Hair

Been a problem for almost forty years, now.  In high school it started coming out in clumps every morning in the shower, skeins of it. 

Of late have tried shaving the whole head and succeeded only in frightening my grandson.  Tried shaving just the pate but the glare caused casual passersby to shield their eyes and reel off to the side. 

Since November past Herself has been saying "Just give it a couple more weeks. C'mon!  It's so close to being, uh, manageable"  It's pitiful.

I'd have to call it a Don King Starter Kit on the top; Pauley Walnuts flourishes on the sides. 

I hear anybody say something about a Bad Hair Day, fur's gonna fly.

Four Days in Beantown

Let's get right to it.  Cold, blustery wet weather is way overrated, when it's rated at all.

We got to our hotel just about sunset and learned that there was only one restaurant within walking distance, but "It's the most famous pizza in Boston!"  Goody

A four block walk uphill into a stiff bitter breeze and we were greeted at the stormdoorway of what looked like a World War I vintage clapboard house by a surly, heavily acned young man in jeans, a t-shirt and apron.  "Two?" we nodded, pleased that this one can at least count.  He turned on his heel and plunged into the bowels of what might be called a fixerupper.  Almost paralyzed with underwhelmsion and a bit startled, Herself summoned up her courage and asked a bearded gent slouched against the jamb "Should we follow him?" "I would" he grunts. 

We catch up and are led over undulating floors back to the dusky nether regions to a wood paneled linoleum floored twenty foot square room with flickering flourescent lights.  Other diners/inmates don't look up, hunched over their meals, pawing through them like dogs guarding their bowls.  "WHAT'S TO DRINK?!" bellows the scullary wench from the door.  "YA KNOWS WHAT YOUSE WANTS?"  Mmm could we see a couple menus?  "WHA!!!???  VIRGINS!!!" 

Well, no, actually, though I often am mistaken as such, but  - -   "NO NO!  YOUSE MEANS YOUSE NEVER BEEN HERE BEFORES?"  So sorry!  If we've offended we can show ourselves out.   NO  NO!!  LOOK EVERBODY!!  VIRGINS!!! 

Great!  Love a lot of attention at meal time. 

"Try the lamb sausage - they make it right here, themselves" volunteers a crusty old scab of a man out of the side of a mouthful of what certainly could have been lamb sausage.  I guess.  I'm thinking of the "lamb" I've seen prepared at the Soprano's Satriale's Meat Market.  Hearing the EEEEEEOOOOOOOO as Christopher runs another piece of "lamb" through the bandsaw.

"Golly, not VERY big on lamb, but we'll try the CHEESE pizza, and as big a flagon of grog as you're allowed to sell.  Right away, if you please, with the grog." 

Day 2 when our narrative continues:

The word "Easter" comes from an ancient pagan goddess worshipped by Anglo Saxons named Eostre. According to legend, Eostre once saved a bird whose wings had frozen during the winter by turning the bird into a rabbit. Because the rabbit had once been a bird, it could still lay eggs, and that rabbit became our Easter Bunny.

Mark This Day

Fetch the notary.  This afternoon, 3:50 of the post meridian, we're watching "How It's Made" on the Science Channel.  A segment comes on as to how they shape and polish diamonds.  Creaky fingered little men with funny round hats.  A lot of close-up work.  Abruptly, her spangledness arises from her chair as if to leave the room. 

"Honey!  It's on diamonds!  Don't you want to see this?  Should'nt I pause it?"

"Oh Genie, I don't need any more diamonds."

GASP      It was as if all the air had been sucked out of the room.  I was being swallowed by a vortex.  Dizzy, I rush to the keyboard to record the event.  Oh hallelujah, if only a hymn were playing, I'd wave my arm to the heavens.

Loose Ends

So I spent a few days in the Land of the Children of the Corn, makig the niceties one must when a parent dies.  My brother, who had done all the heavy lifting these past years, handled the end times with grace and aplomb.  Kid can still throw a frisbee, too.  My sister-in-law successfully resisted what would have been to anyone else an overwhelming need to loudly rejoice, kept all nerves unruffled and stood in there with us like the sweetie she is.  My father's special friend tried her hardest to keep the focus on herself, reading a poem of her own writ during the memorial service, waving one arm above her head (rapture?) during the hymns.  The vultures from institutions dad had supported dutifully attended, embarassing in their efforts to ingratiate themselves.  Ahh well.  That's that.  I did get to see some folks I hadn't for twenty-some years, and sat in the front pew for the first time in more than forty.  Likely the last time for either of those perturbations in my wa.

