If I needed a visual summation of the last six months, this would be it.
Ayup. That’s an orthopedic boot.
I was not in the boot. The Wife was. She has had troublesome ankles her entire life, but this past winter it really started to flare up to the point where she needed medical attention. Medications and physical therapy were up first, as was this big honkin’ spaceman boot.
This did not work.
Enter…orthopedic surgery, six weeks of icing and elevating and not putting any weight on it, and now, finally, physical therapy. She just today got the OK to stop wearing the Big Honkin’ Boot all the time, so for the first time since, I dunno, February, she has two regular shoes on.
This whole ordeal has been a struggle, in a lot of ways, but it was a necessary struggle that will hopefully lead to better days ahead.
And yes, this post was also an excuse to use the fun phrase to make fun of Canadian accents, “oot ‘n a boot”.
I heard this piece of joyously bombastic music on the radio last week, and as I wondered what it was, I found myself thinking, “This sounds like the kind of thing John Williams would write for the Olympics.” Now, I’m a firm believer that music can never depict anything specifically, but in this case…I was right! The work is not by John Williams, though Williams did record it on an album of such music. It is a piece called Javelin, by composer Michael Torke. It was commissioned for the 50th anniversary of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and for the 1996 Summer Games in that same city. Torke has apparently openly admitted the debt the work owes to John Williams.
I’ve got an unconquerable sweet tooth, I must admit. I have to be really careful about indulging it, for obvious reasons, so I try to err on the side of small servings of high-quality sweets. I’ve recently found this stuff, Wiley Wallaby Licorice.
The Store recently started carrying this brand. It’s a bit on the pricy side (a bag of this costs around 2.5 times what a standard bag of Twizzlers does), but it is high quality in that just a few pieces satisfies the craving. A bag of this stuff (full disclosure: I’m on my fourth bag) lasts me a few weeks, when consumed at a rate of two or three pieces at a time, only once a day. I’m not likely to sit and plow through a bag of this like I would a bag of Twizzlers or Red Vines. (Red Vines are particularly dangerous because they, like Twizzlers, are hollow in the middle, and that cavity is wide enough in Red Vines that you can use them as a straw. Imagine sipping your cola through a piece of licorice. Evil, I say!)
Pieces of Wiley Wallaby are much, much shorter, being only about two inches long. But they’re much, much fatter, and what’s more, they’re solid. Behold:
These are a chewy-candy delight.
Now, in “the wild”–meaning, at The Store–I’ve only seen three flavors of this stuff. There’s the Classic Red, which is just about perfect as red licorice goes. And there are Green Apple and Watermelon, neither of which I have tried because I quite honestly don’t like either of those flavors in candy settings. Maybe they’re wonderful in the Wiley Wallaby universe, it’s possible, but I’m not spending that much to find out. Looking at their website, however, I am intrigued by a few other flavors: Blueberry Pomegranate? Huckleberry? Yes, I may well be trying those.
But for now, this stuff rocks.
This has been a non-commercial endorsement. Nobody at Wiley Wallaby has paid me for this. (But if they want to send some free licorice my way, I am not so churlish as to say No.)
One of the things that sticks in my memory most strongly from our trip last December to Oahu is the rainbows. Every day, at least one rainbow. It just became this thing I did every morning: Get up, make the coffee, go out to our balcony, look off to the right, and see a rainbow. I even saw my first moonbow there.
Western New York is not nearly so prolific in the rainbow department.
But the other night, our WNY skies put on a show. A series of thunderstorms rolled in from Lake Erie, and in their wake, the sunlight did its thing. It started with the faintest wisp of a rainbow, barely there:
As the evening progressed, the bit of rainbow brightened…
…until finally…
And the rainbows were impressive in their duration, too: this one lingered in the sky for a good, long time. On the second pic above, we were heading home from dinner at a gluten-free restaurant in Lockport, which is way up north, about 30 miles. I took that full rainbow shot from the car in I-990, north of the Amherst UB campus, after about ten miles of driving. (Safety note: I was not driving! The Wife was driving. I was not doing sky-photography while driving.)
