All Purls. No Swine.
But--of course--it always does. This has been a hell of a week. First there was all the fallout from Hurricane Helene, some of which has gravely affected those I love. Followed by the death of Maggie Smith. And now, that of Kris Kristofferson. https://youtu.be/mtQOY-0sViQ https://youtu.be/vHReBUA8cH4 https://youtu.be/HCgnbRWVvU8 The last is one of the very few great… Continue reading “Dreaming was as easy as believing in was never going to end”
It's the first line of a pretty Christian hymn by Eleanor Farjeon, some of the rest of which goes: Morning has broken Like the first morning, Blackbird has spoken Like the first bird. Praise for the singing! Praise for the morning! Praise for them, springing Fresh from the world! ... Mine is the sunlight! Mine… Continue reading Quote of the Day: “Morning has Broken”
Apologies to A.A. Milne: But now I’m six, I'm as clever as clever. So I think I'll be six now, forever and ever! I guess this was really just the sixty-fourth anniversary of my turning six. (For God's sake, check the math; it was never my strong point). And I'm deliriously happy with the result. … Continue reading Now I Am Seventy
The lease said about me and my father’s trip from the Bureau of Manhattan to our new home the soonest mended. In some way either I or he got balled up on the grand concorpse and next thing you know we was thretning to swoop down on Pittsfield. Are you lost daddy I arsked tenderly.… Continue reading Quote of the Day: “‘Shut up, he explained”
It's the Latin word for "rumor," a concept vividly described, perhaps never better, in Book IV of Virgil's Aeneid (this translation by Theodore C. WIlliams): Swift through the Libyan cities Rumor sped. Rumor! What evil can surpass her speed? In movement she grows mighty, and achieves strength and dominion as she swifter flies. small first,… Continue reading Quote of the Day: On Fama
210 years ago today, when the flag of the still relatively-young republic had only fifteen stars, on September 14, 1814, an American lawyer by the name of Francis Scott Key published a poem he'd written upon witnessing the bombardment of Baltimore's Fort McHenry by the British Royal Navy during the War of 1812. The poem… Continue reading The Defense of Fort McHenry: For the World
The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away--Psalm 90:10 Yikes. For those in Rio Linda, I'm talking about an age of seventy years. The date is… Continue reading Quote of the Day: “Three Score Years and Ten”
Somewhere in the stacks of stuff that form my life, are newspapers and magazines reporting the event. The death of Queen Victoria. The ascension of Edward VII, and subsequently of George V. The election of Franklin Roosevelt. George VI's declaration of war on Germany. The marriage of the Princess Elizabeth. The divorce of the Princess… Continue reading Seventy-Nine Years Ago–Japan Surrenders: The End of World War II. I’m Pretty Sure That Actually Happened. I Even Have the Papers to Prove It.