5/5/23

Friday, May 5, 2023

In bed at 9, up at 4:30, after multiple pss, lyrics of Jane Olivor's The Big Parade repeating in my brain, 50℉ wit drizzle, high of 63℉, cloudy, dry day ahead, wind X at 8 mph, 7 to 13 mph during the day with gusts up to 25 mph, sunrise at 5:39, sunset at 7:57, 14+17.

Geri and Lilly.  I am struck once again by Geri's actions as a loving caregiver.  I am seeing it now with Lilly but I've seen it before, with her sons, her brother Jim and with her sister-in-law Nancy and her nephews and niece, with my Dad, with her friend Elise, and even with our dear cat Blanche.  I used to rattle my good friend David Branch, long since deceased, by pontificating that women are better human beings than men are,  I still believe that is true, notwithstanding its generality, but how could I believe otherwise with the role models in my life, my mother, my sister, and now Geri.

My favorite photo of Lilly kissing Geri (with the reflection of my bedroom window on the large photo hanging on my wall.)

LTMW at two squirrels atop our shepherd's crook competing for control of the sunflower seed feeder and suet cake.  And at a magnificent male goldfinch, with perfect coloration landing briefly on the suet cake holder and then flying away.  On the ground, a squirrel and a chipmunk (probably the one that resides under our front door stoop) compete for grazing rights; the squirrel wins. . . Now a male goldfinch on the sunflower seed feeder, a female on the niger feeder, and a male downy woodpecker on the suet cake.  Then I spotted a bird with a dull yellow breast and belly, too dull to be a goldfinch, and wondered if it might be a yellow warbler, which I googled, and saw similar birds including ovenbirds which reminded me of Robert Frost's poem:

The Oven Bird

BY ROBERT FROST

There is a singer everyone has heard,

Loud, a mid-summer and a mid-wood bird,

Who makes the solid tree trunks sound again.

He says that leaves are old and that for flowers

Mid-summer is to spring as one to ten.

He says the early petal-fall is past

When pear and cherry bloom went down in showers

On sunny days a moment overcast;

And comes that other fall we name the fall.

He says the highway dust is over all.

The bird would cease and be as other birds

But that he knows in singing not to sing.

The question that he frames in all but words

Is what to make of a diminished thing.

Although the poem compares summer to spring and metaphorically, middle years to youth, the concluding line - what to make of a diminished thing - makes me think of old age, and indeed what to make of a diminished thing, an old man, an old woman, even -today at least- our old dog.

License Plate Renewal; Emissions test.  The closest emissions testing site I could find is on the north end of Port Washington, about 25 miles away.  The state of Wiscnsin used to operate its own emissions testing sites.  I believe that was changed under Scott Walker's administration; state facilities were closed and the job handed out to private companies.  The last two private sites I used have both ceased giving the tests, almost certainly because it wasn't profitable enough.  The site in Grafton that I called to arrange this year's test also has stopped doing the tests and almost certainly for the same reason.  So now I take a 50 mile round trip, adding to the air pollution all along the route, in order to get my Volvo tested to see how many pollutants it emits.  Also, the registration fee is up to $130/year.  

Dinner at David and Sharon's tonight with Mary Beth Sazama, celebrating Sharon's 45th birthday 3 days ago.