Telegram

Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.
Monday, May 31st

Memorial Day 2004



Without any trouble I could have chosen among six local parades commemorating Memorial Day. I chose the one in the neighboring town because I had heard that local resident Bill Moyers would be speaking at the ceremony following. I arrived about forty minutes early, and wandered among the gathering paradists -- several antique cars, a horse-drawn carriage, scouts and ball-clubs and civic groups, fire engines, the local high-school band, youth dressed up like cartoon characters, and the aging veterans. The parade went about a mile down Route 202, and even with so far to go lasted no longer than a summer shower. The ceremonial were lengthy, mostly familiar, and sincere. Moyers gave a nuanced but non-controversial speech. The parade doubled back to the firehouse and rain began, lightly, to fall.
David on 05.31.04 @ 04:01 PM CST [link]


Sunday, May 30th

Stranger in the Night

mood: advanced befuddlement


Sometime along about four in the morning, the participants were asked if they would pick up some of the trash littering the track and the infield. A few of us started doing so, picking up broken ballons, playing cards, glow sticks, candy wrappers, and the associated detritus of a semi-organized social event. We started talking to each other, because we were there. We went back to circling the track, and continued to talk. I told her my name, she told me hers -- I forgot it almost immediately, but maybe it was Nicole. The conversation was a little goofy, sometimes rather flirtatious, sometimes prosaic and abrupt. I don't know that we would have spoken to each other under any other circumstances -- she started it by telling me I was smart to bring gloves, somehow that opened the door to chattering for two hours or so, until the sun was up. Sometimes shared discomfort is reason enough to build a temporary relationship.
David on 05.30.04 @ 05:34 PM CST [link]


Saturday, May 29th

View from Orbit


According to the U. S. Naval Observatory, the moon set at 2:49 AM today. This was followed at 5:30 AM by the rising of the sun. I can affirm, for I saw this: the reluctant moon dropping closer and closer to the school building as each time I rounded the track, until sometime after two I was obscured behind it; then, after four, the sky behind the woods began to brighten, deep purple, blue velvet, until the obedient sun showed his face behind the trees. By six o'clock, when I rested, I could sit in full sunlight, and the cold winds of the night were chastised by the birth of the day.
David on 05.29.04 @ 05:36 PM CST [link]


Thursday, May 27th

The Steps I'll Take



Tomorrow is the local Relay for Life. Last year was the first time we had had one of these events locally; VNA was heavilly involved and I was on the team. It was a good cause and a rummage mini-reunion. This year, for reasons hat still aren't clear to me, a VNA team was never organized, and so I have ended up becoming an adult chaperon to the church's youth team. I am looking forward to it with a certain amount of trepidation: first, because of my dubious claim to the status of adult (age seems hardly sufficient qualification); second, because I'm less familiar with the group, less attached to them individually and as a group. But I am participating mostly out of solidarity with my friends who have struggled or are struggling with cancer; some have fallen and some will fall, some have risen and regained their health, and I've been helpless to help them. To assuage my guilt and anguish, I'll try to make myself feel better by making myself feel bad.
David on 05.27.04 @ 05:48 PM CST [link]


Wednesday, May 26th

P. Fair


Passing Fair was a moderate success, I think. It was something of a novelty to most of the rummage people who looked at it, a photographic weblog; some, I think, didn't realize that there would be new content every day and only looked at it once. It was mentally exhausting trying to figure out new subject matter each day, when I've been shooting rummage for six years now and none of the subject matter is really novel any more. I didn't want to feature people without their permission so most of my subjects were objects -- and I photographed people incessantly with my 35mm cameras, because people are what interest me. Some people very much. Now rummage is over and i haven't yet figured out what Passing Fair should be in its absence, or whether it should cease to be until the circus comes to town again. There's always a passing fair, I guess, but you can't always recognize it.
David on 05.26.04 @ 05:49 PM CST [link]


