Loch Ness

When my daughter was in college she spent one summer working in Scotland. I joined her for the last three weeks of summer and we travelled Scotland, Wales and England, riding the British Rails and staying at various Beds and Breakfasts. The trip was one of the best of my life. I wouldn't have gone if not for my daughter, because I am normally afraid to fly, and flying is kind of necessary to get the Britain these days, but happily I made the flight.

One of the most memorable days of the trip was in Inverness, Scotland.

We signed up to go on "Gordon's Loch Ness Tour". Gordon was a retired biologist with a large van. He loaded up two American's (my daughter and I), a Canadian family of three, two Japanese and three Italians and drove us out to the Loch. Once there Gordon served us tea, kept hot in a couple of thermos jugs.

(I kept confusing the British by asking for "hot tea", because the British can't even imagine drinking tea any other way but hot. They don't drink iced tea. They don't drink iced anything.)

Once tea was served, Gordon asked if anyone wanted to swim, and offered his collection of bathing suits for our use. No one wanted to swim in the cold lake, but Gordon said he would. Then he calmly removed all his clothing on the beach and put on a pair of swim trunks. Now the Japanese and Italians took no notice at all of the brief public nudity. The Canadians looked vaguely uncomfortable, but kept talking, while the Americans dropped their mouths open in amazement and didn't know where to look. Americans just don't do nudity in public. I think most of them don't even do nudity in private. Maybe it's the Puritan in us.

After his swim, Gordon led us on a hike up the mountain above Loch Ness. It was a three or four hour hike through the trees, with a stop for sandwiches, and up to a glorious meadow of heather. The view from the top was spectacular, and well worth the climb. Getting down the mountain was actually harder than getting up, but the whole trip was exhilarating, and I am grateful to Gordon, and my daughter, for making it possible.

We didn't see the Loch Ness monster, we saw a little more of Gordon than we bargained for, and we saw some interesting cultural differences.


My Picture Left In Scotland

I now think love is rather deaf than blind,
For else it could not be
That she
Whom I adore so much should so slight me,
And cast my love behind;
I’m sure my language to her was as sweet,
And every close did meet
In sentence of as subtle feet,
As hath the youngest He
That sits in shadow of Apollo’s tree.

Oh, but my conscious fears
That fly my thoughts between,
Tell me that she hath seen
My hundred of grey hairs,
Told seven-and-forty years,
Read so much waste, as she cannot embrace,
My mountain belly and my rocky face;
And all these through her eyes have stopped her ears.


Ben Johnson

Forgive Me, Forgive Me

So the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is calling homosexual acts immoral. This from a guy whose subordinates kill, maim and torture people.

Stevie Smith
Forgive me, forgive me

Forgive me forgive me my heart is my own
And not to be given for any man’s frown
Yet would I not keep it for ever alone.

Forgive me forgive me I thought that I loved
My fancy betrayed me my heart was unmoved
My fancy too often has carelessly roved.

Forgive me forgive me for here where I stand
There is no friend beside me no lover at hand
No footstep by mine in my desert of sand.

The Year of Not Shopping Part 2

I continue not to shop for things, and it's going pretty well. I'm staying out of the malls entirely, and at the bookstore I grab a magazine to read and head for the coffee shop. Then after the family has shopped, I put the magazine back on the rack and leave. I did buy two bunches of tulips at the grocery store last Saturday, but they don't count because I won't have to store them. I've been reading and rereading books I already own. I went through the first six Harry Potter books, and loved them all over again. Fortunately, my husband has already pre-ordered the seventh Harry Potter book from Amazon.com (It's due out in July) so I can read it when he's done with it. Next, I actually went to the Blockbuster Video to rent, rather than buy, the four Harry Potter movies. I have not rented a movie in years, but why stop with the books? The second movie wasn't available (all checked out, I guess) and I was quite content to have three to watch, but the husband went to Best Buy to buy the missing movie so I could watch them all in order. He's a sweetheart, but is it cheating to not shop, and then have someone shop for you?

I've talked at least one person at work into not shopping with me.

Could two people not shopping account for the recent stock market losses? If so, I'm sorry.


Sara Teasdale
Barter

Life has loveliness to sell,
All beautiful and splendid things,
Blue waves whitened on a cliff,
Soaring fire that sways and sings,
And children's faces looking up,
Holding wonder like a cup.

