’s plenty to eat in the house; just nothing that I have is sufficiently interesting to me to warrant using it as a prime ingredient. Oh, well.

The clock claims the hour is 6:00 a.m., but I know better. The time actually is an hour earlier. But what, exactly, is a moment in “time?” Could I label this very instant in time as 5:37 p.m., adjusting all other moments accordingly, and still live a full and complete life? Humans, in general, have collectively agreed to a relatively simple system of differentiating “then” from “now.” And we call that system “time.” We base our assertions about “time” on the movements of the Earth and the Sun and the planets and various observations made by long-dead astronomical mystics. We call it a scientific system. Or, at least, we seem to believe it is scientific. In fact, though, it is an artificial pseudo-scientific construct used to organize chaos into easily-understood packets of experience that last “just so long.”

Yes, I’ve written about the mysteries of time before. Many times. Time is a fascinating construct; evidence of mass psychosis welcomed by billions upon billions of humans who willingly give in to its power over them. How would our lives be different if we did not bother with time? How could we answer the simple question: “When?” Without time, we would not need (or have the ability) to answer the question because the query would be irrelevant and meaningless.

Think of how time has invaded our thought processes and our languages. Before. After. During. When. Then. Now. Multiply those words by the number of languages into which they can be translated. Add other words to the mix; words that suggest different instances or moments or durations. All right, I believe I’ve made my point: the concept of time has crept into every element of our lives. We cannot conceive of life without time, no matter how hard we try. The concept of time is not limited to life, either. Death “follows” life; it comes “after.”  A “lifetime” of memories often are on display at celebrations of the life of a person who has died.

Speaking of language, and I was (at some point), what value would a past participle have in an existence in which time was missing?  Future tense? Was. Had. Did. Will. Looked. Spoke. They all merge thoughts with instances or periods of time.

Yeah, and so what? Nothing, really. Just some irrelevant observations about the human condition. Would time exist in the absence of humans? Hard to say, having never been in such a situation. Whether other animals conceive of the construct of time in the abstract is impossible to know, I think. We have introduced them to time by way of training them about “when” feeding time is/will be. But without our interference, would they have any sense of time? And, again, so what? Does it matter? “Again.” That word also suggests an underlying connection with time. “Not yet.” They keep popping into my head. If they don’t stop, my skull will fill to beyond its capacity and it will detonate in a fiery mushroom cloud; phrases are combustible in the extreme.

Even “combustible.” It suggests combustion “can occur later.” Doesn’t it? Have I lost my mind? Has time entered my cranium and eaten my brain, leaving only an empty container and thousands upon thousands of useless, broken, spent words? It’s possible.

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I mentioned the time when I first started writing this morning because the dog, AKA Bob, roused me much earlier. Bob has not yet adjusted to the time change. (Didn’t we just arbitrarily adjust time on a whim?) He wanted breakfast and, of course, a long, hard-driving walk. He got breakfast. He will get the walk. I’m not sure whether I’ll shower and shave first, though. I look a little like I slicked down my hair with cold bacon grease before bed. The thin, short silver and white and sandy blonde stubble on my face and neck suggests I have not shaved since I was younger (another dimension of time). I’ve not put on jeans or a sweatshirt yet, so if I were to go out now, I would be underdressed, cold, and subject to being detained as an old man who wandered out of his house looking for his youth. I do not feel old, though. I feel like a young buck, a raging stud ready to take on the world and make it mine. A little like that, anyway. I’ll take the damn dog for a walk, first.

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Damn! I just checked my calendar and found that I have a Zoom class. Not to worry; it will be recorded and I can listen/watch later. This is not a good moment to do that; nice that they will record it. I think.

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One way or another, I will set up the heavy wooden bed frame in the master bedroom this week. I will move the twin bed someplace else. Maybe I’ll switch their places. But I’ll need help; my neighbors offered to assist, but the queen bed weighs just over one million pounds, so I’ll need another body or two. That’s no problem. The problem, really, is the reconstruction of the queen bed; getting it back together will be the challenge. It always is. And putting the Sleep Number platform and air mattress back together will make me feel small and inept. Always does. That’s why I should hire a team of servants. Highly paid servants. Pay them enough and they’ll be willing to wash the windows, inside and out. Give them three weeks paid vacation, health insurance, and keys to a new LandRover and they will be willing to clean the rugs on occasion. I already know their names: Phaedra, Linda, Apollonia, and Alluria. By some strange coincidence, they’re each 43 years old and fiercely independent, though deeply jealous. None of them knows about the others; quite a trick, I must say. Each of them has her own room with ensuite facilities; I had to add on to the house to accommodate them.

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Apollonia is the namesake of Apollonia James, a character in Overdrawn and the Memory Bank. Arom Fingal is another character in that film; Raul Julia played that part. Linda Griffiths played the part of Apollonia James. I’ve read that some of the actors who played in the film did not like it. I don’t care; I liked it.

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How would the world (or your little part of it) react if you publicly acknowledged your most private, most tightly kept secrets or fantasies? Would you be shunned? Arrested? Placed in chains? Or are you the type whose fantasies would generate admiration and respect?  Tell you what: reveal those secrets or fantasies to me and we’ll keep it between just the two of us; I’ll let you know what the rest of the world would say without putting you through the embarrassment.

We want to know things about other people; private and personal things that make us feel closer bonds to them. I’m not talking about strangers on the street, of course. I refer to people with whom we’re already close…more or less. And I think we want to share secrets. When a secret is shared with us, we feel privileged. Until it is shared with the rest of the world; the privilege shrivels like a water balloon with a moderately fast leak.

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Enough for now. I’ve been dawdling here, off and on, for more than 90 minutes. Those minutes are gone forever; I cannot retrieve them. I could have spent them painting the laundry room or playing online games of chance. Instead, I spent them here. With you.

A year ago, panic buying of toilet paper had begun. Grocery store shelves had been stripped of dried beans and rice. When a herd mentality, driven by fear of the unknown, begins to evolve, intelligence tends to slip beneath the surface, replaced in full view by emotion. But panic buying and hording and other such reactions to the emerging pandemic were not stupid. They were rational responses to a chaotic environment. We did not know quite what to expect, but in the event the supply chains for food and sanitation were interrupted, we wanted to be prepared.

Repeated circumstances in which at least a subset of the food supply chain has been interrupted have not taught us well. When strawberries are in short supply, we wish we had planted a bed several weeks earlier. When zucchini and yellow squash are not available, we wish we had put in a large vegetable garden at the beginning of the season. But we have no strawberry beds did we install a large vegetable garden. We did not plan for sustainable sources of protein, either, when thoughts of survival disturbed our unreasonable expectations of an unending food supply.

What might have happened if we had finally heeded the call of logic? What if we’d put out strawberries, planted a huge vegetable garden, and raised a few chickens for eggs and protein? If we had planted and raised and tended on a massive scale, many sectors of the agribusiness market, especially small operators, might have folded. Unintended consequences borne of what I might call responsible independence. The economy is an extraordinarily resilient social structure, but that pliancy is available at the cost of rippling fragility. Consider what might happen to the automotive industry if, suddenly, the demand for cars evaporated. Or to the oil industry if inexpensive, competitively productive alternatives to gasolines and plastics were to come onto the scene.

In a more ideal world, collaboration would reveal “unintended consequences” before decisions are made and actions taken. But in a competitive world, the victor takes the spoils, regardless of unplanned and unimagined consequences. Collaboration, though, in which the collective good is the desired outcome, would tend to examine (to the extent possible) potential outcomes at least several effects deep.

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Today’s sky is drab, wet, and unappealing. It is not a day to go walking, but I suspect I will, anyway. My creativity is languishing at the bottom of a sterile barrel. Bah!

This morning’s moment of awe came when I paid close attention to the act of swallowing my daily dose of tablets and pills. Having very little patience, I do not swallow them one by one. Instead, I pour them into my palm, throw them into my mouth, and take a big gulp of water. In one fell swallow, the drugs begin the journey:

• the tongue pushes the pills to the back of the oral cavity by pressing against the palate;
• the nasopharynx is sealed off and the larynx is elevating, enlarging the pharynx to receive the pills;
• the pharyngeal sphincters contract sequentially, squeezing the pills into the esophagus;
• the epiglottis closes the trachea;
• the pills move down the esophagus by peristaltic contractions, past the lower esophageal sphincter and into the stomach.

The only conscious decision I make in the process is the one involving the tongue. After the pills get to the back of the oral cavity, an automatic system takes over.  I did not write the bullet points above from knowledge or memory. I had to rely on The Neurology of Swallowing to guide me through the stages of swallowing. Had I not looked up the process of swallowing, I would have guessed at the physiological systems involved in transporting material from my mouth to my stomach. Thanks to teachers long ago, I would have gotten significant parts of the process right, but I would have overlooked some of the most crucial. The fact that people actually study and understand the complexities of swallowing is a wonder in itself. Life, itself, is awe-inspiring.

As I type this and drink a few sips of coffee, I pay attention to what I am doing. It transports me in some fashion to a different level of consciousness; an awareness of an action I take for granted and rarely appreciate for its mystical wonder.

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Platonic is defined (in one sense) as “intimate and affectionate but not sexual” or “purely spiritual; free from sensual desire, especially in a relationship between two persons of different sexes.” I think the term is simply a label attached to a specific spot on a spectrum of intimacy. Platonic friendships can morph into passionate relationships, just as concupiscent engagements can wither into indifferent partnerships. That is, passionate and platonic are not necessarily steady states; they can slide along the spectrum of intimacy, changing in parallel with the depth of the relationship.

