The summer has finally left, and the rains returned.
The winter is not far off.
I love the autumn, the somber, reflective mood fits me very well...although I sometimes miss the crisp dry chill of the Octobers of my Midwestern childhood. The Northwest lacks the fiery colors, as well; our deciduous trees are dominated by the bigleaf maple, Acer macrophyllum, which does turn a handsome golden-yellow but briefly; the leaves wither and brown up as quickly as they turn.
The days grow short, the shadows long, and another year draws to a close.
I was still only partially awake - as much as you can still be asleep with eleven-point-six pounds of cat on your sternum - when the light flashed beyond my closed eyes.
"That's lightning" I thought muzzily and, after a long, long pause, the low grumble of thunder confirmed it.
Between that moment and the giving in to the furry supervisor's demand that I get up and deal with the whole Lack of Food Crisis several more thunder rolls broke through the usual background morning sounds; birdsong, the tap of rain on the downspouts, the sussuration of tires in the street out front.
As a child of the East Coast and Midwest I miss those thunderstorms as only you can miss something that is too far away to be a nuisance and too distant in time to be a bad memory.
The "thunderstorms" here in the Northwest lack conviction. They are more often like this morning's; a subdued series of distant rumbles punctuated with the occasional flash, usually fading after less than a half hour.
That's not a thunderstorm. Where's the crescendo, from far-off subsonic explosion through building flash-and-crash to the climax of blinding-strobe-and-wall-shuddering detonations overhead? And the decrescendo as the storm cell passes, the artillery of Heaven receding "...like troops to fall on other fields and streets"?
I still enjoyed the brief passage this morning, warm and dry and comforted with coffee in the cup as the minor-key thunder passed by.
The photo above is from the east deck during that morning, in one of those weird "the western sky is storming while the sun climbs bright out of the east" moments we seem to have more often than not in our springtime.
"Sunshowers" they're called, and they're as close as we come to the towering storms of my Midwestern youth. Sad, really.
So. Blogging?
I'm working through another "battle" piece for May, this one the "Battle of Blair Mountain" from the coalfields of West Virginia. It's a real oddity, and I'm having a bit of a struggle finding extensive sources. We'll see how it works out.
As for the rest of life?
Well, we're working up to the biggest remodel we've ever done in the Little House, a completely new kitchen as well as a lot of bathroom upgrades. The whole thing is kind of on hold for the moment, however; the contractor seems to have over-estimated how much structural work they could do without additional foundation support. That wasn't in our initial - high, as it is - budget, so we need to look at that before we decide how to deal with the additional cost.
My Bride soldiers on in our neighborhood school, as Beloved Ms Debra the Secretary. Her friend and work-wife the Principal's Secretaryis retiring at the end of this year, though; she's a treasure, and will be sorely missed.
The Boy is in the local community college, doing what I have no idea. He seldom speaks, and never of his classwork.
The Girl is exploding all over; she's a star for her high school theatre tech staff, the Mistress of the Soundboard, she's going to a theatre getaway this summer, her ceramic art took third in the Potter's Guild show this year, and she finally passed her driving road test, so she's well on her way to freedom.
Me?
I'm knocking about, still working on and off, still writing about soccer and here about everything and anything. Still watching our national devolution into Weimar Germany with a sour distaste for the combination of stupidity and hubris that seems to be the 21st Century American Way. I'm glad, in a sense, to be close to the grave. Between climate and politics I don't want to see what this country will be in forty years.
Oh, well.
Paprika Plains is almost over and I'm off to the gym. If I find anything compelling to say I may be back in a bit. Or you might not see me again until Blair Mountain.
It destroys your crops and starves you to death. It gives you typhoid fever and dysentery and liver fluke. It rips your nipa house apart and scatters your life across the wreckage of your fields.
There are reasons to complain about living in the United States. Don't get me wrong. Those of us not in the two-yacht families get reamed pretty hard sometimes.
It's not that late, but I have to be on the road again in the morning, early, so it's late for me. The kiddos have both been packed off to bed and the front room is a mess from a day forced indoors by the autumn's cold and wet. I'm too tired to try and pick up the litter.
My legs ache with the steady ache I've learned to live with for the past year. My neck and shoulders ache with too little exercise and the hard graft of entertaining small children over a long weekend. The back of my skull aches with the unpleasant knowledge that in less than six hours I will have to rise and drive 200 miles north and then walk a mile through the wet woods to work.
And over all of that I am soaked in a sort of quiet despair. I look around at my country and my world and realize that what I'm seeing isn't really new and it isn't really terrible. It's the same old tiresome horseshit that human beings have been doing to themselves and each other since Cain ambushed Abel out in the cuna grass; lying and pretending not to lie, grabbing everything around them regardless of what the long-term destruction they are causing. Indulging in every hate and stupidity and lust and whatever other evil toxic fucktardry they can think up.