Another ten or twelve miles later, as we were approaching downtown Buffalo on I-190, there was this.
That just made me all kinds of happy.
Meanwhile, in the other direction, out over the lake, the sky was doing this:
Obviously nobody is ever going to mistake Buffalo for Waikiki, all right? But the sky here can really put on a show sometimes. And in Buffalo you can see sunset over water.
Tennyson has been my favorite poet–or second favorite, after Shakespeare–well, he might share that ranking with Poe–for as long as I’ve been aware of Tennyson’s work to any great degree. I’m guessing that was either my last year or two of high school, or sometime in college. More likely college. I love his lyricism, the rhythm of his verse, and his skill at evoking a scene that feels somehow present and distant. Tennyson is for the voice of things long ago, beautiful ancient cathedrals now partially fallen and shrouded in moss and mists. He’s the voice of the waves lapping cold and sometimes lonely shores, and of maidens in their bowers on an island in a river. He’s the voice of old captains taking to their ships for a final voyage into lands beyond the sunset.
That’s who Tennyson is to me. He’s the poet to whom I turn when I need to re-ground my sense of language.
I own several collections of Tennyson, a few of which are good, modern reading copies…but Tennyson is the type of poet who is, I think, best appreciated in antique volumes with paper that’s slightly yellowed, set in a typeface that hasn’t been used in a hundred years, and illustrated with engraved pictures captioned with lines from the poems. I own several of these, too…and while I am always loath to say that “Your library just isn’t complete without [item],” well…I think your poetry library isn’t complete without an antique, vintage copy of Tennyson.
See Sheila O’Malley for a typically great post on Tennyson–I agree with nearly every word she writes, even that Tennyson does at times “go on and on”, but frankly I tend to fall under his spell anyway–and his best work cries out for music.
Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,
But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.
Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;
For tho’ from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crost the bar.
The splendor falls on castle walls
And snowy summits old in story;
The long light shakes across the lakes,
And the wild cataract leaps in glory.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,
Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.
O, hark, O, hear! how thin and clear,
And thinner, clearer, farther going!
O, sweet and far from cliff and scar
The horns of Elfland faintly blowing!
Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying,
Blow, bugles; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.
O love, they die in yon rich sky,
They faint on hill or field or river;
Our echoes roll from soul to soul,
And grow forever and forever.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,
And answer, echoes, answer, dying, dying, dying.
Posted inpoetry|Taggedpoetry, poets|Comments Off on “One equal temper of heroic hearts”
This photo was shared on a Facebook group I follow, called “Olean NY: Memories in Time”, which is just that: memories of the Olean, NY region through the years. This is a photo taken by drone from the top of what is locally called “Rock City Hill”, the high mountaintop just south of Olean, and one of the highest points in the region. This view is northwest, toward the village of Allegany, where I grew up.
My issues with the region aside, New York’s Southern Tier is a hauntingly beautiful place. I don’t exactly miss it, but…I do miss views like this.
Full version available here. Original Facebook post here.
It’s quite a busy day here at Casa Jaquandor, which means posting something I know well without a great deal of commentary. So, here’s one of my least favorite pieces ever…but hey, maybe you love it, and I’m here to please. Enjoy!
August has always been my favorite of the summer months. My relationship with July has never been the best, though I admit it’s improved in the last few years. Back when I detested any temperature over, say, 73 degrees, I found July to generally be 31 days of torture where any minute spent outside the comforts of force-air cooling was akin to some form of Medieval torture. August, however? August is still warm–it can be just as hot as July–but usually August starts to see the shift toward more comfortable air, with cooler and less humid nights. Also, August is when the shortening of the days starts to be noticeable at last: I am a lover of night, and its return is something to cheer.
August is, really, the first of my five favorite months of the year. The light seems a bit more golden, and the stars begin to brighten.
