Summer and the Greenhouse Moon
Shabbat gratefuls: Shabbat. Ruth and Gabe. Alan. Shadow. Golden Stix. Nathan. The Greenhouse. Gladiolas. Lilies. Hot weather. Above 60 all night. Gabe reading. Ruth driving. Alan going to New York to see Francesca. Joanne. Ginny and Janice. Annie and Luna. Coming to visit. Back and leg pain. Labrum tear. Artificial tears. Jim Butcher. Marrow Bones. Wildflowers.
Sparks of Joy and Awe: Talking to Ruth and Gabe
Week Kavannah: Roeh et hanalod. Foresight. Knowing what will be needed in the future.
One brief shining: Ruth and Gabe lounged on the lower level while we spoke of family things, matters of consequence and difficulty, from the lens of old age, a college sophomore, and a high school senior, being with each other as listener, as witness, as grandfather and grandchildren, while Shadow moved among us giving out kisses and attention, her way of saying, yes, I hear you, too.
Family and Friends: Met Alan at the Dandelion for breakfast. The waitress knows us, smiles when we come in.
French toast and bacon for me. Corned beef hash and eggs for Alan. Speaking of travel, bones unhappy and bones made happier, brothers and sisters, friend stuff. We are easy in each others company, knowledgeable about each others past.
Alan and Cheri moved to a Denver downtown condo three years ago. Great move for them. They live within walking distance of the Denver Art Museum, the Colorado History Museum, the Denver Library, the State Capitol, the Courthouses. The Denver Center for Performing Arts sits right across the street where they attend ballet and theater.
No house maintenance. No threat of wildfire or home insurance problems. Lots of restaurants nearby. A good spot for urban living.
I prefer, still, the Arapaho National Forest, Wild Neighbors, Shadow Mountain, room to have a greenhouse. Might I change? I suppose. But not anytime soon. Too much artifice, too busy, too noisy, too little green in Denver for me.
I came home, took a short nap and greeted Ruth and Gabe who drove from Boulder to see me. Our visits always have depth, fun. Laughing and intense conversations.
Ruth told stories of her trip to Korea. How amazing it was to be a minority. To immerse herself in a culture other than her own.
She learned hangul, she said. The Korean alphabet. She could read words, but had no idea what they meant. Her Mandarin approaches fluency so Asian languages are not (ha) foreign to her.
She wants to do a summer abroad there next summer. I hope it works out for her.
Gabe has begun to read. That is, books of his choosing. He went into the loft, got Peter Pan, Night by Eli Weisel, Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse, and I,Robot. The books I give to him with one rule. If you take them, you read them.
Lunch at Golden Stix. A rejuvenated Chinese restaurant in Aspen Park.
Just a damned moment! In closing I offer the first two paragraphs of this NYT article: A White Nationalist Wrote a Law School Paper Promoting Racist Views. It Won Him an Award. I give it the OMG award.
“Preston Damsky is a law student at the University of Florida. He is also a white nationalist and antisemite. Last fall, he took a seminar taught by a federal judge on “originalism,” the legal theory favored by many conservatives that seeks to interpret the Constitution based on its meaning when it was adopted.
In his capstone paper for the class, Mr. Damsky argued that the framers had intended for the phrase “We the People,” in the Constitution’s preamble, to refer exclusively to white people. From there, he argued for the removal of voting rights protections for nonwhites, and for the issuance of shoot-to-kill orders against “criminal infiltrators at the border.””