When I was researching the last Decisive Battle I spent some time with the Praetorian Guard. You can't learn about the Guards without encountering a man named Lucius Aelius Seianus, better known merely as Sejanus. He was, perhaps the "original" Praetorian; one of the Emperor Tiberias' cronies who took the piss-ant garrison troop that had hung about the Forum for centuries and made them into the chooser and slayer of Emperors.
Anyway, you can follow the link if you want to learn more about ol' Lucius. Suffice to say that he was probably an evil little man who was brought down by others probably just as vicious and ambitious as he was. He got the chop, too, for his pains.
But I'm not thinking about an ambitious soldier now, sitting in the window seat looking out on a drizzly night. I'm thinking about a young girl.
Her name was Junilla, and she was the daughter of Lucius Aelius. Her right name was probably something like Junilla Aelia, and I have no idea who she was or what she was, down to her age at the time of her father's sudden encounter with the public executioner in 31AD.
We know nothing about her; not her age, or her looks, not how she walked, or talked, or stood up, or sat down. Being Roman she was probably dark-avised, and being young - at least, young enough that she was not considered a woman but a girl by the ancient chroniclers - probably slender and gracile. Based on the description of her arrest she sounds like a very young woman or little girl. Tacitus says of her:
"...the little girl, who was so unconscious that she continually asked what was her offence, and whither she was being dragged, saying that she would do so no more, and a childish chastisement was enough for her correction."
But we have no idea whether she was a silly or serious girl. Whether she was cheerful or solemn, light-hearted or glum, friendly or standoffish. Did she like to read, was she an indoorsy sort of girl, or one who liked to play outside and exercise with her friends, a sort of 1st Century tomgirl?
Was she one of those young women who grow up early, approaching womanhood with trepidation, or a late-bloomer still a child when her father ran onto the rocks of Roman politics and his own greed for power.
And of her last moments we only know this, as written by Cassius Dio some two hundred years after she died:
"His children also were put to death by decree, the girl (whom he had betrothed to the son of Claudius) having been first outraged by the public executioner on the principle that it was unlawful for a virgin to be put to death in the prison."
First, let me say this: I find this tale of prison rape, which is recounted only in Tacitus and Cassius Dio, to be hard to believe. There is no record of any such "law" in the Roman legal codes, while the punishment for rape (stuprum, that is, forcible intercourse) of a freeborn citizen was death.
But then let me add that regardless of the letter of Roman law the story is effective as horror. It strikes home because of the act itself and the young age of the victim.
Perhaps thinking about the recent awful clamor about abortion and rape got me thinking about what a fucking awful horror rape is.
Perhaps most of all because it takes the moment we are most intimate and defenceless and turns it into a waking nightmare. It takes what should be the most tender act of lovingkindness we can perform and turns it into the ultimate moment of powerlessness, hate, and fear.
So though I don't really think that one of the jailers of the Tullianum went and raped a little girl before he murdered her, I think that the ancient storytellers thought that story was the most awful thing they could think of to add to the horror of the end of the tale of Sejanus and his fall.
And what saddens me even more is that they felt they needed something more awful than the cold fact of a young girl casually strangled for the crime of being born to an ambitious father. Something more shocking to tittilate their readers' jaded tastes.
Something more frightful than the bald fact of her child-body cast down the Gemonian Stairs in a tangle of dirty clothing, her still-unformed arms and legs asprawl in the gross indignity not just of death but of careless cruelty. Something more awful than the thought of the vengeful citizens of Rome stepping casually over this sad little corpse, of the cold winds of December skirling the ragged clothes around her stiff limbs and the pale sun unreflected in the flat stare of her sightless eyes.
I don't really understand why the long-ago death of a girl two thousand years old so saddens and depresses me. But it does, and outside my window the night rain seems to weep for every little girl so lost, and torn asunder, and thrown away down the brutal stairs to lie forlorn under the careless feet of the passersby.
Let the rain kiss you Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid drops Let the rain sing you a lullaby The rain makes still pools on the sidewalk The rain makes running pools in the gutter The rain plays a little sleep song on our roof at nightAnd I love the rain.
"The sky seems to ride fast upon the madly rushing rain; the water in the river is loud and impatient; women have hastened home early from the Ganges with their filled pitchers. The evening lamps must be made ready. O child, do not go out!"from "The Rainy Day" by Rabindranath Tagore
I feel all wrinkled and pruney, like a wizened matriarch veteran of the Charlottesburg debutante's cotillion of 1933. And cold? Did I mention the cold?
It's been a strange week here at the Fire Direction Center.
1. Migraines are scary things. In the course of 4 hours I went from being married to a strong, vital, funny, sexy, smart woman to being the servant of a blind, insensate thing that burrowed from light and sound and was barely capable of movement and coherant thought. And, of course, our friends and neighbors were terrific. "OHMIGOD!" cried Mary, a friend from daycare, "My husband had a horrible headache and it turned out to be viral meningitis!!!"Ummmm...thanks for that, Mary...