We’ve all heard the phrase, “friends with benefits.” Generally speaking, in our society, the phrase and the behavior it describes are looked upon unfavorably. Again, though, our social rules are not necessarily carved in stone. Morality is a flexible construct. While I might (or might not) find the concept offensive today, that attitude might be different tomorrow. And it might have been different yesterday. I wish all people were more open and receptive to new ideas or revisiting old ideas already deemed immoral or unseemly. Even those of us who claim an open-mind live within spheres built of artificial mental boundaries.

And, then, the dog interrupted. Bob and I are not suited for each other after all, I think. Last night, at 1:45 a.m., Bob came into the room where I was sleeping and woke me. He pranced a bit with this two front paws, making me think he needed something. As I got out of bed, his prancing grew more animated. I quickly got dressed (more or less…at least I wore casual house pants, a t-shirt, and slippers), attached his leash to his collar, and took him outside. Aside from a bright streetlight and a brightly-lit house across the street, the street in both directions was dark. Very dark. I took Bob for a short walk, nonetheless, whereupon he demonstrated why he was in such urgent need of going outside. Fortunately, I was carrying gloves and a double-bagged sack from Walmart.

Bob is too big and demanding for me; I’m contentedly set in my ways. My morning routine is completely out of kilter. While taking him for walks is pleasant (except for his incessant pulling and that one late-night emergency poop patrol), I have begun to think morning walks alone, without the distraction of a dog peeing every forty feet and barking at distant dogs and a hundred other diversions, would be more peaceful and thought-inspiring.

Bob need much more activity than I can give. He needs a big yard to play in. He does not need to be cooped up in a house for most of the day, with or without human companionship. As much as I like Bob and enjoy his company, I have almost reached the conclusion that he needs someone with more space and more willingness to walk him several times a day. And take him for rides in the car; he loves car rides.

I think I may foster Bob for a while, just so he does not have to return to a kennel with very little room to roam and inadequate human company (though, as I understand, the Animal Welfare League volunteers do take their dogs out for walks and otherwise treat them well). We’ll see. I thought I wanted a dog. And I think I still do. Just a smaller, less physically needy dog. I think. I wish I could magically find Bob’s original human companion and reunite them. I can’t help but think someone is missing Bob deeply, just as I think Bob misses someone who used to be in his life.

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Two dreams last night stuck with me, at least in parts. In one of them, I was asked to buy a clothes hanger system for a girl who was going away to college. I never saw the girl, nor did I recognize the woman and her other daughter who asked me to buy it. The hangers comprised an ingenious system wherein the hangers were loosely attached to a rail that had multiple sections. Each section of rail expanded out of the section to its left, creating a very long rail when fully extended. The hangers’ design was traditional, except for the top; instead of a curved “hook,” the top was designed to slide onto the bottom section of the rail. It was ingenious except that it was made entirely of plastic; I thought it would not stand much use before breaking. But the woman insisted I buy and install it for her daughter. I do not know how or where it ended. Odd, that dream.

The other dream involved my late wife and me making some sort of frozen dessert and selling it to a bakery. We delivered it, but the passageway from the store’s entry to the area where the freezer was located was too narrow for me to pass through; so my wife when down that passageway and I went through another entry. When we started to unload our products into the freezer, we discovered it was completely filled with other products and, mostly, frost. It must have never been defrosted. Again, I don’t know where the dream went, nor how it ended.

Do dreams actually end with some sort of resolution or natural conclusion? Or do they simply stop, as if they were recorded on film that was suddenly cut in the middle of something important or relevant or meaningful? I’ve often wondered about that.  Many people find stories of others’ dreams boring. I find them fascinating. I can envision a dream-sharing group, just two or three or four of us, sitting around a table relating our memories of our dreams. We could then guess as what they might “mean,” as if we have any way of knowing what or whether dreams have any meaning at all. But it would be fun, I think. The conversations would be great over coffee. Or wine. Or something else.

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A friend from the DFW area plans to visit in early April. I think I’ve met her only once, face to face, but I’ve followed her on Facebook for quite some time.  She writes poetry, which is how I came to know her. My wife and I learned from another friend that this woman was going to read her poetry at a library event. We decided to go. I was impressed with her reading and have followed her, off and on, ever since. She has wanted to visit Hot Springs for years, apparently, and the fact that I am here and have a guest room helped make her decision to come. She may come with a friend; that’s up in the air, I think. She wants to go for day hikes; I told her I might be game, but my stamina may not permit it. I may suggest to my sister-in-law that she give my friend guidance and possibly accompany her on day hikes. My sister-in-law may read this before I mention it to her. That’s the thing about blogs; they sometimes tend to pre-communicate.

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I finished watching To the Lake, a Netflix Russian-language series, last night. To save myself and readers the trouble, here’s how Wikipedia describes its plot:

Residents of Moscow are infected with an unknown deadly virus, the main symptoms of which are coughing and discoloration of the eyes, and after three to four days, death occurs. Nobody knows how to resist infection. The capital of the country is covered by an epidemic, gradually turning it into a city of the dead: there is no electricity, money has lost its value, chaos and lawlessness reign everywhere and gangs of marauders are gathering, the media are panicking, and those who are not yet infected are desperately fighting for food and gasoline. The city is being quarantined; all entrances to it are closed.

Fleeing from the epidemic, Sergei, along with his new lover, her autistic son, his own son, his ex-wife who could not forgive him, his father and the neighbors who joined them, go to Karelia. There, on a desert island in the middle of Vongozero, they want to hide from the threat of contamination in a refuge ship.

Against the background of a terrible global catastrophe, a cruel family drama is also played out. People who normally would never have been under the same roof must now unite to try to escape the growing epidemic. On the way, they will not only face various dangers, but also overcome family troubles, learn not only to survive, but also to forgive.

I found the series (only eight episodes of about 45 minutes or an hour each) fascinating. It is based on a debut novel by Russian writer Yana Vagner.

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I think it’s about time to devour a bowl of bran flakes. In an earlier time, I might have made shakshuka, but it’s not as much fun to cook for one as it is to cook for a couple. My wife sometimes enjoyed my forays into international breakfasts, but more often than not she simply put up with them (or opted to eat something else, much to my dismay). But having her here to watch or, at least, view the finished dish was always gratifying. I miss her so much in so many ways. Until just now, I was ready to charge into the day; now, I’m splintering.

My first blog was entitled Musings from Myopia. The second one was Brittle Road. The third, It Matters Deeply. Those three, plus this one, are the only ones with any significant substance. A few others, each only one or two or three posts long, have disappeared into the ether of my memories. They still may exist, but I have no reason to search for them. And then there is this one, the eponymous compilation of thoughts and emotions and ideas and contemplations I hoped might be worth recording for posterity. Maybe this one is simply a monument to my ego.

Despite multiple attempts to carve out or otherwise stake a claim to an intellectual legacy, the outcomes thus far have been inconsistent and incomplete. But that may be the most lasting lesson of my efforts—that consistency and completion cannot be achieved in the universe in which we live. Our world and everything in it is in a constant state of flux. None of us are consistently reliable. We steadfastly deviate from certainty. And the very idea that we really finish anything is laughable. We don’t even truly begin. Whether we know it or not, our efforts are just continuations of ideas of others; others about whom we may know little or nothing. Our knowledge is built in layers, like the petrified sediments of a million-year-old river bed. Each successive layer requires the ones that came before it to serve as its base. There may be an original layer, somewhere deep beneath the ones above, but probably it is thin and weak. And it may have merged with the ones above it, hiding its crucial role as the place where something started.

Digging deep into our own psyches, we can mine more riches than if we were to dig in a pit of diamonds. Looking within, we are capable of creating knowledge that simply cannot exist in a cursory universe. While we do not begin and we do not finish, we always serve as critical links between past and present and future. But only for ourselves. Only for that secret person hidden beneath the façades we show the world. For me, this blog is the tool I use to explore a mine; to find out where I have been, where I am, and where I might be going. This may sound mystical and mysterious, but it is far from it. Examining every facet of our lives allows us to know ourselves more thoroughly, though not completely. I think most people, though, either are afraid of searching beneath the surface layers. Or they do not realize the substrata reflect our selves far more realistically than does the surface.

I have more to say about this. But not just now. Now, I have other obligations that take my fingers from the keys.

When we are unsure of the directions our lives should take, everyone in our spheres want to become compasses. No matter how different we are from one another, the fact that we belong to the same species suggests we should follow paths trodden by those who share our taxonomy.  Perhaps, though, we are the ones who seek out compasses. We find it easier and less dangerous to let others blaze trails than to carve out our own. But danger finds us, no matter where we go. But when we make our own danger, the path back to safety is unsure.

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This is not working. I do not know what I want or need to say; only that, whatever it is, it is not reachable. A dog can’t fix it. A friend can’t fix it. Only time has a chance of fixing it, and that’s only a slim chance.

The unlit day was cloudy, cool, and windy as I wrote this. I knew these weather conditions from experience, because Bob already had insisted on going outside into the dark. I assumed he needed to relieve himself, but it seems he simply wanted to go on a walk. I’d only barely touched my coffee, so I rejected his demands after taking him out for a brief stroll. A moderate walk, about a mile, came later, but not until after daybreak. Still, he did not seem satisfied. He ate breakfast, slurped some water, and then behaved as if he was ready to begin again.