Life has loveliness to sell,
Music like the curve of gold,
Scent of pine trees in the rain,
Eyes that love you, arms that hold,
And for your spirit's still delight,
Holy thoughts that star the night.

Spend all you have for loveliness,
Buy it and never count the cost;
For one white singing hour of peace
Count many a year of strife well lost,
And for a breath of ecstasy
Give all you have been, or could be.

Hymns of a Fat Woman

My sister lost about 40 pounds last year. She did it the old fashioned way, by eating healthy foods and exercising. She joined a gym and did aerobic exercise and strength training while eating less. She's a size 4 now, bless her heart. She goes with my nieces to the Karaoke Bar at the bowling alley. Men half her age hit on her at the gym. She will probably live forever.

Like many a reformed sinner, she now wants to save the rest of us who are mired in gluttony and sloth. She is trying to market herself as a "lifestyle coach". She will help you find a healthy diet and start an exercise program. She will help you join a gym and a hire personal trainer, if that's what you need. She will go through your pantry with you and toss out fattening foods. She will grocery shop beside you and help you read food labels and figure portion sizes. I think she's really on to something here. A lot of people need encouragement to be healthy, and most people don't get that encouragement from their environment.

I haven't signed up for her services, however. The following two poems are more my style.



The Hymn of a Fat Woman

Joyce Huff


All of the saints starved themselves.
Not a single fat one.
The words “deity” and “diet” must have come from the same
Latin root.

Those saints must have been thin as knucklebones
or shards of stained
glass or Christ carved
on his cross.

Hard
as pew seats. Brittle
as hair shirts. Women
made from bone, like the ribs that protrude from his wasted
wooden chest. Women consumed
by fervor.

They must have been able to walk three or four abreast
down that straight and oh-so-narrow path.
They must have slipped with ease through the eye
of the needle, leaving the weighty
camels stranded at the city gate.

Within that spare city’s walls,
I do not think I would find anyone like me.

I imagine I will find my kind outside
lolling in the garden
munching on the apples.


Fat Is Not a Fairy Tale

Jane Yolen

I am thinking of a fairy tale,
Cinder Elephant,
Sleeping Tubby,
Snow Weight,
where the princess is not
anorexic, wasp-waisted,
flinging herself down the stairs.

I am thinking of a fairy tale,
Hansel and Great,
Repoundsel,
Bounty and the Beast,
where the beauty
has a pillowed breast,
and fingers plump as sausage.

I am thinking of a fairy tale
that is not yet written,
for a teller not yet born,
for a listener not yet conceived,
for a world not yet won,
where everything round is good:
the sun, wheels, cookies, and the princess.

I found these two poems, and many other wonderful bits of poetry at the Library or Congress web site page, 180 Poems: http://www.loc.gov/poetry/180/

Birds

My radio alarm goes off every week day morning at 6:30 a.m. I usually lie in bed for another half hour, listening to National Public Radio tell me the news, weather and traffic. They have such soothing voices on NPR, even the worst news or the most snarled traffic doesn't sound too threatening.

I keep the radio turned low; I can also hear the birds in the yard, excited about the food in the bird feeder.

This past week, every morning at 6:50, Garrison Keillor was on the radio for a brief monologue he calls The Writer's Almanac. He talks about a writer or two, usually on the writer's birthday. Then he reads a favorite poem.

I just love it. What a great way to start the day - soft voices, bird song and poetry.

Check out the associated web site: http://writersalmanac.publicradio.org/programs/2007/02/05/#thursday


I heard him read the following on Thursday as I lay in bed listening to the birds in my yard:



Why I Need the Birds


When I hear them call
in the morning, before
I am quite awake,
my bed is already traveling
the daily rainbow,
the arc toward evening;
and the birds, leading
their own discreet lives
of hunger and watchfulness,
are with me all the way,
always a little ahead of me
in the long-practiced manner
of unobtrusive guides.


By the time I arrive at evening,
they have just settled down to rest;
already invisible, they are turning
into the dreamwork of trees;
and all of us together —
myself and the purple finches,
the rusty blackbirds,
the ruby cardinals,
and the white-throated sparrows
with their liquid voices —
ride the dark curve of the earth
toward daylight, which they announce
from their high lookouts
before dawn has quite broken for me.


by Lisel Mueller