Reflections
-
The Hardening Of The Heart
I managed to stay awake until almost midnight last night, intermittently checking the election returns. When I finally went to sleep at 1145 pm, Biden had 223 electoral votes and President Trump had 166. Still, things looked very hopeful for Mr. Trump. My wife couldn’t sleep and got up before 400 am to check the election status, so I got up with her. Our reaction was the exact opposite of how we felt four years ago when we awakened to the news that Hilary Clinton was not going to get to grind her boot in our faces for four years. I had been telling family and friends for months that…
-
Storm Coming
Our house is quiet tonight, and the hills and dales among which it sits are quiet as well. Amazing how fast the change came…just a few weeks ago and we had the air conditioning on. Tonight, it’s the furnace. This is the way with powerful forces. They can change so rapidly it staggers anyone who witnesses the change. A flock of thousands of birds, a school of thousands of fish…they move as one when they change direction, and their energy is beyond comprehension. Our house is quiet tonight, but the land is not quiet. Tomorrow will see the beginning of something, and who can say what it will be or…
-
All Saints Day
“Mom? Why did Jesus have twelve opossums? I mean, what did he do with them?” — Lizzy Beck This morning during my walk with Jinx, I was struck by how absolutely silent the world was. My own steps were the only sound in the pewter air. It was almost easy to believe that last night the air had been full of ghosts and spirits of ill-will, because the early Sunday hours were so clean, so spotless, so purified. Surely all the saints were watching as I crunched gravel beneath my boots and Jinx’s tail cut the air like a buggy whip. Into my mind came the opening line of Poe’s…
-
Accomplished By Needles
Up before dawn with two hungry dogs, one of them also quite urinacious (the spotted menace has no such weakness, being of the Ancient Order of the Iron Bladder), and Mrs. Orr prepared breakfast tacos. We ate and talked of west Texas and her tough people and her immutable wind that scrapes across her lion-colored hide. Jinx and I walked and watched cows bent to their unceasing cropping of grass, working their magic of transforming green blades into white milk. In the un-sunned early hours, we could hear the moist tugging of the grass into the soft lips, and an unseen owl in the enormous oak tree asked his eternal…
-
Cries Go On
Last year, a male goldfinch at one of the feeders caught my attention with his unusual behavior, and I realized that he was blinded in at least one eye. I’ve seen him a couple of times since then, and each sighting rings in the halls of my heart because it reminds me that, for some reason, he stays near our farm, and that he seems to recognize me. I fill the bird feeders in the evening. We have various types of feeders — the cheap cylindrical kind that are easy to fill but also easy for squirrels to raid, the metal mesh kind that are impervious to rodents but do…
-
Mountains To Moors
When I arrived at work this morning, I had to stare for several minutes at the dark beauty I saw before me. The lights in the parking lot gave fire to the orange and red ornamental maples ringing the lot. Goblins had come along in the night and stuck Poe’s flambeaux into the mulched earth and left them to burn until the sun returned to chase away the effect. Walking to my building, I heard two young men near a car talking. I winced at the tone and content of their words. It’s not an original observation to say that today’s males are not….well, men. There is a hideous softness,…
-
Prayer’s Labyrinth
I received a call today from a friend who asked my wife and me to pray for her family. To say that they are walking in the valley of shadows would be an understatement. I promised that we would be praying for the family and asked her to keep us updated and to let us know if we can do anything of a hands-on nature. Then on the way home, I passed a state trooper headed in the opposite direction. He must have been doing 80mph in a 40 mph zone, lights and siren going. Right behind him were two ambulances, flashing and wooping with equal dynamic presence. I crossed…
-
Tang In The Air
Last night, Mrs. Orr and our little elderly dog Dixee accompanied Jinx and me when we went for our twilight walk. The sun, far below the horizon and providing just a rosy glow, gave an otherworldly cast to the air. The stars were already visible, little faraway dots of fire, and man and wife talked in hushed tones between the mowed pastures while the dogs scampered and explored. This morning, when Jinx and I went out into the lightly-frosted world, I was almost in a trance of joy, drinking in the pre-dawn chilled purity of morning, the air better than any drink or drug. I remember as a teenager, taking…
-
The Lawless Blogger
This past March, just before the big coronapanic hit, my wife and I made our annual trek to the local library’s used book sale. Among the treasures I found were a stack of back issues of Magnificat, the Catholic monthly devotional magazine, selling for .25 cents each. I bought every one of them, enough to fill an entire shelf on the bookshelf in our bedroom. The magazine is of very high quality, with writing and artwork to elevate the soul and the thoughts. I’ve been in a bit of a low valley lately, spiritually speaking, and this morning my wife helped my spirits immensely by reminding me of how blessed…
-
One Day More
Another electric color day in these mountains. The month is half over, which means the scenery will soon diminish and dull itself. But for now, it is a boon to the soul. I did a bit of spray painting when I got home this evening. Didn’t seem like that big of a deal. But then I walked into the bathroom and saw myself in the mirror. I think I screamed. Cirque du Face. Tragic, tragic times. Did you know that errant spray paint can affect the little hairs inside one’s nostrils? *** When Jinx and I walked this evening, the bats were thick in the air over us, swooping and…