Discovering Beauty in Everyday Life

A blank page has nothing, no nothing at all, but it makes itself over with letters and scrawl, nevertheless it remains quite pristine on the edges and margins and spaces between all those letters and such that don’t matter much so if I recall it at all then one word in twenty is plenty. Early (really early) Magnolia buds in Conservancy Garden I've sped read through more books than I can count, and I am really and truly great at it. I have become so proficient that I need only drive by a bookstore to read a book, much like ConEd reads meters. (You may not be aware of the special radio-frequency chips inserted in the spines of most best sellers.) So of course I think you should try it! Here's How: Open your eyes wide, and focus on your smart phone (how do you think that phone got so smart? Downloads!) Anyway, focus, focus. Concomitantly, Flick the pages past with a suitable finger; I prefer the two middle finger method. Now, work hard at remembering a few ...

I am hardened by the unrelenting cold Scorched by winter, moribund with icy calm Burrs scratch and itch, puncturing the edges Cold dirt. Talking drum calls out for me A drop, a flake, a pinch at a time By the tip of a root I become me again. Untermyer Fountain /Three Dancing Maidens by Walter Schott, French Conservancy Garden, Central Park.

Dry leaves rattle and bones click against the soft satin, shredded by time, A coffin day. I don’t know what to do when it comes down to it; Nothing seems to say itself, It just all seems out of proportion, There is no spring back in the touch, no sap of life, My fingers are aching with the sadness of it. And there’s the stupid sun, spreading itself over the morning. Look at that. A tree down for the winter, Gone, gone. Gone, gone, gone. They say the sap is just below the surface, Sticky with life, rich, and waiting. Colorado, Winter 2014

Hello Linda Jo I will share my experience on creating or growing a house, as you requested from your friends. First of course, you must accept the fact that I'm a friend and that the request includes me. I built my first house when I was 13 with the help of my then best friend, Ludwig (Luddy). It was in the in the midst of a deeply wooded area, but actually about 40 yards from my parents's house (just in case). The sides were made from orange crate slats - or maybe Apple crates. I don't remember. The roof was cardboard, procured from the local grocery. We told the owner we needed them because our parents were moving. It was merely a white lie because it was The Great Depression and our parents moved often. But the roof was not water proof and was rather mushy after the first drizzle. To us, it was the precursor of Hurricane Sandy. But we were determined and sneaked into a junk yard and found some corrugated tin. It was not considered stealing since i...

I’m dizzy and ditzy as a bee can be. Yet to be a bee is not for me, I am simply too busy to be a bee, IN fACT….I would like to know where all those behive engineers and botanists are! Where are the gardeners, the tree surgeons, the cultivators and the rose grafters?  It is time to unite behind the latest and greatest sustainable home design in the history of –well, the World.--  WE ARE GOING TO GROW A HOUSE . Why put up with all those joints and connections and what nots? Why not just manufacture a couple of seeds with a few house chromosomes? You know, a few plumbing stem cells, an electronic segment, a brick and mortar constructor? Sheet rock? What is a house but a few organs and an inner and outer skin? Of course, there’s some insulation for fat, a couple of entrances and egresses to manage maintenance, processing and waste. We just need a nice drainage system and some plumbing for circulation to carry the oxygenated water around. Can you experts not desig...

 Around the corner there is a library full of centuries of words hanging onto the shelves. Winter encyclopedias, dark maroon, almost leather, indexed and waiting, full of photographs. Color photos carefully selected, positioned just exactly on the page, heart and soul of a thing. Maps, Charts, Physics in a nutshell, Rome in a fraction of an inch. Me in my blue coat feeling like a leftover good-will bargain table, crumpled up and left for last. Watch your posture, young lady.  The lady says she likes the hat I choose from the second hand bin. Maybe it will have time for a second coming.  I do not select a book right off, it is a sacred act all right. Maybe just a small one, maybe I can taste little bit sunny spring  carrying a spirit  into my upper chest--After all, they say the sap is just below the surface, sticky with life, rich, waiting-- A book! bound with dewy decimals holding its place. The light is on now in this magic space. Oiled wood, ...