Tuesday, May 25th

Rebel Without a Mortgage


I am a middle-aged delinquent. And I'm embarrassed to admit this doesn't mean that my life is full of rumble fish and car theft, knife fights and being rude to teachers, it only means I experienced a case of brain freeze and forgot to pay my quarterly taxes. And my efforts to launch a more foolproof system to keep track of my bills were partially to blame -- it had better be foolproof f you know the fool. I put all the bills in a binder, organized by month and by ate within the month, but when I started this system at the end of March, I didn't bring forward the tax bill which I had had in the old file since I paid the last installment in February. And, knowing I'd forgotten something but never aware of what it was, I passed smoothly through April and May, the months I can barely find my shoes, and thought I was doing well until I was informed of my delinquency today. I wrote a check and sent it back immediately; the thought of spending the night at the police station with Sal Mineo and James Dean was sufficient chastisement.
David on 05.25.04 @ 05:20 PM CST [link]


Monday, May 24th

Charter Day


"Charter Day" is the kind of quasi-holiday municipalities cook up to get people into the downtown area. I don't think anyone knows anything about the town charter, when it was issued or what significance, political or historical, it might have; in effect, the festival replaces the Labor Day Kiwanis Fair that was closed down, in rancor, about twenty years ago. Local merchants, secret societies and civic organizations are persuaded to set up tables along the steetscape for two blocks, stretching from the elementary school to the Presbyterian church; and people mill around all afternoon and pick up free and cheap doodads to take home and throw out. Bookmarks, refrigerator magnets and bags of candy are popular giveaways. On the stages at either end, various small-time acts and school groups perform to general indifference. The evangelical churches are a little like Satan in the temptation story: offering cool drinks and shiny gifts with theone hand, and creepy literature with the other. Thirsty? Try a copy of "The Man In The Mirror"! And it all wound down and everyone went home, and there's a little more trash in the streets on Sunday morning.
David on 05.24.04 @ 07:05 PM CST [link]


Sunday, May 23rd

Drifting



My brother called last night; it had been a long day with Ben care and Charter Day and the telephone cught me dozing in front of the television. I never call him, and his calls got to be rare a few years ago, when he started living with B. And conversation is rather strained these days. I suppose I still hold a grudge against him for all he did, when we were young, by encouragement and example, to lead me down a path I regret having taken, but that's all water under the bridge these days. We just don't have much to say to each other these days; e're leading active but very different lives which suit our different temperaments. But I feel sorry for him because he's so sad about this. Every time I speak to hinm, he expresses regret about not being in touch with me, and the rest of our family and old friends; but he never changes his behavior to rememdy the situation. I've been kind of the same, but I don't feel very guilty. Everybody's drifting, and while you're adrift you can only detect relative motion, not absolute. So getting farther apart isn't the fault of only one party; to a large extent it's the inevitable result of time and motion. It can be overcome with effort, to be sure, but if you're happy where you are, and going someplace you want to go, looking back happens less and less.
David on 05.23.04 @ 06:05 PM CST [link]


Saturday, May 22nd

Ben



I've been looking after Ben, yesterday and today. Ben is a golden retriever, aged eleven at least, and his people wanted to go down to Cape May for a little excursion. Ben has gotten a lot older, in a qualitative sense, since the last time I saw him. His arthritis is worse, he is nearly blind with cataracts, and he's developed diabetes. He doesn't expect much from life any more, and the good things, he walks, the meals, the hugs, the dead things to pick up, he doesn't care for them so much any more. He's marking time, and to a large extent, life is first boredom, then fear, for him. I tried to care for him, feeling the need of a caring hand myself and wondering where it is. He put out his paw, like a handshake. I just sat there with him for a while.
David on 05.22.04 @ 07:37 PM CST [link]


