Farmer's Market

Lovely to sit with Ronnie and watch people at their dalliance. A fine day in every way. TR and I discussed the opera over lunch. He figures that light (as in fireflies) should be a character. I've helped write songs before, but nothing on this scale; then I have the thought that I might write some haiku about fireflies and memory. TR called back and we talked for a long time about point-of-view. We're warming toward this project. Safe to say it will be non-traditional. A soprano, two or three percussionists, and an old guy, sitting in a chair upstage. It's a piece about memory, which, now, gives me a place from which to jump. Not that I trust memory, we lie to ourselves constantly, but I jump far enough aside when the scree slips, to gain footing.

Stillness---
sinking into the rocks,
the sound of wind.

The old guy is a kind of me. When I mentioned it, TR lit up, like I'd finally got it. Heat lightning, and Black Dell is bitching about overtime. A real ruckus outside. I've repacked some shotgun shells with rock salt, the wild dogs are driving me crazy, and I fully intend to blister their asses, anyone else that gets caught in the way. On the way, down the way, across the way. I have an old basket I use when I go to the market, made of white-oak splits, a beautiful thing. I rarely go home empty-handed. People like to put things in my basket. God bless them.