Walking On Water

One time when I was a kid, maybe 6 or 8 years old, the Old Man and I were walking out on a frozen lake to go ice fishing. He looked at me and said, "Take your Goddamned hands out of your pockets! Never walk on ice without having your arms free. And here, keep these in your pocket in case you fall through", and he handed me two 4" pieces of broom-handle, each with a sharp nail sticking out of one end and a hole drilled so they could nest together in your pocket.  The idea was it would allow the potential drownee to pull himself out to safety from a frigid hole onto the slippery ice. I would like to say they saved my life and I still carry them, but I never did and probably lost them 50 years ago. Although, becoming more aware and unsteady as I get older, I do not walk on icy surfaces with my hands in my pockets. I opt to break a wrist rather than a hip or my skull. Score one for the Old Man.

Another Weather Report

Snowing to beat hell, maybe a foot today. Even more further north around the Twin Cities. The wind is blowing like a banshee and the temperature will be dropping like a cold brick, or as NOAA puts it:

Tonight: Snow and widespread blowing snow before midnight, then areas of blowing snow and a chance of snow after midnight. Low around -8. Wind chill values between -21 and -31. Windy, with a north northwest wind between 23 and 31 mph, with gusts as high as 46 mph. Chance of precipitation is 100%. New snow accumulation of 2 to 4 inches possible.

Lorna'a sister Anita was flying out to see her daughter, 'Rissa, who is a student at Cornish School For the Arts in Seattle. The flight was cancelled and they will miss her dance program this evening. They're hoping to make it out tomorrow morning.

Everyone is coping in their own way. We went out to eat lunch. Blondie's was closed, so we ate Mexican. It takes more than a little bad weather to close the Taco King. Then we swung by Fleet Farm for a little light Christmas shopping. We had the satisfaction of putting our backs and shoulders into pushing out a snow-stuck Chevy Blazer parked beside our (not stuck) Honda CR-V. I tried not to be too smug. On the way to the grocery store to lay in supplies, we passed the Eagles Club. Most of the businesses in town either cancelled or closed down early so people could get home safely. The Eagles parking lot was full, SUVs and pickups as far as the eye could see. One suspects that some of those jokers had dig out at home, so they could get could get into town and be stranded at the club. I suspect many of them are there for the duration. I can't imagine trying to drive through ice and deep snow in near zero visibility. Drunk. Let's hope that the beer holds out or they'll get surly. 

When we got to the grocery store, business was sparse except in the baking aisle, which was filled with round Scandinavian ladies buying sugar, flour, eggs, butter and almond extract. It's a Christmas snow day - it's cookie time! We picked up our raw sugars, fats and chocolates and made our way through the snowy streets for home. Cookies may be delayed for a while, Lorna is on page 102 of To Kill a Mocking Bird, curled up with Atticus Finch in a warm fuzzy throw and they are getting pretty cozy. Meanwhile I made one quick pass with the snowblower. The rest will have to wait until tomorrow when the wind is finished rearranging the snowdrifts to her satisfaction.

Ruby

Ruby Anderson died this morning. She made the best pies I ever eaten. We'll think about her every year at Thanksgiving.

Draggin' Broadway in A.L.

Dragging Broadway was something we did almost ever weekend night, if only one pass down and back to check out the action. It's where everybody was. Times change. They eliminated the turn-around at the north terminus and you can't get around the A & W on the south. That's okay. I wasn't a kid anymore and Broadway's time had passed anyway. This is a shortened and edited (not by me) version of a longer piece from the Feb 8, 1974, New York Times. Why A.L.? Why the N.Y. Times? Beats me.:

It is winter, and there is supposed to be an energy crisis on, but that didn't stop a 21-year-old from dragging Broadway here the other night in his souped-up '69 green Camaro with the wide mag wheels. Back and forth, he drove. Back and forth, on a mile long route from the A & W  Root Beer stand to the Fountain Lake dead end. Back and forth, in that teen-age ritual known here as 'dragging,' in George Lucas's current hit movie, 'American Graffiti,' as 'cruising,' and in other cities and towns as just plain 'driving around.' But no matter what the phenomenon is called, the purpose is still the same: for teenagers, and sometimes those in their early 20's, to show off their cars and try to meet someone new of the opposite sex. In other words, Broadway - and streets like it all over the country - is a mile-long outdoor singles bar for those who aren't always old enough to drink. "I think it's a bad way to do it; I'd rather meet a girl at a party or something", said the 21-year- old ... But he conceded that if he saw an interesting looking female pedestrian, he would not hesitate to invite her to ride around with him. "But right now, I'm just, uh, well, uh, just fooling around." he said as he put $3 worth of gasoline into his car at a service station on Broadway.