Friday, May 21st

Mild Monster



I'm not real happy with myself today. A bad mood has been gathering me into its arms since the end of the dinner Tuesday night, and by the end of the day today I had embraced it back. I finally got a reply, sort of, to an inquiry of mine, but the reply leaves me in a continuing state of uncertainty and confusion. I sure didn't say what was on my mind and I don't think she did either, but I can't interpret what wasn't said. I got the answer I was expecting, if not the one I'd hoped for. But I've been irritable and spooky today, being a moral coward in little ways, a complainer, an irritable irritant. Maybe I should have put off the call to another time; I would have if I hadn't needed an answer. I kind of hate myself today.
David on 05.21.04 @ 04:46 PM CST [link]


Thursday, May 20th

Numbers


One: the number of times I've used a cell-phone. Two: number of siblings I have. Three: the number of cameras I'm actively using right now. Four: the hour I usually wake up, for a while, this spring. Five: the number of years, more or less, we were clients of the VNA. Six: the number of years, more or less, that I've been a volunteer with the VNA. Seven: Pride is my worst. But I'm susceptible to them all, one way or another. Eight: Hour I report to work, except on Sundays, when it's seven. Nine: Numerical part of my address. Ten: the number of minutes I expect my commute to take, when I drive. Often it takes less, but it takes more if i leave early and run into traffic at the three schools between my house and the church. Eleven: number of siblings my grandmother had. She was the youngest. Twelve: number of grades I completed in my primary education. After my graduation I spent the next four years earning (ha!) my BA, which is the usual procedure, but everyone else in my family took longer, except my uncle, who got his in three.
David on 05.20.04 @ 04:52 PM CST [link]


Link


A photo gallery of the VNA annual meeting, dinner and centennial celebration
at this site:

Here.

I'm in photos 20 and 82.

David on 05.20.04 @ 11:38 AM CST [link]


Wednesday, May 19th

Night at the Manor


Last night was the big event -- dinner, annual meeting, celebration of the centennial of the VNA. I was not entirely looking forward to it. Suggested attire was "business elegant", and since I'm not in business and by no means elegant, I was a little concerned I'd be barred at the door. I brought my invitation along in my pocket to minimize the potential scene.

The place was easy enough to find, and I got there a bit earlier than necessary. Outside there were four classic cars, of the models the nurses once used for their calls. Also any number of friendly faces, and I relaxed, until I went inside.

Got greeted, got nametagged, stood at the top of the big spiral staircae. Light out on the chandelier. A companionable acquaintance tried to buy me a cocktail. I declined. He continued to insist. I just wanted water. Alcohol may improve my perception of this kind of event, but it doesn't improve me, and I am usually in need of improvement. I move on and make uneasy conversation with some uneasy individuals. I notice I am the only man not wearing a tie.

The organizer of the event comes over to me and breathlessly (she is always breathless) tells me she'd like me to relocate from my assigned table to hers. I agree, realizing as I do so that this situation makes the slow fade impossible -- I'll have to stick around to the bitter end. And I never figured out why she wanted me there. But one of my pals on the board had also been assigned there, so we stuck together and it wasn't too bad. The four people I knew at the table were all divorced women. I never figured out who those other six women were, and they were too far away to ask.

Meanwhile: speeches, introductions, thank-yous; appetizer, salad, main course. Speeches, coffee, thank-yous, presentation of gifts. Photo ops. Then we start sidling toward the exit. I linger in case the birthday girl has something to say to me. She doesn't.

