Morels

Several of you questioned whether or not there was a fungal metaphysics. I have to guess that these are people who have never had morels that had been cleaned, but not washed, cooked lovingly in too much butter, with just a pinch of salt and a goodly grind of black pepper, on sour dough toast. And Kant is perfect: Kant find them, Kant afford them, Kant stand mushrooms in any fashion. Found a couple of nice ones, walking in tonight. Probably could have driven in to the house, but more overnight rains forecast and I need to be at work tomorrow. Got the high school show uninstalled, then patched and repaired the walls, filled the holes, erased the pencil marks that are necessary to hang a painting, they're always hidden, so one typically erases them when a show comes down. Just had a strange experience. I'd poked around for a few minutes, in the woods where I found the mushrooms, thought nothing of it, came home, got a drink, fixed dinner. When I sat down to write, I knew there was a tick on my ass. I couldn't see it, because I'm not a contortionist, and it was in that difficult to see zone, at the bottom of the buttock. I could glimpse it, looking hard over my right shoulder, squeezing my excuse for an ass, tilting that section upward. Yes, it was a tick, and I had to get a mirror and the tweezers. Maybe everyone has done this, if there been anyone else around, even an enemy, I'd have to ask them to do it. It's bloody difficult to manipulate tweezers precisely, in a mirror image. A grisly accident, on my way home last night. At the embankment failure on route 52 a red Neon had hit the sluiced clay the road crew was creating, cleaning up the mess. I didn't mind the delay, rolled a smoke and got out my library book. They needed to clear one lane, because the traffic was really backed up, and the flat-bed wrecker was there, but the Neon was on its head. A fireman flashed the universal hand sign, "we need help here" and those of us first in line, got out of our vehicles, gathered around, and on the count of three, flipped the Neon over, so the tow truck could haul it away. I finally got home. There was blood everywhere and the windshield was smashed. I can only imagine. They flew her out directly, landed a copter in a bean field across the way, flew her to Columbus, where they have a hell of a teaching hospital and a great trauma unit. I'm just happy, to be on the team, that flips the Neon, so we can get stop-and-go traffic proceedings. In the open door, with my foot as a wedge. I warn you, I misconstrue almost everything, it's almost a habit. Something I could wear, an open collar, a tiny crucifix. Something you could lean toward, if you were so drawn. This point in the movie, you wonder where's the buttered popcorn, didn't someone get me a Coke. There is no philosophy, everything is a joke. Where, exactly, does that leave you. If everything is a joke. I only ask because I feel I must ask, given the circumstance, what, really, is in it for you? Black jack do it again. I certainly thought I was done with all that, not a gambling man. B came over and we talked about working on the driveway on Sunday. We have to talk about this, a shared interest. The last big rain washed all the fines down to the catchment for the top (most important) culvert. Have to dig out a few cubic yards of sand and gravel. Took in half the sculpture for the next show upstairs. Lovely pieces, figurative work in polished concrete over wire armatures; some of the concrete is stained, little
pieces of the armatures are exposed. They're mostly about two feet tall or long. The artist Shane Snider (web site) has a gallery in Columbus, he and the wife went up after the drop-off and are bringing those pieces back tomorrow. Install the show tomorrow afternoon, with him. Excellent. Oh, so I forgot to SEND last night, I must have been drinking. First hot spell so soon after the last cold spell. Spring was missing. A lot on my plate, be busy at the museum for the next couple of weeks. Neil visiting from New Jersey, one of the few friends to visit in every place I've lived. Well, he'd didn't come to Utah when I was living out of my truck. I think I published his first book 35, 36 years ago. Food and drink will flow. Conversation into the night. I hope Sara is here, I don't know when she and Clay are getting back. I had a tick embedded between two toes on my left foot, I got it out and cauterized the area, but it lead to me heating a kettle of water, soaking and cleaning my feet, rubbing with skin cream, trimming the nails. My feet have been bothering me of late, so battered, I don't know why, now, more than ever. I've broken at least five toes, one of them more than twice; and my feet look a lot like a picture I remember from a National Geographic, of a Nepalese Sherpa's feet. The first toe on my left foot has healed badly, I'd break it again, to straighten it out, but I couldn't stand the pain. And it's just a broken toe, not like I lost a limb or anything. A deformed minor body part. No one, really, needs notice. I have a correct sixth finger, a prosthetic, that I occasionally wear, to see if anyone notices. No one ever does. That indicates something. A broken toe, inside a sock, inside a shoe, is, really, not going to be noticed. I might walk a little funny, but not something you'd call the cops about. You might help me across the street, where the flow of traffic is unimpeded by street lights, might recommend I sit a spell on the park bench or a stump. You'd have been proud of me tonight. I sped, a little, saw the squall-line moving in, and I'd forgotten my umbrella, and I saw it was a close thing, getting back to house dry. Still no drops, and I posed, at the bottom of the hill, then raced up; was barely closing the door when the first waves of rain hit. I can't tell night from day. The wrong person to ask. Bring some black olives, I'm a cheap date.