Boxing Day Ruminations

Yeah, so it snowed a little bit. You may have heard.

The day started without power at the office, but I was already resigned to staying in (it was, after all, a state of emergency). Tried to get my head together about all the life changes swirling about of late, but of course my head is still apart and I'm now sore from mad shoveling. Best laid plans, and all...

Oh, LIFE! So much to figure out! To wit:

1. A-Dub becoming a Grad Student
2. Finding a second car to accommodate the Grad Student and her Grad Student schedule
3. Fixing the house up
4. Putting the house on the market
5. Getting the house sold
6. Finding an apartment in Portland
7. Moving
8. Figuring out what the hell I'm doing with my life
9. Finding time and inspiration to put fingers to keys and submissions in mail
10. Looking after health and well-being
11. Breathing, etc.

I'm really excited, though. We're so over our commute, neighborhood, everything, and greatly looking forward to returning to city life: walking everywhere, easy access to stuff, etc. Love the house like crazy, though, and I'm sick about leaving it behind. And daunted about the work to come.

Everything evens out eventually, and all I can do is take care of what's in my control and try not to sweat what's not in my control. That's a tall order, but I'll figure it out and deal. Eventually. Somehow, someway...right?

I could use another day off....

Landmarks

12/22/2010

1. The repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell
2. The passing of the 9/11 First Responders Health Bill
3. The passing of the START Nuculear Treaty

All in one day at the end of a Lame-Duck congress, one that has possibly been the most productive since the Great Society LBJ era.

I am very proud to be an American on a day of such landmark achievement.

Glow

You all know I'm a softie. So yes, I'm very fortunate for days like this. The Homestead, flipping shit and laughing like maniacs with my parents, wife, bro and life-long family friends, lots of wine and great grub, the woodstove cranking heat, woodsmoke hazing over the fields, the ghostly silence of the chill country night, a gorgeous tree...I have a wonderful life.

Cranky piss-pants Cube boy will be back on Monday, probably...

My New England Essence

Once again, from a distance of half a century, E.B. White sums up my thoughts completely. Hello Winter.

A Report in January

Allen Cove, January 30, 1958

Margaret Mitchell once made a remark I have treasured. Someone asked her what she was "doing," and she replied, "Doing? It's a full-time job to be the author of Gone With the Wind." I remembered this cheerful statement this morning as I lay in bed, before daylight, marshaling in my head the problems and projects and arrangements of the day and wondering when I would again get a chance to "do" something - like sit at a typewriter. I felt a kinship with Ms. Mitchell and comforted myself with the pleasing thought that just to live in New England in winter is a full-time job; you don't have to "do" anything. The idle pursuit of making-a-living is pushed to one side, where it belongs, in favor of living itself, a task of such immediacy, variety, beauty, and excitement that one is powerless to resist its wild embrace.