Mojo is slowly recovering, but she still says she feels "hung-over", and she was wandering around this morning in her bathrobe and sunglasses looking like a cute, buxom, white Stevie Wonder with bedhead. Thank God the little peeps have been wonderfully gentle with mommy's "head owie", creeping quietly past the bedroom and refraining from leaping on Mommy like she was a pink bouncy house with legs like they usually do.
Oh, just so you know - the "anti-migraine knife"? The migraine part was a hollow handle with camphor in it, a 19th Century specific for headache. I don't think it was bad enough for...naaah.
2. I can't imagine anything that speaks as eloquently of the destitution of the political life in this, the last stages of our Republic, as the "debates" our candidates have been having.
The Palin-Biden "debate" was a joke, what with the utter incompetence of Gwen Ifil to ask anything of substance or follow up on anything else, particularly Palin's blatant refusal to answer questions on subects that she should have been prepared for but clearly knew nothing about.
But the two presidential sideshows have been ridiculous, too, with the parade of talking points and unrefuted spin and outright lies - albeit mostly from the now-desperate McCain, looking ever more like a whacked out bus station psycho missing his meds - that served, possibly, to inform someone who managed to completely miss the preceding nine months of campaigning.
That these pathetic freak shows have been accepted as a legitimate part of the campaign is a telling observation on the barrenness of our national discourse. Its one thing to be lied to by fools. Its quite another thing to demand that you be lied to and treated like a fool. Another thing entirely.
3. And, speaking of loathesome campaign bullshit,
I can't believe that Sarah Palin's "John McCain knows how to win a war" wasn't treated as a laugh line.
Last time I checked, when the enemy shoots you down, they are generally conceded to have "won" that particular encounter. Got it? You shoot them, you won. They shoot you, they won. So by cratering that rice paddy with his aircraft, John McCain did about as much to "win" the war he fought in as George B. MacClellan. But I suppose that you could stretch the incident to represent McCain's having done his bit to take out a $40,000 North Vietnamese antiaircraft missile by...ummm...flying his $2.5 million dollar aircraft into it.
Reminds me of the throwaway bit in the original Rocky where Mick (Burgess Meredith) notices that Rocky has a chintzy new pre-fight dressing gown with an enormous meat packing logo on the back,
and asks what his fighter got for being a walking shill for his brother-in-law's employer.
"I got duh robe" mumbles Rocky
Meredith looks at him with a saddened, pitying expression, and, in that perfect sarcastic gravelly Meredith voice sneers: "Shrewd..."
4. Why are so many Hollywood movies so dopey? At home with Mojo Monday I caught about half of "The Truth About Cats and Dogs". Now I have to confess having something of a thing for Janeane Garofalo; I love her smart, snarky sense of humor and her dark, smouldering intense beauty.
I can't think of a man who WOULDN'T at least give her a moment's attention at a bare minimum. But for the entire picture to work she has to come off as a completely insecure dummy who won't level with Ben Chaplin (who plays the required hunk) about who she really is. The picture is clever and has a bunch of funny moments and Janeane is utterly, deliciously oofy, but that just made it all the more irritating because of the hokey premise.
When Steve Martin made his version of Cyrano at least he had the excuse of the freakish nose. But Garofalo is a luminous delight. The plot's insistence on her insecurity and fear makes her look stupid, and it's hard to be sympathetic with a dope. You just want to shake her character, and that, for me, just kills the picture.
5.
While we're on the subject of Hollywood and movies that don't tax your brain, Turner Classic ran a 1951 gem called "Take Care of My Little Girl", in which we are introduced to the lovely and frivolous "Liz Ericson", played by one of my more favorite classic Hollywood actresses, Jeanne Crain.
Callow Liz goes off to MiddleWestern U. because...well, a less kindly fellow might suspect it's to earn her "MRS" degree. Because she must, must, must pledge "Tri-U", the sisters of Upsilon Upsilon Upsilon being ONLY the most socially desirable, best dressed and popular girls on campus.
Oh, and they sing.
Of course, our little heroine's eyes are opened by the petty and vicious acts of her "sisters" and she ends up in the arms of "Joe" (Dale Robertson), the handsome senior who represents what my father, good Phi Kappa Psi that he is, would have called a "GDI". She returns her pledge pin and rejects the shallow, immoral lifestyle of the Greeks, with their chichi styles and their singing. Oh. Did I mention they sing?
