Imbolc                                                              Waxing Bloodroot Moon

Finished a rough draft of Redefining the Sacred.  As usual, my ambition outstripped the space I had, so I had to leave out several things I would rather have included.  I’ll also have to strip out some things that are in it now, because at 8 pages, it’s a couple of pages too long.  When it’s edited, I will post the long version and the edited version here under Ge-ology.

Heading to the treadmill.

Imbolc                                             Waxing Bloodroot Moon

Two tours today, a long time on my feet.  Hamstrings quivering when I came home.  Gotta back to the resistance training.

Gave a quick tour of the Mourners after the last Titian.  These are remarkable works of art.

Ate lunch with Joy, Tom and Morrie, all three had attended the Seven Days in the Art World lecture.

In just a few minutes Kate and I head out for our 21st anniversary dinner.

Imbolc                                       Waning Bridgit Moon

Whew.  Just got back from snowshoeing to the ridge crest, leaving from from a side door in the Monastery’s east side.  Along the way I came upon other tracks, rabbit and deer I recognized, but one large print I did not.  Can’t imagine what it could have been though it looked like bear to me.

I used to snowshoe every morning for my aerobic workout, a few years ago now.  In fact, I worked at it so hard that I ripped a boot mount off the base of the snowshoe.  That stopped me that year.  I’ve never really gotten back to it.  Felt good.

So far today about 4,300 words.  A better than normal day at home, by about a factor of two, so I think this concentrated time will pay off.  I’m learning how to work away from home.  Not expert at it yet by any means.  I left two chapters at home, late ones.  I don’t know how I missed them, but I’m working around that just fine.

Working on the yellow pad is less stressful on the arms than using the keyboard on my knees.  That’s a plus.  So is the quiet and the lack of interruption.  On the downside.  No Kate.  No dogs.  Not my bed.

It has already got me back in the traces.  What I wanted.

Imbolc                                     Waxing Bridgit Moon

The snow comes down here like a fluffy waterfall.  Behind its flowing curtain pine trees bend to greet it, a gentle wind bends it slightly toward the southeast.  The limestone of the Monastery stands out brown and tan and rust, a wainscoting for the horizon while rising above it is the gray sky, its up turned pitcher still full with frozen water, still pouring on us here.

The interior here, the monastery rooms and church have become more welcoming, our shelter in the face of this quiet storm.  My interior, too, rejoices at the calm the snowfall brings.  It is a time for listening, for being with those I care about, a time for retreat.

Ah, there’s the bell for 8:45.  I have to go.  The herd gathers again.

Winter                                            Waxing Moon of the Cold Month

Boy.  A busy day.  Business meeting where we looked over our expenses from Denver and checked again on our budgeting for the retirement season of our lives.  Looks good.  We also noted those little odds and ends that need to get handled before a big party.  Almost done.  Checked our calendars.  And that was done.

I’ve begun to look into an expressionist tour and focusing on formalism and contextualism.  A fun task, but will require some heavy lifting.  Decided I couldn’t get any Latin done this week, so put off till next Friday restarting my search for a translation of Ovid’s work.

This and that, bits and pieces.  Back to the treadmill.  Finished the 4th part of the War in the Pacific, an HBO special on this aspect of WWII about which I know very little.

Now.  Tired.

Winter                                                                  Waxing Moon of the Cold Month

The last Thaw tours are over and they were good ones.  I’m glad I leave the exhibit with a positive feeling.   This art, important and beautiful as many of its pieces are, doesn’t engage my heart in the same way European and Asian art does.  Individual pieces and cultures do, but not all of it, though I suppose that’s really not too different from the rest.  This was an opportunity to see and become familiar with some remarkable objects from an unusually broad and deep collection.  If I’m ever in Cooperstown, I’ll stop in to see the rest.

The museum is such a peculiar place, bricks and mortar, bureaucracy and guards, elitist opinion all woven around the true stars, mind bending, heart wrenching, beautiful, disturbing works from all over the world.  Many of the works are old friends now, The Cardinal, the Man of Sorrows, Germanicus, Doryphoros, Song dynasty ceramics, the collection of Chinese paintings, the Tea House and the tea wares, the ukiyo-e prints, the Benin head and the Bierstadt, Moran and Copley American paintings.  Dr. Arrieta.  The Delacroix, the Cezanne, the Monet.  Kandinsky.  the tryptych Blind Man’s Buff.  the Bryce Marsden.  The strange and disturbing telegraph operator.

When I come into the presence of these and many other pieces, we pick up things where we left off the last time I visited.  Hello, Cardinal.  You’re looking serious today.  Does Jerome bother you or does he give you inspiration?  Mr. Marsden, are you there behind the surface, the paintedness?   You gods, the jam session must have been a good one, you look exhausted.  Yes, your colors still move me today as they did they last time, Mr. Kandinsky.

Do you ever wonder what the paintings and the sculpture think after the lights have gone out and all the art lovers have gone home?  Many of them are, after all, of vampiric age.  Lucretia is a spry 345.  The Jade Mountain 225.  Doryphoros?  2,100 years young.  A real antidote to that sinking feeling when you turn 64.  As, for example, I will do next month.  Over all those years they must have accreted some wisdom, some knowing.  Think of all things they’ve been around for.  To be in their presence is to inhale the passage of not just days or months or years, but centuries and millennia. As I said, the museum is a peculiar place.

Samhain                                         Waxing Moon of the Winter Solstice

Groceries.  Grit. (small chunks of granite that give me traction.) Organizing meetings.  Some English to Latin, trying to implant participles, the ablative absolute and the passive periphrastic.  A nap.  Worked out.  Watched TV.

Tomorrow a half-day conference on environmental issues in the upcoming legislature.  It will be a more interesting event than I imagined when I signed up for it.

Samhain                                            New Winter Solstice Moon

Correction.  I will spend today shoveling the sidewalk, putting grit down on the slope, retrieving the Celica from the neighbor’s garage, driving it up and into its stall, then heading over to Festival Foods for groceries.  Now, after only getting up at noon, I’m ready for a nap.  Later.