Almost all of the dragsters who were interviewed in this city of 19,000 on a recent Saturday night - Friday and Saturday nights and Sunday afternoons are the hottest cruising times-said they didn't believe there was an energy crisis, and that even if there was, they hadn't curtailed their dragging activities any because of it."There's no gas shortage!" said a senior at Albert Lea High School. "The only evidence we've had here is that they close the stations on Sunday." 

According to the dragsters, cruising is more fun in the summertime, when it's easier to shout to each other from open car windows without having to worry about catching pneumonia. "But we still do it [shout]," one young male dragster said. "We just turn up the car heater, so you don't notice the cold so much."In the summer, of course the A & W Root Beer stand at the southern end of the drag route is open. A lot of between-car socializing takes place there, not to mention the offers to climb into one's car for a few spins around Broadway. "In the winter, the teenage hangout is Jake's Pizza, where one has to park one's beloved car, get out, walk into the restaurant and sit in a booth in order to make social contacts. But winter cruising lives even in the frequent subzero temperatures of this region because winter is when the high school basketball games are played, and a high school basketball game with cruising afterward is like an A & W Root Beer without a hamburger, tangy but somehow incomplete.

Dragging begins around 7 p.m. and pretty much ends around 11 p.m. "By that time we've found out where the parties are - if there an" one teenager said. A party can deter a dragster temporarily from his appointed rounds. But after it's over, you can be sure he will be back on Broadway, checking to see if there are any interesting new faces driving around. The new faces usually belong to teenagers from the small surrounding farm towns in Minnesota and nearby Iowa, who come to Albert Lea because of it's two movie houses and its lively drag route.

In Praise of Potlucks

In the circle of friends and relatives we socialize with, when someone is invited for a meal, the first response is, "What should we bring?". And a bottle of wine doesn't count; it is assumed. I suspect what killed the Christmas party (parties) this year is that somewhere along the line we lost the Potluck Spirit. Maybe next year.

Winter and Changing Plans

Juncos

We are winding down our first real day of winter -  winter: the environment as modified by temperature altered forms of water. Or, it's getting real cold and what ain't snow, is ice. We  had a few inches of snow last night, enough that the snowplows were out and I had to crank up the big orange Husqvarna snowblower. Old Hussy is a cold-blooded girl and after her long summer estivation, she was a little reluctant to fire up. After some swearing, threatening and kicking, eventually she woke up and together we cleared away the snow so Lorna could go to one of her Saturday touchy-feely women's retreat things. I suspect mostly the women of the town gather to eat, drink and share stories about how dumb their men are. And of course they're right. The only thing that came out of this one, that affects me, was that Lorna caucused over in the corner with some other Oakwood women.  They took it upon themselves to cancel the annual Oakwood Christmas party at the last minute, in lieu of a New Years Eve party. The Christmas party has gotten to be a contest to up the ante every year and I suspect the food preparation time and cost became onerous. New Years Eve should be easier - BYOB and the snack of your choice and we're ready to roll.

The Empathic Civilisation

Thanks to Jonny over at Consequences Dictate for this.

Dog's Inner Fears?

Last night, the middle of the night, there was a rattling and banging, loud enough to wake us both up. My first thought was raccoons of course, as I had run one off the night before. The sound seemed to be coming from the living room where Bud sleeps. He has a comfy kennel cage with a blanket draped over it and a heat lamp on chilly days to ease his old doggy bones. Bud's a good sleeper. That is, he does a lot of it. He racks up about 18 hours a day, and as he's quite deaf, sleeps through most night sounds.

The noise was coming from Bud thrashing and banging the cage around quite violently, When I saw him I thought he was having a seizure or something because even when I laid my hands on him he continued his thrashing and twisting. Eventually he stopped and woke up, apparently quite shaken and was very clingy for a while, then started running around in his excited circles. I let him outside to run it off. It was cold, so he was back in the kennel in short order, curled up like a happy little puppy falling asleep.

