Day 34

I was outwitted by two birds today, a downey woodpecker and I believe a Broad Hawk. The woodpecker laughed at me, the little creep, and I did not get to shoot him. He was very sweet though, flew off. The hawk, on the other hand, was a much bigger deal, I saw him soaring over railroad tracks and I could see where he was landing and it was low in a pine tree, so I turned off the road and pulled my car up close, keeping my eyes on him as he landed in that tree. I jumped out of the car with the camera in hand and could not see him in those open branches, I walked around the tree a little, still no sighting. I took pictures of it anyway, I talked to him... then I turned around and the sun was beginning to set so I snapped a picture and as I turned I saw his wings open up in front of me and off he took. I shot as much as I could; the sneaky bird. Anyway, I don't think it was a redtail, but here he is.



I have to have emergency oral surgery tomorrow. I'm a chicken when it comes to this stuff, a complete and utter chicken. Emma's Nana is taking me. She's a nurse. She's my pal, she'll hold my hand. AHHHH. But if I miss a day, which I hope I won't, you'll all know why.

I've been doing a lot of thinking in the past 24 hours. I woke up in the middle of the night, and I knew what woke me was silence. I knew it must be snowing. It had that dead silence of snow falling feel to it. It just added to my large sense of sadness. I am sad this week. I am sad that my mother is frail.



So here's an old poem that is kind of the same tone that prevails in me tonight.

An Ode to a Music Box

You made me cry
when you broke my wooden music box.
Four wooden rabbits dressed in wooden overalls
and pastel checkered shirts
danced around the base
of this wooden Easter merry-go-round,
singing "twinkle twinkle" or 'three blind mice."
I don't remember, and I'm not sure it matters,
who, if anyone, gave me the toy.
I may have bought it myself because it was innocent
and I wanted to stay
in that place where
I could like miniature rubber versions
of all 101 Dalmatians.
And Barbie and Ken,
who drove their pink plastic car
around my parent's linoleum floors,
dressed up in all those outfits.
And this merry-go-round singing box
with a knob that set those rabbits to circling, spinning
or turning back the other way
and singing a childhood rhyme
a childhood ditty.
Then this day,
some thirty years later,
after the rabbits had
survived ten or more packings and unpackings,
and many children's hands
had pulled over and over again on that knob.
Start, stop, start, again and again,
you smashed it.
You didn't think it was so important.
It was a stupid song
and the colors were too pastel
and it was about to break anyway
and it was a mistake.
and I never cried about broken things from my past.
I never worried if a child
broke some crystal horse or china lamp or
ceramic bowl or one of my beautiful porcelain dolls.
So why did those Easter bunnies
dancing on a music box
devastate me, sudden tears turned
into a low guttural painful moan?
The last shining shimmering twinkle
of a long ago past childhood
where fathers thought to buy their daughters
a German wooden drawing board
with a roll of paper fitted underneath.
The paper threaded through a slit at the top
where it was secured by a metal clasp.
And there was a hidden place for crayons.
Did I like to draw?
I don't remember.
Did my father bring me presents often?
Just to see me smile?
I don't remember.
I remember this six inches in diameter
painted wooden music box that
sang a stupid song.
Little rabbits flipping around in
their pastelly checkered
shirts, their too white ears and the knob.
That's what I remember
and I won't soon forget you
smashed it today.


I hope everyone has a great day tomorrow. Keep good thoughts in your heart for me. See you on the otherside. Oh and by the way, I love my brothers and sisters.