Growing apple trees

30 September 2008

I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree...
A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;
                "Trees" by Joyce Kilmer

There are apple trees growing in my front yard. That delicate reach of leafy arms someone once called lifted in prayer, the smooth stretch of young bark, tugs at my soul and my own arms ache to reach upward.

But actually my apple trees don't. The last gardener was training them to bend out along the fence-line, all around the roses. So they sit flat and squat like a child's drawing: six even arms protruding from a fence-high trunk. The sweet green apples sit on the hard ground where the branches have bowed to lay them. I ate one after school last week and it tasted of grass and sunshine and a bit like summer rain.

But the gardener's left or moved on or retired. The roses need clipping and the geraniums need weeding. The apple trees are sending out odd limbs vertically; they look skewampus for their reaching and remind me to prune this week.

Some days I am an apple-tree fence. But today I am a renegade twig that can't help but stretch out of bounds to pray.

Litmus test

20 September 2008

School House Rock would have its young and impressionable viewers believe that the Pursuit of Happiness chiefly involves chasing after young colonial women and is therefore reserved for young athletic colonial men.

My dear Reader, may I impress upon you the ridiculousness of this claim by suggesting a few simple pleasures in my own Pursuit of Happiness:

1. Cheap white nail polish—the kind so thin it runs down your nails clear and pools into French tips. A very sophisticated and classy look for only $1.07 at your local Dollar Tree.

2. Ceramic Scrabble tiles—smooth edges and a soft, hefty, cool feel. Rattling around they make a satisfying clinkety sound.

3.(Vegetarian) EggMcMuffins for breakfast—toasted English muffin with sharp cheddar and egg over-easy. Definitely to be eaten over the sink; drippy yoke and all comes off as quite barbaric even sans the Canadian bacon. For culinary perfection, serve with a tall glass of tomato juice.

Red pine lake

13 September 2008

I fell in love this weekend again with my mountains. On California’s tree-lined streets and wrapped in her bay-fog I forgot the sweet breath and wide embrace of the mountains I have loved.

Friday afternoon we threw together some gear and strapped on our packs. The head of the trail was deceptively flat, paved and civilized, but as soon as the cars were swallowed from view the path crumbed into gravel and then into a damp creek bed.

My lungs were sore form the valley’s pollution and my legs tired from its concrete stairs. But I was in my mountains and my soul laughed at the red of the wild berries, the whisper of yellow in the leaves, the soft cool of wet air that kissed my thirsty skin.

True love is waking up to the cold of pre-dawn, the air burning against your face. It’s the smell of dew on the living earth that fills your nostrils and fills your head— alluring, enticing. It’s the bright of first sun that washes slowly down the mountainface to fill the dark lake and warm the shadows. It’s waking up aching all over from loving the climb too much.

But Saturday is laundry day and homework and housework so now I’m back in my house in the valley, sitting by the window wondering what my mountain is doing.

From the library of m. f. hales

06 September 2008

I have of late been looking for a few new good books. I was about to label “good” as the operative word here, but I believe the significant terms in this passage are “good”, “new” and “books”. I have recently had my fill of bad old movies, shocking fresh news, and ridiculous fugitive pranks, so I think a nice new good book would be just the ticket.

A while ago Cait passed on a warning “Always read stuff that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it.”

As in “I wouldn’t get caught dead reading…”

So, with all this in mind, imagine my joy when right in my very own inbox I found a message from Amazon.com, "Amazon.com has new recommendations for you based on items you purchased" and of course based on the predictions of the Amazon.com Crystal Ball. I read on with mounting anticipation:

Veronica, by Roger Duvoisin— Veronica, a hippopotamus who wants to stand out from the herd and be famous, travels to the big city where she indeed does stand out…

Saving Juliet, by Suzanne Selfors— Selfors injects an angst-ridden 17-year-old Manhattan actress into Shakespeare's star-crossed romance, yielding hilarious and often very clever results…

Shark Girl, by Kelly Bingham— Jane, 15, is smart, good-looking, and the best artist in her school. After a shark attack at a local beach, nothing is the same…

Useful Fools, by C.A. Schmidt—What makes a terrorist?

All I’ve got to say is Amazon.com better have nothing to do with my obit.

On the campain track

05 September 2008

Now that I talk to adults again, politics figure more heavily in my conversation than they have in recent months. But I'm not sure if I oughtn't to have discussed elections with the kiddies anyway- this seems right up their alley:

"I guess I’ll go with the McCain cockroach. I think he’s got gentler eyes.”

The New Jersey Pest Management Association organised a cockroach race representing the presidential contest. John McCain’s roach won, but ominously appeared to fall asleep the moment it crossed the finishing line. MyCentralJersey.com, August 21st

Hmm.

Pieces of me

01 September 2008

I saw some old friends today: dinner with my best buds, dessert with my old neighborhood, and I realized these friends are a piece of my soul that I had forgotten I had lost. And now I am found, Back home.

Home is where you keep the most boxes.

Also. Home is where you are whole.