Poetry, Found

I like my friend Ellen's idea to wrap up another fun month of Slice of Life! Thank you Two Writing Teachers for sponsoring this annual challenge-- it's been a blast!

Super Tuesday
What does the groundhog say?
Just you wait!

Wildly predictable
makes you stronger,
mush!

A stroll through time,
first hand knowledge,
busy town,
as writers do,
ooh ooh!
the time it is a changin.

Csi: the bunny trail,
checks and balances,
seen and unseen,
sixth grade rising,
highly unusual,
the name game,
natural rivalry?
TMI!

Companion ticket,
waffling,
two for lunch,
a day at the park,
a little bird told me--
tricks of time,
story starters,
she's seen the sights...

Golden treasure!

Golden Treasure

It was just a metal tube filled with mustard, and yet...

In this country we sell our mustard in jars and squeeze bottles, and that's the way we like it. Yellow, spicy, Dijon, honey, whatever the type, that's the way it comes, and why not? Such packaging is convenient and familiar to our nation of sandwich makers. But not long ago I was in an international grocery of the kind that is rather common in our diverse area.

Shopping there you can travel the world aisle by aisle, finding unusual products at every turn. For the adventurous American cook seeking a specialty item it is a treasure trove, but for others it is a bit of home.

Having had the privilege of living in overseas, I could appreciate both. There was a particular store in Lugano, Switzerland when I was in school there that stocked a variety of international items, among them such novelties as Oreos and Doritos. Some Saturdays we took the bus downtown simply to troll the aisle of American products, longing for a taste of the USA.

Now I picked up the toothpaste tube full of mustard and closed my eyes. I was back in Switzerland at Angelo's, the small general store right off campus, and Angelo's mama was making their famous ham and cheese sandwich. First she split a roll that had been delivered from the local baker just that morning. Next it was a foil wrapped disc of Bel Paese cheese that she spread on the bottom, topped with Italian ham and some sliced cornichons. The final touch was a squirt of mustard and then mayonnaise from the metal tubes on the counter. We growing teens couldn't get enough of them after study hall, but it's still one of the best sandwiches I have ever eaten.

Into my cart went the mustard, and down the aisle I headed, wondering what other treasures this place might hold.

She's Seen the Sights

News today that Patty Duke has died. For some reason this passing rather upsets me. It's not that I'm a huge fan, or anything, but I always enjoyed the re-runs of The Patty Duke Show that aired on nearly every afternoon of my childhood. Despite Patty's spunk, I was definitely team Cathy; I can still sing the song, which introduced me to Zanzibar, minuets, crepes suzette, and Brooklyn Heights, by the way.

It's true Patty Duke hasn't been around much in the last few years, although I loved her role as Meredith Baxter's wife on the last season of Glee. After that, I followed her on Twitter where she became more of a real person to me, tweeting and retweeting about nature and space, politics, the issues she advocated, and her friends and family. She was always gracious to the fans who reached out to her.

Of course her death was too soon: 69 seems ever younger, and the world just seems a little emptier knowing that Patty Duke is gone.

Story Starters

When advising my students about finding topics for their Slices of Life, I usually have one suggestion and one warning. I warn them not to write about having nothing to write about, because otherwise that's all they would ever write on most days!

Which brings me to the trick I like to pass along: think about your day and find something that stands out a little, whether it's for good or bad or because it reminded you of something else, or made you laugh, or made you cry, and then start writing about that, like so,

5:30 A.M. comes even earlier than usual on the first day after spring break...

Tricks of Time

"We have to get a picture of the dog in the middle of all these flowers!" Heidi exclaimed as we stepped off the boardwalk and into the early spring woods on the Bull Run Trail.

"We have one," I shrugged, "from the last time we were here."

"Na ah!" she replied. "When was that anyway?"

Through the miracle of modern technology, I was able to show her by searching through the photos on my phone. The last time we had been on this trail at Virginia Bluebell time was April 1, 2012.

Oh, we still took plenty of pictures of the dog sitting pretty in a lovely spray of lavender and spring green, and when we got home I checked my blog post for that date as well. It was ironically rather timeless:

"Why do we go to a nature center to learn about energy?" the ranger asked the congregation of sixth grade students. And the answer was that energy is everywhere, and nature both uses it and conserves it well. Case in point? Our guide showed us an example of the Virginia Bluebell. This plant is visible for no more than 4-6 weeks in the early spring. It grows and blooms in the sunshine that is only available because the trees have not yet leafed out, then dies back to its roots to wait for the earth to complete another trip around the sun. It is a spring ephemeral.

Years ago I drove from Houston to Austin at this time of year. Courtesy of the Texas Highway Department and Lady Bird Johnson, the hills were literally covered in Blue Bonnets, the showy lupine native to that part of the country. Fiery orange blooms of Indian Paintbrush were scattered across the blanket of blue blossoms, and it was hard to breathe, much less drive, in the presence of such an exhibition. I have never forgotten it.

Today I witnessed the local equivalent of that grand display. As we walked the trail along Bull Run,Virginia Bluebells carpeted the forest floor, rolling blue and spring green as far as I could see, their dainty lavender bells bowed away from the very sun they sought. I have to admit that I appreciated the beauty of their presence much more knowing as I did that theirs was a limited engagement.

But then, whose isn't?

A Little Bird Told Me

Another day, another walk with the dog. This time we drove about 20 minutes out to a small man-made lake in our neighboring county. The combination of sunny skies, brisk breezes, and barely budding branches made this an ideal walk for bird watching, and we were not disappointed:

Canada goose, mallard, sea gull, goshawk, red winged blackbird, starling, nuthatch, downy woodpecker, robin, cardinal, blue jay, tufted titmouse, Carolina chickadee, house wren, wood thrush, swallow, bluebird, one lonely mute swan, and a well-known bird that I have never seen before: an oriole!

I think that's a good sign as baseball season approaches!

A Day at the Park

Irate voices carried across the park and onto the trail we were walking on with the dogs. Always drawn to a drama, I slowed my pace and craned my neck to see what was going on. Three children were clinging like happy monkeys to the lower branches of a sturdy tree while a couple of dogs yapped at its trunk. What could possibly be wrong?

A little further off, two men stood face to face. It was their voices I had heard, and now I listened to make out their words. The man with white hair was the most strident, and it soon became clear that the children and dogs were with him. The space they were playing in was in the middle of a frisbee golf course, as the younger guy was trying to explain.

It was hard to tell if it was the tone or the message, but the older man was growing increasingly frustrated. At last he gathered the children and dogs and stomped off indignantly, but not before exchanging many ugly words with the other man and then the whole group of golfers at the tee about 50 yards away.

We continued our walk, passing people playing on baseball and soccer fields, and then on tennis courts, too. No one would ever blink at being asked to move from those places so that a game could continue; clearly the angry man had misunderstood the situation, but perhaps the young frisbee players could have been more patient; I couldn't say.

I looked to the sky. The sun was shining, and a soft breeze stirred the light green and pink branches all around us. No one could stay mad on a beautiful day like today, could they? I wondered, and hoped that I was right.