My plan was to write, before Bob insisted on taking over my morning. I think I may have to do what his former foster family did; put him in his kennel overnight and then let him out after they had sufficiently engaged with the following day to become servants, treating Bob like royalty. I have never fancied becoming a serf.

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Distractions, the ones impossible to ignore, wreck my thought processes. They redirect my thinking, turning it upside down and sideways. Even when I crave solitude, distractions can convince me otherwise, causing me to pack my schedule with events I would appreciate and enjoy another time, but not then—not when I need to carefully unwind the spiral spring steel that resides inside my head. Distractions hatch more distractions in a never-ending pattern until I can’t quite understand whether I live in this century or another one long since passed or yet to be.

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Desire can have the same effect as distractions. Desire can bend a thousand perpendicular, steely strands of thought into a twisted, garbled, impossibly knotted mat of fragile and incomplete ideas. Wishes tangled with wants tangled with hopes and thirsts and passions. That snarled mass of emotion transforms reason into ignorance; motive into blind impulse.

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The need for affection can decay into a willingness to accept the embrace of the nearest set of arms. Loss of self-respect cannot be far behind and, with it, the loss of any sense of purpose…even a twisted, gnarled, damaged sense of purpose. When affection becomes more important than life, that’s the moment danger wraps its ragged, skeletal hands around the neck and squeezes as if the end of life depended on it.

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My only reliable reason for living was my wife. We had plenty of difficulties and unmet challenges, but we relied on one another for love and a reason to be. Her absence leaves a terrible wound whose pain is being deadened with time, but the wound remains, infecting all the remaining tissue.

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A year ago I wrote about wanderlust, a desire to be on the road and to experience different landscapes and different relationships.  My mind produced these words: “My daydreams about hitting the road may be about developing new relationships without worrying about navigating around existing potholes. It may be easier to repair an axle broken by driving into a new pothole than repairing a relationship damaged by misinterpreting, as cues, messages that were never sent.” I can only guess at what caused me to write that.

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I’ll have lunch with friends today, then late this afternoon I’ll participate in a Zoom call with other friends who live far, far away. Before the day is out, I’ll try to arrange to pick up a loaner telescope from the library and I’ll try to submit a form to the State of Arkansas. How could I describe my “productivity” for the day? What value will I add to humanity during the next twelve hours? Hard to say, really. Impossible, actually.

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More groceries, plus household goods. Two orders from two stores. Little that’s truly necessary, but apparently it’s sufficiently important to me that I’ve willingly spent nearly  $100 to satisfy my wants. I pick up one order tomorrow morning and the other one very early the following day. I am reduced to talking about my grocery-buying habits. I have nothing else of value to say. Jesus! But the thing is I do not want to have to take ownership and responsibility for being of value (or lacking it). So it appears I will continue to bitch about being lazy, while wanting nothing more than to be lazy.  What a sour mood I’m in right now. And there’s really no reason for it.

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I have yet to shower or shave or eat breakfast. And I’ve had only a single cup of coffee. I am tired. I could sleep for a year.

A few days ago, the decision my late wife and I made to skip the joys and obligations of parenthood was a subject of my observations. Today, I am at least the temporary caretaker of a fifty-four pound lap dog named Bob; a dog that requires twice-daily feedings, at least two (usually, so far, more than two) walks per day, regular veterinary visits and the attendant expenses, unwavering attention, and more. And Bob has disrupted my life to some extent. My early morning solitude is a luxury of the past. Instead of getting up, making coffee, and meditating through my fingers, Bob urges me to take him outside. Now. He wants to walk. A more apt description is that he wants to run, his nose glued to the trail of some unknown target, but his desire is thwarted by having to drag an old man behind him.

As much as I like Bob, I wonder whether I have tricked myself into believing I need a companion? I wonder whether I just wanted a way to get through the loneliness? Yet my desire for a dog is not new. I have had a romanticized idea about dog companionship for a very long time. But I have not had a dog since I was in high school. I could have had a dog long, long ago. My wife would have been flexible about it; even though she did not embrace the idea, I am certain she would have been happy with a dog if it made me happy.

Do I really want a dog, or do I simply want the idea of how a dog at my side would make me feel? I suppose time will tell. But not too much time. I do not want a dog to become attached to me, only to be put back in the dog fostering system. The thing that really gives me second thoughts is the obvious fact that Bob wants room to run and frolic and play and chase real or imaginary quarry. I strongly suspect he had that kind of home before he was brought in to the HSV Animal Welfare League. I wish I knew more about his history. I thought, today, that he might have lived on or near Brookhill Ranch, where there’s lots of room to roam. I’m tempted to try to find out. But I’m not sure how. As much as I think Bob is a wonderful beast, I think he needs more room than I am able to give him. But if I’m his last best hope, then I’ll certainly give him a home.

Before I stumbled across an online listing for Bob, I was convinced the only dog for me would be a small (under 20 pound) dog; a friendly, easy-to-care-for animal that would quickly develop an attachment to me and vice versa. Bob is nearly three times the weight. He is fiercely powerful and dedicated to pull hard on his leash. He sits on command, but only when presented with a treat. He responds to a few other commands, but only in the right circumstances. He enjoys sitting in humans’ laps or sprawling on sofas.

I’m still leaning strongly toward keeping him, but I’m feeling quite guilty for doing it. He needs more space and energy than I am able to give him. Maybe if I bought some acreage and a mobile home…

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My home insurance bill came in the mail today, taking my breath and much of my financial cushion away. The size of the bill makes me seriously consider going “naked,” also known as self-insuring. Of course, self-insuring assumes adequate liquid cash to rebuild and restore one’s home and possessions. I ask everyone this question: do you have enough ready cash to rebuild your house and refurnish it with everything you have bought and kept for the last fifty years? If so, I applaud and admire and very nearly worship you. I don’t have that kind of cash sitting around collecting dust (or even interest). I will not go naked. I will pay the bill and plan to set aside even more each month so I have what it takes to pay the bill next year without blinking. My wife took care of this stuff until now; she provided the pump for the financial pipeline for our two-person family. I contributed gas and appreciation and recognition, but I did not get very involved. Now, I am. With each property tax bill and insurance statement and credit card statement, I am becoming more miserly.

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I went to be early last night, about 9:30, and awoke late, around 6:00. Despite the long hours of sleep last night I am so tired I can barely keep my eyes open. This has been something of a regular thing for several days, though, before I got Bob, so I cannot blame him. The other day, I fell asleep at my computer in the afternoon. I awoke and saw the computer clock read 6:27. I was confused; I thought I had slept late and that it was 6:27 in the morning. Maybe I am aging faster than I realized.  Whatever. I need a nap.

The decision to have children is, to many and perhaps most people, no more a decision than is growing hair. It is viewed as the inevitable outcome of maturation; the natural process of replenishing and enlarging the herd. Contravening the process is as deviant as plucking every follicle in one’s head and filling the void with a chemical to induce alopecia.

On the contrary, the decision NOT to have children often involves making irreversible judgments after engaging in long, deep, and difficult thought. The hair analogy really does not quite reach the level of gravity involved; deciding against having children is more like opting to remove a limb. Obviously, one can choose to “correct” that decision with a prosthesis. The closest thing to it, with regard to children, is adoption; but after deciding against having children, I suspect agencies are not likely to permit adoption. That is not so in cases of infertility, etc. Once the decision is made and confirmed by vasectomy or other such procedure, the permanence of the choice is pretty much set in stone. But, I know very few people who, after having made the decision, wished they could reverse it. It’s simply the right decision for those who make it, despite the fact that some of them have the occasional and short-lived regret that there will be no grandchildren and no one to care for them in old age.

I have never regretted our decision against having children, aside from the very, very, very occasional (read that as “rare as ten-carat diamonds”) tinge. I’m happy to have a niece and nephews. But I think I would have made a miserable father. I would have resented the time and money and emotions I would have had to spend on children. Selfishness is a very good sign that opting to have children is a bad, bad choice. Maybe, though, all of this is on my mind right now because I’m coming to grips with the fact that I’m an old man and I’m alone. When the time inevitably comes when I grow weak and feeble and unable to look after myself, my options will be extremely limited. A civil, humane society would provide resources to peacefully and painlessly bring a lifetime to an end. Instead, our society  turns us into criminals who may have to illicitly assemble tools of compassion.

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I finished watching my Danish series, Warrior, last night. It got better as the series developed. Or my criticism weakened. Or I finally gave in to the idea that I do not really require high art in my entertainment. Sometimes, simple stuff that doesn’t pass the “willing suspension of disbelief” test is perfectly fine. But I draw the line on mindless slapstick. Usually. I don’t know what I want to watch next. If anything. I may have temporarily tired of the television screen and books and computer monitors and magazines. I may have tired of everything. Almost everything seems artificial. Relationships of all kinds are brittle replicas of reality so fragile they break into pieces when touched by frayed nerve endings. Life is not like a police drama in which a crime is committed, the criminal is caught and tried, and the future is successfully sealed in a half-hour episode.

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Yesterday was a good day. It should have left me with a platform upon which to build an excellent weekend. But in spite of positives, I’m sitting on a mat of shredded, decaying leaves loosely tethered by thin vines to the edges of a canyon fifty yards to either side. A thousand feet below me, a surly river rushes between jagged rocks and broken ledges. I’m bound, hand and foot, with barbed wire. And my nose itches.

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I’m scheduled to meet Bob this morning. Bob is a Mountain Cur mix, the Village Animal Welfare League says. Bigger than I was hoping to find, but apparently a nice temperament. We’ll see. Bob may require more exercise than I am able or willing to provide. And they tell me he insists on lolling about on the furniture. But, still. We’ll see, as I said. Over and over and over again.