I help some of the organizers carry the mannequins which were used to display the antique uniforms to the storeroom. I recognize one of them; it's a dressmaker's form I was given by a college friend and kept in the garage for years before I donated it to the sale. The great wheel of rummage spins on.
David on 05.19.04 @ 05:12 PM CST [link]


Tuesday, May 18th

The Sower


I haven't even thought about a garden. When my mom was alive I always tried to grow a few annuals, anyway, to please her. Such a little thing to give so much pleasure. I guess it's a sign that I've been living alone for too long, that I've learned to live without those kinds of pleasures, pretty flowers, a home-cooked meal, day trips and rambling conversations. Probably I am diminished, without realizing, by these losses, and maybe all I have to do to regain them is to plant a seed.
David on 05.18.04 @ 04:17 PM CST [link]


Monday, May 17th

Bell's Infernal Machine


I am not very good at using the telephone. I try to avoid situations where I might have to use it, and, if I have to do so, I agonize over the potential conversation beforehand and dissect it obsessively afterwards. Usually the conversation itself is unremarkable, prosaic, to-the-point; if they were travel such conversations would be strictly commuting. In face-to-face conversations I am more likely to meander and travel for pleasure. I am no better with answering machines. I don't like them and can't leave a decent message, though my problem is that I am concise to the point of being cryptic, not that I stray and ramble. I wonder if the message I left made any sense at all, or if it made too much sense altogether.
David on 05.17.04 @ 06:57 PM CST [link]


Sunday, May 16th

While I Was Out


A week ago I was so out of touch, so immersed in all my frantic activities, that i wasn't aware that the big race had been run, and didn't care. Now I can't help but think that what I've awakened to is worse than the nightmare -- decapitations, brutalities, the incessant chatter of the bobbleheads and the self-serving blimperies of the officials. We look into the process of interrogating enemy prisoners with the same cautions that we might look into the slaughterhouse: we may find the results palatable, but the process is repulsive and we would probably be happier if it were hidden from our delicate eyes. But at least when you slaughter cows, you're pretty sure you'll get your hamburgers in the end; I have no confidence that anyone knew, or cared, whether the men subjected to our military's processing had any meat to yield. Our people are representatives of a nation, its laws and ideals, its way of life and its moral code before the world, and they have represented none of those well.
David on 05.16.04 @ 05:46 PM CST [link]


Saturday, May 15th

RSVP


I should really do something about accepting these invitations. Somebody saw my most recent Mirror Project submission, followed the link, and invited me to participate in something called "1000 words"; what a picture is worth, these days, I guess. I let the idea slip by me while Rummage was happening but I am susceptible to flattery, the more undeserved the better, and if I can dig out a picture and write some copy to go with it I suppose I'll give it a try. And it reminds me that, ages ago, a reader invited me to submit something to her e-zine, called saucyvox dot com, ages and ages ago, and I never really did. Writing for "publication" seems like an invitation to pretentiousness, and I sometimes suspect I'm already pretentious enough -- but I've got plenty of company, here in cyberspace, in that regard. Pretentious, cliche-ridden, sentimental: if I was only a bad speller I'd be the archetypal internet writer.
David on 05.15.04 @ 07:15 PM CST [link]


Friday, May 14th

Pins and Needles (In My Heart)


I was late but she was later; she smiled when she saw me and sat in the empty chair beside me. The meeting went around and around, for a couple of hours. I wanted to talk to her, but she was gone.
David on 05.14.04 @ 06:11 PM CST [link]


Thursday, May 13th

Aftermath


The heat hasn't helped. Monday and Tuesday the temperatures and humidity soared, when the volunteers had to do so much heavy lifting to put Rummage away for the summer. Back to picking up the threads I dropped; settling accounts with the people I housesat for weeks ago, making contact with the lady who's running the Relay for Life this spring. Handing off some of that information to an interested party, or an interesting one. Yard work; cutting an unkempt, unkept lawn in 90 degree heat. A ragged lawn is more scandalous than adultery around here. Grocery shopping, laundry, housework. I need a haircut. I want to sleep. I need a hug. I am amazed that I managed to keep myself alive, update two websites daily, and keep gas in the car and pay the bills these last five weeks. Make way for tomorrow.
David on 05.13.04 @ 05:54 PM CST [link]


