Wednesday's jazz: I started with Joe Sample and then gave a long listen to the band he was in, The Crusaders.
1. When I was younger and heard those announcements on tv or the radio telling us a heat wave was underway and that people over 65 or those with respiratory problems should stay indoors, I used to think,"What a bummer for those people." Then I'd go out and work in the yard or go for a hike up Sweet Creek or maybe even go to a ball game at Civic Stadium.
Now that I'm leaving age 65 farther and farther in the rear view mirror of aging, I'm understanding better and better how difficult it is to be older and exposed to the heat. "What a bummer for those people." Now I'm one of them!
Today the temperature got up into the 90s and it's expected to get even hotter for the next few days.
So, I did my best to stay cool, but I took a short trip to Yoke's for a few things and, when I returned home, I didn't want to do anything at all except sit in the house and rest.
2. Before I went to the store, I watched today's online broadcast by Billy Collins (2:30 PST). Billy continued to make fun and rambling comments about his poems and read three selections from his book, The Art of Drowning -- "Days", "Cheers", and "Metropolis".
I made one serious miscalculation while living in Greenbelt, MD. I thought I would live there a long time. Had I been thinking more clearly about how unstable life is and how things can change quickly and how it's wise to do seize each day and do what I love as often as possible, I would have visited the National Art Museum more often in Washington, D. C. (I would have also gone to a baseball game at Nationals Park.)
Billy Collins' poem, "Metropolis" explores his love for the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, and, as he explored his affection for paintings in the more remote and sparsely attended corners of the Met, I thought about the paintings I loved at the National Museum, how I loved standing, say, in front of paintings by Toulouse-Lautrec and looking at the soul-crushed faces of the women he painted in public places and at the soulless faces of the men looking ready to numbly prey on them and I tried to imagine stories for them, how they came to be where they are in the paintings and what might lie ahead. My stories weren't very good -- I don't know enough -- but those afflicted faces stayed with me. They haunted me. I see those faces all over the place, at the store, in the bar, walking in Kellogg or in Spokane or in Coeur d'Alene. I saw them when I taught -- and, at LCC, I often didn't have to imagine stories -- either in writing or in conversations in my office, many students told their stories.
3. I bought a half a gallon of vanilla ice cream while at Yoke's. Later in the evening, I put scoops in a wide mouth glass, poured milk in the glass, and stirred until I had a cooling refreshing drink that was close enough for me to a milk shake. It cooled me and sweetened my disposition.
Here's a limerick by Stu:
It’s place near a gray sludgy quag.
Was not a feature of which we could brag.
But, on ice it was handy,
And in traps ‘stead of sandy.
Some uses for a mountain of slag
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