Meow

January 2, 2019

 

Back to work today.  I have to say that no matter how long you have been away and how mellow you have gotten and despite your aura behind totally adjusted, it only takes about five minutes to get grumpy back at the grind.

Life is suffering.  Work is suffering.  So it goes. 

At least I get to go home and pet the cat tonight.

Oh, I did start the list.  One of January three goals is to write three letters of some length to people.  We will see if I get there.

At the Turning of the Year of our Lord 2019

January 1, 2019

 

No resolutions this year. My wife has suggested a goals concept that is more interesting. She read it in a tweet. (I am on Twitter, but I don’t use it, I struggle with it.) The concept is to create a month by month calendar and simply list three goals for that month. As I gather from my discussion with her of the thread, these should be reasonable rational goals. February’s goal should not include “To Have Lost Fifty Pounds by the end of the Month.”

 

I think I will try to do this. I will post some or all of these goals in a near future post.

 

Do I have hopes for the coming year? Well of course I do. Do I believe they will all be achieved? Well of course not. Do I think it is a good thing at the turning of the year to think of the long range? Yes.

 

Buddhists and new age prophets all assert we should be present in the moment. At ah so many times I am aware that I am living in the moment but that I am not fully present in the moment. I have one foot in the here and now and one foot on six months from now. My third foot is firmly planted in the past.

 

At 62 I don’t want to think too far ahead. But it is important to think about direction and what we hope will be the outcome of our acts and labors. Such thinking should not take on a life of its own but to live in the moment we must look at both the past and what may come to be.

 

One year and three days from now and I will stop doing the wage slave thing. This assumes no tsunami like life events in the meantime. I must be setting goals, I want the next act to have meaning and the transition to be smooth.

 

Best of the New Year to you all.

Too Old, Too Cranky

Got up early today. Dressing warmly, I went out on my first snow blowing mission of the day, there will be more.  The forecast is for 4-8 inches of heavy wet snow, heart attack snow.  Based on this forecast there will be at least two trips for me into the white world.  Earlier there was between two and three inches of snow on the ground.  In that my snow machine will only clear six or so inches in such a scenario I will have to go out twice.  Exercise.  It all counts as exercise.

 

Seems a familiar story in Michigan and Ontario, snow on American Thanksgiving or very near Thanksgiving.  I have been stuck travelling on this holiday at least three times.  Two times have been in recent years tied to snow-ice-snow storms making a multi lane highway undriveable.  Once was in 1974 when I got snowed in on the Ohio Turnpike near Sandusky at an old Howard Johnsons Service Plaza.  Had to sleep on the floor using my coat as a pillow.  The Turnpike was closed for 18 hours.  What a heck of a time that was. 

 

Next year I plan to be somewhere that lacks snow.  You get old.  You get cranky.  You get tired of the extremes. 

Moonrise Looking East

Tonight the moonrise has been spectacular as I look out my hotel window.  It was a little bit of grace to end a lovely day.

Started off the morning at a clean cheery breakfast place.  The menu was expansive and eclectic. Only in Canada would they have breakfast poutine.  Three eggs on top of what is already death on a plate. I demurred any personal impulses toward self destruction and simply had the breakfast special.  This consisted of three eggs, three pieces of bacon, two pieces of toast and home fries.  I only ate the egg whites.  I did use copious amount of ketchup. I am so ashamed.

From there we headed off the Stratford and then subsequently to St. Mary’s.  Stratford has changed.  Stores that have been there for years have now disappeared.  The goofy toy store, the Tim Horton’s, the science toy shop, the old clothing and traditional places are fading and falling by the wayside so very fast.  The last of the felines that used to roam Watson’s china shop died last June.  Wow,  the first time I went into Watson’s, probably on my first trip to Stratford some thirty years ago, there were five cats inside the china shop and some were sleeping next to costly tureens and others were wending their way amongst the crystal.  The incongruity was a delight.

Methinks (good word for a town that holds a Shakespeare festival) is that I have outlived the things about the place I loved, well except for the live theatre.  Life is change and while I appreciate that I cannot step into the same river twice even if I put my foot in at the exact same locale because the water is totally different, Stratford now is a pale memory of what I liked about the place. All the stores now are the equivalent of t-shirt vendors on the boardwalks of the Atlantic coast. Yeah, I can hear you thinking, “I bet he yells at kids hey get off my lawn”.

Thank goodness for St. Mary’s.  This little burg still has the small town Ontario vibe I have always loved.  The ever present Chinese restaurant, the diner/coffee shop with butter tarts and black coffee, an ancient pharmacy not swallowed up by Walmart, plus a chocolatier and the amazing used goods store all are standing there giving progress the finger.  It is still the early 1960s on Main Street (well, Queen Street-this is Canada).

I don’t know where he gets his stuff, but the guy at the used merchandise store (and it really is a Needful Things kind of place) always has great leather jackets at unbelievable prices.  For about $50 US he had ¾ length soft leather coats today.  No two are alike.  I always have the feeling he must have a deal with a funeral parkour or a hospital emergency room.  I don’t ask questions.