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The backstory is too long to tell here. I received a multi-page handwritten letter from a young woman (as in 40+) yesterday afternoon. She’s a Facebook friend by way of my sister-in-law. Though we only barely know each other (I met her in person once and I’ve exchanged short messages with her…maybe twice). At any rate, the letter was a delight to receive, despite the fact that it revealed displeasure with her life at the moment. If I could write legibly, I would write a handwritten letter back to her; but I hope she’s satisfied with a typed letter. Her letter to me is part of a project she’s launched to write handwritten letters to people who are willing to receive them (I think to prompt her to get back in the habit of doing what she used to do).

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I’ve arranged to borrow a telescope from the library next Tuesday. The weather forecast calls for clouds and rain for the remainder of next week, so the telescope probably will sit, unused, for several days. The first day when sunny skies are forecast is Thursday, March 18. The forecast may change between now and then, of course.  But on March 15, I will participate in a Zoom educational program about dark night skies; I hope to learn enough about night sky viewing to know at least a little about what I’ll seen through the telescope.

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Time for breakfast. I’m hungry for something, but I don’t know what.

Dr. Fauci and another medical specialist used a word in response to interview questions yesterday that sounded, to me, a bit “stuffy.” The word is “efficacious,” a synonym for which is “effective.” Had I been the one speaking to the press, I would have used “effective,” but I am not a medical doctor. The website, etymonline.com, defines it as “sure to have the desired effect (often of medicines),” so I suppose it is not used to demonstrate superiority of the speaker. Perhaps I’m just a thin-skinned skeptic who prefers his own sesquipedalian usage. I hope not, though. I do like to use words with which I am either unfamiliar or only moderately familiar; it helps build my vocabulary, though my memory is fighting against that endeavor. For example, I’d forgotten the word for “given to using long or multisyllabic words.” I had to look it up; once I saw sesquipedalian, I remembered. But if I saw the word without a definition attached, I’d probably recognize it as a word I once knew but no longer remember.

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This post was not expected. At least not by me. I wrote a second post yesterday to take the place of this one, which I thought I would not have time to write. What with showering, shaving, and tidying up the house for the bi-monthly housekeeper, I thought I’d be hard-pressed to finish my “chores” before it was time to leave the house. Wrong. If I’d get over my penchant for cleaning up in preparation for the person I pay to clean up, I’d have more time. Or if I can’t stop myself from cleaning up, maybe I should stop paying someone to re-do what I just did. I know I am not alone in that absurd habit. Am I?

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I watched another couple of episodes of the Danish series, Warrior, last night. It’s not especially good, but it’s entertaining and sufficiently action-packed to keep my attention. Plus, I get to hear people speaking Dutch. That’s not common in Central Arkansas, so it’s worth a trip into the bowels of Netflix to get enmeshed in another culture and language. I find films and series in which characters interact in Spanish and French and Arabic to be just as interesting. Dutch fears of Afghans and vice versa flow just under the surface of the series, at least under part of it, and that’s an interesting tension to watch and hear.

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Once again, out of the blue, I got horrific leg cramps in the middle of the night last night. I was in the midst of a dream in which I felt awful pain in my legs; when I woke up, the scene was different but the pain was real. I hadn’t been using good leg-cramp-avoidance practices; I got up (finally, after painfully forcing my legs to cooperate) and drank a few big swigs of tonic water. Maybe it helped. Or maybe it was the stomping of my feet. Or perhaps the profanity had something to do with the subsidence of agony. Damned leg cramps.

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A British doctor with a Middle Eastern name presents, on a BBC video, his theories about seduction. It’s an interesting piece, though it has been a few weeks since I watched it. He defines seduction in a broader sense that most of us do and he claims seduction techniques work to achieve desired results in any number of endeavors, from romance and sex to job promotions and getting hired. Seduction plays a part in every part of our lives, he says, suggesting that the better one gets at seduction, the more likely it will be that the person will enjoy success in all aspects of his or her life.

I’m probably written about Leon Redbone and his song, “I Want to be Seduced,” before. I like that song. It’s so straightforward; incredibly direct.  Here are some of the lyrics I find appealing:

I want to be seduced,
I want a woman to take me out to dinner for two
I want to see her eyes gettin’ moody,
Flirtin’ with the thought of what flirtin’ can lead to
I want to act real cool, have her think about gettin’ little me in bed
Have a chat about Magna Charta, or Puerto Vallarta, or somethin’ Gandhi said
I might demure politely,  falter slightly, if she starts to fondle my knee,
But I’m relatively certain I’d compromise if I know me

I think the appeal is in the last line; “But I’m relatively certain I’d compromise if I know me.” Brutal honesty; but, then, that’s the way he begins the verse and the song. Nothing different, no surprise, but still it’s a flash of honesty that labels him in an unflattering way.

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Time to go. Off to Hot Springs.

Given that I seriously doubt I’ll have either the time or the inclination to write tomorrow morning, I’m writing Friday morning’s post on Thursday afternoon, instead. The possibility exists that I will write tomorrow, as well, but if not, I’m covered.

There was a time that I would type long letters to friends and family, but the letters rarely received replies. I am a throwback to a time when people wrote to one another instead of emailing or texting or calling or whatever. I do some of those things, too, but I prefer “writing.” My handwriting is illegible, no matter how hard I try to make it legible, so typing is the best option. I’ve read letters written in the 1800s, though, and their illegibility is simply more consistently attractive than my illegibility. I wonder how in hell people could read the stuff I’ve seen. But I suppose they could; perhaps it’s not my writing’s illegibility that’s the problem; perhaps it’s my illiteracy. Maybe I just cannot read cursive writing. I’m convinced that’s not the case, though; though it could be that I cannot read 1800s style cursive writing. Not that any of this matters much. Back to letters. I made the transition from letter-writing to blog-writing. My blog posts don’t get much response, either, but at least I know they can be read. But, then, so could my typed letters. Maybe it’s not the format; maybe it’s the content. Stream-of-consciousness insanity can be hard to follow and harder still to enjoy.

I have no idea where I was going with this. Suffice it to say I do not want to start over, so I’ll leave it as it is and hope some day I’ll remember what I was planning to write, so I can finish it.

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Thanks to a phone call from a friend who had just gotten her COVID-19 vaccination, I got my first vaccination today, too. She was notified yesterday she had been assigned to a slot at noon today. After she got her shot and was waiting the obligatory 15 minutes afterward before leaving, she was told there was a slight surplus of vaccines for that time slot and that people who arrived before 12:30 would be eligible to get a vaccination without an appointment. Her call came in about 12:15; I thought it impossible to get to the site before 12:30 and I was right. I arrived at 12:39. They accommodated me in spite of my tardiness. And I now have an appointment for a second shot on April 1. So, two trips to Little Rock to get my injections have been avoided. I cancelled my March 11 slot in Little Rock after I got home.

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On a very definitely related subject: the volunteers and professionals at the Balboa Baptist Church, where the shots were given, were extraordinary. The church provided the space and a number of its members provided the staffing to orchestrate and implement a remarkably well-organized process. From parking directors to parking lot ushers to people who checked credentials and provided forms for visitors to complete in advance of the shots, the volunteers were nothing short of spectacular. And the nurses and other professional staff were equally as capable and as friendly as the volunteers. I’ve rarely been so impressed with what amounts to an almost all-volunteer people-management process. Accolades to the Balboa Baptist Church. If they would radically alter their dogma, etc., I might visit occasionally just to express my appreciation.  😉

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Today’s weather has been outstanding. I think it’s about 72°F now and the brilliant blue skies are pristine and clear. Though the day started chilly, it warmed up nicely and very quickly. Word on the street, though, is that the temperature will drop to around 45°F tonight and will reach only 54°F tomorrow, with showers and clouds most of the day. If things go according to plan, I will take a friend in to town for a dental procedure and, then, if the timing is right, I will meet a friend and her partner for lunch at Superior Brewery. A little later, I am scheduled to have a telephone consultation with a doctor about the possibility of getting a medical marijuana card, the purpose of which will be to enable me to purchase products that may address should and neck pain and a few other physical outcomes of geezerhood. The possibility exists that the non-purchaser of my Camry will drop by later in the day to return the car’s maintenance and repair records. If so, I will invite her in for wine, as she seems to be an intriguing person who shares some interests with me. If not, I am not sure what I will do. But since I have wine and televisions and books and Spotify in the house, I have a pretty good idea.

Tonight, too. Anyone want to come over?

A chilling news item was posted twelve hours ago on the BBC.com website. The article indicates that thirteen of twenty-five people traveling in a Ford SUV were killed near Imperial, California when the vehicle pulled directly into the path of a Peterbilt truck loaded with gravel. The SUV’s legal capacity was eight or nine. The article attributes a statement made by a spokesman for the Border Patrol as follows: the people in the SUV “could be farmworkers involved in harvesting winter greens in the mainly agricultural area.” Regardless of whether one thinks overburdening an SUV with so many passengers is negligent, the fact that thirteen people died is horrendous. I surmise (though I may be wrong) that the passengers had few options; many or most or perhaps all of them had no other means of transportation. If they were migrant workers, probably they earned very low wages for backbreaking work. They were scraping by. But maybe not; maybe they simply chose to cram into an SUV instead of driving their late-model SUVs and sedans to work in the field. Maybe their work in the fields was simply a hobby, a way to connect with other wealthy people who needlessly take away jobs from people who really need the money. Yeah. Maybe they deserved what they got. The most bothersome aspect of the attitude that they stole jobs and got what they deserved is that many people actually believe such idiocy.

