Still here. Still ok.

Winter and the beautiful waning crescent of the Moon of the New Year

Ordinary time. Is there any such thing right now?

Saturday gratefuls: Kate. A good night’s sleep. For both of us. Much needed. Rigel keeping me warm. Kep the good boy. Impeachment. 25th Amendment. Resignation. January 20th. All. Subway last night. Beef stroganoff tonight. Easy Entrees, thanks Diane and Mary. Life. Its wonder even amidst its difficulties.

 

 

 

Whoa. Yesterday was tough. I slept from eight last night to seven this morning. All the way through. Thankfully. Feel rested and ready for today. Grateful, really grateful.

Kate’s still worn out though the oxygen situation has resolved. She’s already fatigued from whatever has been going on for the last three weeks, then to have an insult like the oxygen concentrators gave her was hard. She’s still asleep. I’m glad.

As long as I can stay rested, healthy, get my workouts in, see friends and family on zoom, I am ok. Though on occasion I get pushed right up against my limits. I imagine Covid is helping me since I don’t get out, am not around sick people. Or, when I am, I’m masked. Odd to consider, but I’m sure it helps.

Life continues, no matter. Until it doesn’t, of course. That is, even when an evil bastard like Trump is in office, we still have to eat. When a rampant virus rages, we still have to sleep. When a family member is ill, we still love each other, support each other. Life is a miracle and wasting it, well, please don’t.

Got an article about building a computer. Something I’ve always wanted to try. Might just do it. Also read about an experiment that proved quantum entanglement is not instantaneous. And one about the lost merry customs of Hogmanay. And about lyfe, the idea that life might be, probably is, existing in forms we carbon based life forms might not recognize, even if it’s in front of us. And another on why water is weird. And another on why the universe might be a fractal. (thanks, Tom)

No matter how proximate or distant disturbances in the force, science goes on, literary folks write books and articles, the past remains a source of inspiration, and the future a source of hope. No matter whether life has meaning or whether it is absurd (as I believe) the secondary effects of this strange evolutionary push into awareness persist. And, yet they persisted.

Lucretia hangs in the Minneapolis Institute of Art, ready for witnesses to her dignity, her sense of honor, and her tragic fate. Goya’s Dr. Arrieta, not far from her, documents gratitude for healing and the comfort of ancestors. Van Gogh’s Olive Trees teach us that perspective differs from person to person, yet each perspective can be beautiful while remaining unique. Beckman’s Blind Man’s Buff embraces the mythic elements of life, helps us see them in our own lives. Kandinsky. Oh, Kandinsky. His colors. His lines. His elegance.

Mt. Evans and its curved bowl continues to deflect weather toward us here on Shadow Mountain. The light of dawn hits Maine first, as it has for millennia. The polar vortex slumps toward Minnesota.

Roman Ephesus. The last standing pillar of the Temple of Diana. Delos. The Temple of Apollo at Delphi. The ruined temples of Angkor Wat. Chaco Canyon. Testimony to the ancientrail of human awe. Of an eagerness to memorialize wonder.

It is, in spite of it all, a wonderful world.