Anyhow the town also has a modern coffee shop with expensive lattes. Modern coffee shops have decaf fixated coffee, the diner has a cold look when you ask for decaf. St. Mary’s, the stone town so named for its quarry, also has a pet store with two of the cutest kittens ever.  I had great fun just walking in the sunshine and taking in the glories of a small town.

The ride through the country showed us how far out London was growing.  It stretched its tentacles way north of its old boundaries.  The traffic has become a pain in the tail.  Still it was fun to see the towns that used to have a tea room and a general store, places we used to stop.  New housing is going in but the yellow brick of old Ontario still stands out in the United church buildings and various civic structures.  I grow old.  I grow old.

Back in town we ate at a fern bar, one of the Irish persuasion.  I had a salmon and cream sauce puff pastry with a green dinner salad.  I went for the smaller dish. The food was surprisingly good.  Everyone else has headed off to the Christmas tree lightening ceremony.  Me, I am feeling a little off and so I decided to just stay in the room tonight.  Tomorrow we have places to go, the farmer’s market, the old south neighborhood and then a wander back home.  It will be fun to see what wares they have displayed out there at the farmer’s market.  Christmas brings out all the weird little nick knacks and decorating flourishes.

I will leave it there.  Happy post Thanksgiving rush to Christmas.  I did not buy a damn Black Friday deal of any kind.  Kind of proud of that.

The ride through the country back to the hotel showed us how far out London was growing.  It has stretched its tentacles way north of its old boundaries.  The traffic has become a pain in the tail.  Still it was fun to see the towns that used to have a tea room and a general store, places we used to stop.  New housing is going in but the yellow brick of old Ontario still stands out in the United church buildings and various civic structures.  I grow old.  I grow old.

Back in town we ate at a fern bar, one of the Irish persuasion.  I had a salmon and cream sauce puff pastry with a green dinner salad.  I went for the smaller dish. The food was surprisingly good.  

Everyone else has headed off to the Christmas tree lightening ceremony.  Me, I am feeling a little off and so I decided to just stay in the room tonight.  Tomorrow we have places to go, the farmer’s market, the old south neighborhood and then a wander back home.  It will be fun to see what wares they have displayed out there at the farmer’s market.  Christmas brings out all the weird little nick knacks and decorating flourishes. 

I will leave it there.  Happy post Thanksgiving rush to Christmas.  I did not buy a damn Black Friday deal of any kind.  Kind of proud of that.

A Tight Squeeze *

You didn’t think I was going to let the day go by without another Portuguese story did you? No, I’m sure you were waiting to see what else awaits an intrepid traveler.


One of the things that you see in guidebooks are admonitions not to drive in Portugal. Various reasons are given for the stated warnings. The main warnings focus on the insanity of driving in Lisbon where the streets change names, the drivers are said to be crazy, and where the lack of street signs to offer an...y guidance leave you doubting the GPS.

There are other reasons however not to drive in Portugal. Take the city of Coimbra as a for instance. Just down the hill from the ancient university located in Coimbra is the old cathedral, the old Se. There is a one-way street that runs from just below the glorious and ancient library of the University down to a square where the old cathedral and several sandwich shops are located.


On the day that we were exploring the University we discovered the challenges of navigating that street. A car had come down to the Square from up near the university. It was something small like a mini Cooper or a Fiat 500. When the car reached the corner where the cathedral is located the driver about freaked out. The distance between the cathedral and the building on the opposite side of the corner was so small that the tiny car’s mirrors had to be folded in. One of the passengers had to step in front of the car and act as an air traffic controller waving this way and that to navigate the car through the narrow slot. The driver was making adjustments centimeter by centimeter. If you look at the walls on the building across from the cathedral you can see that that process has not always worked well.


After watching several cars being navigated through the space we headed back up to the university. About 10 car lengths up from the passage, and at a point well down the one-way street that leads to it, a nine passenger van was just parking. Jokingly, but not really, we told the driver of the van that to exit the area he was either going to have to back up the hill, or simply walk away from the van and tell the rental agent that the van had been stolen.


Much laughter ensued. The driver was basically giving us a manifestation of a no sweat attitude. The passengers were Brits, French and English. As we watched them walk down the hill we started to hear words that we were familiar with. Merde stood out and I believe there was a bloody f&@king hell as they actually saw the space. Wonder if they filed a police report?

Coffee and Water and a Panorama

Seasonal transition is in full swing this Michigan October morning.  Last night’s air grew cold. The morning remains cold. Early last evening the weather people advised us of frost and freeze dangers.  Luckily, I had harvested the last of our basil a night earlier.  Picked the volunteer peppers, too.

Preparing to leave this morning, leather coat (check), thick sweater (check), I did find the canvas bag filled with gloves. So right now, there are on my hands a matching (!!!-true surprise at finding mates) pair of black snug hand covers sufficient to warm my hands.

Gloves were the last thing on my mind when I spent the last week of September in Lisbon. Every single day the temperature reached the 90s. The sky was absolutely clear, there was virtually no humidity. In such spectacular conditions I walked about 8 miles each day. Lisbon is built on a number of fairly steep hills. I think at the end of each day my Fitbit application would be telling me I had walked 14 or 16 flights of steps.