Wednesday, May 12th

Rise


I come back to the surface, drowned but not dead. The confusion subsides, I regain m senses and orient myself to the world which has carried on in my absence. After a few breaths I see the shoreline and know that I can make it in. And what did the world do while I was under water? How have you been? What's the news? The murmur of disputation and reconciliation looks the same as ever: the particulars have changed but the pattern is identical. Maybe after I've rested a while I'll enter back in, but right now they don't mean the slightest thing to me. There are two luminaries, one to rule the day and the other the night, and many lesser lights. The rush of blood and water fades from my ears and I can hear the voices of the world, but I don't want to understand.
David on 05.12.04 @ 06:56 PM CST [link]


Tuesday, May 11th

Crawling out of the Trenches


I am full of broken glass, broken glass in my body, broken glass in my soul. The clean-up day was unseasonably hot, the luncheon was emotionally exhausting, the work, it seemd, unending. There were the goodbyes, heartbreaking and hopeful. Today I went back to work, dashed out to Far Hills for a quick contribution to the final clean-up. A late meeting with the sound committe. Calls I haven't returned. A humid, squalid, neglected home. One thing at a time. I'm too tired to think. And yet I can't stop thinking, and there's so much to think and hope and wish upon.
David on 05.11.04 @ 07:44 PM CST [link]


Monday, May 10th

E


So the sale is over, and the counting, and the recounting will begin, here, later. But first, to tidy up: my selection for the letter "E" was The Guardian, by Bill Eidson. It looked like it had the potential to a novel of crime and suspense in the manner of John D. MacDonald, whose work I have found satisfactory in the past. Although the book started off in promising fashion, the author ended up too dependent on coincidence and hidden relationships for the story to be first-rate in this genre. The violence was implausible, and not in a good way.
David on 05.10.04 @ 06:39 AM CST [link]


Sunday, May 9th

Value



What makes for value? working at rummage puts an interesting angle on that question. Items are donated, mostly, because they have no value to their owners, but they hold out hope that the items may be valuable to someone else. So the actual value is one thing, but the potential value is something else. These values are assessed during the course of Rummage several times, and if both drop to zero the item is discarded. Items can actually have negative value, because we have disposal costs to figure in. But, in the end, the value can't be determined until the sale happens, becuase the actual value is the amount someone is willing to pay. We are only open for four days, we want to sell all our stock, and don't want our customers to hesitate or try to bargain. That brings our assessed value down, but not too low, we hope. Some items acquire excessive value because too much volunteer labor has been put into preparing them for sale. On the other hand, we don't manfacture or purchase, so those costs don't become part of our nut. And we are chronically overstocked, which depresses both potential and actual values; we have too much stuff for our customers to browse.
David on 05.09.04 @ 06:43 AM CST [link]


Saturday, May 8th

Day One -- The Blur



Thunderstorms rolled through the area about four o'clock Friday morning. It cleared up and further storms did not occur, but the fairgrounds were a mess and it was hot and humid all day. I remember putting up flaps, spreading hay, taking pictures, guarding purchases, totalling checks, holding the north end of a baby while she held the south end, closing flaps, and squishing around in chocolate syrup.
David on 05.08.04 @ 07:03 AM CST [link]


Thursday, May 6th

Mock Turtle Soup


The annual meeting of the congregation last night was the most lightly attended I have seen. The staff was dreading a display of discontentment over the schedule change, but mainly got a display of indifference and complacency. Fewer than half of the nominated officers were in attendance. The meeting after the meeting, a discussion of the schedule change, went on forever, albeit with a handful of participants; the main objection was not to the particulars of the change but but the way it was accomplished. The movement began with staff, continued in semi-secrecy in the back rooms of session and council meetings, was approved and announcedas a fait accompli. Then the public relations campaign began -- all sunshine and roses rather than an honest admission of a troublous situation. The rank-and-file get a solution to a problem they may not have been aware existed, and they should have been given the chance to hear about the problem and be active participants in its remediation. Instead they have been encouraged, yet again, to be passive consumers.
David on 05.06.04 @ 07:13 AM CST [link]