I know dogs dream. I call them rabbit dreams. Bud's legs kick in running twitches, sometimes softly boofing in his sleep. I like to imagine in his sleep he's a wolf again, running in a pack, bringing down caribou, bringing down the big game and tearing it apart with his packmates. More likely he's reliving chasing a cottontail the day before. Who knows. I think last night was different, it was a dog nightmare, canine night terrors. What awful thing could a Pug imagine in his deepest sleep? They don't seem to have a concept of death, though when Sam died, the separation was traumatic for Bud. Pugs have been bred to be perennial puppies. What are Pugs afraid of deep down in their bones?  I hope he sleeps better tonight. Poor little pup.

Faribault Art Furniture Chair

A couple of weeks ago I posted a picture of a maple chair, one of five that I bought from the Old Mill Restaurant. Laurie Sather, who made our old chairs, bought the surviving three back for what I paid for the five "new" ones. I think those have already gone to live with his daughter Rose, which pleases me.

Installation No.1 of 5:  Maple Chair on Maple Floor, Backed by Maple Cabinets - Painted Yellow.

I took fine steel-wool and mineral spirits and cleaned sixty years of gunk, glitter and wine stains from one of them. After patching some screw holes (repairs that were a little too honest), I put a light stain on the bare wood then rubbed on a couple of coats of tung oil. I think it looks pretty good, but still has a comfortable butt-worn charm to it. It's ready for another 60 years, or at least until I die. 

The Cyber Inbox

The first item in my inbox this morning was the Albert Lea Tribune with the headlines:

First major snow to blow in today

"Get your snowblowers tuned up and shovels dusted off. The National Weather Service has issued a winter storm warning for today in Albert Lea — and much of central and southern Minnesota — which could blow in as much as 6 inches of snow."    

Oh shit, here we go again. I'd better dig out the wools: Malone pants, Filson double-cruiser, stocking cap, lined leather choppers and the L.L.Bean boots I inherited when my brother died. :-(
I'll check on the blower after I clean the house. Cocoa! I'd better see if we have enough cocoa to carry the peppermint schnapps. It'd be a bitch to get caught without the essentials.

Pottery/Poetry

Each is a typo of the other. I'm been thinking about this one for awhile, but I can't really put structure to it, so I'm just going to wade in and flail about for a while.

Part 1. Pottery

My neighbor Harvey is a retired mental health professional, but he's alway been a hands-on guy - building things, making furniture, restoring sportscars - even shooting his own paint. The first thing he did upon retiring was get a tattoo on his neck. So it didn't surprise me when he cleared out a room in the basement and started to buy pottery making tools and equipment, first a wheel, then a kiln. After he'd been at it for a year or so, I asked if I could see some of his work. He said, no, that it wasn't good enough to show to anyone. He said he throws a few, fires them and puts them on a shelf. He studies them for a while, then smashes them all to shards. I accused him of just going down to his cave and drinking Scotch, but Jane said she has actually seen the pots through the open door so she knows he's actually working down there. It's been a couple of years now since we've talked about his pottery. I'll be seeing him at a Christmas party in a couple of weeks. I'll find out if he's progressed enough that his pots meet his standard for public display. I hope so.

Part 2. Poetry

I've always enjoyed reading poetry. A year ago I started writing my own to fill some of the winter hours when Lorna's at school. I bought some how-to-books that mw recommended, read a lot more poetry, actually studying the structure. Then I started hacking away at words. One morning at breakfast I mentioned this to LP. He's slow talker, that is, he thinks things through before he speaks. He mulled it over a while, then paused between bites of fried corn-beef hash and asked if I was writing poems because I had something I had to say, or if I just liked playing with words.  I like the question. Thinking about it, I realised, for me, it's just the words. It's arranging the right words, in the right order, laying one after the other, after another, until they read well and convey a thought or image. I suspect to be an even average poet one has to have something more to say. I'm not average. My poetry is simply dreadful - shallow and trite. I work them over, let them rest for a while, work them again until they read as well as I am able, then delete those suckers for good. Harv takes his clay, shapes it, glazes it, fires it, then smashes it. I take words, shape them, glaze them, fire them and smash'em. I am the very Harvey of poetry.

Willie. Busted. Again.

Willie's 77 years old. A couple of days ago he was busted for marijuana possession. Again. I hereby propose a special dispensation of drug possession laws for all seniors. Especially those that still have phrasing and guitar chops like this. We could just call it the Willie Pass.

It's scary to realize that it's been forty years of Willie for Lorna and me. He was an obscure Texas songwriter. We went to early Willie concerts with just half a crowd, and yet Willie played far into the night, leaving country and venturing into jazz, show tunes, blues, rock, gospel, what ever crossed his mind. I remember thinking that this guy is amazing and everyone in the world should know his name.    I guess now they do.