Anyway, Jeanne is lovely, Robertson is manly, the slinky Jean Peters is delightful as the Eeeeevil Queen Bee of the Tri-Us (expand the picture above to really appreciate Jean's comittment to authenticity in her pictures: the shot is a publicity still from her first feature, the utterly awful "Captain from Castile". As terrible as the picture is, Jean is terrific, and note the genuine 16th Century leg hair on Jean - she's wild and positively woolly. And this in the Fifties, mind you, when it was every American woman's duty to shave, pull, depilate, slash and burn every single exposed follicle - God forbid that one of the Mad Men or Cocktail Nation Weenies got the idea that women had, y'know, like, actual body hair!) and the whole thing is good campy fun on the way to being a "scathing indictment" of the campus Greek system.
So "Take Care of My Little Girl" is a total hoot without being as irritatingly dumb as "TTAC&D". Catch it if you can.
6. It's sad to admit, but when it comes to pumpkin pie, the recipe I still like the best is on the inside of the freaking Carnation evaporated milk can.
It's a goddam 1950's artifact (and evaporated milk has got to be the Devil's diaper gravy, anyway, right?) and combined with frozen pie crust has GOT to be bad for you. But I love the stuff. It's memories of childhood autumns in Chicago with the cold wind whirling the fallen leaves outside, cider and pumpkin spices and a warm woolen blanket and "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown" on the black-and-white TV inside.
None of my kids or Mojo likes the orange squash as pie. So I am forced to make the whole thing and eat it myself.
Sad, really. But in a good way.
7. Cats must have very odd little minds. Nitty has been sitting next to the laptop (enjoying the hot fan exhaust, I suspect) licking herself with concentrated effort for a solid ten minutes. And yet, I've seen her unable to do the same thing for more than a second or two. It's like there are two cat brains in there; one with an infinite patience and painstaking attention to detail, the other like a dandelion puffball. You never know which one is in charge at any given moment.
8. I wish that all those ads using scantily clad, painfully thin women to sell stuff would just come right out and say what they want you to think will happen if you buy their crap. Like this (Warning - NOT safe for work!):
Note that the original image went viral on the Internet, long story. But is this all that much skeevier than one of those commercials where the guy puts on the cologne or takes the "male enhancement" or gets the new car or whatever and is suddenly attacked by women who want to have his babies?
I think that Mennen or Enzyte or Accura should just do a spot that has a naked woman rubbing their product on her body (difficult with the Accura,I know, but bear with me) as the voice-over says: "Our product will make women have sex with you, regardless of how disgusting you are." Fade to black.
No shit, if I was 16, I'd have gone out and robbed a bank to buy an Accura. Robbed a fucking bank. I'm totally serious.
9.
Why is rain so enjoyable to watch and soothing to hear, yet the moment you're caught out in it, it sucks enormous pipe?
Oh, and, for the record? When we set out the new rain barrel, Mojo looked it over and noted the attachment to feed a second barrel in series. "Who needs two rain barrels?" she quipped.
Second day of rain?
Barrel's full.
10. I finally got to watch the last half of the U.S. Women's National Team vs. Brazil in the Olympic gold medal game. Tragic. Tragic. I usually love Julie Foudy as a color commentator, but for this game I kept hearing her going on and on about what a back-and-forth game it was, and how the U.S.'s grit and will to win were keeping the game so close and kept I looking at the screen and thinking, Loudy, you have GOT to stop drinking sterno, it makes you babble and you can't see for shit.The Samba Gals knocked us on our ass, and only inhumanly great goalkeeping and pure damn luck kept them from winning in regulation time. The U.S. lost the game in the 71st minute only Hope Solo stuck out a hand. For 90 minutes the Brazilians were robbed, denied, unrewarded for their great play...soccer can be a cruel game sometimes, and this was one of the times.
There were two teams on the field that night two months ago, a good team and a great team and they both won a medal. But the team that won the gold wasn't the great team and the medal the great team won wasn't the gold.
Extra Credit. I couldn't resist: here's our own Doctor Farley, "accredited Apocalypse Specialist", to help us through the coming economic hard times. Hat tip to Bob Lefarkins of Lawyers, Guns and Money. Ahem:
Dear Dr. Farley,
In view of the impending financial distress, I'm worried about my cats. Should I stock up on cat food, or will it be available in post-apocalypse America?
Thanks,
Worried in Dubuque
Dear Worried in Dubuque,
No. You should concentrate on stocking up on firearms, clean water, and canned goods. Cat food will most certainly not be available in post-apocalypse America; any housecats will only be a drain on your resources. Your cats should be eaten at the first opportunity, followed by the eating of any surplus cat food. Most such food is edible by humans, and while you may be tempted to "fatten up" your cats, much of the energy in the cat food is lost when its eaten by the cat.
Yike!
But, hey - my wife is Christmas shopping. Christmas! Shopping! In October! And has rearranged the interior of the refrigerator! What does this mean? Is it the Apocalypse? Is she bored out of her skull after having been home sick for a week? Are they the same thing?
