More Rain

Going to rain all weekend, a Low settled in the Ohio Valley. I got out this morning without any problem and set about prepping the museum/theater for Pegi's young person Xmas show, cleaned the theater, cleaned and stocked the bathrooms. Next weekend she does her version of "The Nutcracker" on the main stage at the University, but I won't have anything to do with that. I never want to hear "The Nutcracker" again. Left an hour early, still raining, knowing I was going to be walking in to the house, first time in seven months, and I needed to carry a few things. I'll need to go back to town tomorrow, to get a few more things, and walk in again, but then I can hole-up for a couple of days. Just as it was getting dark a lovely fog infiltrated the trees, filled the hollow and brimmed over the top. Visibility maybe fifty feet. Pea soup. First walk in is the most difficult, by February it'll be easy; I had to stop four or five times today, not just because I was winded but because there are certain vantage spots, and I hadn't stood there and looked at what could be seen from that place in many months, and the view was different, from each of them; I had to register memory against what I was seeing. In this fecund zone, fertile and plenty of rain, things grow and change so rapidly. In the desert Southwest, things looked almost exactly the same for hundreds of years, but here, in seven years everything is completely different. The Red Maples grow so fast, the Poplars; the succession is a litany of nature: blackberry canes, sumac, Poplars and Red Maples, then the oaks and other native nut trees. The trees will probably survive our demise. The fox was at the compost heap, as I was walking in, and I saw her before she saw me, and was able to stop, sit on a stump, and watch her for a while. She danced around, with her ass in the air, and was cute in every other way besides, digging with her nose, examining possible tidbits; I sat there until she was lost in the fog. It often takes me an hour to write a coherent sentence, which seems like slow going, but I have a lot of hours. Factor the week and there I am. X number of hours. More rain spatters against the metal flashing on the northwest side of the house, which lets me know that this particular storm traveled through St Paul. Nice to know we share weather systems. Hard rain wakes me, napping on the sofa, a jarring staccato beat; South American or African, slack guitar, Congo drums, street dancing, the house vibrates in the night. I pick up where I left off, being aware, listening closely. I can't see a thing, because the darkness is absolute, what do they say, you could cut it with a knife. Black thick as tar. When I move away from my desk, to get a drink; from the island, where I pour a libation in shadow, my writing seat looks so artificial, a cone of light and the computer screen, off in the corner, otherwise, nothing. Phone was out last night and still out tonight, so I can't send. A fine walk down to the Jeep. The headwaters of Upper Twin Creek are in my hollow and it was running full, making a lovely sound in the still morning. Heavy smell of rotting leaves, the fecund odors of fall. I carry a small metal cup in my pack, and I sampled the water from several wet-weather springs. Excellent stuff, mineral rich, and cold enough to freeze your brain. I make a note to get some watercress seed. The napp over the spillway is 8 inches deep, a solid sheet of water crashing against the baffles below, Turkey Creek is running spate. I trust the Army Corp is on their mettle, because there's a lot of water flowing into the Ohio right now. I had only gone to town to get a few things to ferry to the house, but I spent most of the day at the museum. Nosing around in the Carter archives. I found a book, a ledger actually, stuffed with incidental papers that concerned the prints (serigraphs, mostly, (a silk-screen technique) but also some lithographs, that I didn't know existed, "Jane And Dora" for instance, and I'm sure the staff at the Columbus museum doesn't know that) and the hours just slipped away. Mary kept a very good record: each print, how large the edition was, who bought them, how much they sold for, and kept a running total on the sales. Starting in 1952 this was a large part of their income. The prints are beautiful, incredibly well printed; for eight years I've been trying to find out who printed them, and today I found an invoice from the printing company, outside Philly, that did them. It's very cool, when you've wondered about a particular thing, researched it as best you could, to suddenly find the answer. I think about writing a fictional account of Cartie's life. I know so much about him, viewed from the outside, very little from the inside, I'd have to invent, but I can do that. I spent an hour today, looking at Sargent's watercolors. Some of them are very good, and now I understand a little bit better where those great mid-western watercolorists were coming from. Like with bagpipers, it's good to know the history. Who studied with whom. The rain wakes me again. The phone is still dead, I checked it, as a matter of course, and there's just a deafening silence. Turn on the radio, for some company, Buddy Guy, you can't get that stuff no more, after midnight, searching for you. Lonesome as I can be. Let's go where the sky is blue. Lord have mercy, snow eight feet deep, what's to become of me. Feel like a broken engine, ain't got no driving wheel. I used to be a good man, now I have to be your dog. Saying nothing. Thoughtless ways. A lap-guitar, lingering chords. I hate country music. You won't ever make a fool of me again. What's that in the background, an accordion? no way I'll dance a polka. I was half asleep, my senses out of reach. Don't let me wake up yet. The waters so blue, Pete and the banjo. I was thinking about that today. Doc Watson, keep on the sunny side of life. Was in the spring? one sunny day, now she's gone, I don't worry anymore. I'm sitting on top of the world. A fiddle in the back-ground. You hear it? I'm no carpenter, but it's clear to tell, I was born with common sense, that wall is designed to fail. I'm just rambling. Signs of life. Too much reality and not enough fantasy. I've been around long enough to see. Dueling mandolins. Jesus.