The Secret to Long Life

Day 270

Alright, we are convinced that this is possible – mostly through the wonders of science and medicine.  We are fed that from birth, pretty much.

Me?  I come from really old people.  Unless I do something really stupid, I’m probably going to live out that kind of expectation.  Which does not mean that I don’t take vitamins.  I take them from a tidy packet because it says it is all I need, and because it cuts down on the number of bottles and containers I have sitting around.  Opening all of them is exactly the kind of ritual I can’t get into…it is a quirk, probably, but I would rather not take vitamins than to have to  stand there and assemble them every day.  So I tear open a packet and down the contents.  Job done.  Live forever.  When my Aunt Lizzie was 93 her doctor told her that her cholesterol was high and that she might want to stop eating three eggs with bacon every day for breakfast, and that she should start taking some medication to control the situation.  Her reply is a classic:  “Son, so how old do I have to get?”  Yes, I’m with her.  But that in no way means I don’t want to collect as many sunsets like these as I can:  

Detritus

Day 245

Oh, how many words do we actually have for roadside trash?

I realize that it is a world wide problem – in some places worse than others, but there is this need, in the minds of some, to distance themselves

from the trash they create – it seems as though they can’t bear to have it in their car for as long as it takes to get it somewhere it can be properly disposed of – so there it lays alongside the road.  Of course, a cd tossed to the curb is another matter.  That could be an entire short story if I was in the mood to let my imagination out to play.  Normally, I would do that, but today I have to focus – an art show/festival in New Jersey is claiming my attention.  The car is loaded and ready to go, all I have to do now is to identify the most important thing I am likely to forget to take with me, and get it to a place where I will fall over it getting out of the door.  It will make me doubly disgusted with myself when I find that I left it behind, but it will be a proper kind of effort…

Sunrise and sunset yesterday bracketed the day deliciously.  Looks like good weather again today…I can hope.

Liriodendron

Day 237

Yesterday ended pretty much the way it began – in a blaze of glory…

Yesterday is a hard act to follow, but if I think about it, this could be said of every day, yet it is done…

I am put in mind of a John Prine tune with lyrics “Leaves are burning, just like embers, in colors red and gold – Light us on fire, burning just like a moonbeam in our minds…” (Killin’ the Blues)  It always comes to mind in the fall – I sing it when I’m walking.

The tulip poplars along the driveway are old – old for the variety, species and genus – filled with hollows and broken spaces, home to raccoons, squirrels, snakes and who knows what all kind of beasties – they are like the tenements of the farm – every level seems to house some other species.  But it not only the shelter they provide, but the broad green leaves and the great banded blooms (that remind me to sherbet somehow) that make them such desirable trees – I wouldn’t dream of taking them down.

The leaves turn early.  The oaks alongside them haven’t considered a change yet, but already there are falling leaves from the poplars.  Lots of green left, but laying in the driveway, the harbingers…