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Another, more uplifting, video piece on BBC.com explains why we cannot go faster than the speed of light. One of my favorite sentences from the video says “As a kid, I sorta thought of StarTrek as being like a documentary about the future.” According to the animated video (and according to physicists the world over), it would take an infinite amount of energy to go as fast as, or faster than, the speed of light. And if one were already going that fast, it would take an infinite amount of energy to slow down. These concepts are beyond my capacity to fully understand, but I think I may attempt to disprove Einstein’s theory of relativity in my next incarnation. Except that I do not believe I will have another incarnation, so that becomes a dilemma for which there is no solution. A solution can be, among other things, either an answer to a problem, the process by which one reaches the answer, or a homogeneous molecular mixture of two or more substances. The challenges and thrills of language can be almost orgasmic! I sometimes wonder whether language arose out of the innate need to communicate about sudden waves of keen physical excitement or emotions. Not really; I’ve never wondered that at all. I’m just making things up with my fingers.

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If I did not have to meet a schedule today, I think I’d spend the morning watching BBC.com videos on subjects related to physics and science. Consider the following titles available right now:

• Does Our Universe Have a Twin?
• Is Our Perception of Time Wrong?
• The Flaw in Every Recipe Book
• How Your Toaster Explains the Universe
• Probing the Universe’s Dark Energy
• Our Window into the Universe
• Is Our Future Set in Stone?
• The Other Dimensions that Could Exist
• What is the Smallest Particle?
• Einstein’s Big Idea Made Simple
• What Happens Inside a Black Hole?
• What is the Universe Expanding Into?
• Why the Sky is Dark at Night
• Can We Trust What Science Tells Us?

Granted, several of these are extremely simplistic, presenting information most of us already know (or think we do). But they tend to resurrect interests that we might have lost. Or, at least, they trigger curiosity that helps retrieve the awe we felt, as children, when we looked into the sky and wondered what was “out there” or what part we play in the overarching scheme of existence. Too often, I allow myself to overlook the awe I still feel when I look at close-up images of insects and see the intricate patterns woven into their bodies. And I don’t take the time to think deeply enough about what might be hidden from our view on the other side of the Milky Way galaxy. And I fail to give in to the sense of overwhelming wonder at the ability of ants to communicate in the midst of chaos on the ant hill. It’s not science so much that enthralls me as all of existence. Our life spans should be thousands of years long, not just decades; we could absorb so much if we just had the time and took it seriously.

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No word yet on my application to adopt Rosie the Chihuahua mix. I’m patient this morning (believe it or not), though. Whatever happens, happens, when it happens.

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If life were fair and just, my sculpted bronze well-muscled body would not be changed by the unlimited consumption of highly caloric foods. Exercise would be irrelevant, though with a body like mine it would be easy and enjoyable. Excellent health would be my lifelong destiny, no matter my habits, the risks I take, or the environment in which I live. My brain would quickly and complete absorb all information and knowledge passing through it. My unfulfilled desire this morning for two or three jalapeño-sausage kolaches would not trigger feelings of guilt; not even if my desire were fulfilled would I feel guilt. But, alas, life is fickle and harsh and demanding.

It’s nearing 7:00 and I have obligations to meet this morning, so I’ll end my regular morning diatribe and go to battle with the enemies of sloth.

I Care a Lot was not on my list of films to watch. Netflix simply stuck it in my face as I was beginning the process of sorting through entertainment options available on the platform. Too lazy to make my own decision, I accepted the suggestion and began watching the film. The antiheroine is a monstrous witch who cons the court into appointing her guardian for well-off elders. She places them in friendly (to her) nursing homes and keeps them locked inside while she siphons their assets into her own accounts. I’ll leave it there, in the event someone reading this wants to view I Care a Lot. I still have about 20 minutes left to view. I just couldn’t keep my eyes open last night. It was not necessarily the movie; I just needed sleep. Many elements of the film are intended to be comedic. The subject of the plot, though, is a hot button for me. As I watched it last night, I found myself wanting desperately to bludgeon the main character and leave her limp, dying body in the nursing home administrator’s office. Cheery thought to wake up to on a Tuesday morning, eh?

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Yesterday, after my appointment with my oncologist (all’s well), I picked up a check in payment for the sale of my wounded Camry. As I cleared out the console, glove compartment, and trunk, it occurred to me that I have no place to put some of the crap I had stored in those places. Not only do I have no place to put it, I have to reason to keep it. So, I will spend some time today sorting it into piles; keep and toss. I’d bet the toss pile will be considerably larger. The buyer, the garage that accidentally damaged the driver’s side door, is in the midst of repairing the car. A new door will be installed and painted. Who knows what else will be done to the car? They plan on selling it, they say. I have to make sure that, today, I cancel my insurance on the car and that I notify the State that I’ve sold it.

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After taking care of the car business, I followed up by telephone on a letter I mailed more than a month ago to a financial institution, requesting that a joint account be changed into my name. The call led to yet another form to complete and mail. This process may take years to complete, at the rate it’s going. And, then, I went to the bank to accomplish the same objective and to order new checks and deposit slips (though I can make deposits with my phone); a much simpler process. Later, still, I completed an online application to become Rosie’s human; Rosie, the five and a half year old Chihuahua mix. And I submitted another online request for a telephone appointment this Friday. And I left a message with a guy at the Garland County Library in preparation for borrowing a telescope.

It’s turning into a busy week. I have multiple odds and ends on my calendar for the rest of this week. For some reason, I am not finding them especially burdensome, unlike in weeks past. Recently, I felt that a full calendar was maddening and oppressive. I am feeling “chill” about things at the moment.

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Why is it, I wonder, that news organizations tend to give prominence to negative news stories? For example, why does the kidnapping of 279 Nigerian schoolgirls seem to get more coverage than their release? Or is my sense that the kidnapping got more coverage than the release overblown? In both cases, though, the underlying story is one involving fear, crime, treachery, and intense danger. Those negatives seem much more likely to get reported than softer, happier, uplifting events. I suppose news organizations, as much as they try to report “just the news,” respond to public demand. We clamor for more chilling, adrenalin-pumping, heart-pounding stories. On occasion, we love the good feelings we get from reading a positive piece, but it’s the grittier stuff we seem to crave the most. Is it possible to train ourselves to respond more favorably and more vocally and more excitedly to “good” news? The bottom line, I suppose, is that we tend to define “news” in a negative context. It’s more newsworthy to report an explosion at a chemical plant than it is to report its milestone of twenty years without a single safety infraction. I have no answers. Only questions.

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I am jealous. Jealous of people who have a claim on the time of other people with whom I would like to spend more time. I’ve explored the meaning of the word. The definition that most closely fits is “feeling resentment against someone because of that person’s rivalry, success, or advantages.” That’s it. I resent people who rival me for the time and affection of others. But, no, it’s not resentment; it’s envy. I’m not the jealous husband. I am jealous of the husband. I envy the husband. And the friends. And the fortunate pets that can nap comfortably with their heads in the laps of the objects of my affection. I realize, of course, how utterly creepy this must seem. If I were a more skilled and patient writer, it would come across as more benign and beneficent. Affection is a dangerous word. Its meaning and its synonyms range from care and closeness to love and passion. That’s the problem with some words. They can be interpreted, legitimately, to mean much more or much less than might have been intended.

As I think on this somewhat strange topic (which wouldn’t be so weird if I were better at this), I remember a song by Emerson, Lake, and Palmer from my high school days: Lucky Man. The message, essentially, is that envy can dismiss elements of a life of which we would not be envious. The “lucky man” in the song had all the trappings of success until “no money could save him.” I place myself in the position of the “lucky man,” the man who had everything. At the same time, the object of my envy remains in the same position. Suddenly, in my case, the world seemed to snap; no money could save me from a random universe. But friends and affection can. Yet I seem to long for higher dosages. Maybe it’s like an addiction to heroin; more and more and more is required  to satisfy my need for the drug. (Is that the way heroin works?)

Why is it that a man who claims to be so solitary—so introverted, so attuned to aloneness—want or need more and more individual, personal engagement? I was sure I had all I ever needed, with my wife. Without her, though, I sometimes feel utterly adrift and detached and in need of an anchor.  Okay. Enough of this B.S. My sister-in-law is on her way over for our regular morning coffee. If it weren’t for that routine, I think I might be even more adrift.

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Another grocery order is in the offing, and so soon after my most recent one. I did not bother to look closely at what I need. And there is more. So, another order online. Or I may get aggressive and go inside Kroger, where I can find things I miss so very much. Like Zatarain’s Creole Mustard and Minute Maid frozen lemon juice concentrate and Mediterranean oregano leaves And Kroger brand diet tonic water. And various other little luxuries.

My Sunday evening continued, even after I wrote about finishing Hinterland and my experiences over the past few days. Despite feeling tired and ready for sleep, I opted to stay up, thinking I would begin watching Hillbilly Ellegy and finish it Monday. I finished watching it just before 11:20 Sunday night. I enjoyed it immensely, despite its tendency to drag tears from my unwilling eyes. That’s life. I’ve intended, for quite some time, to read the memoir upon which the film is based. I think watching the movie has provided the impetus to get my hands on the book.

