Civility

Nasty talk. Turn off the radio. Build a quick fire and cook a johnny-cake on top of the stove, two eggs on top of that. I spent some time in the woodshed, Rodney's bringing over a load of wood, and I wanted things arranged to my liking. I put a post-it note near the back door, a reminder to get a snow-shovel, last year's is now a walking stick. I take the sling-blade out and clear the paths to the outhouse and woodshed, so I'll be easily able to shovel the path later. I got back-up kitchen matches, back-up on the back-up for coffee (a couple of dented cans of Cafe Bustelo), and an extra tube of toothpaste. You build these little fires in the fall, midge-smudges, Ronnie calls them, to boil water or cook something quickly. Everything is so ephemeral, the king dies, the leaves fall. It's interesting, the way the Norman influence affected Old English, courtly French, them damned monks and their Latin; a patois becomes the vernacular. Then paper and movable type, codification. I had a moment today, brief and passing, where I actually understood what was being said in A-S. One of the riddles (the answer was a woman peeing) and it was only a couple of lines long, but I actually knew what was being said. Blew me away. I don't expect rewards for this, it's nothing, really, but it makes my day. She slipped off the path and squatted. Once I have the nouns and verbs, even without the grammar, I can make sense. If this, then that. Basho:

Not dead yet
at journey's end---
autumn evening.

A good trip into town as I actually got a few things I needed: an extra box of saltines, a couple more cans of the rolled anchovies. The library, the liquor store for back-up whiskey, and I stopped at the pub for a pint. Cory wanted to show me the new kitchen device, a dry fryer (convection, high heat), and this is exciting, fish and chips for one thing, chicken wings, stuffed jalapeno, be still my heart. And I know I'll have samples of everything. We talk about sauces; he prefers a malt vinegar and I love a thicker mayonnaise thing with garlic and sweet relish. Drove back home the long way around, all the way up the creek, so I could clean the undercarriage of the Jeep at the ford. This time of year it's an interesting drive, still lush and green along the Ohio, then gaining a thousand feet of elevation in 7.570 miles, it's fully fall atop the ridge. All along the way, because of the season, I kept noticing little pockets of extremely local climate, pockets of particular plants. Things happen for a reason, mostly, and I'm engaged by the causes. A specific bend of creek, a protected space, the succession of growth when the power company clears an easement. Years ago, Martin, a forager of the first degree, showed me how power easements were a gold-mine for ginseng. Good to know.