Unexpected joys prevailed more times than not. We didn’t mean to, but we did end up on the number 28 tram. All the tour books talk about this tram.

Yellow and ancient and jerking along it paused where we were standing and decided, why the heck not. Having taken the flyer of that ride I can tell you without question the guidebooks are right, get on the tram at the first stop and grab a seat. We got on the tram at the second or third stop, thus we stood soon for the entirety of the ride.  Still, it was not comfortable.

Craning our necks and scrunched in the center aisle as more and more people boarded, we did see a great number of the sites the ride offers to visitors of Lisbon.

We got off tram 28 early because we had seen a park with umbrella covered tables that had wine and beer and what looked like a quite beautiful overlook of the city. Believing the end of the line was soon we overshot the park by a couple of stops.  When we got off we tried to walk back to those enticing tables but alas we got lost. Hopelessly lost.

Eventually we decided to sit down in one of the infinite numbers of pastry /coffee shops that are omnipresent in Portugal. The smell of flaky, fluffy delightful pastry mingled with fresh espresso scents can be found everywhere. The beauty is these little corner spots also serve beer and hard liquor. “Uma becca (sp?) e uma agua, faghe (sp?) favor”, espresso for the lovely lady and water for the old sweaty dude please.

We asked the proprietor for directions back to the park we had passed. Nao, she wouldn’t give us directions to park. She without reservation stated to get the most beautiful view of Lisbon we had to go up the hill. So, after purchasing our coffee and water, the ever present ever needed agua we headed out. Three blocks up the hill she said. Three blocks at a 45° incline we said. Sipping our water, no guzzling, panting, sweating, we made our way up the three blocks. The senhora at the coffee shop was right, it was a magnificent view.

Off to the side of the park was a small chapel. The park had a small cluster of trees and some benches.  In the shade a man was playing a guitar for the  tips his hat sat waiting to catch. Guitar man's sound was pretty good. What a joy it was to view the city from side to side as we listened to some laid-back jazz noodling.  Eventually we sat and sipped ice-cold water. The panorama was a delight. Serendipity.

Two Photos of Portugal with Narrative



Lisboa Morning Light

Walking in this morning there’s a slow steady rain. Light precipitation not enough to stop me from putting in the work to get five miles in a day, but it is a pain. About a quarter of the way in I walked by about 10 middle school age kids standing huddled together waiting for the bus. These pre and early teens are subdued today. Usually they’re joking, pushing, laughing, jostling or staring at their phones but nary a smart phone light is to be seen in this black misty early morning. Further, they are silent as monks.  The drizzle today tamps down life.

A couple carrying two golf umbrellas are walking their pooch. He’s decided to relieve himself. I don’t look back to see if they use the little blue bag is required here to pick up his waste.  It is bad enough they must get up to take the dog out, on a day like this, they don’t need silent judgment.

I’m thinking about the next post I want to do for my blog. I’ve been silent for so long. When I’m not writing experiences and thoughts out, things seem to drift out of focus. Writing clarifies my mind. Writing purifies my thoughts. I’d say purifying in the sense that putting the words down on paper strip away the little bits and pieces that attach over time to the story as a memory fades. If I get my thoughts down now close to when something is happening, later when I look back I see a much more real vision of the experience.

Right now, I am thinking about two photographs that I must pull off the role on my iPhone. One shot is the view out of the apartment I stayed at in Lisbon. It’s a sunny day, (every day I was in Lisbon was sunny and hot). The particular picture was taken in the morning light before things got toasty. My mind tells me that what I saw and photographed captured the promise of a new day. Much of my trip to Portugal carried with it a morning promise of something new, of something interesting.

There is a second picture which comes to my mind. Captured within was the sun fading over Coimbra on the second night of the trip. Francie and I were having dinner of boar stew and wild deer loin when the sky just took on the most amazing shades. I struggle for the descriptive terms;  the faintest orange-pink, the growing indigo of evening, these covered the horizon. A couple of college girls giggled and worked their way through shared entrée and then a shared delicious looking dessert. Their talk was animated, and their hands were circling and flying about. What they were doing was irrelevant. The sunset at that day’s end was as beautiful as any I’ve seen in years. Maybe it was travel euphoria, or maybe the light at that time of day, at that time of year, in that place part way around the globe is just special.

Normally when I walk in the work I cut across a pocket park to get away from traffic on Harrison Road in East Lansing south of Grand River Avenue. The people from Glencairn fly down the southbound stretch of this rain-soaked road on their way to Michigan Avenue, where they turn heading to downtown Lansing. I don’t mind walking up this hill in the evening because traffic is coming toward me. However, the walk down is scary because people are flying in their haste to get to their desks. It always seems like I’m one second away from a pickup truck jumping a curb and shuffling me off this mortal coil.

Life is very short. I want to savor every bit that I have left. Maybe I have 10 or 15 good years left. Maybe I have four months. I don’t know, and it is not for me to know. But let me appreciate the good that is around me. Let me feel the rain on my face. Let me walk putting one foot after another from point a to point B with purpose and enjoyment.

Coimbra Evening Light