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I misspoke (miswrote?) in my last post. The most enjoyable experiences of the last several days did not contribute in any way to my sense of strangulation by kudzu. Those experiences saved me from that unpleasant fate. They provided comfort when I needed it most; they chopped away at the vine, freeing me to breathe fresh air. And, of course, I was wrong about relaxing rather than writing this morning; writing IS relaxing to me, at least most of the time. So here I am again, writing about whatever pops into my head.

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My list of things to do includes making an appointment with an ophthalmologist (or, at least, an optometrist) to update my prescription for eyeglasses. Once I get the prescription, I’m going to invest heavily in coddling my vision. First, I’ll get new glasses with frames that will accommodate magnetic snap-on sunglasses. Then, I’ll get a pair of reading glasses and a pair of computer glasses. Even though my “normal” glasses will include an invisible band of the lens for reading, a lens dedicated to reading is the only way I will be totally content as a reader. And the computer glasses will enable me to avoid kinks in my neck from trying to see the computer screen clearly. First world problems, to be sure, but this is a luxury I feel is a “necessary” luxury.

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Eventually, our brains quench the fires of the unattainable. Over time, intense desire dissipates into a clutching fog that clings to us forever but finally loosens its powerful grip. At some point, we can move on, damaged but not destroyed.

But in the midst of that fierce longing, we feel certain it will never release us. We don’t believe there will be an end to hungering for that which will never be within our grasp.  Futile craving can lead to madness if we cannot tolerate the wait or do not believe waiting will ease the pain of impossibility.

So, that’s how I will frame the position of a character I one day will write about. He will be secretly in love with a married woman who senses his desire but who, he decides, does not feel the same way about him. He dares not reveal his feelings to her, and the impossibility of having a relationship with her tortures him. But, suddenly, the woman’s husband leaves her for another woman. And then, almost as suddenly (and before the character gathers sufficient courage to approach her), the woman enters into a relationship with another man.

This sounds a little too much like soap opera stuff to me. It needs massive rethinking and, very probably, disposal. That’s what happens to many of my plots. They go nowhere because they start from nothing and end in the same place. Maybe that’s why I’m writing so much stream-of-consciousness non-fiction.

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A friend called my attention to a CNN piece about international soups. I found the piece online and copied the article. Among the soups are bouillabaisse (synonymous with Marseilles, the article says), chorba frik (a North African soup popular after sunset during Ramadan), chupe de camarones (Peru), gazpacho (Spain), moqueca de camarão (Brazil), yayla çorbasi (Turkey), among others. I am fascinated by international cuisine, so I will make it another of my missions to seek out recipes and ingredients for many of these soups. The CNN article seems to have emerged from a book entitled Soup: A Global History, by Janet Clarkson. I’ll have to look for it.

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Enough of this for now. Three more hours until my appointment with my oncologist. In the interim, I have to shave, shower, and otherwise make myself presentable to the world outside my window.  And I wasn’t going to write this morning. I am a dissembler, apparently.

During the past several days, my budding social life (such as it is) blossomed into a garden. Dinner on Wednesday, followed by wine and hors d’oeuvres on Thursday, followed by two delightful hours with a good friend on Friday, culminating with another dinner on Saturday.  In between times and after, I had lunch with a new acquaintance and coffee and games of Words with Friends and Mexican Train with my sister-in-law, and a sprinkling of other social interactions. While I should perhaps consider the whirlwind of activity the equivalent of dancing in a field of fresh clover, even the most enjoyable elements began to collectively feel a bit like  kudzu vines attempting to strangle me. Each of the experiences were enjoyable, but rare and pleasant experiences are meant to provide the punctuation, not the full-diagrammed sentence structure of a paragraph. Or a novel. So, this evening has been a nice respite. I finished the series, Hinterland, before 8:00 p.m. so I could take a break and write/journal a bit. Whether these words find their way onto my blog remains to be seen. They may, instead, join thousands of others I keep locked away for my own eyes, though my private collection is shrinking in comparative size. Lately, I’ve tended to share damn near everything except for the most intimate things that would embarrass me or embarrass the people on my mind or subject me to potential arrest and imprisonment.

I don’t recall who, but someone, told me within the last few days that I am gregarious. I think it may have been the neighbor who does not know me well (though, in all fairness, most neighbors don’t). Whoever it was doesn’t recognize artificial extroversion practiced by deeply introverted people. I learned the practice during my first actual “executive” job (the one that first introduced me to dictating equipment and provided me with secretarial support). Unless I aggressively injected myself into conversations and, especially, discussions at meetings, I would have failed at my job. I had an aversion to failure, so I cringed and jumped in, learning from my actually gregarious boss. It was an incredibly stressful situation, but I was able to go home after work and decompress in solitude with my equally (or more) introverted wife. Since then, I’ve been able to withdraw into much greater comfort; I can simply observe and jump in only when I think I have something to say that matters. Which is, as I think I’ve said recently, rare. I do not miss most aspects of association management, the career I fell into entirely by accident. If I had it to do over again, I think I would attempt to escape into something that had a greater likelihood of making a positive difference in the world. Like trash collection or urban planning or rural water supply systems or cartography or auto oil change. Or almost anything else.

Now that the available seasons of Hinterland are behind me, I have a thousand other options. But my list of “must see” is too large, so I avoid looking at it; too many options can paralyze me. That’s when I think seriously about stained glass and sword-swallowing and jumping out of moving automobiles. Not really. I never seriously consider sword-swallowing.  But thinking about professions, I remember this adaptation of a silly meme from Facebook:

The photos were taken during my efforts to grow my hair. I succeeded, by the way. These photos were during the shorter period, before my hair grew down past the middle of my back; before I was able to have it pulled back into a pony tail and before, at the every end, my wife agreed to have my sister-in-law do a French braid. Those were the days when my hair regularly blew into my mouth, causing me to develop an intense dislike of long hair on my head.

I’m writing Sunday night because I think I’ll feel a bit lazy tomorrow morning and will want to kick back and relax with my coffee, rather than write. I’ll shave, take a leisurely shower, and then dress when I feel like it; as long as I can get downtown before 10:00 for an appointment with my oncologist. After that, I’ll go pick up the check in payment for buying the old Camry and then come home and relax some more. Maybe I’ll be able to convince myself to go through a mass of papers that I desperately need to sort and file and otherwise act on. Maybe by then I will have received a reply to an email I sent to a friend this evening, making inquiry about life in general. We’ll see. We will, indeed.

Considering the number of times I mention BBC.com in my posts, one might think I have stock in BBC. I don’t, but perhaps I should. Just this morning, I read a piece about Yaupon and learned that it is North America’s only known native caffeinated plant. I learned, too, that it once was a popular plant used to brew tea by almost all indigenous tribes. And it’s readily available throughout the southeastern United States. Where else but BBC.com is one apt to read about such a common native plant in a context that includes sentences like this:

At the Spanish outpost of Saint Augustine in northern Florida, yaupon was consumed to such an extent that in his 1615 chronicles of New World medicinal plants, botanist Francisco Ximenez noted that, “Any day that a Spaniard does not drink it, he feels he is going to die.”

Exactly! For that experience, and so many others, I nominate BBC.com for some unknown prize that will recognize the extent of its deeply interesting journalism and the fascinating ideas that spring from it.

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Last night, among the topics of conversation after dinner was a discussion of nudity. My neighbors, at least the female component of the couple, commented about the nude beaches in Germany (from whence her husband came). This was in response to something I said, questioning the prudishness of Americans and pointing to Americans’ almost pathological fear of the human form. She responded that the nude beaches in Germany displayed unappealing nudity; taut young bodies with sculpted shapes and rippling muscles are one thing, she suggested, while elderly pot bellies and flabby arms and drooping boobs are quite another. Clearly, we have different perspectives. I implied, but did not say it outright, that I advocate teaching kids, from an early age, that nudity is no more unpleasant or unappealing or embarrassing or wrong than full-dressed people going to work every day. I guess nudity is right up there with BBC.com in terms of the number of times I mention it and the potential for its use as an educational tool. I think the single most appealing aspect of common public nudity would be the potential erasure of body-shaming. People should not be embarrassed of their own bodies. Of course, I readily admit to being embarrassed by mine and it’s unlikely I will lead the charge for public nudity. I would follow a charismatic leader, though.

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The neighbors I hosted for dinner last night (the ones with whom I discussed nudity) enjoyed the eggplant parmesan I bought from Dolce Vita, as did I. We had good conversation, a nice dinner, and plenty of laughs. They sensed I was tired, though, so they insisted on leaving before they would normally have gone home. I suppose my attempts to dissuade them from leaving were silly, given that they were right and I probably looked and sounded like I was ready for them to leave. Long before they left, I had developed a splitting headache and a very sore throat. I noticed a slight cough, beginning around 7:30 p.m., that got progressively worse. After my neighbors left, I felt like I might have had a fever, but the thermometer disagreed, measuring my temperature at 97.6°F. In these days of COVID-19, I was a bit concerned, though the symptoms were not entirely in line with COVID.

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There was no way I would be able to sleep with the headache, I decided, so instead I did a search on animal adoption sites, looking for a potential companion dog. I found Rosie, an adult Chihuahua mix, who looks like she might enjoy being in my company and vice versa. On a whim, I sent an inquiry. I got a response around 11:20, inviting me to complete an application. By that time, though, I was about ready to try to get to sleep. During my search of animal adoption sites, my headache improved and then returned with a vengeance. I decided to try to get some sleep. I was able to fall asleep fairly quickly, but I woke several times with a very dry mouth and a sense that I had just emerged from a troubling dream about which I had (and still have) absolutely no recollection.