The Silver Swan

The silver swan, who living had no note,
When death approached unlocked her silent throat,
Leaning her breast against the reedy shore,
Thus sung her first and last, and sung no more:
Farewell all joys, O death come close mine eyes,
More geese than swans now live, more fools than wise.

The Raisin - by Donald Hall

I drank cool water from the fountain
in the undertaker's parlor
near the body of a ninety-two-year-old man.

Harry loved horses and work.
He curried the flanks of his Morgan;
he loaded crates twelve hours—to fill in
when his foreman got drunk—
never kicking a horse,
never kind to a son.

He sobbed on the sofa ten years ago,
when Sally died.
We heard of him dancing with
widows in Florida, cheek
to cheek, and of scented
letters that came to Connecticut
all summer.

When he was old he made up for the weeping
he failed to do earlier:
grandchildren, zinnias,
Morgans, great-grandchildren.
He wept over everything. His only
advice: "Keep your health."
He told old stories, laughing slowly.
He sang old songs.

Forty years ago his son
who was parked making love in the country
noticed Harry parked making love
in a car up ahead.

When he was ninety he wanted to die.
He couldn't ride or grow flowers
or dance
or tend the plots in the graveyard
that he had kept up
faithfully, since Sally died.

This morning I looked into the pale
raisin of Harry's face.

Obit

The Reverend Palmer Ervin Swenson, a longtime leader in Omaha’s religious community, died Friday at the age of  87.  Rev. Swenson was born in 1919, the seventh of ten children to Jens and Marie (Pedersen) Swenson, a first generation Minnesota farming family.  In 1938 he traveled to Chicago for studies at Northern Baptist Theological Seminary, and met Helen Bates, a home missionary he courted for four years and then married in June 1942.  Pastor Swenson was ordained in 1944, and served churches in Winnebago and Albert Lea Minnesota, and Huron South Dakota before being called to Omaha’s Sunset Hills Baptist Church in January 1962, where he served until 1972 when he moved to pastor in Worland Wyoming.  Rev. Swenson returned to Omaha in 1983, serving as interim pastor over the years for 10 Nebraska churches until his failing health kept him close to home.  Recently, his attentions have turned to fund raising projects for Camp Moses Merrill in Nebraska and the University of Sioux Falls in South Dakota.  Helen, his wife of 57 years, preceded him in death in 1999.  He is survived by two sons: Lyle of Phoenix and Kent of Omaha, daughter Jewel Cooper of Cedar Rapids Iowa, three grandchildren, two great-grandchildren, and his best and closest friend, Floretta Ward of Omaha.

Eighty Seven Years and a little bit more

After an excrutiatingly long inexorable decline my brother checked our dad into hospice last week.  Dad hasn't taken any food for four days now, and isn't responsive.  An unsubstantiated report has him opening his eyes wide this morning, throwing his arms into the air above his bed and exclaiming "What's next?!" then lapsing back into semi-conciousness.

One of dad's favorite stories was how, at the age of two, he contracted nephritis, and all that could be done was to tie his ever ballooning girth down to the bed with belts.  The doctor was so certain that his death was imminent that the church choir was practicing hymns for the funeral.

He felt called to "the Lord's work" at an early age, and delivered his first sermon in the Artichoke church when he was twelve.  He said he practiced it for days, but when he got up in front of the little Minnesota congregation, he said all he could think of to say in a little under five minutes.  The more than ten years that I collected splinters in the front pulpit side pew, aisle seat, convinced me that brevity was a very temporary challenge for him. 

At the end of each Sunday service he'd always move away from the pulpit to the center of the dais for the final hymn, at which time those who felt called would come forward to "give their life to the Lord" and receive  the "Right Hand of Fellowship."  That moment occasionally provided some suspense and drama, but typically the call went unheeded.  During the last verse of that last hymn dad would start down the center aisle, always handing his hymnal to me with the same swift twist of the wrist, always the same way, so that it was face-up when it came into my hands. 

Sir Cumference

What a terrific bit of serendipity -

On the day that the most entertaining basketball player ever is going into the NBA Hall of Fame, youngest daughter hooks me up with a new band.  Wait for it:

Gnarls Barkley

Give a listen to "Crazy" at         http://myspace.com/gnarlsbarkley        you'll likely have to use an external browser