This is the second installment about Roadrunners in the desert west. The season this time is fall In our early years in unincorporated county south of Albuquerque one roadrunner frequently enjoyed a sunbath atop the shed in the corner of the weedy paddock. Lizards, horned toads, garter snakes and grasshoppers abounded below in the days … Continue reading Roadrunner seasons: Fall
The light and the dark of us
In the dark before dawn today I arose, fed the dogs and went to watch the first glimmerings of the existence of a sun to the east. That view is quite surrounded by three story, pillored, white Georgian style buildings with black mansard roofs. The black and whites is what some locals call the buildings. … Continue reading The light and the dark of us
On Paula Bidwell
At midnight between last Saturday and Sunday the warm hearted person, a friend to so many different kinds of people, Paula Bidwell, died of a heart attack in her Pocatello, Idaho home. This after a period of failing health. Hearing this only last night (Tuesday), I felt, with the rolling tears, alternating honor at having … Continue reading On Paula Bidwell
The bottlebrush tree
Early fall south of San Francisco and the bottle brush trees burst out with their brilliant red fuzzy flowers. Legions of bees, hummingbirds and other pollinators flock to them like so many bits of iron to magnets. And here was I, a bit cooped up in my second floor condo, observing a few bottlebrush trees … Continue reading The bottlebrush tree
Elf and Opus go to the sea
Elf and Opus went to the sea, in a beautiful pea green Jaguar. Really. Here they are, cruising by Pebble Beach.... During a morning walk on a lovely holiday weekend in September the pair observed a vintage auto parked right in front of their rose-covered front yard. Slung temptingly low to the ground, it had no … Continue reading Elf and Opus go to the sea
On being a polio survivor finding new ways to travel, and live
A reason exists behind each thing that happens, though two people seeing the same event side by side may have two very different ideas about the reason. At the moment I'm talking about subjective interpretations of natural events. Perhaps half buried associations trigger such interpretations? Like my father I tend to react in certain … Continue reading On being a polio survivor finding new ways to travel, and live
Summer Roadrunners
It is evident that days grow shorter now it’s August, even cooped up in a second floor apartment while wheelchair repairs are awaited. It’s downright cool between mountain ranges here in the peninsula between San Francisco Bay and the Pacific Ocean. This slow reduction in the sun’s daily rays brings strong thoughts about a creature who … Continue reading Summer Roadrunners
The racism in me
"Racism, one of the most baneful and persistent evils, is a major barrier to peace. Its practice perpetrates too outrageous a violation of the dignity of human beings to be countenanced under any pretext.” ~The Promise of World Peace, 1985 Results of America’s long simmering, latent, at times overt, racism fill the news and the … Continue reading The racism in me
Transiting & lemon squeezing
Moving involves a fair amount of self re-creation and may bring into play the re-discovery of potentials we once glimpsed, only to let slip away. You think you are a country person, and here you are, by your own choice, in a city. You used to roll your badass power wheelchair around quiet village streets, … Continue reading Transiting & lemon squeezing
Boxed in in balmy California
We arrived at our destination in northern California a few days ago, frazzled by two days and a night of steady driving — me with complaining back and numb leg, questions as to why I was doing this buzzing ever louder within my grasshopper brain. Sleep was something that occurred in brief snatches for days on … Continue reading Boxed in in balmy California
Rising Over the Smoke 