The grey of March casts small sorrows,
bleeding ash through lengthened hours. A trick
of the clock, to alter time, but the
uncounted tick
tick stays the same.
These banal days, twisting into weeks,
linen writhing ghostwhite on a line,
last too long. Wind makes them dance,
remembering November.
There is a chill we don’t speak of.
Caught in a season not spring,
not winter. But ice loosens its grip
at long last, and the vows of January
come undone:
promises unfurl like half-glimpsed fronds
through murky bottlegreen,
lazily waving good-bye or come closer,
and drown with me in all this water.
Trickle, thaw, drop.
The air inside is used up, warm, and stale. The memory
of a hundred ordinary meals lingers,
soap, garlic and onion, and last week’s perfume.
Throw the windows open,
let the new displace the sighs of over-breathed rooms.
My grandmother would have beaten the rugs,
washed the walls, scrubbed away
a long winter’s worth of woodsmoke and grease,
exorcising the dark months in lemon, ammonia,
and the common ritual of household.
I simply go outside,
with the smell of green and wet, heavy,
and bend to the damp earth,
turn over the rock, curious.
Worms uncurl, beetles scuttle,
like grave attendants hurrying away.
Moss-thick memories of another season, more gentle
than this.
I built a wall, stone by stone, sip by sip, spent three
summers
to watch it rise. One bad winter, to see it crumble. I
haven’t
the touch of those humble Scots of my blood.
A sigh, or just the flighty wind, and ponder the damage:
mottled grey, jagged stone by stone, another season
to undo the hurt of frost and ice. The grey, the green
are timeless,
already dreaming summer into colour.
The Last Juror - John Grisham Hey, one has to ease into reading again. Better than I expected, though.
The Girl, The Gold Watch, and Everything - John D. McDonald. (MacDonald?) An old favourite, and only took an evening and a bit to read again. There was booze involved. Not just in the book, but in the reader. :) A bit dated now, but still lots of fun.
Good Faith - Jane Smiley Surprisingly good sex scenes. The tragedy that I anticipated did arrive at last. It started slow, a straightforward and very detailed narrative. A lot of financial talk. It must have been hell to research. Sure felt like the 80s, though. I wanted to fuck the narrator. Did I just type that? Enjoyed the sex scenes a lot. I will have to read more by her--I recall liking A Thousand Acres, too, though it was dark.
In progress - I am starting, for about the fourth time, Something Wicked This Way Comes - Ray Bradbury. Maybe the writing is a little too beautiful. I keep putting it down and letting it sit. It's really an autumn book, though. I will probably do a little Stephen King, too. And I'd like to tackle something a little weightier than King and Grisham.
Also in progress, Quartet - Jean Rhys. I really thought she was the bomb, as the kids say, back in high school. Now it seems rather pitiful, all those sad, drifting, passive characters whose lives get more and more small with every reduction in circumstance.They just... drift.
Also in progress: a random pile on the bedside table.
"Clover! No French-kissing!
--ack!"
Our dog is an enthusiastic face-licker, which is fine, but if your lips part but a mere fraction, you get French kissed.
I am sitting here trying to type with a little dog
between me and the keyboard—my husband is still playing Super Mario Galaxy! and
still getting frustrated—very frustrated-- with the little Mario dude. Clover
doesn't like it when he gets angry. She’s turned into a little pile of fur that
requires cuddles. She even wants to go for walks now.
Poor thing—we’ve stressed her into being the perfect dog.
Thoughts from late March. Same subject:
It’s Saturday, early evening. Still light out at 7 p.m. (on the dot) but not warm enough to stay outside in the back. And that’s where I am longing to be: in the back yard, with a beverage and a book—or, preferably, a stack of them. And some snacks. Bits? Bites? As long as it’s salty and crunchy, I won’t be picky.
The optometrist confirmed what I suspected: the prescription has changed, the glasses I’m wearing now, though stylish, aren’t suitable for print. I need a new pair. (Not really a surprise.) I can’t read in bed with low light, but I had no trouble last summer in the back yard. Lots of light, and maybe the table to eyeball ratio was good.
I want that time again.
I’ve been yearning for warm afternoons and summer evenings with books. Real books, not the web. Books, my old friends. I can’t wait to just go out and sit and read and read and read and… To unplug. The web, the TV, the DVD player, the VCR, the Wii… too easy to succumb and oh, how I miss books.
It might be too early, this second day of spring, but I was there this afternoon: book, beverage and Bad Things. (Those would be cigarettes, damn it.) And potato chips. And lo—it was good.
There are crocuses, a month or more overdue, in purple, white and yellow, and one showy variety that combines both purple and white in the same flower. Clover the Dog lingers in the driveway in the sunshine, not wanting to walk, and not wanting to go inside. She just wants to stand in the sunshine and smell the promise that spring brings us.
I don’t blame her.
This week, or the next, I will start buying plants, even though this weird winter killed all my potted friends. Maybe lots of colourful annuals. Green is nice, green is lovely, it could be so much worse, but I want more colour! Pink and violet and yellow and red and keep working on the shades of blue, a blue garden, an idea I’ve shamelessly stolen from the wife of a friend. Blue flowers amid green are indeed, very relaxing!
It's not summer yet, but for two days, I could believe it was coming.
All I want to do is sit in the back yard, tend flowers, garden, and read.
No computer, no TV, no Wii, no DVD no VCR.
No acronyms at all, just books.
So far, despite a lousy spring:
The Last Juror - John Grisham (hey, gotta ease into reading again)
The Girl, The Gold Watch, and Everything - John D. McDonald. (MacDonald?) An old favourite, and only took an evening and a bit to read again.
Still in progress: Good Faith, Jane Smiley
