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Ascent Of A Dog
Jinx got skunked last night. I went out with him a bit before sundown for a post-supper walk. He left the road and loped across one of his favorite pastures, and I busied myself taking some photos and enjoying the cool breeze while awaiting his return. He was gone a few minutes longer than usual and when he returned, he threw himself to the ground at my feet and wallered around in the grass, apparently just enjoying himself. Then we turned for home. As soon as we walked in and Jinx walked past my wife, she cried out, “He’s been skunked!” I stood there gaping at her. I hadn’t smelled…
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The Fogs Of August
My mother and grandmother taught me to count the number of foggy mornings during the month of August. The number, they told me gravely, would correspond to the number of snows in the coming winter. I’ve tracked the August fogs more closely since we purchased our little farm here, and while never exact, the ratio of fogs to snows is fairly close. So far this month, we have had nine fogs out of twelve mornings. Last winter was quite mild, and the old-timers in these parts are already beginning to murmur about how “we’re due for a bad, bad winter.” We shall see. I recently re-watched one of my favorite…
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Gate Of Heaven
I worked from home today, an experience which was not as peaceful as I had anticipated. But I enjoyed the solitude very much, and in spite of my many mistakes and blind alleys, I had a productive day. It was also nice to be able to take the dogs outside and stretch my legs whenever I wanted. While wearing a t-shirt and shorts. And snacking on pork skins. In bare feet. With Jackie Gleason playing the background. How many of you know who Jackie Gleason was? Many have watched the old “The Honeymooners” sitcom on television. Some of you likely have seen Gleason’s masterful performance as Minnesota Fats in the…
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Undertakings
Jinx and I were up before the sun lifted above the fog, and the air was as cool as an August morning’s can be, full of mist and memories and murmurs, and we set out for our stroll. On the way back, the sun pierced the fog and clattered down upon us in arrows and spears, and the birds sensed the change and their cries grew more boisterous and they began to swoop from tree to fence to building to post to rock. The gravel crunched beneath my shoes and a chipmunk scampered across my path, his tail held straight up. Jinx was looking in the other direction and I…
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Mist Will Lift
A coworker who sits next to me at my office tested positive for the Covid-19 thingamajig, so I was required to be tested at a local hospital. It was interesting to note what a ghost town the hospital was. I was expecting squads of harried nurses and doctors to be running up and down the hallways, calling out orders and wheeling lifeless bodies on gurneys and asking for assistance. But the place was all but abandoned. A girl young enough to be my granddaughter performed my test, which, while not especially painful, was markedly unpleasant. She asked me if I was okay when she removed the fourteen foot swab from…
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Bandito
I stood out in the back yard this morning just before dawn, looking up at the gourd birdhouses and listening to the gradual crescendo of birdsong as the eastern sky brightened by degrees. I thought back to yesterday, a singularly grueling day, wasting my finite hours in the company of people with whom I have nothing in common, hours in which I was forced to work with my alleged “supervisor,” a younger woman so vapid, so mean-spirited, so coarse, so comprehensively ugly that I am tempted to think I live and breathe under God’s curse. But such thoughts make me recoil with that familiar jerking reflex action. You’re not…
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Will Find You Out
The weather in these mountains is very unusual these days. The heat is absolutely tropical, with moist, saturated air — still air, with no breeze at all — and the sun feeling closer to the earth, the way it feels in Texas. Thunderstorms every day and every night, and the insects are thriving and the frogs are practicing for their annual Dog Days oratorio. Speaking of frogs, this morning a fine specimen was perched atop the rail around the back deck. I’ve heard that when one sees a turtle on top of a fence post, one can be sure that someone put him there. The frog is probably a lot…
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Days Of Laze
Saturday’s weird dust-haze from the Sahara was gone Sunday morning, and in its place was a steady, soft curtain of rain. My wife and I deliberately chose to do nothing except rest. We felt somewhat battered by the week, by information we’re trying to process, by decisions we’re trying to reach, and by the time the first day of the week came around, we were more than ready to call “Time out!” and shrug the packs from our shoulders. I spent a large portion of the day with Jinx. Just wandering around, walking the road, exploring the woods and fields, sitting quietly, playing fetch. Jinx, for all his fine qualities,…
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Unseen Enemies
Yesterday Jinx cornered two black snakes. Like all of his kind, he has a special hostility for the legless, undulating creatures that appear in our nightmares and in certain gardens. I’m sure Jinx would join me in my disdain and mistrust of anyone who keeps a snake as a pet. Such herpatalogical husbandry is certainly a type of virtue signaling. A very bad type. The bark Jinx used to alert me to the snakes was an interesting cross between his “Hey, there’s a cow coming up the driveway and I think I’ll go herd her out of here!” rhorf and his “There’s a rabbit! I think I’ll see if I…
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Summer Song
The American calendar tells me it’s Father’s Day, and also that it’s the second day of summer (I rather like Bruce Charlton’s view on the timing of the seasons). I’m not clear on how many churches have resumed holding public worship services, but for those who are open for bidness today, I’m sure Father’s Day sermons will follow the time-honored American tradition of devoting most of the message to telling the fathers what inept doofuses they are, challenging them to man up, and lashing them with pronouncements about what husbandly headship and wifely submission do NOT mean. For years, I’ve wondered why any father would willingly attend these services, knowing…