Overcast

Nice weather for splitting wood. Hope to get everything under cover this weekend. Came inside when the overcast started leaking, and I'd used my shoulder muscles enough for the day. Picked up an old oak tabletop from a dumpster in town, a bit rotted but it should make nice kindling. By the looks of me, if I do haul wood all weekend, I'll need a motel room next week. I was talking with an exotic dancer friend at the pub and she offered to come with me and scrub my back. She thought an evening of Chinese take-out and watching some of the new shows on TV sounded like a fun time. She doesn't own a TV either. We discuss books. She's a reader and asked me for a list, and now we talk about those and she wants more lists, and I give her books. We had sex, ten years ago, but now we just talk. I got her into Emily Dickinson, and we have incredibly convoluted discussions about feminism. Oddly, I come across as the feminist. She's one tough pragmatic lady. Paul swore I'd have a phone by five tomorrow afternoon, and if I do, I'll call my sister, to check on the death watch, then Joel, to see how his kidneys are holding up, then Kim, to check on his arm recovery. I'm being very careful, as I go about my chores, very careful; I look where every foot falls, I plan my trips outside to pee; I know where every irregularity is embedded. You can't be too careful. I burn any mail that's addressed to me, start fires with bank statements or offers for life insurance, and generally try to disappear. That pack of young dogs showed up again. I hate the way they invade. Stupid and loud, I ran them off with a firecracker. Firecrackers are the perfect defense up to anything other than an Army Ranger or a Navy Seal. A sudden explosion is proof against almost anything, snakes, bears, mountain lions; the ingrained ethic is flight. I can light and throw a dry firecracker in two or three seconds, quick enough to avoid most situations. People move slowly, for the most part, so that anything you do quickly is missed. Sleight of hand. Crashed early, sore muscles and a tad too much medication, then awake before dawn to more rain. I stay supine, listening to rain on the metal roof, for a long time, picking out time-signatures in the drip patterns. Spent the day reading The Old Gringo, by Carlos Fuentes. I made a small batch of chorizo sausage (very easy to do) and had it with beans on toast, topped with Kim Chi. A lovely meal that I repeated later. The deadline comes and goes and, of course, there is no phone. Leaf fall all day is a constant distraction. I love watching them twirl and get blown about, and I love that I can just sit and watch. A cup of tea, a book, a pillow for my back; I don't ask much, so I'm seldom disappointed. I need to get another radio / CD player, as I had to go out to the Jeep last night, to listen to the end of the book-on-tape I had taken to Florida. It's due back at the library. I enjoyed going out there, with a drink and a smoke, listening to someone read to me. Like going to a drive-in movie. Next time I'll have some greasy popcorn. I've always read. I read at the new third-grade level when I was in kinder garden. There weren't books at the house, but both Mom and Dad read, swapped books out with a used book store, 2 for 1, so they could read westerns and Nero Wolfe novels, and I read all of those. Then teachers started sending me home with other books and libraries became very important. Because we moved so often (Dad was doing pre-induction physicals at Navy recruiting stations) and because my school years spanned three tours of duty (between which were 90 or 100 days of 'lay-over' times, which we spent in Mississippi or Tennessee with family) I ended up going to school in eight or ten different states. They all had libraries. You tend to meet other readers in libraries. And, too, books are easier than people. If a teacher really likes you, they give you a copy of either Shakespeare, Whitman, or dear sweet Emily. Through a chance encounter (I love that, and's it true) I read Olson, then Dorn, then hundreds of books, thousands, that weren't even on my list. This winter I want to read everything Flannery O' Conner ever wrote, in order, you know, in sequence. Mary Flannery and those fucking peacocks.