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My headache, not nearly as severe as it was last night, remains (or has returned). My neck and shoulders remain stiff and achy. I would pay handsomely for a neck and shoulder rub, though I would prefer caring caresses given freely. Caress is probably not the right term; strong hands and significant pressure would be far more comforting at this very moment, I think. But I probably wouldn’t refuse caring caresses, either. A massage from my forehead all the way around to the back of my head might help, too. I’ve tried it myself, using only the fingers on my left hand, to press hard enough on my forehead so that the pain might be relieved; it helped, but it’s not quite accomplishing the alleviation of pain I had hoped for. The pain is not bad, though. Coffee, alone, may take care of it.

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Passion. When does it fade into the background in our lives? At what point do our passions develop protective crusts that hide them from others and from ourselves? I wonder about these subjects and all such matters involving emotion. Emotions evolve over time, I suppose. They tend to become less brittle or, depending on one’s perspective, more flexible. Their hold over us weakens; or, at least, I think passion’s hold over us weakens. Passions tend to lose much of their intensity as we age, though that’s not a universal statement of fact. The urgency of youthful romantic passions mellows in old age, although I think it can be triggered again. We become used to the familiar; the familiar can lose its ability to stir passions. But I think an injection of freshness and novelty and just simple difference can stir them. That’s true not just of relationships between people, but relationships involving activities; a person can become passionate about skydiving or creating stained glass objects or making pottery or caring for abandoned or abused animals. New activities can fill a void, inflaming passions in the process. But that doesn’t happen to all people when their passions flag. Some people just wither, emotionally. That is a dangerous transition, I think. I am afraid withered emotions can suck out one’s energy and leave an empty shell. Passion is a good thing. But it can be overwhelming, I suppose, to be in the presence of someone who is passionate, regardless of the object of their passions, whether the object is automobiles, jumping out of airplanes, tending to stray dogs, or entering into passionate personal relationships.

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I hear sounds all the time. Unusual sounds, like a background noise of millions of crickets. It’s not overwhelming; I can hear everything else, but even in silence, I hear those damn background noises. I say it’s not overwhelming. Sometimes it is. I can imagine, one day, reacting to those constant annoying sounds by detonating a nuclear device in each of my ears, just to make the sounds stop. That might be overkill, but I’m pretty sure it would work.

I’m suddenly so tired I can barely keep my eyes open. I have to stop. Maybe a short nap. Enough of these bullet point snippets. I need to sleep and dream an entire novel.

I control an incredibly small section of a tiny slice of an almost impossibly minuscule fragment of a microscopic piece of the universe. My control is equivalent to the power over the gravitational pull of the sun possessed by a one-hundred billionth segment of an organism barely visible through the most powerful electron microscope. But that power is absolute, within tightly defined infinitesimal parameters. In other words, the power I possess is insufficient to cause a tiny, almost imperceptible, movement of the hair on a gnat’s back by a micro-fraction of a Planck Length.

But I behave as if my power were as expansive as the sky; as boundless as the edges of the most distant galaxies. Because I know no better. None of us do. So we claim powers we do not have because…power. Power, we seem to believe, equates to redemptive capacity. We have the power to redeem even the most irredeemable among us. Which, of course, is absolute nonsense. Some of us are too stupid to warrant wasting the air we breathe. Some of us are too dull to be allowed to continue consuming water than could go to a more deserving cause, like quenching the thirst of a long-dead cactus, shriveled on the surface of a desert so hot no human being could ever hope to live there. But we continue to allow breathing and consumption of water. Because. Just because.

And with that, I welcome everyone to the ninth Saturday of the two thousand twenty-first year. Our artificial measure of time based on events that took place long after the formation of the planet on which we live, not on a sequence that began with that formation. No matter, it would all be artificial. I like the definition adopted by an online dictionary:

“the system of those sequential relations that any event has to any other, as past, present, or future; indefinite and continuous duration regarded as that in which events succeed one another.”

An arcane explanation of a concept impossible to grasp except in the most elementary terms. “Time” for us Earthlings is an abbreviation for a sequence that relies on the relationship between the movement of the Earth and the Sun.

In fact, though, time is not so mysterious. It is what allows us to understand our experiences. Without time to serve as a guidepost, we would be lost. Even though we don’t fully understand time, we are in love with it, even in instances we want it to stop. As in situations such as the one I will mention briefly in a moment.

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I had a delightful afternoon yesterday, the sort of experience I wish I could have every day. It was full of the kinds of casual interactions with a friend that weave a relationship made from threads of friendship and love. My friend came to my house and we sat and talked the entire time she was here. I haven’t laughed so much and so freely in a long time. I haven’t felt so utterly at ease for so long it is impossible for me to remember the last time. Those few hours made me feel relaxed and comfortable with myself and the world around me. But now the absence of that sense of deep comfort has dissipated; I will have to wait until the next time to feel so comfortable with and close to someone.

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Tonight, I’ll have neighbors over for dinner that I will buy at La Dolce Vita, an Italian restaurant nearby. I’ve already arranged for three orders of eggplant parmesan, along with side salads. In a short while, I’ll go to the liquor store to buy a large bottle of their “go-to” wine. These people are neighbors who have invited me over many times for dinner. They did it again, but I suggested it was my turn to treat them; fortunately, they were happy to accept. There’s really not much I need to do in preparation, other than straighten up a bit and pick up the dinners. As much as I enjoy cooking, lately I’ve not felt much like getting into it. Maybe my attitude will change as I start to see evidence of Spring.

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Yesterday, I arranged to go. on Monday, to retrieve the contents of the 2002 Camry and pick up a check in payment for its purchase. I’ll sign the title over to the new owner, go deposit the check, and mark that task off my to-do list. I went to the garage late yesterday morning, where I was to meet the former potential buyer of the car to discuss the matter with the business owner. He was not there, but it all got resolved later. Inasmuch as it was around lunchtime, the former potential buyer of the Camry mentioned that she was in the mood for barbecue at Clampit’s. I invited myself to join her. We sat and talked over lunch for an hour or so. She is interesting and energetic and very intelligent. It was a nice opportunity to relax and learn some intriguing facts about a person I did not know much about.

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Despite my social calendar of late, I am not a “social butterfly.” It just happens I’ve been much more social in the past few days than ever before. As much as I enjoy these interactions, I find they tire me out, especially with people with whom I am not extremely close. Which is, of course, most people. Yesterday afternoon was the exception.

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I got up very late this morning. Though I awoke around 5, I went back to bed and slept until almost 7. When I got up, I was slow to get going. By the time I had made my first cup of coffee, my sister-in-law called to suggest we have coffee after she had breakfast and got dressed. She came over and we chatted for a while, then played several games of Words with Friends. It’s now about 11, five hours after I dragged myself out of bed. I have yet to shower and shave. That’s my next “chore.” Then, it’s off to Cork & Bottle for the wine. Even though time is a mysterious thing, I can feel it passing, so I better get to work.

I awoke in front of the television some time ago, just before 3:30, a full glass of wine sitting on the table beside me. I turned off the television, wondering how much of the series, Hinterland, I missed. And I thought of the clothes I had put in the dryer “a few minutes ago.” I took the glass of wine into the kitchen, poured it down the sink, rinsed the glass, and put it in the dishwasher. I then took the dry but wrinkled shirts out of the dryer and put them back in the washer. In all probability, there is a setting on the clothes washer for “rinse and spin only for items left in the dryer,” but I could not find it, so I picked the minimum setting I could find, hoping to gently wash the shirts so I can once again dry them. This time, I will listen intently for the buzzer and will hang them up immediately.

I did not watch much of Hinterland last night, pausing the program when the now-former-prospective-buyer of my Camry called around 8:30. She told me she spent the day in Little Rock, getting the first dose of the COVID-19 vaccination in her newly-eligible arm. And she bought a car, a 2014 Lexis sedan. We were on the phone for just shy of an hour. She plans to meet me in a few hours at the mechanic’s garage, where my car awaits; there, I will request a check from the garage in payment for the old Camry. I’ll take the car’s title with me, along with a bag to collect my belongings from the glove compartment and trunk. I do hope this goes smoothly. I have no interest in wading through a lawsuit to collect payment.

After my hour-long conversation with her, I sat down to continue watching Hinterland. That lasted all of ten minutes, I think. My promises to myself that I would not allow myself to fall asleep in the recliner in front of the television, thereby doing unnecessary damage to my back, have been broken too many times. It’s time to get serious about the matter. I will relocate my television viewing spot to the mid-century modern sofa in the living room, where I must sit upright with my feet on the floor. It’s harder to go to sleep there; certainly harder to stay asleep.

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“The relationship between Christianity and sex has never been simple.” Thus begins a BBC introduction to a very short video about “what you find when you remove the fig leaf.” The video and accompanying text reveal that a fig leaf was affixed to a Roman statue to cover the genitalia originally in full view on the form. I was surprised to learn that the fig leaf was an addition to cover “that which should not be seen” on such statues. The one revealed in the video was one at Crawford’s Art Gallery in Cork, Republic of Ireland. The full documentary, Shock of the Nude, is available on BBC Select. Unfortunately, I do not get BBC Select, as far as I know. The concept of hiding nudity from innocent eyes has always seemed quaint and prudish to me, to use a phrase from the video short. Nudity on statues is not in the least titillating, in my opinion.  Hiding original nudity on statues is silly in the extreme, though. Again, my opinion.