Wednesday, May 5th

Our Names


Amy. Ann. Anne. Arlene. Alice. Betty. Betsy. Bill. Carol. Carole. Chris. Dutzie. Denis. Dennis. Ed. Evelyn. Frank. George. Gus. Helga. Jenny. Janet. Jim. James. Jackie. Jack. Katie. Kelly. Kathy. Lil. Lillian. Lynne. Lena. Lois. Nancy. Natasha. Nina. Perlita. Pat. Patricia. Patrick. Razel. Rebecca. Sue. Susan. Susie. Sam. Steve. Tori. Wanda. Wendy. Willie.
David on 05.05.04 @ 07:04 AM CST [link]


Tuesday, May 4th

Man Without a Face


I have worn a beard for most of my adult life, and I am going through one of the periodic phases when I consider shaving it off. I don't know the face under there any more, but it might be a pretty good face. The beardless look might be more appealing, and it might delude people into believing that I am more together than I really am, at least to the extent that I can handle a sharp tool and organize my ablutions to include the use of it. On the other hand, I worry that it would be too dramatic a thing to do, make me the center of too much attention (temporarily), and make me feel nakeder than I would if I went without pants. I wouldn't be doing it for myself, particularly, and not for anyone else, either; I don't look in the mirror much, and the people that do look at me aren't complaining. Maybe I'll take a poll.
David on 05.04.04 @ 07:42 AM CST [link]


Monday, May 3rd

There and Back Again


Some days everyone's small problems seem to multiply and gang up on them all. It was moderately war but humid, and everyone was uncomfortable but the air conditioning wouldn't come on. I opened the windows in the sanctuary. The coffee didn't want to perk. Two Sunday school teachers didn't show up. There was trouble with the candle-lighting, and one of the acolytes was mischievous in front of the congregation. I had forgotten to give the pastor his glass of water for the sermon, and handed it off to him during the traveling music. Worship ran long. I was late leaving for the fairgrounds, and I worked for an hour and a half on rummage and got my Sunday pants muddy. Then back to the church for the recital. That went well; the vocalist was nervous but did very well. Home to a wreck of a house, and it'll stay that way until Rummage is over. I dozed in front of the TV, and tossed and turned in the early morning, trying to solve for Z.
David on 05.03.04 @ 06:33 AM CST [link]


Sunday, May 2nd

Keys


She had her keyring tucked into the waistband at the back of her shorts. I was looking, of course, and I saw two keys. Car, and, I guess, house. compared to me: Car; bicycle lock; quilter's closet; garage door; somebody else's house; my house; Rummage padlocks #1; Rummage padlocks #2. On my work keyring I have thirteen more and recently removed about ten others I hardly ever use. And what do I really think about all this? Is she really less encummbered than I? We wear the chains we forge in life. Are they my gravity, binding me to the ground, while she is a kind of light princess...Or am I thinking about the door between us, which is unlocked but not quite open, and each of us gong right up to the threshold but never crossing.
David on 05.02.04 @ 06:40 AM CST [link]


Saturday, May 1st

Dog Days


I was a little difficult, fitting Mindycare into everything else i was trying to do this week, but I think it went okay. She adjusted to my presence and my rules pretty well: coffee for me before breakfast for her, walks morning and evening, quick release at midday, early to bed. She saw me naked and was indifferent. She thinks I'm a genius because I can get the food out and open doors. One afternoon I went through the whole routine and she started acting strangely; I realized I'd forgotten to feed her. I knew her well enough to figure that out from her behavior, and I apologized because her opinion matters to me. She knows some of my secrets, and won't tell.
David on 05.01.04 @ 06:52 AM CST [link]




Home
Archives

links
a b c d e f g
h i j k r x
May 2004
SMTWTFS
      1
2345678
9101112131415
16171819202122
23242526272829
3031     



Powered By Greymatter