I love BBC‘s practice of developing very short videos for its website to introduce website visitors to more in-depth explorations of various topics, whether videos or articles. The people behind the videos are excellent marketers; and they know how to pique interest in topics that otherwise might go unnoticed.

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Shortly after I wandered into the kitchen this morning, glass of wine in hand, I saw a flash of lightning to the south. Seconds later, a rumble of thunder shook the house, causing some of the pots and pans on the pot rack in the kitchen to vibrate and move enough to gently clang in response. The online weather forecast calls for thunderstorms this morning, turning to showers that will end before midday. We can expect a high of 55°F today, dropping to 46°F tonight. The next couple of days will be rainy and cool, if the prognosticators’ prognostications can be trusted. I am ready for some moderately warm, clear days with no obligations clogging my calendar. A two-hour or three-hour drive north would do me good, I think. It would help me clear my head and gently re-introduce me to the practice of taking day-trips. But I rarely took day-trips alone, so it might be emotionally jarring, too. Just thinking about it is having that effect on me. I will redirect my thoughts elsewhere.

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The latter part of yesterday’s church board meeting conflicted with another obligation, so I withdrew from the meeting early. Something happened in my absence that apparently caused a stir, but I don’t know precisely what it was. My involvement in the church board has largely seemed to be one of observation versus active participation. I listen to the conversations, but rarely have anything of substance to add, so I remain silent. On one hand, that’s just my style; I don’t feel any need to contribute unless I have something relevant to add. On the other, my style may make me appear disconnected and/or disinterested. Or just not especially bright. I suspect I decided, during all the years I managed associations and worked with their boards, that “active participation” often meant board members talked for the sake of trying to appear valuable to the group, even when their contributions were meaningless drivel. So I may have learned to keep silent unless the conversation went in a direction I found damaging to or inadequate for the issue at hand. But silence can be interpreted as ignorance. At this stage of my life, though, I’m beginning to realize I don’t, and shouldn’t, care. But not really.

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On my way back home from my blood-letting the other day, I listened to a radio interview involving two lesbian women who once operated lesbian bars (before the pandemic). One of them now operates a lesbian online “bar.” Though I haven’t given much thought (maybe none at all) to lesbian bars, my immediate reaction to the conversation was something along the lines of “what’s the point of a bar strictly for lesbians?” I further thought lesbians should feel comfortable in any bars, not just lesbian bars. The more I listened, though, the more I learned. The women said “lesbian bars” are not necessarily exclusive to lesbians. Male gays also are welcomed in many such places, they said. The one comment that stuck with me most, though, was that lesbian bars are “safe,” in that people of the same gender can be comfortable knowing they can approach others in the knowledge they, too, are gay. It never occurred to me that gays, whether male or female, would be in danger (either emotionally or physically) if they were to “hit on” someone in a straight or non-exclusive bar. While they might be rejected in a lesbian bar, they would be much less likely to be attacked. That’s what I took away from the radio interview. But it wasn’t just the relative safety of the places the two women emphasized. It was giving patrons a sense of camaraderie. Something else that occurred to me was that straight people probably would not be welcomed, at least not with open arms, because they would cause confusion; their presence would make the place no longer “safe” for gays. So it’s not a matter of pure discrimination; it’s a matter of maintaining a reliable atmosphere. Not that I have had any plans to go into a lesbian or gay bar in the past, but now I certainly won’t, simply out of respect for their maintenance of the atmosphere of safety. I also learned that the number of lesbian bars is in sharp decline and had been even before the pandemic; I think I missed the cause of the decline, but now I’m curious. It’s interesting how much one can learn just by listening.

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Before my phone conversation with the former potential purchaser of the Camry, a scene in Hinterland struck a chord with me. In the scene, a person was walking along a concrete pier, I think, on a desolate stretch of oceanside beach. Seeing that scene made me long to be in such a place. I used to love walking along the beach on Padre Island in Texas, but only in the winter. In the winter, when cold winds blew, the beaches were desolate. Other times of year, especially summer, they were clogged with people. I feel certain that’s even more true today than in my youth.

The beach on television, though, is a present-day location that’s probably just as secluded as I would like. The series was filmed in and around Aberystwyth, Wales, according to Wikipedia. Much of the filming was done in rural areas near the town. I think I would love the area, though I might have a hard time communicating with people there, even those who speak English with Welsh accents. The people who speak Welsh would be even harder for me to understand.

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Late yesterday afternoon, I visited my neighbors, Ted and Sharon. We sat and drank wine and talked about subjects ranging from the view out their back windows to airplane turbulence to wi-fi signals to COVID-19 vaccinations to ways we would be philanthropic if we won the lottery. They are extremely nice people who generally keep to themselves but who have been very outgoing in all of my interactions with them. Before I left, we agreed (which we have done before) that we should get together once a week for wine and conversation. I look forward to that.

Almost immediately upon entering their house, Ted gave me an old but very high quality adjustable camera tripod. He said he bought it for $5 at a garage sale; he said he had no use for it but he couldn’t pass it up at that price! I should have offered to pay him for it, but I didn’t; I was stunned, I think, that he greeted me with the offer of the tripod as a gift almost the moment I walked in the door. When I got home, I dredged out my rarely-used Lumix camera to see if it would work with the tripod. It does, just as Ted assured me it would.

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I’m having biscuits for breakfast. Big, fluffy, highly-caloric, fresh from a tube and baked in the oven biscuits. I smell them calling my name.

The prospective buyer of my 2002 Camry was doing her due diligence yesterday afternoon. She asked me whether she could take the car to a mechanic to have it checked out. I agreed. But something went awry. I wasn’t there, but apparently the mechanic left the gear in “reverse” (or it somehow slipped into reverse) with the door open. The door ran into an object unwilling to be pushed aside. Bent metal tells the rest of the story. The mechanic’s shop has offered to have the damage repaired and/or buy the car. The prospective buyer does not want me to sell to the mechanic, but she still wants to have another mechanic, a friend, check it out before committing to buy it. I’m mulling it over, attempting to decide what I should do. It was just an unfortunate accident; it could have happened to anyone. No one should be penalized for a simple accident. But, in this case, especially not me. Yet I don’t want to protect my financial interests at someone else’s expense. This should not be a particularly difficult issue; so why is it so troublesome?

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More about yesterday. As I am wont to do, I was very early getting to the place where I was scheduled for my CT scan yesterday; closer to 7:30 than to my scheduled 8:00 a.m. appointment. After checking in, I was told my lab results were not yet in; the staff would call at 8:00 to check on them. Before that time arrived, though, I got the bad news: either the blood had not been shipped to Florida or the results of the lab work had not made it to Florida (I’m not sure which…The American Oncology Network is headquartered there, I know). But the staff would check to see if my oncologist’s office, where the blood-letting took place the day before, to see if they still had some of my precious red fluid. If so, I was told, they could send it to the hospital for lab work and I would be able to have my CT scan…just a bit late. As in one or two hours late. “You can leave and come back, if you like,” I was told. Where would I go, I wondered to myself. I decided to stay. Finally, my blood work results came back; results that could have halted plans for the CT scan were not found, so it went ahead. I had an 11:00 a.m. online meeting scheduled. I had already explained my situation to the leader, saying I might not make it. Fortunately, though, I missed only a few minutes. I joined the meeting in progress without any hiccups.

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News about my online grocery order came by email a little less than half an hour before I was to pick it up. Four items were out of stock and five items were substituted for ones I had ordered but which were unavailable. When I got to the store, I was surprised to see a line of cars waiting to pull into the limited number of online-order-pickup parking spaces. I waited for a touch more than an hour before my order was placed in the back of my car. My patience must be improving. I waited the entire hour without getting upset with the universe. I simply acknowledged to myself that the grocery store was inundated with demand after a long period during which everyone was snowed and iced in. I used the time to look lovingly at a grey and tan pit bull puppy in the car next to me. It wanted out of the car, but its human prevented that. Occasionally, the puppy erupted into the most wonderful wolf-like howl.

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Day before yesterday, Governor Asa Hutchinson announced that COVID-19 vaccinations would be made available to people over 65 (it had been available to people over 70). Being barely eligible, in my relative youth, I inquired about where I might be able to schedule my injection. I tried, to no avail, several places that had been suggested to me; they were already full. Finally, though, a friend called to tell me of a place in Little Rock where she had been able to schedule her vaccination. Immediately, I went online to check. Bingo! I got an appointment at 4:06 p.m. on the same day in early- mid-March as my friend. We’ll drive together to get the shot on that day.

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Last night, a writer acquaintance (and fierce Republican, I might add) and his wife treated me to dinner at a nearby Italian restaurant. I have not seen or spoken to them in at least a year, I think, except recently by phone. They had invited me to come by their house beforehand for a drink before dinner. I entered their house wearing my mask, but they were not wearing masks. I succumbed to my discomfort and ill-ease and removed mine. I hope that and the visit to the Italian restaurant were not mistakes. He has had his COVID-19 shots (his 85th birthday is approaching), but his considerably younger wife had not. Not that having the vaccination reduces transmissibility. We did not even touch on politics or on religion (though I was asked about my church). It was a pleasant dinner and the food was good. I was home by 8:00 p.m. I think I left my to-go container of leftovers on the table at the restaurant, though. Or else I will someday stumble upon a container of rotted, malodorous food in some inexplicable place in my house.

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I read this morning that China is celebrating the official end of extreme poverty. That’s certainly something to celebrate. But I have my doubts.

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There are so many things on my mind this morning I could write all day. But I won’t. Time to pause and breathe.